realme 11 Philippines Review Verdict: Despite appearing to be more of an incremental upgrade, the realme 11 has a great 108-megapixel camera that has a proper digital zoom to make it versatile for most shooting conditions. 

Pros

-Great digital zoom performance

-67w fast charging

-Smudge-resistant design

Cons

-Thick bottom bezel

-A bit on the expensive side

realme completes its 11 series lineup in the Philippines with the arrival of the standard variant. The brand promises that the realme 11 has a flagship-like camera performance with its 108-megapixel main shooter and optimized software features. Is this enough to make the realme 11 a compelling mid-range phone in the Philippines?

realme 11 Review Philippines: Design

While the realme 11 looks similar to its predecessor at the front, all of the design changes are in the back. The standout design element is the circular module that’s placed in the top left corner, which is not the usual approach when it comes to similar modules.

Despite the huge module, you only get two cameras and an LED flash. The main highlight of the realme 11’s camera module is the 108-megapixel main shooter–more on that later.

Save for that change, the realme 11 shares a lot of similarities with its predecessor design-wise. It retains its slim frame, along with a side-mounted fingerprint scanner that’s placed together with the volume buttons and a headphone jack beside the USB-C port at the bottom.

There are two color options for the realme 11, and our review unit is the Glory Gold colorway. The back panel has a glittery finish that emits a rainbow-like gradient or wavy lines for added visual appeal. We like how realme is making the glossy finish of its recent phones resistant

realme 11 Review Philippines: Display

The realme 11 uses the same 6.4-inch 90hz AMOLED display found on both the realme 10 and realme 9. While we do like that it’s an AMOLED panel, we wished that realme trimmed down that thick bottom bezel that made the realme 11 look a bit dated despite having a punch-hole.

That criticism aside, AMOLED displays are a pleasure to use especially if you love binge-watching videos on YouTube and Netflix.

Just like the AMOLED panels realme used for previous models, you get deep blacks and vibrant colors when watching videos. You also get niceties like Widevine L1 so that you can enjoy your favorite Netflix videos in Full HD.

Aside from the thick chin of the display, we wished that the realme 11 came with a stereo speaker setup since most phones in its price range have it. If there’s any consolation, you still get that much-loved headphone jack so that you can enjoy listening to music with your favorite wired earphones.

 

realme 11 Review Philippines: Cameras

realme brings back the 108-megapixel main camera on the realme 11, which was last seen on the realme 9. The realme 11 uses the same ISOCELL HM6 sensor but performs better with the Helio G99’s ISP.

While the realme 11’s other camera is a filler 2-megapixel camera, realme maximized the 108-megapixel main camera with a well-tuned 3x digital zoom. Phones priced at under Php 15k rarely offer a decent digital zoom, and the realme 11 is an exception to that.

Comparing our photos shot at the native 1x zoom to the 3x digital zoom, the realme 11 performed better than most of its rivals in the same price segment. This can be attributed to better camera software, with Street Mode maximizing the capabilities of the ISOCELL HM6.

While the realme 11 is a decent phone for street photography, its video capabilities are limited. You can only shoot Full HD video on the realme 11 due to limitations with the processor, though that should be fine for most users.

 

realme 11 Review Philippines: Internals and Battery Life

The realme 11 borrows the same set of internals from its predecessor: Helio G99, 8GB RAM, and 256GB internal storage. While we wished for newer internals, the Helio G99 is still the best 4G-only processor. We prefer this chip from MediaTek over the popular Snapdragon 680 with superior GPU performance.

The Helio G99’s superior GPU is evident with gaming, as the realme 11 can run Genshin Impact and Honkai Star Rail at medium graphics without any issues. We used the realme 11 to accomplish dailies and a few material grind runs on both games and we had a smooth overall gameplay that’s free of any lag.

The realme 11 comes with Android 13-based realmeUI 4.0 out of the box. realme has improved its Android skin since the formal implementation of realmeUI, and we appreciate that the realme 11 has less bloatware compared to its predecessor. Having less bloatware means that you can make the most out of its large 256GB internal storage.

While the realme 11 keeps the same 5000mAh battery, it gets a significantly faster 67w charging solution that can top up the battery to 100% in less than an hour. We got a score of 13 hours and 30 minutes on PCMark’s battery test with the display set at 90hz, which should translate to more than a day’s use before needing to charge it.

 

realme 11 Review Philippines: Wrap-up and Conclusions

Despite being more of an incremental update, realme made a big effort with the realme 11’s camera. While the sensor is a familiar 108-megapixel one, realme managed to maximize its potential with a very decent 3x digital zoom feature that makes the realme 11’s main camera more versatile than similarly-priced rivals.

realme 11 Review Philippines: Price

The realme 11 is priced at Php 13,999 and is available online at realme’s E-store and official stores in Lazada, Shopee, and TikTok, and offline at authorized realme dealers nationwide.