In merely two years, Realme has successfully carved its name in the budget smartphone space. The company has launched a bunch of good phones and has even spread its wings in other categories. Realme has left no stone unturned and covered up almost every price point in the budget segment. Due to the hike in the GST rates, the prices of the devices have been increased.

The new Realme C11 is the solution to the price hike in the industry. The cost is reasonable and it's on the Realme C3, the cheapest entry-level phone to date. The end-of-budget market, which continues to shrink in terms of margins and flexibility, has been hit hardest by cost revisions.It is a shame that not many results have been achieved, but in recent years the competition has been so strong that the overall standard for the budget segment has risen considerably and you can still get good results. Realme C11 - the right phone at the right time? Read to find out.

HIGHLIGHTS-
* New MediaTek Helio G35 processor feels underpowered
* The camera produces acceptable photos
* The Realme C11 is easy to handle
* It is an affordable phone
* It has impressive battery life and decent screen.

Realme C11 Design-
The Realme C11 looks pretty good as a cheap budget phone. It has a lot in common with other budget Realme phones, and you can't see it on its own just by looking from the front as usual. The screen takes up almost the entire front of the phone, but has a slightly thick chin at the top and a slit with water droplets above it.

In my review, there is a pre-applied self-adhesive anti-scratch protection that doesn't touch the edge of the screen. You can choose the muted and neutral Rich Green and Rich Gray to suit everyone. There are no shiny surfaces or gradations at this price level. The body is made of molded plastic and the back has a very fine wavy texture except for a thick strip that runs vertically through the thickened portion of the camera. I liked the effect and it also helped me with the grip, but I also saw fine dust and dirt sticking to the protrusions when I was using the phone.

Realme has finally converted the standard vertical camera module seen on several models, this time into a square shape. Since there are only two cameras, this is mostly for style, but it works. I'm not a fan of the huge Realme logo, but this phone doesn't come with a case. The volume rocker is in the upper right corner of the power button, which is rare on Realme. The company continues to use the micro USB standard in low-budget phones, and it's time to move forward. It also has a 3.5mm audio jack and speakers at the bottom. At 196g and 9.1mm thick, the Realme C11 is quite large. It's a little tricky to use with one hand, but the texture on the back makes it easy to fit the phone into the palm of your hand without worrying about slipping. It doesn't look like an expensive phone, but the build quality is good, there are no flaws in either the design or the build quality.. I would have liked reinforced glass on the front, though.

Realme C11 software and usage-
Realme software in general runs smoothly compared to the costs other manufacturers charge for phones, especially in the budget sector. There were no issues with annoying ads or notifications, except for some news articles with click-through supported by the Realme UI browser. I don't need this browser at all because Chrome is showing on the home screen, but I can't turn it off or uninstall it. Realme based checkers come with several pre-installed programs, including apps that are currently banned in India. Realme informed that several batches of C11 were built and packaged prior to the announcement of the ban. Some early subscribers may have seen this broken icon as well, but the app was later removed from the supplied device.

The other preinstalled apps include Doc Vault for your DigiLocker account for personal loans and insurance, Realme Link to manage various Realme accessories and get after-sales service, a Realme Store app for buying products, and Realme Community for company updates and forums. Many of these apps have overlapping functions, but some can be uninstalled.

Realme UI looks and behaves much like stock Android, and there are some customisations including themes. Beyond the usual Android 10 features, you can change the icon grid density, adjust icon style, and activate some gestures to make using the large screen easier. Within the Settings app you'll find options for split-screen multitasking, app cloning, game optimisation, privacy protection, and gestures. One neat touch is the ability to share your music with someone else by using Bluetooth and wired headsets simultaneously.

Performance-
The flagship Realme C11 smartphone lets you run any Android app you want, but that's not always a good thing. You feel and feel a certain hesitation when doing simple things yourself, such as waking your phone from standby and pulling out the app drawer or switching tasks. There is a lag when launching the application and multitasking, as well as when flipping through photos in the gallery.

