Asus 6Z – An all-out Flagship killer (Review)

Asus has been in the mobile business for quite some time and recently seem to be much more committed than ever. After the success of Asus Zenfone Max M1, they have been giving exactly what the user base has been asking for. They are listening to the community and changing their strategy. Asus 6Z (known as Zenfone 6, outside India) is the newest flagship mobile from Asus. The heart of Asus 6Z is innovation and let us see if this can beat out the competition.

In the Box

• Asus 6Z
• Hard plastic back case
• SIM ejector tool
• 18W QC3 Charger
• USB C Port
• ASUS ZenEarTM Pro earphones tuned by 1MORE
• Extra ear tips

It is rare to see earphones in the box. The ASUS ZenEarTM Pro tuned by 1MORE is a high-quality earphone which excellent sound signature and quality build.

Design

Asus 6Z is a glass body with metal rims on the side. It weighs 190 grams and not exactly a thin mobile. But it has retained the 3.5mm port. Also, you can find the USB C Port at the bottom and the speaker grills. The secondary speaker can be found on the top tucked beneath the flip camera. It also has a notification LED. The mobile supports dual SIM along with a dedicated slot for SD card. It has a smart key on the top right, above the volume rocker. This key can be configured to open Google assistant or any other frequently used actions. The glass body at the back is protected by Corning Gorilla Glass 3 and the front display is Corning Gorilla Glass 6. The mobile has a capacitive fingerprint sensor at the back below the camera module.

The camera module houses a plethora of sensor. It is a flipping camera controlled by an advanced stepper motor for precise control. The entire camera housing can flip to the front to become the front camera. It also has a sensor to detect fall and retract immediately. It has Laser autofocus and
Dual LED flash arranged between the dual camera setup. The fingerprint sensor is fast, but it also has face unlock. The camera flips to the front, unlocks and the retracts. It is fast, but not as fast as the popup camera we saw on the Oneplus 7 Pro. It is definitely slower than conventional face unlocking mechanism.

Asus 6Z is a unique mobile. It is the first mobile in the market with such a precision control flipping mechanism. The mobile build quality is impeccable. It screams premium and looks stylish. The Asus product design team should walk away with the award for the Best mobile design of the Century.

Display

Asus 6Z has a Notchless all-screen NanoEdge display with 19.5:9 aspect ratio. It is a 6.4″ FHD+ NanoEdge IPS LCD display. It is very bright and has a
Wide Gamut. It is protected by Corning® Gorilla® Glass 6. Color reproduction is accurate. The display is vivid and is visible under all light conditions. It has good viewing angles. It does not have any kind of notch and that wins my heart. The display is best suited for gaming, browsing, reading or any kind of media consumption.

Camera

Asus 6Z has a unique camera arrangement. The rear camera flips to the front and becomes the front camera, on demand. It has a dual camera arrangement. The primary sensor is the Sony IMX586 48MP sensor with a lens of f/1.79 aperture. It can shoot up to 4K videos in 60 fps. The secondary camera is a 13MP, 125° ultrawide camera. It is assisted by Laser autofocus and Dual LED flash. The entire arrangement flips to become the front camera.

The flip camera can be stopped and controlled every 2 degrees giving you creative angles to shoot videos and photos. It can also do an auto pan for panoramic shots. The motion tracking video can track a person and keep them in the frame while shooting. It is one of kind camera and the sheer engineering innovation that has gone into making this, excites me.

It can shoot 4K UHD videos at 30/60fps for the main camera, at 30 fps for secondary camera. The 1080p FHD videos can be recorded at 30/60fps. It has 3-axis electronic image stabilization and no OIS. It can also shoot 4K time-lapse videos, Slow Motion video (1080p at 240 fps / 720p at 480 fps) and Motion Tracking videos at 1080p 60fps).

The quality of the images does excite me as well. The images have good detail under ample light conditions. Focusing is fast and accurate. The images have good dynamic range. Saturation levels and exposure are accurate. Under low lights, the details are captured, but the grains are still evident. Night mode helps, but only to an extent. Indoors or outdoors, under most light conditions, Asus 6Z can shoot impressive photos and videos.

Performance

Asus 6Z has Qualcomm® Snapdragon™ 855 Mobile Platform with 7nm, 64-bit octa-core processor. It has Qualcomm® Adreno™ 640 for GPU. The mobile has up to 8 GB of RAM and 256 GB of internal storage type UFS 2.1. It has dual band WiFI, Bluetooth V 5.0, Wi-Fi direct and NFC. The performance is smooth and never shows any signs of glitches. It heats up a bit by over 12 degrees on playing games for over 90 minutes or recording 4K videos for over 10 min. It also heats up a bit while charging, but the intelligence built into it stops the charging if heat is detected and resume charge, once the device cools down. Overall, the performance of the Asus 6Z is smooth and breezy.

Software

Asus has made a lot of changes to their software. 6Z runs on Android 9 with Asus skin on top of it. It has no bloatware and the visual design feels light and easy on the eyes. Asus UI has matured a lot over the years and what we see in the 6Z is the pinnacle of user experience. It looks and feels like stock Android, but has loads of functionality beneath it. Smart Key customization, Home screen customization, Dark theme, Game Genie suite, AI battery care, AI performance optimization and Gesture controls are some of the noteworthy features on the Asus UI that makes the user experience a lot better. The UI is slick and it is fast to load apps and the hardware helps in the better memory management of the apps. Asus has done a good job in the software department and Asus 6Z is the proof.

Battery

It is uncommon to see a 5000 mAh battery on flagship mobiles. Asus has gone all out and packed in a 5000 mAh battery. But due to the increased capacity, the separator between the anode and cathode has to be big, if the mobile has to support super fast charging. Asus has struck a balance and has gone for 18W charging support and nothing more than that to keep the size of the battery slim. With the bundled charger, you can charge the mobile from 0 to 100% in about 2 hours. Once charged, the mobile can last for about 2 days of moderate usage or 6-7 hours screen on time on intensive usage.

Verdict

Asus 6Z mobile is priced at Rs 31,999 for the 6/64 GB variant. The 6/128 GB variant is priced at Rs 34999 and the top end 8/256 GB variant is priced at Rs 39,999. At this price, it directly competes with Oneplus 7 and the upcoming Redmi K20 Pro. Asus 6Z is comparable to the Oneplus 7 in all department. But it has a better battery and better front camera performance. It also brings in a lot of innovation to the table. I would choose the 6Z over Oneplus 7 for the innovation and the no-notch display. If I am not comparing, Asus 6Z is a very good choice for any looking to buy a flagship mobile within a sensible budget. It climbs to our Gadgetdetail recommendation list.