If you are on the train or sitting in a cafe sipping a cup of coffee, try looking at people’s phones around you, you’ll be bound to see one that’s pretty beaten up or has a cracked screen, and these poor souls probably just don’t want to pay for a new phone because they are so expensive these days and just can’t afford to break another one.
This is the very reason why aside from gimmicky AI features, many brands have begun to emphasize durability on their smartphones, with companies like Honor leading the pack with its X series phones, although the recent Honor X9c still isn’t affordable to many people, such as students or someone that’s just getting started in the workforce.
This is the reason why the realme C75 will matter to many people, despite not supporting 5G and a bunch of AI features, this phone features a reinforced structure that not only reduce the chances of screen cracks if you accidentally drop it, but it is the very first sub RM1000 phone to sports three IP certifications – IP66/68/69 – and yes, it means your nasty kid can throw it into the pool and you just chill out of it, and you don’t need to worry about friends pranking you with a strong water jet in a garden with your phone on hand.
The realme C75 looks unmistakably like a mid-entry level smartphone, featuring a familiar camera rear camera island that we have seen on phone since three years ago, it does feel like a lazy job of not keeping up with more recent and attractive designs, though on the front I appreciate the rather slim and uniformed bezels of the 6.72-inch display, it is a really nice looking FHD+ LCD screen with 90Hz refresh rate, though protection wise it’s not Gorilla Glass given that it is a budget phone, but rather, an ArmorShell glass that realme claims that is as strong as flagship-level glass, which I don’t doubt as I have accidentally dropped the phone several times during the review period, and it survived without a crack and scratch.
Powered by the Mediatek Helio G92 Max chipset with 8GB RAM and 256GB storage, the realme C75 is not a snappy performer by all means and there’s visible stutters in the phone’s user experience, it’s quite a shame that the company didn’t even consider using at least the G99 or G100, which are at least tried and reliable mid-range chips with 4G connectivity, but I reckon most of the cost has probably gone into the design of its robust architecture and IP certification.
Despite that, you will still get along fine with the realme C75 for basic smartphone tasks as long as you don’t treat it like a realme GT 7 Pro. The phone ships with realme UI 5.0 based on Android 14, which can be disappointing to some people, but you really aren’t missing out much in terms of features and realme will most certainly give it at least a major OS upgrade during the ownership.
Like its rivals, the realme C75 isn’t short of AI features but I do miss the fun AI Studio that’s on the realme GT 7 Pro, the more useful feature would be the AI Smart Loop, which is an intent detection feature that lets you drag a text or image to an app to perform certain actions, such as sharing a photo to your social feed or inputting an address directly in Google Maps and start navigating.
realme C75 Camera
The realme C75’s camera setup isn’t particularly interesting for a budget phone with a 50MP wide camera that’s assisted by an unknown secondary camera, which I assume is for depth or scene detection, photos that’s shot with the main camera are perfectly acceptable, it has good dynamic range and decent sharpnes for an entry-level grade camera, low light shots are noisy with visible oil painting effects, it isn’t a camera that you will want to bring for a road trip but it will suffice for basic photography.
With a 6000mAh battery, the realme C75 has no issues lasting me two straight days of regular use until which I keep having the anxiety of ‘when do I need to charge this phone’, one saving grace if you happen to juice up the battery one fine day is the support for 45W wired fast charging, which unlike most similar segment phones that still offer a shameful 18W fast charging that would have required close to two hours to fully charge such a big capacity battery, the realme C75 can get you ready from an empty battery in an hour.
The realme C75 might not be an exciting phone for most of us, but it is no doubt a great choice for people that require ruggedness on a smartphone without spending too much of their paycheck, which compared to actual rugged smartphones, this phone at least looks sleek and comes with a polished software that you will be confident of using every day, it ultimately depends on how much you care about water and drop resistance on your phone, because if you have RM699 to spend on a new smartphone, there are just too many choices out there.
