Realme X2 review

GSMArena team, 07 Nov 2019.

ColorOS 6.1 on top of Android 9 Pie

The handset comes pre-equipped with Android 9 Pie with Oppo's own ColorOS on top and while we were a bit disappointed to see the Realme X2 Pro not being released with the latest version of Google's OS, we can let that one slide with the considerably less expensive Realme X2. Still, Realme has promised a swift upgrade to Android 10 For both phones.

Realme X2 review

Anyway, the ColorOS 6.1 is a familiar thing, especially since we've reviewed it on the Realme X2 Pro, Although, this phone is currently running the Chinese ROM so we might see some small, negligible differences. Feature-wise, it's almost on par with the X2 Pro.

Lock screen, home screen, recent apps menu - Realme X2 review Lock screen, home screen, recent apps menu - Realme X2 review Lock screen, home screen, recent apps menu - Realme X2 review
Lock screen, home screen, recent apps menu

You get to choose between the standard app drawer and displaying all of the apps on the home screen. In the home screen customization sub-menu, you can also find a rather exciting option to speed up animations related to opening and closing apps. It's set to "fast" by default, so we suggest keeping it that way.

General settings menu and home screen settings - Realme X2 review General settings menu and home screen settings - Realme X2 review General settings menu and home screen settings - Realme X2 review General settings menu and home screen settings - Realme X2 review
General settings menu and home screen settings

The notification shade is different from most we've seen - it drops down with a single swipe displaying two rows of the quick toggles and the notifications as opposed to showing just one row of quick toggles. The brightness slider is also the first one to show up.

A second swipe down reveals the other two rows of toggles. It reminds us of the old days before Android 5.0 Lollipop when a single swipe was all you need to bring down the notification shade. We kind of like that implementation here - it requires fewer swipes depending on what you are looking for.

Notification shade - Realme X2 review Notification shade - Realme X2 review
Notification shade

Speaking of navigation, we are happy to see the broad choice of navigation methods Realme provides with ColorOS. The default option is set to "Swipe Gestures from Both Sides", which is basically Android 10's new gestures. Swiping from the left or right edge of the screen takes you one step back, a single swipe from the bottom bezel acts as a home button while swipe and hold brings out the recent apps menu.

The quick switch gesture is rather tricky. Swipe up, hold and imagine you are throwing the app window to the right - this gesture will switch over to the last used app. However, we find that gesture quite fiddly and it works around 30% of the time. It needs more work. We've had the same issue with the Realme X2 Pro, so it's not ROM version-related.

Navigation gestures and navigation keys options - Realme X2 review Navigation gestures and navigation keys options - Realme X2 review Navigation gestures and navigation keys options - Realme X2 review
Navigation gestures and navigation keys options

There's an alternative set of gestures that are the same but the back action has been moved to the bottom bar - right or left off-centered swipe up works as a back button. And those of you who are still struggling with the new navigation gestures, you can still use the old software navigation keys if you prefer.

The fingerprint reader is one of the strongest suits of the phone. Just like its more expensive sibling, the phone uses the latest third generation Goodix optic under-display fingerprint reader. It illuminates your finger with white light, as opposed to the green one on the previous generation and it works pretty well. It's super reliable, fast and accurate. We've had just a few misreadings over the course of writing this review and that really says something. We can say it's the best-in-class UD fingerprint scanner.

Realme X2 review

Additional options like per-app lock and different fingerprint animation effects are also available. And for maximum convenience, you can set the screen to illuminate the fingerprint area when you move the phone or when you double-tap on the screen.

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Biometrics options

There's also the less-secure face unlock option using only the front-facing camera, which is also quite fast and reliable although less secure. It can be fooled with a mug shot since the camera doesn't have depth perception.

The so-called Convenience aid menu offers an Assistive ball and Smart sidebar. The first one is basically a ball that can be moved around the screen, and you can execute various gestures with it, helping out with the navigation through menus. The sidebar, on the other hand, offers shortcuts to apps and tasks. You can pull it out from the right edge of the screen and then customize it to your liking. It's something like Samsung's Edge panel but less customizable.

