Asus 6z Review: The understated flagship?

Asus 6z is the Asus’s latest flagship, which it launched a few months ago globally. After a lawsuit claim, the company had to rebrand their Zenfone 6 to Asus 6z in India. The Zenfone 6 or the Asus 6z offers great performance along with innovative technology at an affordable price according to the company.

However, we cannot always adhere to what the company claims, so let's find out whether the Asus 6z is a smartphone you should spend your hard-earned money on or not.

Asus 6z Review

Asus 6z is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 processor coupled with 6/8GB RAM and 64/128/256GB of storage. There is a dual SIM card slot along with a separate microSD card slot.

The device sports a 6.5-inch (2340 x 1080 pixels) 19.5 aspect ratio IPS LCD display. For optics, it features a dual-camera setup on the back, consisting of a 48-megapixel, f/1.8 aperture main sensor along with a 13-megapixel f/2.4 aperture ultrawide sensor. It has a motorized flip camera, which allows the rear camera to flip out and become the front camera for taking selfies. All of this is backed by a 5,000mAh non-removable battery. It runs Google’s Android 9.0 Pie operating system with the company's own ZenUI 6 skin on the top.

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The phone sports a 3.5mm headphone jack, which is something that we don't usually get to see in flagships nowadays. It also comes with a USB-Type C port and a fingerprint sensor at the back.

Asus 6z Review: Design

Design of the Asus 6z is really good. The back panel is made out of glass with an accented Asus logo and text, which looks good. The smartphone looks classy and feels great in hand. There is no wireless charging despite the glass back, which is a little disappointing.

The speaker grille is located above the display, whereas there is no front camera as to say, so the top is completely bezel-less, which looks great. The bottom of the device has a considerably big chin when compared to the top bezel but it doesn't make much of a difference while using.

Coming to the back, Asus 6z sports a dual-camera setup paired with an LED flash aligned horizontally on the top. The camera flips to become the front camera, which is amazing. There is a small camera bump, but nothing that major. The included case in the box offers a lip around the camera to protect the lens. The fingerprint sensor is located towards the top of the device.

The right edge consists of the volume rockers and a power button with an accented ring around it. There is also a smart button for opening up Google Assistant above the volume rockers. It would be great if it was remappable, but Google Assistant will do. The top edge ha the secondary microphone. The left edge sports the sim card tray only, while the bottom edge has the USB-Type C port along with the speaker and the headphone jack.

Overall, the design of Asus 6z feels pretty good. It looks quite classy, which according to me is a good thing. The back is made out of glass with accented text which looks good. Overall, Asus did a good job of designing the 6z.

Asus 6z Review: Software

Asus 6z runs Android 9.0 Pie operating system with the ZenUI 6 skin on the top. The software resembles stock Android with few minor tweaks under the hood for better performance and stability, which is a good thing as I wasn't a fan of the older ZenUI at all.

It is one of the cleanest and the fastest software experiences you will find out there in the Android ecosystem. It has all the bells and whistles of the Android Operating system. It also comes with next to no bloatware, which is an amazing thing. Overall, 6z's software is one of the best in the market as of now.

Asus 6z Review: Performance

Performance is a major area of concern on any device, the same goes for the Asus 6z. It is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 processor coupled with an Adreno 640 GPU. Our review unit came with 6GB RAM/128GB storage.

We ran our usual benchmark tests to evaluate how the device performs. On AnTuTu the device was able to score 358872, which is great considering the price and competition. On GeekBench it managed to get a single-core score of 3536 and a multi-core score of 11043. The performance numbers of the device on paper are quite good.

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While playing light games such as Temple Run and Crossy Chicken, the phone runs flawlessly. Heavy games like Asphalt 9: Legends and PUBG Mobile and Call of Duty also run without any hiccup without much heating.

Overall, the performance of the 6z is good compared to the price a user needs to pay.

Asus 6z Review: Display

Asus 6z sports a 6.4-inch IPS LCD display with a resolution of 2340×1080 pixels and comes with an aspect ratio of 19.5:9. The LCD display is disappointing considering you can get AMOLED at a comparatively lower price than this. The brightness levels are able to get super low and immensely high depending on the situation. The colours are good, as good as an LCD can portray them.

Asus 6z Review: Camera

Asus 6z features a dual-camera setup on the back. There is a 48-megapixel, f/1.8 aperture main sensor with PDAF along with a 13-megapixel f/2.4 aperture ultrawide sensor. For selfies, the rear camera flips out to become the front camera, which offers good front camera performance.

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As the rear camera flips out to become the front camera, you will get the same performance for the selfies as your normal shots. Which is great because usually, companies compromise on the front camera to offer a better screen to body ratio.

Images from the camera unit come out great. The colours are not highly brightened up but look natural instead. The sharpness is acceptable, and the ultrawide sensor is just great. The camera quality is not top of the line for the rear camera, but the same performance for the selfies is just great.

Overall, the camera performance of the 6z is good.

Asus 6z Review: Battery

Asus 6z is backed by a 5,000mAh Li-Po battery, which easily lasted me more than a day on a single charge. Charging time with the included charger is around 120-150 minutes, which is good.

We tried to run PCMark’s Work 2.0 Battery Life test, which subjects the phone to heavy usage and finds out how the battery performs in those conditions. However, the smartphone's battery protection feature killed the app every time before the tests could finish.

Asus 6z Review: Verdict

Asus 6z starts at Rs. 31,999 and goes all the way up to Rs 39,999. Our 6GB RAM and 128GB storage variant cost Rs 34,999. For that price, the Asus Zenfone 6z offers one of the best overall performance.

Things like an LCD display are a bummer and you can get under the screen fingerprint sensor at this price easily, but the flippable front camera, which offers amazing selfies, stock Android and generall overall design combined with the price make the smartphone a good option to choose.