If there’s one thing about Snapdragon 8 Elite phones, they are generally pricey: the OnePlus 13 in the Philippines starts at Php 55k, while the Galaxy S25 starts at Php 52k. realme wants to make Snapdragon 8 Elite phones more accessible with the GT 7 Pro Racing Edition, which has a starting price of CNY 3099 or around Php 25k in China for the 12GB/256GB model.

But what makes the Racing Edition different from the one unveiled globally a few months ago? realme had to downgrade a few components on the GT  Pro Racing Edition to make it affordable: you lose the telephoto shooter and the main camera uses an IMX896 sensor instead, and you get a BOE S2 OLED panel instead that has an optical fingerprint scanner instead of an ultrasonic one.

It’s not all downgrades either: the GT 7 Pro Racing Edition uses faster UFS 4.1 storage and has bypass charging to support long gaming sessions without straining the battery. Save for those differences, you still get a Snapdragon 8 Elite processor, along with LPDDR5X RAM, 6000nits peak brightness, an IP68/69 rating, and a huge 6500mAh battery that supports 120w charging.

While the GT 7 Pro went official globally, it’s only made available to select countries. As for the Racing Edition, there’s speculation that it will eventually become official globally as the GT 7.