The new Asus Zenfone 9 belongs to an endangered species, that of compact smartphones. Within this niche, another niche has been chosen, because it is a compact smartphone but with top-of-the-range technical features. Not only that: it is positioned in a price range where almost nobody is anymore, squeezed as it is between 500 euro phones that work better and better (here two excellent examples) and those over 1000, for those who do not want to give up anything.
Yes, because the price list of the new Asus Zenfone 9 (in Italy it is on sale from the end of July) starts at 799 euroswhich is a figure that will raise more than one eyebrow: not because the technical characteristics are not worth them, but because it is a jump of 200 euros compared to the starting price of last year’s Zenfone 8. It is true that there is the economic crisis, that technology has made progress and that there are 2 GB of RAM more, but a high step of 200 euros between one generation and another of a smartphone is still a rare thing to see. .
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Asus Zenfone 9, the technical characteristics
To be somehow forgiven, the Taiwanese manufacturer has put under the body the best it had available: Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 1, 8 processor or 16 GB in RAM (as in the version under test), 128 or 256 GB of storage space, 5.9 “Amoled display with refresh up to 120 Hz, 50 and 12 MP rear cameras (the main one with a very rare 6-axis stabilization ), stereo audio and 4300 mAh battery with 30W fast charge. There is also the power supply in the packageand even the headphone jack.
The fingerprint sensor is on the right side: it is precise and quick to unlock, but we continue to think that this is a position in which accidental unlocks (or in any case touches) are too frequent. Better to have it under the screen.
The Zenfone 9 in everyday use
The phone is light (173 grams, detected being tested) and compact at the right point: it is small but without being too small. To understand, an example is useful: the display is slightly smaller than that of the Pixel 6A, but we have never struggled to read something, browse a document online or surf the Internet. Which has happened to us sometimes with the Google smartphone. Here the credit probably goes to better screen quality: better defined, brighter and with a refresh rate that is double.
Like the previous 8, and perhaps even more, this Zenfone 9 take good or very good photos and it does so with excellent consistency and continuity: it is difficult to bring out an image that has come out badly, unless you overdo it with HDR or with daring shots, such as (for example) against the light. Interesting the OIS stabilization, similar to that of a gimbal: it almost exclusively has effects on videos, where in fact it works very well, but it is still a rare technical solution to see and worthy of note.
The battery is adequate, perhaps the largest that Asus could put inside such a small smartphone: with moderate use you can reach beyond the stand-by day without problems and the power supply, although it is not a splinter, puts everything back in place in the within a few tens of minutes. We liked the operating system, based on Android 12, a little bit and not: nice the ability to scroll the notification curtain from the fingerprint sensor, some nice customizations (such as the double tap on the rear body to activate specific functions), but some apps that we found pre-installed we would honestly have done without.
That weird problem with the audio
It is not a serious thing, while much more worrying is that with this phone we have really (really, really) hard to call. Which seems a bit absurd but that’s it: more effort than with the Xiaomi of a couple of years ago and their capricious proximity sensor. The line did not fall, but more or less in 80% of cases, our interlocutor kept repeating that “I feel metallic”, wondering if “are you still there?”, To hang up and try to call back. Tiring and annoying, with repercussions also on the vowels of WhatsApp, which always came out at very, very low volume when sending.
It is possible that this is only a problem with our model, even if a software update which seems to have partially solved it, but it still seemed correct to report it.
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What we liked
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compact
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screen quality
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equipment technique