It's fair to say that competition is heating up in the budget and lower mid-range price segments in the Indian smartphone market. The Xiaomi Redmi Note 5 Pro was the first phone to launch with the Qualcomm Snapdragon 636 system-on-chip in India. It was followed by the Asus ZenFone Max Pro M1, which had an even lower price tag. Now, Oppo has officially launched the Realme 1 in India. It's the first smartphone in the Realme series, and it's a lower mid-range phone.

Realme is a new Oppo sub-brand, and Realme smartphones will be exclusively available online. They will also be priced aggressively. The Realme 1 has a 6-inch Full HD+ (2160x1080) IPS display, the MediaTek Helio P60 SoC, and a 13MP rear camera. Its pricing starts at Rs. 8990 ($132) for the 3GB RAM/32GB storage variant -- undercutting all of its competitors.

Let's take a look at the Realme 1's specifications:

Oppo Realme 1 - Specifications at a glance

Oppo Realme 1

Specifications

Dimensions and weight

156.5 x 75.2 x 7.8 mm, 158g

Software

ColorOS 5.0 on top of Android 8.1 Oreo

CPU

Octa-core MediaTek Helio P60 (4x 2GHz ARM Cortex-A73 cores + 4x 2GHz ARM Cortex-A53 cores)

GPU

Mali G72MP3

RAM and storage

3GB of RAM with 32GB of storage / 4GB of RAM with 64GB of storage / 6GB of RAM with 128GB of storage; dedicated microSD card slot

Battery

3410mAh

Display

6-inch Full HD+ (2160x1080) IPS LCD with an 18:9 aspect ratio

Wi-Fi

802.11b/g/n

Bluetooth

Bluetooth 4.2

Ports

microUSB port, dual nano SIM slots, VoLTE, 3.5mm headphone jack

Bands

GSM: 850/900/1800/1900MHzWCDMA: 850/900/2100MHzFDD-LTE: Bands 1/3/5/8TDD-LTE: Bands 38/40/41

Rear camera

13MP camera with f/2.2 aperture

Front-facing camera

8MP front-facing camera with f/2.2 aperture

The Oppo Realme 1's design is similar to the Oppo F7, which was launched in March. It features the same reflective back with fiberglass (which is fiber-reinforced plastic). The phone uses onscreen buttons for navigation. Strangely, it does not have a fingerprint sensor. Instead, it relies on AI-assisted Face Unlock for unlocking the phone, which is said to unlock the phone in less than 0.1 seconds. Face unlock is software-based, so users won't be able to use it to authenticate purchases. This means that the omission of the fingerprint sensor is a major drawback.

The phone is powered by the MediaTek Helio P60 system-on-chip. This is the flagship chip in the Helio P series, and it's manufactured on a 12nm FinFET process. It features four ARM Cortex-A73 cores clocked at 2.0GHz along with four ARM Cortex-A53 cores clocked at 2.0GHz, paired with the Mali-G72MP3 GPU. The SoC has support for NeuroPilot, MediaTek's AI technology. It has a 2-core mobile APU (Artificial Intelligence Processing Unit) dedicated for AI tasks.

On paper, the SoC's performance should be better than that of the Qualcomm Snapdragon 636. It's also a substantial leap ahead of all previous Helio P series chips.

The Realme 1 has three RAM and storage configurations, although only two variants will be available at the beginning. It has 3GB of RAM with 32GB of storage, 4GB of RAM with 64GB of storage, or 6GB of RAM with 128GB of storage. The 4GB RAM variant will be available at a later stage. All variants have a dedicated microSD card slot, instead of using a hybrid SIM/microSD slot. Thanks to the triple slot, users can use two SIM cards and a microSD card at the same time.

The phone's display is a 6-inch Full HD+ (2160x1080) IPS LCD. Unlike the Oppo F7, it doesn't have a notch. The Realme 1 has a 13MP rear camera with an f/2.2 aperture, and an 8MP front-facing camera with f/2.2 aperture.

It's powered by a 3410mAh battery with 5V/2A charging. The phone has "AI Battery Management," a feature that learns users' usage habits and shuts down background apps to lower power consumption.

It has the usual connectivity options including a microUSB port, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 4.2, and a 3.5mm headphone jack. It ships with ColorOS 5.0 (Oppo's custom UI) with an exclusive and unique theme "designed for India" on top of Android 8.1 Oreo.

Oppo Realme 1 - Pricing and availability

The 3GB RAM/32GB storage variant of the Realme 1 costs Rs. 8990 ($132). The 4GB RAM/64GB variant will be available later for Rs. 10,990 ($162), while the top-end 6GB RAM/128GB storage variant costs Rs. 13,990 ($206). The phone's pricing is significantly cheaper than the Xiaomi Redmi Note 5 Pro (which now starts at Rs. 14,999 for the 4GB RAM/64GB storage variant), and it manages to undercut the Asus ZenFone Max Pro as well (which starts at Rs. 11,999 for the 3GB RAM/32GB storage variant). The Realme 1 will be available in Diamond Black and Solar Red colors.

The first sale for the 3GB RAM/32GB storage and 6GB RAM/128GB storage variants of the Realme 1 will be held on Amazon India at 12PM on May 25th. The phone will be exclusively available via Amazon. Launch offers include benefits worth "Rs. 4850" for Jio subscribers and a 5 percent cashback for SBI cards. A free case and screen protector will be bundled in the box.

Let us know your thoughts about the Realme 1 in the comments below.