The usual screen-off gestures are also at your disposal. You can summon the camera by drawing "O" or draw "V" on a locked screen to turn on the flashlight. Music control is another useful feature when streaming over a Bluetooth device or headphones without hardware controls.

Assistive ball, smart sidebar and screen-off gestures - Realme X2 review Assistive ball, smart sidebar and screen-off gestures - Realme X2 review Assistive ball, smart sidebar and screen-off gestures - Realme X2 review Assistive ball, smart sidebar and screen-off gestures - Realme X2 review Assistive ball, smart sidebar and screen-off gestures - Realme X2 review
Assistive ball, smart sidebar and screen-off gestures

The system-wide dark mode that ColorOS 6.1 offers is pretty sweet too. It applies the dark theme not only to the system menus but to third-party apps as well. It works pretty well in most cases and it's nice to have it ahead of the Android 10 release, which promises a more refined dark theme that works with all apps.

Dark mode - Realme X2 review Dark mode - Realme X2 review Dark mode - Realme X2 review
Dark mode

And finally, the battery menu holds a couple of additional settings on top of the usual ones that Android Pie offers. There's a power-saving mode that can be triggered at a certain battery level a so-called smart power saver that optimizes apps that you don't use all that often and an App Quick Freeze option. The system freezes apps that you don't often open or use at all to keep them from running in the background and messing up your battery life. It remains questionable whether this is a good solution, especially when having several chat clients with some of them being used rarely. Then again, you can always whitelist some of the apps but less tech-savvy users might be intmidated by the extra legwork needed.

Battery menu - Realme X2 review Battery menu - Realme X2 review Battery menu - Realme X2 review Battery menu - Realme X2 review Battery menu - Realme X2 review
Battery menu

Additionally, three performance modes are at your disposal - an automatic one, which is the default one, one that doesn't improve performance, and the third one is high-performance mode, which is pretty self-explanatory. Use the latter when playing games.

In terms of overall usability and experience, we can't think of anything bad to say about the ColorOS. Aside from the quick switch gesture that needs more tweaking, we found it to be a snappy custom skin overlay with plenty of options and features to play around with. We even found it to be just as fast as on the Realme X2 Pro despite the vanilla X2 having a considerably less powerful SoC. And despite all the bloatware with which the Chinese version of this ROM ships with.

On the other hand, stock Android fans might find themselves overwhelmed by the heavy customization ColorOS has to offer so keep that in mind.

Performance

The Realme X2 is built around a particularly powerful mid-range SoC - the Snapdragon 730G. The chipset is a variation of the vanilla Snapdragon 730 but with a slightly more powerful GPU due to the higher clock speeds. It's still the same Adreno 618 GPU, though. It's just that the 730G has 50 MHz higher clocks than the 500 MHz-clocked vanilla Snapdragon 730.

Realme X2 review

On the CPU front, we have 2x Kryo 470 Gold cores (Cortex-A76 derivatives) ticking at 2.2 GHz and 6x Kryo 470 Silver cores (cortex-A55 derivatives) for less-demanding tasks to save on power. They are clocked at 1.8 GHz. The CPU is built on the 8nm LPP node.

GeekBench 4.1 (multi-core)

Higher is better

  • Realme X2 Pro
    10373
  • Oppo Reno2
    7001
  • Realme X2
    6926
  • Oppo Reno2 (High performance mode)
    6881
  • Xiaomi Mi 9T
    6863
  • Samsung Galaxy A70
    6584
  • Realme 5 Pro
    6106
  • Realme XT
    6102
  • Realme X
    5915
  • Nokia 7.2
    5440

GeekBench 4.1 (single-core)

Higher is better

  • Realme X2 Pro
    3527
  • Oppo Reno2
    2547
  • Xiaomi Mi 9T
    2537
  • Oppo Reno2 (High performance mode)
    2536
  • Realme X2
    2508
  • Samsung Galaxy A70
    2391
  • Realme 5 Pro
    1913
  • Realme XT
    1899
  • Nokia 7.2
    1534
  • Realme X
    1475

GeekBench 5 (multi-core)

Higher is better

  • Realme X2 Pro
    2602
  • Oppo Reno2
    1752
  • Realme X2
    1744
  • Oppo Reno2 (High performance mode)
    1731
  • Realme XT
    1569
  • Nokia 7.2
    1425

