The realme C65 joins the popular C-series of smartphones from the company. It's priced below Php 10K and is set to continue the success of realme C67. Hardware-wise, the phone humbly packs a Helio G85 chip and 8 gigs of RAM. Despite this, realme has given this phone a convincing set of software features. In this review, let's find out if the phone is worth its asking price and who it's designed for.
The standard box of the realme C65 contains the usual inserts which include the case, documentations, SIM ejector tool, USB-C cable, and the 45-watt power adapter.
Pros
- Elegant Design
- Handful of Software Features
- Long Battery Life
Cons
- No Stereo speakers
- Aging Chipset
Design
Like any other smartphone from the C series, the realme C65 dons a fancy exterior with a flush of vibrant tone—well, at least with our Starlight Purple review unit. If you want a classier one, you can get the Starlight Black. The back panel dons an alluring design which resembles repetitive patterns of meteor showers. There’s a vertically-placed camera island which reminds me of the Galaxy S22 lineup; but no matter what the inspiration is, I can tell that this is a beautiful smartphone.
The construction is entirely plastic, and I could easily spot certain vulnerable areas where tapping produced audible sounds, particularly in the middle section. The railings also have a purple tone; both the backing and the frame attract fingerprints, but they are not obvious unless you intentionally stare at them.
Ports and buttons are situated where they should be. The bottom portion houses the 3.5-millimeter audio jack, the microphone, the USB-C port, and the speaker grille. The left side has the SIM tray with a triple card slot, while the right houses the power button and the volume rocker.
The overall design of the realme C65 is quite practical. It’s not slippery on the hands due to its plastic backing; the frame also gives a good grip on the phone. Additionally, it's lightweight with its 185-gram weight and very slick at 7.64-mm “thinness”.
Display
The realme C65 frames a 6.67-inch HD+ display with 1604 x 720p resolution. It has a typical brightness of 500 nits but can go up to 625 nits. It also has a 90Hz refresh rate, an 89.97% screen-to-body ratio, and up to 16.7 million colors.
The phone is given TÜV Rheinland Low Blue Light certification that could help filter out harmful blue light especially at night. This could help in ensuring that users' sleep patterns are not disrupted. The phone can also go as low as 1 nit in instances where you need to use it in a poorly lit environment.
The realme C65 touts the Rainwater Smart Touch which technically preserves your screen’s sensitivity and performance of up to 96% whenever it’s wet with droplets or mist. Having said that, the realme C65 is also rated with IP54 dust and water resistance.
When it comes to the display quality, it does not differ from the previous HD+ panels that we had with the realme C Series lineup. Colors are quite accurate with less contrast than normal. The screen is bright enough for outdoor usage, and the viewing angles are also on point with no unwanted tinted effect when viewed from extreme sides.
The hole-punch design also makes the overall experience less intrusive. Thus, consuming content with the realme C65 is ideal.
Performance
The realme C65 is powered by MediaTek Helio G85 chipset coupled with 8GB of RAM. The latter is expandable by up to 8GB via virtual RAM. This feature gets a part of your storage to fulfill the function. Speaking of storage, we have a roomy 256GB capacity. The phone also supports expandable storage via a dedicated slot for a microSD card.
The handset performs smoothly when navigating its interface. However, it sometimes stutters whenever I try to load multiple apps at once. This is quite understandable knowing that this is an entry-level chipset. The realme C65 generally gets the job done for day-to-day apps.
Additionally, the smartphone is quite capable of running gaming titles such as Mobile Legends: Bang Bang and Genshin Impact in low to medium graphics settings. I played multiple sessions of MLBB with this phone and was quite surprised by how it can hold a candle to some mid-range phones. There’s also an AI Boost feature that’s very handy for dealing with intense gameplay.
The realme C65 excels in multimedia consumption. It can run my favorite streaming apps in such a breeze. On top of that, the phone features a “200% Ultraboom Speaker” which handles the job in improving audio quality when using the loudspeaker. This feature enhances the low frequencies and loudness of the soundstage. The overall sound quality is acceptable.
When it comes to our benchmark tests, the realme C65 scored 284893 in our AnTuTu Benchmark. Meanwhile, for the Geekbench 6 tests, it recorded a multi-core score of 1349, a single-core score of 428 in the CPU benchmark, and a score of 1127 in the GPU Vulkan test.
Camera
There’s a 50MP camera that’s the centerpiece of the phone’s camera module. It has a field-of-view of 79.5 degrees and 26 mm focal length. Additionally, a 2MP f/2.4 depth sensor couples the main shooter. Flipping the device, we have an 8MP front camera for your social media selfies. Both rear and front cameras support up to 1080p video recording at 30fps.
The main shooter produces decent shots with good color accuracy. There’s no denying the fact that these photos need to take both sharpness and dynamic range up a notch. However, the details are quite okay considering this phone falls below Php 10K.
The camera app supports Street Mode just like the C67. I took a lot of fun shots using this mode and the in-app filter. Plus, the camera app allows you to shoot in 2x and 5x. However, I wouldn’t suggest using the latter since it gave me grainy shots even though I took them with steady hands. The overall camera experience is okay, as long as there’s enough light and you stick to the 1x and 2x modes.
Software + Battery
Running the whole show is the company’s proprietary realme UI, which is based on Android 14. The software gives you tons of customizations, improved user interface, beefed up battery management, and additional security features.
From the get go, there is still a considerable amount of bloatware aside from the ones I accidentally installed in the recommended app section while setting up the device. I’m a fan of the Mini Capsule 2.0 so it’s great to see it here. For the uninitiated, it’s basically a software overlay on the screen's hole-punched area, drawing inspiration from the iPhone’s Dynamic Island. It gives you information or access to battery status, charging percentage, sleep tracking, reminders, weather, and music playback controls.
There are other software tricks that the phone can do. For one, it allows you to set a double tap gesture at the back panel to scan a QR code. Plus, the phone supports a “Riding Mode” which intelligently showcases an app window that houses essential apps for motorcycle riding.
There’s the Air Gesture feature, which allows you to take selfies without physically tapping the phone. I find this feature rather gimmicky, as it took multiple attempts just to capture a selfie. Lastly, you can map the power button with a double-tap or double-press gesture to activate the intended app or function.
The realme C65 packs a 5000 mAh battery. According to the company, it can provide up to 28.7 days of standby time. It is supported by 45-watt SuperVOOC fast charging tech which can charge the phone up to 50% in just 30 minutes. In our real-time test, the phone lasted more than a day with moderate usage.
Should You Buy the realme C65?
The realme C65 does all the basic stuff you’d expect for a sub Php10K smartphone. It's a great working phone with its beautiful design, large HD+ display, loud speakers, and a handful of useful software features. Its battery life is also something to be lauded about; it's a phone that could outlast most of its rivals.
Sure, there's are a lot of choices in the sub Php 10K department, but the realme C65 stands out with its gorgeous design, long battery life, and overall dependable performance. This phone is ideal for students and young professionals due to its balance of affordability, performance, and features.
