Asus has brought in a new player in the INR 10,000 segment. Though its is not an all new phone but a reworked and improved version of a previous one, this phone still has a few bits to boast about. The smartphone we are talking about is the 2016 Asus Zenfone Max. This phone is packed with power and when we say power, we mean battery power. A jumbo sized 5,000mAh battery is its biggest USP that could make this a phone a deal breaker for many. So is it worth your bucks as a whole package, you may ask? Read on to find out!
The 2016 Asus Zenfone Max is the upgraded version of the Zenfone Max that came last year. This one is powered by Qualcomm MSM8939 Snapdragon 615 instead of the 410 and gets an upgraded GPU. Thumbs up for MarshMallow out of the box! This one here is a 2GB RAM variant that sells for 9,999, and its 3GB RAM version sells at 12,999.
Build and Battery
The construction is all solid and doesn’t creak, but it’s time for ASUS to get their design department back to work. These Zenfones need a makeover in order to ace in the looks department. The Asus Zenfone Max features a 5.5inch IPS display with corning Gorilla Glass 4 and three touch capacitive buttons at the bottom – the menu home and back. The standard Zenfone looks! On top of the screen are the earpiece, 5 MP FF cam, and the proximity sensor and a tiny LED notification light.
The phone weighs a good 202gm, courtesy – the giant 5000mAh battery packed inside. The phone tries to be premium with its metal finish sides and a leather fish back cover, which actually is plastic. No keys on the left. The volume rocker and the power keys are at the right and up top is the 3.5mm jack. To the back is the 13 MP rear camera, a dual LED flash Noise cancellation mic, ASUS and Zenfone branding underlined by the wide speaker grille.Under the back cover, the Zenfone Max hides a mammoth non-removable 5000 mAh battery. The phone gets dual sim capabilities and a Micro SD slot for cards up to 64GB.
OS and UI
The Zenfone Max comes out of the box loaded with Android MarshMallow 6.0.1! Big thumbs up to the company. The android experience is assisted by the ASUS Zen UI . The UI is loaded with a lot of unwanted apps. Nevertheless, there are a few apps that come handy. The Zen UI offers a ton of customizations to the UI, some of which we don’t even need. The ASUS UI is pretty close to the stock android. There is no lag while flipping through screens even when we already have many apps running in the background. The octa core config seems to be supporting well.
Camera
This Zenfone Max uses the Pixel Master Camera that is a 13MP rear shooter and a 5MP at the front. The camera comes with a lot of options including time-lapse, slo-mo, HDR. The shooter does a decent job in taking photos in well-lit conditions though it loses marks in capturing details. The laser focus is pretty quick and gets the job done in seconds. You can see how fast the autofocus feedback is. The colours are good, nice and vibrant in such bright environments but in the dim lights, the camera does no good. The front facing camera is also decent. With a few settings here and there, selfies can come out good.
Gaming and Performance
We tested the Zenfone max with three games – Ashphalt 8, Nova three and Subway surfer. Subway surfer is a piece of cake, not frame loss or slowing down. Nova and Ashphalt get heavy and the phone tends to warm up. Heating is not a problem for this phone. It seems to handle things well without much of a problem. It doesn’t excel at performance, but the job gets done.
Battery
The most important USP of the phone is its gigantic 5000mAh battery that lasts up to more than a day even on heavy usage including gaming, browsing, playing music and videos. The battery lasts for long but to fuel it up it takes up to 4 full hours.
Verdict
Performance is not up there; it misses out on a fingerprint sensor and extra RAM, but makes it up with its solid build quality and the massive battery which would easily last you more than a day even with heavy usage. Quick charging support would have made the proposition even better. If battery life on a well-built phone that mostly does everything right tops your priority list, the ZenFone Max makes sense. There are many other phones in the same price bracket offering better specs and features. However, if performance, outright camera quality and features such as a fingerprint sensor, more RAM take precedence then you should probably be looking elsewhere.
Here is our Video review of the 2016 Asus Zenfone Max. Do like our youtube channel, share and also subscribe!
Specifications
| Platform | Android™ 6.0 |
| Color | Black/Sky Blue/Orange |
| Dimensions | 77.5 x 156 x 10.55 ~ mm (WxDxH) |
| Weight | 202 g (with battery) |
| CPU | Qualcomm Snapdragon 615 MSM8939 |
| GPU | Adreno 405 GPU |
| Memory | 2GB LPDDR3 RAM |
| Storage | 32GB eMMC Flash 5GB free lifetime ASUS WebStorage |
| Memory Slot | MicroSD card (up to 64 GB) |
| Navigation | GPS, GLONASS, AGPS & BDS |
| Display | 5.5inches, HD 1280×720,IPS 72% screen to body ratio, ASUS TrueVivid Full Screen Lamination technology, 178˚ viewing angle |
| Battery | 5000 mAh Li-Polymer (non-removable) |
| Standby Time
Talk Time |
914 hours
37.63 hours |
| Camera | Front 5 Mega-Pixel Back Light (HDR) mode with ASUS PixelEnhancing Technology for up to 400% brighter , and evenly exposed photos Low Light mode with ASUS PIxelMaseter Technology for up to 400% brighter photos and videos Real Time Beautification Auto Focus Wide View F2.0 Aperture PixelMaster Zero Shutter Lag Night mode Selfie mode Photo Effects Time Lapse Wide-angle 88 ˚ / ˚ lens Selfie Panorama (up to 140 ˚) HDR mode GIF animation Rear 13 Mega-Pixel dual-color Real Tone flash Back Light (HDR) mode with ASUS PixelEnhancing Technology for up to 400% brighter , and evenly exposed photos Low Light mode with ASUS PIxelMaseter Technology for up to 400% brighter photos and videos Manual Mode for DSLR-like camera detail settings Real Time Beautification Auto Focus Wide View LED Flash F2.0 Aperture PixelMaster Zero Shutter Lag Night mode Depth of field Selfie mode Photo Effects Panorama mode Miniature Time Rewind Smart Remove All Smiles Time Lapse HDR mode GIF animation |
| Audio Slot | 3.5mm |
| Audio | MP3/3GP/AAC |
| Sensor | Accelerator/E-Compass/Proximity/Ambient Light Sensor/Hall Sensor |
| User Interface | ASUS ZenUI 2.0 with over 1000+ software enhancements What’s Next ZenLink ZenMotion ASUS Splendid Kids Mode SnapView One Hand Mode Trend Micro™ Security Power saving mode PhotoCollage PhotoEffects MiniMovie Google Apps ASUS Sync File Manager Quick Memo Themes ZenCircle |