GeekBench 5 (single-core)

Higher is better

  • Realme X2 Pro
    589
  • Oppo Reno2
    548
  • Realme X2
    547
  • Oppo Reno2 (High performance mode)
    544
  • Realme XT
    410
  • Nokia 7.2
    336

AnTuTu 7

Higher is better

  • Realme X2 Pro
    396827
  • Redmi Note 8 Pro
    224759
  • Oppo Reno2 (High performance mode)
    217008
  • Realme X2
    215578
  • Oppo Reno2
    214097
  • Xiaomi Mi 9T
    211915
  • Realme XT
    185193
  • Realme 5 Pro
    182765
  • Samsung Galaxy A70
    167750
  • Nokia 7.2
    139495

GFX 3.1 Manhattan (1080p offscreen)

Higher is better

  • Realme X2 Pro
    78
  • Oppo Reno2
    30
  • Oppo Reno2 (High performance mode)
    30
  • Realme X2
    29
  • Redmi Note 8 Pro
    29
  • Realme 5 Pro
    27
  • Xiaomi Mi 9T
    27
  • Realme XT
    26
  • Nokia 7.2
    15
  • Samsung Galaxy A70
    15

GFX 3.1 Manhattan (onscreen)

Higher is better

  • Realme X2 Pro
    57
  • Oppo Reno2
    26
  • Oppo Reno2 (High performance mode)
    26
  • Realme X2
    24
  • Redmi Note 8 Pro
    24
  • Xiaomi Mi 9T
    24
  • Realme XT
    23
  • Realme 5 Pro
    22
  • Nokia 7.2
    13
  • Samsung Galaxy A70
    13

GFX 3.1 Car scene (1080p offscreen)

Higher is better

  • Realme X2 Pro
    47
  • Redmi Note 8 Pro
    18
  • Oppo Reno2
    17
  • Oppo Reno2 (High performance mode)
    17
  • Realme X2
    16
  • Xiaomi Mi 9T
    16
  • Realme 5 Pro
    15
  • Realme XT
    15
  • Nokia 7.2
    9
  • Samsung Galaxy A70
    8

GFX 3.1 Car scene (onscreen)

Higher is better

  • Realme X2 Pro
    37
  • Redmi Note 8 Pro
    14
  • Oppo Reno2
    14
  • Oppo Reno2 (High performance mode)
    14
  • Realme X2
    13
  • Realme XT
    13
  • Xiaomi Mi 9T
    13
  • Realme 5 Pro
    12
  • Nokia 7.2
    8.1
  • Samsung Galaxy A70
    7

3DMark SSE 3.1 Unlimited

Higher is better

  • Realme X2 Pro
    5792
  • Realme X2
    2576
  • Oppo Reno2
    2573
  • Oppo Reno2 (High performance mode)
    2556
  • Redmi Note 8 Pro
    2439
  • Xiaomi Mi 9T
    2329
  • Realme XT
    2284
  • Realme 5 Pro
    2253
  • Nokia 7.2
    1427
  • Samsung Galaxy A70
    1112

As expected, the raw single-threaded and multi-threaded CPU performance is pretty strong thanks to those big Cortex-A76 cores.

The higher clocked GPU appears to have a slight edge over its vanilla sibling, which should come in handy during gaming. The combined AnTuTu 7 scores are here to attest.

Still, the difference shown in synthetic benchmarks is too little to felt by most users when gaming. The 50 MHz higher clocks offer insignificant gains. That doesn't mean we are not happy with the overall performance of the SoC, though. The Snapdragon 730G is a pretty competent mid-range SoC - a spiritual successor to the Snapdragon 660.

Reader comments

  • Vishnu
  • 28 Jun 2023
  • 7j}

I think something on your phone not everybody I think or I hope my phone's battery health is still good I think I can get 12 to 14 hours still I am using I buy on 2019 December more than 3 years ago 😊

  • Vishnu
  • 28 Jun 2023
  • 7j}

Super and excellent phone in mid range segment I am using in 3 years still going on. And awesome camera no leg hang anything else still unique 🥰

  • Anonymous
  • 07 Apr 2021
  • Lbe

NFC work this phones