Unfortunately, the user interface is not that smooth. According to benchmarks, a combination of SoC Helio G35 and 2GB of RAM is rarely enough for an input phone. The results are consistent with what I saw on Realme C2 and Redmi 7. I scored 104,616 on AnTuTu and Geekbench crashed despite repeated attempts. The main graphics benchmark 3DMark Sling Shot scored just 844 points, while the TF-Rex GFXBench benchmark also ran at 33 frames per second.

PUBG Mobile uses the lowest graphics settings by default, but is still annoying with lots of bugs and pop-up textures. The menu also dragged on. But PUBG Mobile Lite is smoother. Asphalt 9: Legends also takes time to load and causes an interruption during the race. The overall gaming experience leaves a lot to be desired, but at least the phone isn't hot at all.

The screen is not bad for the price of the device. The colors are very subtle and the viewing angle is acceptable. The video looks good, but the speakers are not that good. The music sounded pearly and rough, and in most cases I found that even the conversation was ambiguous.

Camera-
Realme C Series still offers a dual rear camera setup. It consists of a 13-megapixel primary sensor with an f / 2.2 lens and a 2-megapixel f / 2.4 secondary sensor for portrait photography. It has a 5 megapixel camera sensor with an f / 2.4 aperture on the front. This intercom has slow mode and time delay mode besides HDR and portrait photography. Realme has even added a dedicated night landscape mode, which claims the company can display the best photos in its category.

In terms of price, the Realme C11 has some great photos to offer. In the daytime, the camera delivers beautiful, sharp photos with good image processing. The lighting is mostly well done. In direct sunlight, the color is slightly enhanced and the details are not harsh. If you want vibrant colors, HDR works fine, but it's best to ignore the chroma scaling feature. Cameras can capture images with high saturation and look artificial.
Selfies taken with the 5MP front camera were above average. The skin color is unnatural, details are lost, so you can see more when you zoom in. The camera takes smooth selfies, but you can get better results in good lighting. There are additional beauty filters to make your selfies even worse. In fact, the portraits taken with the Realme C11 were shot well. The bokeh effect is in focus and the color, detail, sharpness and lighting are rendered very well. You can adjust the intensity of the bokeh effect when shooting. This is a great feature.

Non-human subjects have adequate background blur, dynamic range, and above average detail. We love detailed and natural close-ups. Night scenes are noisy, but colors and details are better preserved in night scenery mode than in normal mode. In this mode, it takes about 4 seconds to take multiple pictures of the same scene and make them brighter.The focus was locked moderately, and you might sometimes be required to tap on the viewfinder for better focus.

BATTERY-
The Realme C11 features a 5,000mAh battery, and the handset delivered us less than two days of battery life. If your usage involves just basic messaging, calling, random videos on YouTube, and social networking, you don't need to worry about the battery draining out in a day. However, adding gaming, hours of binge-watching, long photography sessions, and browsing will give less than a day's battery life. Once the battery is down, the 10W charger takes quite a lot of time to fully charge the Realme C11. In our usage, it took more than 2 hours.

Is it worth buying?
There is currently no good option as the price of smartphones has risen due to the GST rate hike in India. If your budget is limited, you might want to consider the Realme C11. It's important to note that you won't be too happy with the overall performance and lack of a fingerprint sensor. You get a decent camera, good design, and battery life. However, buying the Realme Narzo 10A would be the smarter option. The device offers a more powerful processor, 3GB of RAM, a fingerprint sensor and more. The situation changes when Xiaomi launches in India the budget Redmi 9 series with better features for the same price.

Verdict-
Realme C11 gets plenty of things right for its class. It has a good display that produces bright colours. Its cameras manage to deliver beautiful shots in daylight but struggle a bit when the light conditions take a turn. The portrait shots are decent enough. And, finally, the 5000mAh battery on the Realme C11 is one of the strongest points about it. The battery can last for more than one and a half days, which is more than impressive about a smartphone that has Android 10 and other nifty features under the hood.
Realme C11 is worth buying. It will not disappoint you as long as you don’t expect miracles like playing Fortnite on it or making the Full-HD movie with it from it.