Asus ROG Phone 5s: Is the gaming flagship recommended for regular users?

After its global debut in 2021, Asus launched ROG Phone 5s and ROG Phone 5s Pro in India this February. smartphone comes with a good-quality display, excellent speakers, and a solid gaming performance to give a quick summary. Or aspects of device, such as camera and battery life, are on par with or price models.

This review will cover all aspects of device and explain everything more straightforwardly so that even someone who is t a gamer can understand knits and stitches of Asus ROG Phone 5s. How good is gaming performance? Should a regular user invest in smartphone? Keep reing to find out.  

Display

Asus ROG Phone 5s comes with a large 6.78-inch display that supports up to 144Hz refresh rate. Users can lock refresh rate of smartphone to 60 Hz, 120Hz, or 144Hz. re is an option to set it at 'Auto', which detects of content being viewed on-screen and justs refresh rate accordingly. AMOLED display has a touch sampling rate of 360Hz, a response time of 1ms and a touch latency of 24ms. While regular users might t be able to figure out difference, gamers will cherish device for se display characteristics. Since screen can go up to 1200 nits, outdoor us would t be an issue.

Performance

Solid and consistent performance seems to be forte of Asus ROG Phone 5s. credit goes to octa-core Snapdragon 888 Plus with a maximum clock speed of 2.95GHz. processor is built on 5nm fabrication techlogy, which means it consumes lesser power while computing same number of calculations compared to chipsets built on 7nm or 8nm techlogy. processor is accompanied by re 660 with a maximum clock speed of 840MHz. 8/128GB model showed lag in day-to-day tasks. re were frame drops while using smartphone at a higher refresh rate.

Asus ROG Phone 5s performs well on benchmark applications, which are a great way to test a smartphone's specifications. Upon running Antutu benchmark application on device, it scores a maximum of 7,79,154 points and a minimum of 7,63,450 over five different tests. Upon running ar popular benchmarking application called Geekbench, device scores between 1,117 to 1,071 on single-core test and 3,480 to 3,102 on multi-core test. Both scores are decent and put Asus ROG Phone 5s among top-performing flagship smartphones.

Gaming

This is most crucial device aspect as Taiwanese company places ROG series of devices as dedicated gaming machines. While smartphone's benchmark scores are alrey mentioned above, availability of graphics settings in popular battle royal game called Battlegrounds Mobile India is considered benchmark of gaming performance of a smartphone. Asus ROG Phone 5s can run BGMI in 90fps at 'Smooth' graphics setting. 'Balanced, HD and HDR' are available to play in 'Extreme' frame rate. On se settings, game runs smoothly, and re are lags whatsoever.

Owing to Snapdragon 888 Plus' high gaming performance, players can also run game in 'Ultra HD' settings up to 'Ultra' frame rate. However, most players like to run ir game at a lower graphic setting, at a higher frame rate. While smartphone can sustain high-performance levels for an extended period, it tends to get a little warm during long hours of gaming. Those who wish to purchase device specifically for gaming can also buy cooling fan. While smartphone's battery is discussed at length in ar section, smartphone has a large 6,000 mAh battery that can easily last for hours of heavy gaming. ditionally, smartphone has two dedicated modes for increasing performance called X mode and X Mode Plus.  

Camera

Asus ROG Phone 5s performs decently in camera department as a gaming smartphone. device has a triple rear camera setup with Sony IMX686 as primary sensor. To enable 64MP mode, users have to go into Settings menu on camera app: secondary lenses, i.e. a 13MP ultrawide and 5MP macro, decent ims in well-lit environments. pictures ed with primary lens in bro daylight are excellent, with balanced shows and highlights. Even indoors, primary sensor of smartphone does a decent job of capturing details in subjects. Owing to its high resolution, digitally cropping into frame two times does t deplete im quality. 

Users can record videos in up to 8K resolution with smartphone, 4K (30/60fps) and FHD (30/60fps). audio recorded with videos is punchy, clear and crisp. While recording videos, camera can smoothly shift its focus from subjects located in foreground to distant subjects. Recording videos with ultrawide lens is also an option. However, only downside to camera system of smartphone seems to be videos recorded with front-facing camera, which is a 24MP sensor. Although, it provides a wide field of view for ing selfies from a hand's distance to accommodate multiple people in frame. 

Connectivity & Battery

As far as connectivity is concerned, Asus ROG Phone 5s was able to pick cellular network in remotest areas of a building. It also supports 5G connectivity, Wi-Fi 6 and Bluetooth v5.2 and Qualcomm's low latency aptX aptive techlogy. smartphone also features NFC and Wi-Fi Direct. 

Promising battery life is one of things that makes Asus ROG Phone 5s a complete gaming smartphone. smartphone can easily last for up to two days upon moderate us. With regular web browsing, watching content, attending video calls and recording casual videos for social media, smartphone can clear a day with about 20% battery. Upon hardcore gaming, 6,000 mAh battery of Asus ROG Phone 5s can last for hours.

Although smartphone supports 65W fast charging, it comes with a 30W charger in box. Asus has divided battery in Asus ROG Phone 5s into two halves of 3,000mAh units, which keeps temperate under control and is suitable for battery in prolonged us. While charging speed is quick eugh, lack of wireless charging is a bummer. 

ditional features

Asus Rog Phone 5s comes with dual-firing front speakers and some of best speakers on a smartphone, including doubly priced iPhones. speakers are t only loud, but y also produce crisp audio with an equate amount of bass and provide stereo separation. At ir peak volume, y can quickly fill a room. Asus has used Cirrus Logic amplifier for producing louder sound without minimal distortion. n smartphone features Dual Ultrasonic AirTrigger built within its chassis at extreme right and left corner when holding smartphone in a horizontal orientation. Gamers can also setup up motion controls on device. 

Asus ROG Phone 5s for regular users?

In a world where all smartphone manufacturers are focusing on creating models with large screens, bigger batteries, and robust performance, Asus ROG Phone 5s are ideal for gamers and regular users. Although it has a slight gaming bulk to it and has thin bezels at top and bottom, multiple aspects make up for it. For instance, those who love to consume content on ir smartphone will love AMOLED display and dual-speaker setup on Asus ROG Phone 5s.

For those who need ir smartphone's battery life to be decent, Asus ROG Phone 5s can make it up to two days. For those who want a gaming smartphone, re is need to mention that Asus ROG Phone 5s is among few reily available models and provides top-tch performance. It is crucial to te that Asus ROG Phone 5s should receive software updates for at least a couple of years, so it should easily last for ar two to three years. While writing this review, smartphone is available on Flipkart for Rs. 49,999 for variant with 8GB RAM and 128GB stor.