Realme just released its new model, the Realme GT Neo2. The brand’s last major release was the Realme GT Master series, which was released around the end of July. So the new model comes just a couple of months after the GT Master series. The reason why Realme is able to confidently update its product library so quickly is because of its increasing sales figures in the global market. It continues to be the fastest-growing phone brand in the world in 2021. 

The Realme GT series has become one of the top-selling phone series in the last season due to its high value for money. And the new GT Neo2 is another attractive option that still continues the GT series’ credo. 

Judging from the features, it looks like the new model isn’t going to give competitors a chance to breathe. This time, the Realme GT Neo2 focuses on gaming performance. It’s powered by the Snapdragon 870 platform, which is also the most commended flagship chipset for Android this year especially since Snapdragon 888 models often faced thermal issues. 

So is the GT Neo2 going to maintain the brand’s attacking position in the market? Let’s find out. 

Realme Neo GT2 Unboxing

First, let’s unbox the device and talk about its design. The GT Neo2 continues to apply Realme’s classic packaging, and we can see the main selling points of the phone at the back, including a 870 processor, 120Hz E4 AMOLED display, 65W superfast charging, and the brand-new cooling solution. And the most intriguing selling point is definitely the new cooling solution. We are very curious to see if it can help the chipset achieve an even better performance output.

We will come to this very soon in this review. 

Once you open the box, we can see the phone is on the upper layout. And below the phone, there is an attached phone case and the 66W charging suit. 

Realme Neo GT2 Review: Design & Display

Well, looking back to the phone, we have to say that Realme always gives us surprises over colors. This time, apart from the Blue and black variants, Realme offers an extremely visually appealing color, which is none but the Neo green variant in our hands. The contrast rear design between fluorescent green and black looks so realme-style. The green area adapts AG-glass processing, and it feels so smooth that the glass cover reminds us of a silky texture.

Even the bulging camera module has a consistent color finish. Over to the right side, the dark glossy bar with the brand logo makes this design stand out and brings a balance to the fancy green color shade. No doubt, the green version will become the favorite of many users. But if you prefer a simple and low-profile design, we still recommend the Black or Blue variant since they look more elegant. 

The front face of the phone uses a 6.62-inch 120Hz AMOLED display with a hole punched at the left upper corner, which looks no different from the brand’s previous models. However, this display is probably the best display that you can have in this price range.

The Full-HD+ display is made of a Samsung E4 panel with a peak local brightness at 1300 nits. While playing HDR Content, it has a well-tuned color presentation and decent contrast. 

And unlike those edge-curved displays, the flat panel on the GT Neo 2 looks more comfortable with a better presentation of edge content. In addition, on this 120Hz display, all the operations and animations feel very smooth similar to those of premium models. 

Compared to its predecessor, the Realme GT Neo2 has upgraded its battery capacity up to 5000mAh, which makes long hours of gaming very easy. But at the same time, the larger battery will increase the thickness and weight of the phone to some extent. The GT Neo 2 is 8.6mm thick and weighs 199.8g, which is still acceptable for most gamers when considering the 5000mAh battery. 

And coupled with Realme’s 65W fast-charging efficiency, the large battery could still be easily charged to 100% in just 37 mins. Note that fast charging can also be used while gaming, which is definitely good news for those long hours of gaming. 

Realme Neo GT2 Review: Performance & Gaming

As for performance, since the phone is powered by the flagship-grade Snapdragon 870 chipset, we no longer need to mention how powerful the processor can be. 

Just check the benchmark results we got here. They are almost the best results that we’ve got among all Snapdragon 870 platforms.

Now, let’s move on to its actual gaming performance. In PUBG Mobile, the GT Neo 2 could give us an extremely stable gaming experience at 60fps frame rate, which is one of the best results that we tested this game under HDR graphics.

Then, in the stressful Genshin Impact under the highest graphics settings, it surprisingly got an excellent average frame rate at 58.23fps. But here, please note that in some complicated scenes, the running state got a bit fluctuated. But thanks to the powerful thermal design, when it came to some less stressful scenes, the phone pulled the performance up again and maintained a smooth experience.

Then, we subject it to another heavy game, Nimian Legend. Under 1080P resolution with top graphic settings, the phone proved itself again with the frame rate result of 53.30fps. We continuously played the three games for a total of 1 and a half hours, but impressively, the phone didn’t really heat up much.

Well, at least it was not like other gaming models, as the max surface temperature only reached around 46℃. With such a powerful performance output, such a cooling effect is very rare on the models powered by the Snapdragon 870. 

Although it’s not strictly a gaming phone, the GT Neo2’s gaming performance is close to or even exceeds what other gaming phones can do. More importantly, during all the tests under the aggressive GT mode, the phone didn’t let thermal issues become a limitation of the stable performance output. 

Realme Neo GT2 Review: Cameras

On this phone, we also want to talk about its camera performance. The Neo 2 comes with a 64MP main camera, an 8MP wide-angle camera, and another 2MP macro lens. 

Main Camera

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Let’s start with the main camera. From the samples, we found that the image tone of the main camera looks brilliant, and sometimes it even could be a bit over-saturated when shooting vivid subjects. And sometimes the image could be overexposed when meeting high-contrast scenarios and lost detail in extremely bright parts. Apart from these things, the image looks pretty awesome, thanks to its rich detail and life-like colors. And it also has good performance in night shooting. Under low light conditions, most images are clean with a good dynamic range. But under extremely low light conditions, the images are not so good at capturing dark details. 

Wide Angle Camera

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As for the wide-angle camera, the images have a pretty good white balance and close color presentation with the main camera. But the purple fringing issue is a bit serious, especially at the corners.

Under general night scenes, the images look good but under extreme low light scenes, the samples have no surprises despite improvements in overall brightness.  

So obviously the image quality of the wide-angle lens still needs to be optimized.

Macro Camera

Well, the macro lens only comes with 2MP resolution. So the images shot on this lens are not really impressive. For shooting close subjects, we prefer to use the main camera, which has much better color and details. 

Street Mode

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In addition, we found that Realme has added the Street mode to the GT Neo2, which used to be an exclusive shooting mode for the GT Master series. The images shot in this mode have really strong styles and more dramatic filters for options. And it also supports quick open by double-pressing a volume button when the screen is off, which is really useful in street photography. 

Realme Neo GT2 Review: Battery Life

In our test about its battery life, the result shows that the 5000mAh battery can support a slightly longer usage time than those models featuring 4000 or 4500mAh batteries. Coupled with the 37 minutes of full charge efficiency, there’s no need to worry about power while playing games for a long time. 

So the Realme GT Neo 2 no doubt is another flagship killer for the brand. 

We talked about its impressive design, excellent display quality, powerful performance, amazing power solution, revolutionary cooling system, and so on. It has almost all the important features to be a real flagship killer. If you don’t care much about the phone’s cameras, the GT Neo 2 will not let you down at this price point.