Realme suggests future budget phones could omit charger

Realme has announced that it is to leave out the charger from its forthcoming Narzo 50A Prime budget phone. Will other budget phone makers follow suit?

The recent launch of the Realme Narzo 50A Prime, which appears to be aimed at select eastern markets, could herald a new trend for budget phones. It’s been confirmed through a post from a Realme Community Official that the handset in question “will not include a wall charger in the box”.

We’re growing accustomed to flagship phone makers omitting chargers from their boxes, with both Samsung and Apple (the biggest and second-biggest phone makers in the world) taking such a step in recent years. Budget phones, however, have reliably included a wall charger in the box.

Realme’s stated reason for this move is sustainability, with CEO Madhav Sheth recently revealing that the company is “attempting to achieve Double Zero targets like net-zero carbon emissions by 2025”.

The associated post also asserts that the omission of a charger has enabled “a big leap in terms of chipset performance & screen revolution” for the Narzo 50A Prime.

Before we indulge in too much speculation on potential trends for better-specced but brickless budget phones, it’s worth pointing out that Realme itself seems unlikely to adopt such an approach across its entire range. Not for the foreseeable future, at least.

As XDADevelopers points out, Sheth himself recently indicated that his company would only consider removing a charger from the box if charging speeds were set to remain constant across successive generations.

This would seem to suggest that the immediate successors to the Realme GT 2 and the Realme 9 Pro Plus – both at the pricier end of the budget phone scale – are likely to continue bundling a charger in the box. For those phone ranges that retain the same low charging speeds year on year, however, you might need to hold onto that old brick.