Asus 8z Review: Small Wonder
The Asus 8z is small but packed in powerful hardware
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Asus 8z |
It has been a long time since Asus completely stopped
introducing budget and premium smartphones in India. For a few years now, the
company has been focusing exclusively on its ROG smartphone range that offers a
crowd of games. ROG Phone 5 offers good hardware but is intended for niche
audiences, and Asus had no other market in India. All that is about to change
now. The Asus 8z may sound familiar, and that’s because this phone was
announced in 2021. Known worldwide as ZenFone 8, it was set to launch in India
as 8z (due to the trademark dispute). Asus says it has delayed the launch of
the phone so far due to epidemics and supply problems, but it is finally
available.
The Asus 8z may look late to the party, but apart from the
lack of the latest and greatest SoC, some details make it look like this phone
can still be considered a premium even today. Can the Asus 8z help the company
make up for lost time? I put it to the test to find out.
Price of Asus 8z in India
The Asus 8z has a value of Rs. 42,999 in India and comes
with 8GB of LPDDR5 RAM and 128GB of UFS 3.1 storage.
Asus 8z design
The main prototype of Asus India's previous flagship,
India's Asus 6Z (Review), was its rotating camera module. On the Asus 8z, it is
a compact size. Compact Android flagships are not uncommon, and 8z is a good
break for all phones with big screens on sale right now. Asus is targeted at
consumers who want an integrated smartphone without compromising on performance
or build quality.
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Asus 8z |
The Asus 8z risks getting out of hand as a small thing. I
had an Obsidian Black unit with no gradient patterns or accent colors to break
the monotony, except for a different blue power button. Asus seems to have
inspired the Google Pixel series about this. You get snow in the rear glass
which does a good job of closing the fingerprints. The module with two rear
cameras comes out slowly.
The Asus 8z has a 5.9-inch AMOLED display with thin bezels
around it, but with a slightly thicker chin underneath. It has Corning Gorilla
Glass Victus on the front and Gorilla Glass 3 on the back to prevent
scratching. The frame is made of metal and feels precious when you touch it.
The Asus folds down the sides of the rear glass where it meets the frame making
it easier to hold the phone. The volume buttons are on the right while the left
one is completely empty. You get a 3.5mm earphone jack on top, which makes the
8z one of the few flags to own.
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Asus 8z |
A nice addition under the frame is the notification LED that
illuminates when the phone is charging and flashes when you have unread
notifications. It is right between the ground speaker and the USB Type-C port.
Asus gives the case to the box. The 8z is IP68 rated for water and water
resistance.
Asus 8z details and software
The Asus 8z display has full HD + resolution, 120Hz high
resolution, and 240Hz touch rate. This AMOLED panel has a brightness of 1,100
nits and has an integrated fingerprint scanner. Asus also offers stereo
speakers at 8z.
It powers the Asus 8z Qualcomm Snapdragon 888, which was the
flagship of last year 5G SoC. The Asus 8z has two nano-SIM spaces supported by
5G and 4G and VoLTE. Other connectivity options include Bluetooth 5.2, Wi-Fi 6,
FM radio, NFC, and five satellite navigation systems.
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Asus 8z |
As for the software, the Asus 8z runs ZenUI over Android 12.
The UI looks and sounds like stock Android but this can be customized to suit
your taste. You can change icon shapes, font styles, and tone colors. It also
has a black mode for system objects and applications, and this can be activated
automatically after sunset. Privacy clues, an Android 12 feature that lets you
know when using a camera or microphone, are also available. My 8z unit was
using an expired December 2021 security piece.
Asus pre-installed a few third-party apps on 8z such as
Netflix, Facebook, and Messenger; the first can only be disabled while the
other two can be excluded. Asus has auto-enabled touch navigation in the UI and
adds a few special touches to perform specific actions. For example, a swipe
under three fingers will take a screenshot, and I have used this many times.
Asus also adds some functionality to the power button.
Pressing once puts the device in standby mode as usual, but you can adjust what
the phone does when you double and long press this key. Depending on what you
choose, 8z can open a particular application, change Wi-Fi mode, or turn on
flashlight. Similarly, you can get 8z to launch Google Assistant by long
pressing the power button instead of displaying the power menu.
There are five battery modes in the Asus 8z. You can choose
from ‘High Performance’ to ‘Strong Performance’ based on your performance. The
smartphone is set to ‘Dynamic’ by default but advanced options allow you to
sing exactly how it works. Asus also adds a one-handed navigation feature that
minimizes UI features for easy access. Interestingly, you can customize the
level of UI decreases.
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