It seems like these days, smartphone makers have been overusing the term “flagship killer” when referring to their new releases, making the term less of a rarity and more of a common occurrence. However, only a select few have lived up to that expectation. Will the realme GT 7 make the cut? Let’s find out.
Unboxing Experience
We’re firm believers of the box setting the tone for the whole smartphone experience, and realme certainly did not disappoint. The realme GT 7 comes in a sleek black box with silver lettering, kinda reminiscent of another flagship smartphone.
Inside, you’ll find the following:
- The GT 7 itself
- A Black case
- USB Type-C cable
- 120W SUPERVOOC power brick
- SIM ejector tool
- Few documentations including quick start guide and manual
To get a good sense of the unboxing experience, watch our unboxing video below:
Design
realme didn’t really go out of the box with the design of the GT 7 but that’s not without a reason. Of course, the first one that comes into mind is the price. Packing this much power but still being relatively affordable is quite difficult to achieve. But that’s not to say that the GT 7 doesn’t look good, because it does.
One thing that definitely stands out is the power button which is accentuated with a red color, a theme that you’ll notice around the phone. One thing’s for sure, you’ll never be confused on which button to press, especially with the physical buttons situated on the right side.
You’ll find the SIM card tray, the USB-C charging port, and one of the stereo speakers at the bottom. *add sentence for top and bottom.
The GT 7 weighs 206 g and measures just 8.3mm thin, quite misleading when you get to know the power it packs, but we’ll get to that in a second. It comes in two flavors: IceSense Black and IceSense Blue, the latter of which we have in our studio.
realme opted to use a fiberglass backing and a plastic frame to probably keep the cost down. Honestly, we couldn’t feel the difference, it still feels premium and good to hold. For protection, the GT 7 features realme’s ArmorShell Protection and ArmorShell Glass for the display. And, to top it all off, the GT 7 also features an IP69, IP68, and IP66 dust and water resistance.
Display
If you think the design looks good, wait till you turn on the screen. The large 6.78-inch 2780 x 1264 LTPO AMOLED display greets you with such brightness and vibrancy, even having the ability to peak at 6000 nits. It also supports HDR10+ and Dolby Vision, further enhancing the entertainment experience.
And for the gamers out there, the GT 7 supports a variable refresh rate of up to 120Hz. Plus, a high touch sampling rate of 360Hz, providing a highly responsive gaming experience. Sweaty palms such as myself also get a saving grace in the form of the Rainwater Smart Touch that ensures responsiveness even with wet fingers.
Prolonged gaming sessions can also take a toll on your eyes which is why realme imbued the GT 7 with a 2160Hz PWM Dimming and DC Dimming to minimize eye strain.
Performance
Almost every flagship these days all feature the same chipset, albeit with varying clock speeds and optimizations. How will you stand out if that’s the case? Simple. Beat them to the punch. That’s just what realme did with the GT 7, featuring the latest and greatest that MediaTek has to offer, the Dimensity 9400e 5G.
This bad boy can deliver clock speeds of up to 3.4Ghz, delivering an impressive AnTuTu benchmark score of 2,250,000+. For graphics, it features the Immortalis-G720 GPU clocked at 1.3Ghz with support for Ray Tracing.
Couple that with 12GB of high-speed LPDDR5X RAM, which can also be expanded up to 24GB via the dynamic RAM Expansion, and 512GB UFS 4.0 internal storage.
Of course, the chip is only as good as the cooling it comes with. To handle all that power, the GT 7 is the first-ever smartphone to feature the IceSense Graphene Design. To give you a quick rundown, graphene is great in transferring heat making it perfect for cooling devices especially those working with tight spaces.
And, as the cherry on top, there’s also a 7700mm² Vapor Chamber Cooling Area and Bionic Heat Sensing with 9 temperature sensors that dynamically adjusts cooling strategies to lower temperatures by up to 1.4°C.
Just look at how the GT 7 performs in our gaming test:
Battery
Of course, with great power comes the need for a large battery. realme put their money where their mouth is, putting in a colossal 7000 mAh Silicon Carbon battery. But, how does that translate to real-world usage? Simply put, it can last up to 8.9 hours of Mobile Legends: Bang Bang or 12.7 hours of Arena of Valor. It can also last up to 3 days of light usage.
