The ASUS ROG Phone 8 is the latest flagship gaming smartphone from the Taiwanese company, and it brings some major changes to the series. The phone has a sleeker design, a better camera, and wireless charging support, making it more appealing to mainstream users. But does it still deliver the best gaming performance and features? Let’s find out.
The ASUS ROG Phone 8 has a more refined look than its predecessors, which were known for their flashy and aggressive gamer aesthetic. The phone has a glass back with a matte finish, a metal frame, and a subtle LED logo that can be customized with different colors and effects. The phone also has an IP68 rating for water and dust resistance, which is a first for the ROG Phone series.
The phone still retains some of the signature gaming features, such as the capacitive AirTriggers on the sides, which can be used as shoulder buttons for games. The phone also has two USB-C ports, one at the bottom and one on the side, which can be used for charging, connecting accessories, or attaching the AeroActive Cooler X, which is a fan attachment that helps cool down the phone and adds a 3.5mm headphone jack.
The ASUS ROG Phone 8 Pro has a slightly different design, with a dot-matrix display on the back called AniMe Vision, which can show animated graphics, notifications, or custom messages. The Pro model also has a slightly larger battery and more RAM and storage options than the regular model.
The Performance: Blazing Fast and Smooth
The ASUS ROG Phone 8 is powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 898 processor, which is the most powerful chipset available for Android phones. The phone also has up to 24GB of RAM and 1TB of storage, depending on the variant. The phone runs on Android 12 with the ROG UI, which offers a lot of customization and gaming features, such as the Game Genie, which lets you tweak the performance, display, network, and audio settings for each game.
The phone has a 6.8-inch AMOLED display with a 144Hz refresh rate and a 360Hz touch sampling rate, which means it can render smooth and responsive graphics for any game. The display also supports HDR10+ and has a peak brightness of 1200 nits, making it ideal for watching videos or playing games in bright environments. The display also has an in-display fingerprint scanner and a punch-hole cutout for the selfie camera.
The phone has a 6,000mAh battery, which can last for a whole day of heavy use or gaming. The phone also supports 65W fast charging, which can charge the phone from 0 to 100% in about 40 minutes. The phone also supports 30W wireless charging and reverse wireless charging, which are new features for the ROG Phone series.
The Camera: Surprisingly Good for a Gaming Phone
The ASUS ROG Phone 8 has a quad-camera setup on the back, which consists of a 64MP main camera, a 13MP ultra-wide camera, a 5MP macro camera, and a 2MP depth sensor. The phone also has a 24MP selfie camera on the front. The camera system is one of the biggest improvements over the previous ROG Phone models, which had mediocre cameras at best.
The camera app has a lot of modes and features, such as night mode, portrait mode, pro mode, panorama, slow motion, time lapse, and more. The phone can also record 8K videos at 30fps or 4K videos at 60fps with the main camera, and 1080p videos at 30fps with the selfie camera. The video quality is also enhanced by the super-stable mode, which uses electronic image stabilization to reduce shakes and jitters.
The camera performance is impressive for a gaming phone, as it can capture detailed and vibrant photos in various lighting conditions. The main camera can produce sharp and clear images with good dynamic range and color accuracy. The ultra-wide camera can capture more of the scene, but it suffers from some distortion and noise at the edges. The macro camera can take close-up shots of small objects, but it has a fixed focus and a low resolution. The depth sensor helps with the portrait mode, which can create a nice bokeh effect around the subject.
The selfie camera can also take decent selfies, with good skin tones and exposure. The selfie camera also supports face unlock, which works fast and reliably. The camera system is not the best in the market, but it is definitely a huge improvement over the previous ROG Phone models, and it can compete with some of the mainstream flagships.
The Verdict: The Best Gaming Phone Gets Better
The ASUS ROG Phone 8 is a gaming beast with a Zenfone twist. It has a sleeker design, a better camera, and wireless charging support, making it more attractive to mainstream users. But it still delivers the best gaming performance and features, such as the AirTriggers, the dual USB-C ports, the AeroActive Cooler X, and the Game Genie. The phone also has a stunning display, a massive battery, and a powerful processor, making it a great device for any task.
The phone is not perfect, though. It is still quite bulky and heavy, and it lacks some features that are common in other flagships, such as a telephoto camera, a high-resolution selfie camera, or stereo speakers. The phone is also quite expensive, starting at $1,099.99 for the base model and going up to $1,499.99 for the top-of-the-line model with the cooler. The phone is not for everyone, but if you are looking for the ultimate gaming phone, the ASUS ROG Phone 8 is the one to get.