Another year, another new ROG Phone – ASUS’ efforts to expand its Republic of Gamers (ROG) brand beyond desktop and laptop gaming hardware has clearly resulted in some success for the company, and its line of ROG gaming phones do a great job of standing out from an otherwise crowded Android smartphone landscape. With that in mind though, it looks like ASUS is trying to grab a bit of that mainstream market share, at least with the upcoming ROG Phone 8.
A new set of leaked product photos and hardware specificiations – courtesy of the folks over at Windows Report – give us an idea of what ASUS has in store with its upcoming flagship gaming phone. As such, we’re going to take a quick look and see what makes the ROG Phone 8 different from its predecessors.
Design Changes
If you’re not familiar with past iterations of the ROG Phone, ASUS designed its gaming handsets to feature a lot of the same visual elements seen on gaming PCs and laptops, with a healthy serving of RGB lighting and angular looks, infused into an otherwise standard-looking smartphone. With the ROG Phone 8 though, there are some notable changes which brings the phone’s design much closer to what we’re seeing on “mainstream” brands.
For one, the ROG Phone 8 now comes with a hole-punch camera cutout within an 6.78-inch 165Hz AMOLED screen, instead of the full (albeit slim) bezels on older ROG Phone models that used to house the camera. The ROG Phone series were one of the few alongside Sony’s Xperia phones that maintained full top and bottom bezels, although this change somewhat modernizes the look of the phone’s display.
Another big change is the phone’s rear panel, which now comes with a cleaner look, moving away from the super-angular design that ASUS featured on devices like the ROG Pone 6 and 7. While the newer design retains some design aspects such as the glowing ROG logo and some geometric elements, it’s a much more “conservative” feel, especially when you consider how its predecessors looked.
Specs and Hardware
Unsurprisingly, we can expect the ROG Phone 8 to feature the new Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chip onboard, which Qualcomm touts as one of the most powerful mobile SoCs to date thanks to a combination of performance and AI features. Interestingly, there’s also word that we’ll see an ROG Phone 8 Pro which will come with hardware configurations not found on the regular model.
For one, there’s a base memory setup which will supposedly come with 256GB of internal storage and 12GB of RAM, maxing out at 1TB of storage and 24GB of RAM for the Pro model. Other hardware details include a 5,500 mAh battery for both models, as well as a camera setup which includes a Sony IMX890 50 MP main sensor, 13 MP ultrawide lens, 32MP sensor with 3X optical zoom, and a 32MP selfie camera.
There’s no word on pricing and availability yet, but it’s expected that ASUS will show off its new gaming phones during CES 2024 next month.
