ZenFone 3 Deluxe: All hail Asus' new flagship phone (hands-on)
The Deluxe version of the ZenFone 3 comes loaded with the best hardware encased in a beautiful aluminium design.
The company's most impressive looking flagship to date, the Asus ZenFone 3 Deluxe overpowers the ZenFone 3 and large-screened ZenFone 3 Ultra phones it was announced alongside at Computex in Taipei. It looks like it has the chops to match up with other flagship phones in the market, too.
Sporting a monster 6GB of RAM, the base 64GB model will cost $499 (£340, AU$695). The competitively priced phone will be available in Q3, sometime after July.
Own looks
Unlike the glass-clad ZenFone 3, the Deluxe model has a curved aluminium back, though it shares the same rear camera design and a fingerprint sensor on the back.
The phone is comfortable to hold and has a slightly larger 5.7-inch Super AMOLED display as compared to the ZenFone 3's 5.5-inch screen. Some may have a little bit of trouble reaching over with their thumb due to the slightly wider screen, but for me each corner was reachable with a bit of a stretch.
Asus has also worked on removing antenna lines to give the phone a clean looking back. We're told that the antenna is located around the sides of the phone instead. If you look closely, you'll see little antenna bands on the small chamfered edges near the display. Asus' engineers said the Deluxe won't have the "grip of death"/Antennagate issue found on the iPhone 4, as the chamfered edges aren't likely to be in contact with your hands while holding it.
If you look carefully, you should be able to see a small tiny white antenna banding on the chamfered edges.
Top grade hardware
Like the Samsung Galaxy S7 and the Xiaomi Mi 5, the ZenFone 3 Deluxe sports a Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 processor. Unlike those devices, it houses a whopping 6GB of RAM.
The Deluxe will come with different storage capacities that go all the way up to 256GB. It blows my mind that a smartphone will soon have more onboard storage than the laptop I'm using to write this right now.
Like the ZenFone 3, the Deluxe's camera will have four-axis optical image stabilization, but it's on a 23-megapixel camera instead of a 16-megapixel camera. Asus is using the Sony IMX318 sensor, which features a super quick 0.03s autofocus and three-axis electronic image stabilization for video. The phone can shoot 4K 3,840x2,160-pixel video, and there's also two tone flash, a colour sensor and laser autofocus.
The fingerprint sensor is located at the back.
Should you get it?
The ZenFone 3 Deluxe seems like great addition to Asus' ZenFone line. I'm glad the company is finally budging its focus from budget and midrange handsets, which its ZenFone 2 line was largely comprised of, to make this high-specced device.
If you're due for a smartphone upgrade, the ZenFone 3 Deluxe is a device to keep your eyes on.
Key specs
- 5.7-inch Super AMOLED display, full HD resolution (1,920x1,080-pixels)
- 3,000mAh battery
- Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 quad-core processor
- Five magnet speaker and NXT amp
- Three colours: Grey, Silver and Gold.
Check out the rest of CNET's Computex 2016 coverage here.
This review also appears in Spanish. Read: ZenFone 3 Deluxe: nuestra primera impresión del nuevo celular insignia de Asus.