Asus has been relatively tight-lipped about its next phone, the Asus ROG Phone 8, with the aim to reveal the model during CES in Vegas next month. However, WindowsReport has revealed an apparent wealth of details about the upcoming phone.
Asus fielded a strong contender in 2023 with the Asus ROG Phone 7. That phone has an awe-inspiring battery life and a well-designed screen with varying refresh rates that helped to create an immersive gaming experience. However, certain aspects needed work to help give it a bit more mainstream appeal.
Our review found the camera wasn’t quite up to expected standards in 2023. The cameras supplied were serviceable, the lack of a telephoto lens was noticeable. We also mentioned bezel size made the screen feel smaller and more compact than it was. However, it seems Asus had similar thoughts — the company looks to have made significant changes for its newest model, based on this leak.
The first thing to note is that the Asus ROG Phone 8's screen appears to now have, as previously reported, much thinner bezels and a punch-hole camera. The base ROG Phone 8 is supposedly supplied with a 6.78-inch FHD+ Samsung AMOLED, while the ROG Phone 8 Plus is the only one listed with HDR 10 support.
What this tells us is that the ROG Phone 8 screen will have a dynamic color range, as well as a fair amount of damage protection due to the inclusion of Corning's Gorilla Glass Victus 2.
While the leak doesn't give away details about the camera attached to the base ROG Phone 8, it does list the apparent details of the ROG Phone 8 Plus. The phone will supposedly be shipped with a tripled rear camera setup with a Sony IMX890 50MP main sensor, a 13MP ultrawide and a 32MP third camera with 3X zoom. The front punch-hole camera will apparently be 32-megapixels.
While it isn't the most impressive setup and is somewhat similar to the cameras provided on its predecessor, the inclusion of the 32MP 3x zoom camera would be a welcome addition. All in all, it would be relatively decent to take photos with, but lacking compared to other phones on the market.
Power — and a whole lot of RAM
However, those folks opting for gaming handsets may not be as discerning about camera performance as your average phone user. The focus for gamers needs to be more on the power of the phone across the chipset, RAM and battery. As was expected the ROG Phone 8 appears to be coming with a Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chip and 12GB of RAM for the base model, while the Plus could receive either 16GB or a massive 24GB of RAM.
Surprisingly, it seems as though the battery may be taking something of a downgrade. The ROG Phone 8’s battery, according to this leak, is only listed as equivalent to 5,500 mAh for both the base and Plus models. Considering the ROG Phone 7’s battery was listed at 6,000 mAh this would indicate a drop in longevity. However, it is important to note that the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 may be the deciding factor on whether the ROG Phone 8 can outpace its predecessors’ 18-hour-long battery life test.
The reveal of more of the ROG Phone 8’s internal hardware, especially the battery, will raise some interesting questions on how it will compare to its predecessor.
However, the new sleek design and camera setup are very aesthetically pleasing. While its RAM and processor have stats that would put some gaming laptops to shame, we will not know more until we have a chance to test it ourselves.
