Comparison: Redmi Note 6 Pro vs Honor 8X vs Realme 2 Pro

(L to R): Redmi Note 6 Pro, Honor 8X and Realme 2 Pro

The last two months of the year are normally not so happening in terms of smartphone launches. Companies normally launch all of their major smartphone series by October and brace themselves for the sales to go up. But in 2018, we have seen the shortening of smartphone product cycles like never before. The first half of the year saw the launch of three exciting sub-Rs 15,000 smartphones from three different Chinese smartphone makers—the Redmi Note 5 Pro, Realme 1 and Honor 7X. And here we are, in November, with the successors of all of these smartphones, namely the Redmi Note 6 Pro, Realme 2 Pro and Honor 8X.

The trio seems to be very different from one another inside-out. But is it really the case? Let’s find out.

Design:

While the Realme 2 Pro and Honor 8X have glossy rear panels, the Redmi Note 6 Pro features an all-Aluminium body. The main difference between the glossy backs of the Realme 2 Pro and 8X lies in the choice of materials—the Honor 8X goes for the glass back while the Realme 2 Pro goes for plastic. Thanks to the glass sandwich design, the Honor 8X feels very premium in the hand, but the Realme 2 Pro is more durable as plastic is more shatter resistant. The Redmi Note 6 Pro looks a bit conservative in its design language, as the all-Aluminium look is starting to look dated these days.

The dimensions of all the smartphones, however, are roughly similar, be it height, width or thickness. The Redmi Note 6 Pro is the heaviest though, weighing 182g.

Display:

The three smartphones offer three LCD displays of varying diagonal lengths. The biggest screen is that of the Honor 8X, measuring at 6.5 inches, followed by Realme 2 Pro at 6.3 inches and Note 6 Pro at 6.26 inches. However, the one with the biggest display also has the lower pixel density, at 397ppi. The Realme 2 Pro has the best, at 409ppi while the Note 6 Pro has a density of 403ppi.

All displays in the lot come with Corning Gorilla Glass 3 protection.

Hardware:

All three phones come with different chipsets, all octa-core.

The Redmi Note 6 Pro is powered by the Snapdragon 636 SoC based on 14nm process. All cores are clocked at 1.8GHz. This is paired with up to 6GB of RAM and 64GB of internal storage that is expandable up to 256GB.

The Realme 2 Pro is powered by Snapdragon 660 SoC which is also based on 14nm process. It has four efficiency cores clocked at 1.8GHz and four performance cores clocked at 2GHz. This is paired with up to 8GB of RAM and 128GB of internal storage expandable up to 256GB.

The Honor 8X has Huawei’s Hisilicon Kirin 710 processor based on 12nm process. It has four efficiency cores clocked at 1.7GHz and four performance cores clocked at 2.2GHz. Since it’s built on a smaller process it offers higher efficiency and performance. This is paired with up to 6GB of RAM and 128GB of internal storage expandable up to 400GB.

The Redmi Note 6 Pro has a 4,000mAh battery while the Realme 2 Pro and Honor 7X have 3,500mAh and 3,750mAh batteries respectively.

All phones support dual 4G LTE, WiFi and Bluetooth and have 3.5mm headphone jacks.

Software:

All three phones run Android Oreo 8.1 with different UIs. The Note 6 Pro runs MIUI 10 while the Honor X and Realme 2 Pro run EMUI 8.2 and ColorOS 8.2 respectively. There’s no word out on Android Pie updates to any of these devices as of now.

Camera:

The Redmi Note 6 Pro sports a dual camera setup at the back consisting of a 12MP primary sensor and 5MP secondary sensor with f/1.9 aperture. The front of the phone also has a dual camera setup comprising 20MP primary and 2MP secondary sensors.

The Honor 8X has a 20MP+2MP rear camera setup with an f/1.8 aperture. The front of the phone features a lonesome 16MP camera with a 26mm wide angle lens.

The Realme 2 Pro comes with a 16MP+2MP setup at the back with f/1.7 aperture and 16MP front-facing camera with a f/2.0 aperture.

Price:

The Redmi Note 6 Pro comes in two variants—Rs 13,999 (4GB/64GB) and Rs 15,999 (6GB/64GB).

The Honor 8X comes in two variants—Rs 14,999 (4GB/64GB) and Rs 16,999 (6GB/64GB).

The Realme 2 Pro comes in three variants—Rs 13,990 (4GB/64GB), Rs 15,990 (6GB/64GB) and Rs 17,990 (8GB/128GB).