Asus ROG phone 2 got the best gaming smartphone award from us last year. Why? Because it had everything that was cutting edge at the time and one needed from a top-notch gaming phone. Now its bigger brother is out in the market in the form of Asus ROG Phone 3. Is it better than its predecessor? Let us find out in our Asus ROG Phone 3 review. Read on.
Design and Display
Let’s quickly talk about the design of the Asus ROG Phone 3 first. Out of the box, it does not look very different from the previous gen, however, there are good and some bad changes on the phone. The good ones are that the USB Type-C point at the bottom is off-centre so that you can connect the charging cable and play with ease. The RGB lit logo makes a comeback and the rear design has got subtle changes and the heat exhaust grill at the back is an A+ in our books.
However, there is no 3.5mm audio port on the phone. That has now been moved to its Aero Active Cooler 3 attachment or you can attach a headphone with a supplied USB-C adaptor. Over that, there is no wireless charging. Majorly because of the RGB logo at the back.
But otherwise, the phone looks great. Sure it does not have an edge to edge touchscreen, but it is large enough for gaming and video pleasures. The display comes with Corning Gorilla Glass 6 protection, you get the nifty power and volume buttons and very modern rear camera panel. Overall we loved the design of the Asus ROG Phone 3. And before we forget, yes, the air triggers do come on the Asus ROG Phone 3 as well and the response rate has become better with them.
Moving to its 6.59-inch AMOLED display. It supports HDR 10 and 144Hz response rate. Max brightness here is 650nits and the screen supports glove touch too. We played a lot of games on the Asus ROG Phone 3, ranging from Call of Duty: Mobile to Asphalt series and not once did it disappoint us. We took it out in bright sunlight and everything on the screen was very legible. With that, the movie experience both indoors and outdoors is superb. Yes, the dual speakers sound was not super loud, but for single viewing and gaming pleasures, it was very decent.
Asus ROG Phone 3 performance and cameras
Let’s quickly talk about the insides before we tell you about what we felt about its overall performance. Asus ROG Phone 3 comes with Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 Plus chipset with Adreno 650 graphics. This is combined with 8GB RAM and 128GB UFS 3.1 storage. Android 10 with Asus’s own skin comes right out of the box. All this makes up for the best gaming experience? Yes, it does. You get the absolute best when it comes to performance.
We loved every bit of it and the phone did not give us a chance to really bicker when it came to gaming or movie performance. Like we said we threw the best (highly demanding) games at it and it ran them with extreme ease.
When it comes to cameras, the Asus ROG Phone 3 has Sony IMX686 64MP camera at the back with another 13MP secondary sensor and a third 5MP camera for bokeh. Here too, the phone did not disappoint. We got very close to life shots, indoors and outdoors. Portrait shots had good edge detection, but landscape ones not so much. During low light or night time, we did face a little bit of graininess, but that went off as soon as we turned on the flash. Over that, the rear camera can also able to take exquisite 8K video shots at 30fps.
On the front Asus ROG Phone 3 has a 24MP sensor with f2.0 aperture, which we adored. The selfies during day time or in well-lit rooms were fabulous. Nighttime or low light not so much. So anytime we had to click a selfie, we made sure there is ample light in the room.
Moving to its battery performance, the Asus ROG Phone 3 has a 6,000 mAh battery that supports quick charge 4.0. This battery can last! We played hours of COD on the Asus ROG Phone 3 and the battery would just not die. Under normal circumstances, it can last you up to 2 days. Saying that, if you game a lot on it, it will still last you a day. For security, the smartphone does get Face Recognition as well as an in-display fingerprint sensor. Both of which work well. WiFi 6 and Bluetooth 5.1 with QC aptX support is also part of the package.
Overall, we loved the performance of the Asus ROG Phone 3 except its 240 grams weight. This has been distributed well, but we are sure Asus could have shaved a few grams off, here and there.
Verdict
Overall, we just loved the whole experience with the Asus ROG Phone 3. It has a battery that lasts, it can run the latest games at the best settings and design is very modern. Yes, there is a but here. The price is on the higher side of things and not what we were expecting. The 8GB model comes at Rs 49,999 and that seems to be 5-7K higher of what everyone was expecting it to be. Nevertheless, with the current schemes and bank offers, you can easily get it at under Rs 45,000, which makes it a very worthy buy.
Pros
Good display
Best in class for gaming
Long battery life
Cons
The sound could have been better
Weight
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Best GAming Phone , Asus Rog 3. Other ASUS product are all best in class