Since the relaunch of the Realme digital series, two generations of products have been launched. Every generation is focused on high-quality display, premium design, and high-resolution imaging.
More so on camera technology, the series has come a long way. From the Realme 10 Pro+ with the game-changing 100MP 3x single-lens zoom, the Realme 11 Pro+, to the world’s first mid-range phone fitted with 200MP 4x single-lens zoom, now finally, the Realme 12 Pro+, pushing large-sensor periscope telephoto into the mid-range market, realme’s digital series will continue to set the benchmark for imaging in mid-range smartphones.
The same commitment shows that the Realme digital series is technology-leading in mid-range mobile photography and dedicated to keeping up with the ever-evolving needs of the users.
What makes Realme 13 Pro+ stand out
After nearly half a year, the Realme 13 Pro+ again benchmarks with an ultra-long-distance shooting capacity for travel and daily life. First equipped with an ultra-light industry Sony LYT-600 periscope telephoto lens, the Realme 13 Pro+ offers 3x optical and 120x digital zoom, making it unprecedented among its peers.
The Realme 13 Pro+ further enhances telephoto performance. Equipped with the LYT-600 ultra-light periscope telephoto lens, it is coupled with 3x optical zoom and 6x lossless zoom for capturing distant landscapes during travel and fine details in daily life with remarkable clarity.
Even considering these upgrades, the Realme 13 Pro+ surprisingly shows slenderness at only 8.23mm thick and feather-light at 185.5g, which, in a word, makes it the lightest periscope telephoto phone in the industry.
The main camera is equally marvelous: Sony’s LYT-701 flagship CMOS sensor has a sensor of 1/1.56″ with a pixel size of 2μm to guarantee fantastic image quality.
With these imaging features, the Realme 13 Pro+ is the best camera phone for under 3,000 yuan ($420).
Other selling points
Building on the ideology of Never Stop Improving, Realme 13 Pro+ brings huge upgrades in durability, protection, and user experience. Self-developed Crystal Armor Glass protects the display, increasing drop resistance by 160% and scratch resistance by two times compared to the previous generation. Moreover, it is IP65 certified for dust and water resistance, ensuring reliability in daily use.
Equipped with all the above-mentioned all-around protection features, Realme has enough confidence to provide corresponding extended warranty services. It offers users of the first batch a free two-year warranty to give better protection and peace of mind.
Appearance
The Realme 13 Pro+ carries the front-leading hyperbolic screen gold-plated glass technology, providing a comfortable and dynamic grip.
At the front, there is a 6.7-inch frameless AMOLED panel with a resolution of 2412×1080 and a maximum refresh rate of 120Hz. Realme has designed the hyperbolic screen with its self-developed Crystal Armor Glass, promoting 160% better drop resistance and 100% improvement in scratch resistance over normal glass.
There is a 32MP front camera organized within a compact punch-hole design.
In Monet Gold, the Realme 13 Pro+ gets the ground-breaking gold-flashing glass process applied to capture light and shadow interweaving like Monet’s paintings and infuse it with the phone, providing a soft gilt mirage that has both comfort and liveliness, leaving it visually appealing as though it were a work of art.
Up at the central module of the lenses, there is a triple-camera configuration and a monochrome temperature LED fill light located in the lower right corner. Furthermore, a triangular anti-wrinkle ring decorates the edge of the lens, cut by CNC machinery 300 times so that there is a 360° precision texture that is luxurious and looks something like a high-end diving watch.
On top, there’s a removable speaker and a noise-canceling mic for the Realme 13 Pro+, but it doesn’t have an infrared emitter sensor. As for the bottom, there is a speaker matching the top one for a stereo one, a Type-C-based charging/headphone combo port, a microphone, and a SIM card slot. On the right side of the phone, there are the power and volume buttons.
This includes an 80W quick charging kit, as the phone gets fully recharged in no time.
Camera
Far beyond what a normal periscope module offers, the Realme 13 Pro+ brings to consumers long-distance imaging quality that is new among rivals at its price segment due to its top-class Sony LYT-600 periscope telephoto lens.
By employing a full-focal-length triple-camera module, the Realme 13 Pro+ greatly upgrades the primary camera and periscope telephoto module, setting up as the most advanced mid-range imaging phone to date.
Main Camera
The Realme 13 Pro+ gets a 50MP Sony LYT-701 CMOS with a supersized 1/1.56-inch sensor size and large 2μm pixels. Coupled with up to 2x lossless zoom and OIS image optimization technology, shots maintain their brightness while maximizing clarity and detail even in low-light environments. So, it makes the shots easier and stabilized when one wants to capture them freely without worrying about the quality of the images.
