Skip to main content

The Realme Book is the smartphone brand’s first try at a laptop

If you know the Realme brand it’ll likely be for its smartphones like the Realme GT, but like many other companies, it’s working on building an ecosystem of connected products, a mission that has taken a big leap forward with the announcement of the Realme Book laptop. It’s Realme’s first attempt at computing, and it follows the brand’s familiar path of offering high specs for a reasonable price.

Realme Book laptop.

Made from metal, the Realme Book weighs 1.38kg and is 14.9mm thick, with the option of choosing a blue or grey anodized finish. The IPS LCD screen measures 14-inches and has a 3:2 aspect ratio, plus a 2160 x 1440 pixel resolution with a 400 nit peak brightness. It’s covered in Gorilla Glass for protection, and has thin bezels for a 90% screen-to-body ratio.

Inside the top model is an Intel 11th generation Tiger Lake Core i5 1135G7 processor with Intel’s Iris Xe graphics, and up to 16GB of RAM with a 512GB SSD. A cheaper Realme Book uses a Core i3 processor, but it has not stated which one. The Book is cooled using a dual fan system, and it’s claimed the battery will last for 11 hours before needing a recharge. Realme uses a 65W fast-charging system for the Book, which is also a feature on many of its smartphones, where it takes a 4,500mAh battery to full in a little over 30 minutes. However, it does not list a charge time for the Book laptop.

The chassis has a Thunderbolt/USB 4 port on the Core i5 model, plus a USB Type-C port, a single USB Type-A port, and a 3.5mm headphone socket. There are two speakers tuned by Harman Kardon with DTS HD support, and a backlit keyboard with 1.3mm of key travel and a touchpad. The power button also contains a fingerprint sensor. The Realme Book has Wi-Fi 6 connectivity and comes with Windows 10 installed, plus a PC Connect feature to link your phone directly with the laptop.

Realme does not sell its smartphones in the U.S. and while it’s not clear where the Realme Book will be released, the company has provided prices in U.S. dollars. The top Core i5 model with 16GB of RAM and a 512GB SSD will cost $999, while the cheapest Core i3 version with 8GB RAM and a 256GB SSD will be $749. No release details have been announced at the time of writing, but the pricing may suggest a U.S. release is in the plan for the future.

Realme’s strategy of starting out with smartphones and then launching a laptop as part of a growing device ecosystem, including smartwatches and smart home equipment, is common. Huawei and Honor have followed this path over the past years for example, as has Xiaomi.

Editors' Recommendations

Andy Boxall
Senior Mobile Writer
Andy is a Senior Writer at Digital Trends, where he concentrates on mobile technology, a subject he has written about for…
A brand-new M3 MacBook Air could be just months away
Apple MacBook Air M1 open, on a table.

Apple has only just launched its M2 Pro and M2 Max chips inside new MacBook Pro laptops, but some people are already looking to the future. And according to a new report, next-generation Apple silicon chips could be here in a matter of months.

That idea comes from Taiwanese publication DigiTimes (via MacRumors), which claims that a new 13-inch MacBook Air with an M3 chip could launch in the second half of 2023. That device might represent the most significant performance increase in an Apple laptop since Apple silicon first launched in 2020.

Read more
Why the MacBook Pro is the perfect gaming laptop for me
Apple MacBook Pro seen from the side.

Macs can game. In fact, my 14-inch MacBook Pro with an M1 Pro processor can game so well, it’s become the best gaming laptop I’ve ever owned.

I’m no Apple fanboy, either. I'm loyal to my Windows desktop gaming PC with its 12th-gen Intel i7 and a power-hungry RTX 2080 Ti GPU -- and I always will be. But as I game less and less at home because of my family, my desktop barely gets used anymore. And that's where my MacBook Pro steps in.

Read more
As a laptop reviewer, this is the CES 2023 laptop I’m most excited for
The Lenovo Yoga Book 9i sitting on origami stand.

Lenovo announced a laptop at CES 2023 that I really want to love. It's the Yoga Book 9i, the most striking dual-screen laptop I've seen yet and the one that holds the most promise for my workflow. My editor, Luke Larsen, wrote a piece comparing the Yoga Book 9i to the Surface Neo, and that's an apt comparison.

Our opinions are similar, but I'm going to focus on what most excites me about the Yoga Book 9i. And that's its ability to work side by side with two lovely 2.8K OLED displays.
Multitasking is my thing

Read more