A battery that big will take forever to recharge on a measly 50W wired charger, thankfully, it supports a max charging input of 120W. This enables the GT 7 to fully charge to 100% in approximately 40 minutes, and 50% in just 15 minutes.
That amount of wattage can generate quite a lot of heat which is why realme incorporated a Smart ByPass Charging feature to further enhance battery longevity and thermal management during intense gaming sessions. It’s also quite tough, with the battery receiving a TÜV Rheinland 5-Star Battery certification, withstanding temperatures from -25°C to 45°C.
Camera
Let’s divert for a second and talk about the camera. Despite the GT 7 being marketed as a performance-oriented smartphone, it still packs an impressive repertoire of camera lenses.
Inside the rectangular camera island that’s accented with red, the realme GT 7 is equipped with an AI Travel Camera system featuring a 50 MP Sony IMX906 OIS main rear camera, a 50MP 2x Samsung S5KJN5 telephoto lens, and an 8MP wide-angle camera. While the front sports a 32 MP Sony IMX615 sensor.
Feature-wise, it’s packed with a ton of features that not just aids the user but enhances the output. These include AI Lightning Snap which allows for capturing over 50 photos per second, AI 2K Live Photos, new “Travel Filters,” and AI Landscape+ Algorithms to name a few.
The specs are nice and all but putting it into practice can be different, let’s see how it performs with the sample shots we took.
Outdoor shots capture natural scenes with good clarity, I mean just look at how the vegetation looks. However, taking a shot of the sun in direct sunlight can produce fuzzy images around the sun itself.
Indoor shots look good as well, especially if matched with good lighting. The separation between the foreground and the background is clearly established.
Let’s bump the zoom a little bit to 2x. While it remains clear, especially with good lighting, the over sharpened look can be off-putting for some.
The 2x portraits on the other hand, look really good. It doesn’t look oversharpened and the colors look really accurate. I mean just look at how the camera distinguishes the different shades of brown that is seen in the photos.
Let’s talk filters, cause there’s a lot of them, like A LOT.
These are just some of the filters to choose from. There are just so many that we couldn’t possibly mention them all, but we hope you get the idea.
For video, the GT 7 can shoot up to 8K video or 4K Cinematic Video at 120fps, 4K 60fps Dolby Vision, and 4K 60fps Underwater Video. While the front cam supports up to 4K 60fps.
Gaming Enhancements
Just like what we’ve mentioned earlier, optimization is a big factor in performance. Optimization not only refers to how the system reacts to the chipset, it also pertains to the feature that enriches that experience.
With that, realme integrated an improved GT Boost which reduces gaming power consumption by 21%. There’s also a revolutionary AI Gaming Coach, supported in ML:BB and PUBG Mobile which comes in clutch for in-game status updates, smart danger alerts, and provides tactical information via AI-generated voice or text notifications.
Connectivity has also been boosted with a dedicated TÜV Rheinland High Network Performance Certified SignalCatcher Chip that offers a 40% signal improvement in weak signal areas. As well as supporting Wi-Fi 5, 6, 7, 5G, Bluetooth 5.4, and features 360° NFC and an Antenna Array Matrix for consistent signal and seamless wireless transactions from any angle.
Additionally, the Hi-Res Dual Stereo Speakers adds to the level of immersion that only a select few can provide.
Software
Under the hood, the GT 7 runs realme UI 6.0 based on Android 15. And, as with any phone of this era, the GT 7 incorporates useful AI features with its Next AI. That includes an AI Planner which intelligently recognizes texts from social media, chat apps, and travel plans to add schedules and set personalized daily reminders using supported languages.
Conclusion
Going back to the question of whether the realme GT 7 lives up to its “flagship killer” title, we’d say it’s a resounding YES. It truly delivers on its promise of “Power Within Reach”, combining top-tier performance with an extraordinary battery life, an innovative cooling system, and a suite of AI-enhanced features for both gaming and photography.
It sets the bar from which all other smartphones are tested. Being the first to feature MediaTek’s latest and greatest, and incorporating innovative features like the revolutionary IceSense Graphene Design. Every aspect of the GT 7 is crafted for uncompromising performance.