Xiaomi’s Poco brand takes the fight to Realme with Poco M3 Pro, its first ‘affordable’ 5G phone

The Poco M3 Pro starts at Rs 13,999 for the base variant with 4GB RAM and 64GB storage.

Xiaomi’s Poco brand just announced its first 5G phone in India, the entry-level Poco M3 Pro. Though it has 5G, which technically makes it next-gen to some extent, it is actually a mid-cycle refresh of the budget Poco M3 which was launched barely four months ago. Poco is using a brand-new system-on-chip, a faster screen and a tweaked design in the Poco M3 Pro — all updates that matter — but it is the price of the phone that makes it really stand out. This is a phone built from ground up to take on Realme even as Poco takes a shot at trying to slow down the Oppo spin-off brand’s rapid strides in 5G.

Poco M3 Pro is Poco’s answer to Realme 8 5G. It is priced and packaged on very similar grounds. Though it is not an exact spec-to-spec comparison. There are areas where the Realme 8 has a clear edge, while there are some areas where it’s definitely advantage Poco. This means, both phones have their unique selling points which makes this competition all the more exciting. We will of course have more to say about the Poco M3 Pro soon, but for now, let’s take a quick look at how it stacks up against the Realme 8 5G.

The M3 Pro has a 6.5-inch 1080p LCD display with a 90Hz “dynamic” refresh rate and centrally aligned hole punch cut-out. The Realme 8 has a smaller 6.4-inch screen with 1080p resolution which can also refresh 90 times per second, but Realme is using a Super AMOLED panel which can also get slightly brighter. Also, Realme’s corner implementation of the hole punch is something I personally prefer but your mileage may vary. The M3 Pro has Corning Gorilla Glass 3 protection though which makes it more durable than the Realme 8, at least on paper. For biometrics, while the Realme 8 has an optical in-display fingerprint reader, Poco is using a conventional side-mounted reader in the Poco M3 Pro.

Under the hood, both phones have the same 7nm MediaTek Dimensity 700 SoC but while Realme pairs its phone with up to 8GB LPDDR4X RAM, Poco caps the Poco M3 Pro at 6GB RAM though it is using faster UFS2.2 storage (up to 128GB). More specifically, the Poco M3 Pro comes in 4GB/64GB and 6GB/128GB configuration while the Realme 8 comes in 4GB/64GB, 4GB/128GB and 8GB/128GB configurations. Both phones support expandable storage but only the Realme 8 has a dedicated micro-SD card slot. Both phones are powered by a 5,000mAh battery and support 18W fast charging.

Both phones have a similar three camera setup on the rear with a 48MP main and two 2MP camera, one for depth and another for macros. The Realme 8 has a 16MP front camera. The Poco M3 Pro has an 8MP front camera.

Both phones are based on Android 11 with custom UI (Realme UI 2.0 in Realme 8 and MIUI 12 in Poco M3 Pro).

The Poco M3 Pro starts at Rs 13,999 for the base variant with 4GB RAM and 64GB storage while the 6GB RAM and 128GB storage variant of the phone will set you back by Rs 15,999. On June 14, when the phone will go on sale for the first time, Poco will sell it at reduced prices of Rs 13,499 and Rs 15,499, respectively.

Realme 8 5G starts at Rs 13,999 for the base 4GB/64GB model. The 6GB/128GB and 8GB/128GB models of the phone cost Rs 14,999 and Rs 16,999 respectively.