Periscope Telephoto
The periscope telephoto camera has a big industry-first Sony LYT-600 sensor of 1/1.95 inches, plus 500 million ultra-high pixels of 0.8μm pixel size. The lens allows 3x optical zoom, 6x ISZ lossless zoom, and up to 120x ultra-telephoto zooming, making it possible for users to capture long-distance photos with great clarity.
Photography Capabilities
Main Camera:
In slightly overcast outdoor conditions, the telephoto provides abundant light with the large 1/1.56-inch sensor of the Sony LYT-701 main camera. The photos are bright and vivid, with clear reproduction of the real colors and an atmosphere of reality. The addition of optical image stabilization keeps the pictures stable to give a better image quality.
The 3x periscope telephoto camera supports native 3x optical zoom, which equates to 75mm. Light and shadow are well captured in the right sense during daylight; hence, it’s vivid and true to life. The 6x lossless zoom supports 144mm, still with near-perfect picture quality, holding even the smallest details, like faraway text or fine building textures.
Ultra-Wide Angle:
The 8MP ultra-wide-angle lens allows for automatic correction, capturing amazing wide landscapes or architectures with pro-grade depth and drama.
Night View:
The 23m main camera, on the other hand, performs well with direct light and minimizes optical interference as night falls. In effect, the resulting captured image is clear and detailed, projecting the brilliance of the city lights and the serene depth of the night sky, passing easily to the unique ambiance projected by scenes at night.
Performance and Gaming
The Realme 13 Pro+ still has the same powerful performance as the previous generation, due to being equipped with the Snapdragon 7s Gen2 mobile platform. It will come with 12GB RAM as standard and can support DRE dynamic memory expansion, which allows it to increase up to 12GB+12GB.
For our review, we took the top version with 12GB RAM and 512GB storage. We ran two hot mobile games: “Honor of Kings” and “Game for Peace”, to observe how it would affect the frame rate and temperature of the phone.
Results of the Game Tests
1. Honor of Kings:
The following setup for the Realme 13 Pro+ was inside an office at a temperature of 25°C but with ultra-high frame rates and high-definition quality. Across a 15-minute 5V5 team battle, the average frame rate was 89.94FPS, while still able to maintain almost perfect performance throughout the play. During the play session, the highest back temperature detected was at 39.4°C.
2. Peace Elite:
It was tested at HDR high-definition Quality, with an extreme frame rate. Realme 13 Pro+ has gone well, and during a 15-minute intense battle, its average frame rate stayed around 59.9FPS, if not higher, as the frame rate curve almost had no fluctuations. The temperature peaked a little higher compared to the previous test—up to 39.6°C.
The transient response of the Realme 13 Pro+ also reflects these results. It can be quite laborious playing a tenacious game that ends up not overheating with this phone. Therefore, to enjoy a good gaming experience, users can have a go at difficult games.
Charging and Battery Life
Regarding both battery capacity and charging speed, the Realme 13 Pro+ has improved much compared to its predecessor. The battery capacity has increased to 5200mAh, and wired charging power now reaches 80W, up from 67W.
Charging Test
Our screen-off charge test charged the battery to 5% – 31% in just 10 minutes, 54% in 20 minutes, 74% in 30 minutes, and fully charged it in just 46 minutes. This fast charging hence ensures less or close to no downtime.
Battery Life Test
We tested the Realme 13 Pro+ for endurance using the professional test tool Battery Dog. It created simulations of the real scenarios of use: with constant conditions and running multiple tasks such as heavy CPU operations, AI recognition, image browsing, video playing, and web browsing at a screen brightness of 50% and volume of 30%.
The battery took 10 hours and 11 minutes to charge, from 100% to 20%, almost 13 hours of total battery life on a full charge. That is close to 2 more hours than the Realme 12 Pro+ has and around the top ten in midrange devices. It’s not hard for it to make it through a whole day under heavy use.
Conclusion
The Realme 13 Pro+ is a leap forward in imaging technology applied to the Realme digital series. First applied in mid-range models, the Sony LYT-701 main camera and the LYT-600 periscope telephoto lens make the phone boast super photo capabilities. We tried that with the 3x optical zoom combined with OIS optical image stabilization to increase much of the enhancement in long-range shooting, while even in low light, one can get bright images with detailed parts and minimal overexposure.
Its top-of-the-line level image processing algorithms sustain 6x lossless zoom, perfect clarity, and well-protected details—rare in this category. With that, the Realme 13 Pro+ is really the best camera phone under 3,000 yuan ($420).
Besides the camera, the Snapdragon 7s Gen2 chip ensures smooth performance for popular games such as “King of Glory” and “PUBG.” Further paired with a 5200mAh battery, the phone lasted almost 13 hours, ranking among the top ten in the mid-range category.
It is resistant to damage; touting self-developed crystal armor glass and IP65 waterproof certification, this device boasts an industry-leading warranty of 2 years—twice as much as the standard. The Realme 13 Pro+ is unrivaled in imaging, performance, and durability combined.
