Asus Zenfone 9 review: a compact Android flagship - The Verge
The Asus Zenfone 9 features a 5.9-inch display — small by modern standards — but it comes up big on performance. It offers the latest Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 1 processor, a smooth 120Hz screen refresh rate, fast wired charging, and a 50-megapixel main camera with gimbal stabilization.
Unboxing the Asus Zenfone 9 was like meeting someone new and learning that you like the same obscure movies or went to the same high school. I could tell immediately we’d get along. “You’re IP68 and you have a headphone jack? No way! I love headphone jacks!”
A lot of the attraction has to do with its size. As it did with the Zenfone 8, Asus has set out to answer the question “what would a small (read: reasonably sized) flagship Android phone look like?” The answer starts with a 5.9-inch screen — not nearly as small as the 5.4-incher on the iPhone Mini. But as far as the Android ecosystem goes, it’s downright tiny.
“Small and runs Android” isn’t the only thing going for the Zenfone 9: it offers top-shelf components like a Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 1 processor, a smooth-scrolling 120Hz display refresh rate, and a 12-megapixel main camera with a one-of-a-kind stabilization system. It starts with 8GB of RAM and 128GB of storage for $799 and will go on sale in the US directly from Asus in mid-September. Introductory pricing will be lower — $699 — and you can find global versions of the phone on Amazon right now for a bit less than MSRP. However, there’s good reason to wait until it’s officially on sale: Asus provides a one-year warranty with the phone when you purchase it directly, and the imported versions floating around now don’t include that.
Rating: 5