Asus Zenfone 11 Ultra review

The competition

The Zenfone 11 Ultra is a fully-fledged flagship, and it is priced accordingly. A base 12GB/256GB unit has an MSRP of €1,000/£870 or €899 on a pre-order deal. The 16GB/512GB version has a price of €1,099/£950. Of course, that is merely the official eurozone pricing, and actual pricing will vary a bit from market to market.

Now that the Zenfone 11 Ultra has grown in size quite significantly, we no longer need to worry about picking compact competitors for it. The OnePlus 12 is looking like a good alternative. It has a 6.82-inch display and is bigger than even the newly grown-up Zenfone 11 Ultra. It has an excellent display all around with great brightness, Dolby Vision support, and QHD+ resolution. But that’s not all that the OnePlus 12 brings to the table. There is IP65 ingress protection, which is not exactly the IP68 on the Zenfone, but OnePlus does sweeten the deal with Gorilla Glass Victus 2 on the front. The Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 is at the helm for excellent performance, and the camera setup is arguably even more impressive than the one on the Zenfone 11 Ultra. A comparably sized 5,400 mAh battery is also on board with ridiculously fast 100W wired and 50W wireless charging support.

OnePlus 12 • Samsung Galaxy S24+ • Apple iPhone 15 Plus • Google Pixel 8 Pro

Over in camp Samsung, we have the vanilla Galaxy S24 with its compact 6.2-inch display. However, the Galaxy S24+ is a better match for the Zenfone 11 Ultra in every possible way. It brings to the table an IP68 ingress protection, stereo speakers, a 6.7-inch 120Hz, and a Dynamic LTPO AMOLED display with great brightness as well as QHD+ resolution. Depending on where you live, the S24+ will be powered by either a Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chipset or Samsung's Exynos 2400. You also get a solid triple-camera setup at the back. And autofocus on the selfie cam.

Of course, if you don't necessarily care about the latest and greatest hardware, you could approach the matter differently and get yourself last year's still-excellent Galaxy S23 Ultra at about the same price. It has now depreciated nicely, and you still get an amazing all-around flagship with all the bells and whistles, plus an S Pen on top of it all.

Naturally, Apple has you covered in this price range too, and for around €1,000, you can get the excellent iPhone 15 Plus. It's got things like IP68 ingress protection, stereo speakers and a large 6.7-inch XDR OLED display. Sure, you aren't technically getting one of Apple's Pro devices and, hence, are stuck with the older Apple A16 Bionic chipset, which has one camera short on the back. Having said that, if you are okay with a more compact device, you could get the iPhone 15 Pro instead with its dedicated 3x telephoto camera and newer A17 Pro chipset, as well as 120Hz display refresh rate.

Last but not least, why not consider Google's Pixel 8 Pro? If you are into the Asus clean approach to OS, you will love rocking Google's Android. Not to mention all of the updates to look forward to. The Pixel 8 Pro is also a great flagship device with features like IP68, a QHD+, 120Hz OLED display, and a powerful triple rear camera setup powered by Google's impressive computational photography tech.

Our verdict

We unquestionably enjoyed our time with the Zenfone 11 Ultra. Asus has a very "no-nonsense" approach to smartphone development and the general UX, especially regarding the Zenfone line, which is meant to have a much broader appeal than the ROG Phone.

At the same time, the Zenfone 11 Ultra confuses us on multiple points. Primarily, we are left wondering if this big new Ultra is all for the Zenfone 11 generation or perhaps there is a compact sibling still in the works.

Naturally, Asus is keeping a tight lip on the matter and, on occasion, brings up the Zenfone 10 as a viable compact alternative that will continue to be sold in the foreseeable future.

Let's not beat about the bush here or misrepresent reality. While having a great compact device option is great and losing one of the few compact offers is quite a bummer, for better or worse, a small device is different from what the market generally wants. The shift towards bigger and bigger display diagonals has been ongoing and seemingly unending, and we do not doubt that putting out a 6.78-inch device was the much safer and potentially smarter play for Asus. And yes, it is a bit odd that the Zenfone 11 Ultra is now effectively competing with its own ROG Phone 8 Pro sibling in some respects. But even so, we believe a larger Zenfone just makes more sense in the current market.

As for the Zenfone 11 Ultra itself as a product, we can't find any glaring faults. The only thing that rubbed us the wrong way was the absence of a charger in the retail box. Oh, and perhaps cooling could be better for the beastly Snapdragon 8 Gen 3.

Other than that, we have nothing but praise for the Zenfone 11 Ultra. It is a superb device all around, worthy of rubbing shoulders with the best and most popular premium phones currently out there. Here's hoping it brings Asus some much-needed market success and wider popularity with buyers.

Pros

• IP68-rated body with no-nonsense design.
• Bright OLED with thin bezels and 144Hz refresh rate.
• Awesome battery life.
• Very good stereo speaker setup.
• The Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chipset offers excellent burst performance.
• Great all-around camera performance.

Cons

• No charger in the box.
• Chipset throttles rather aggressively.
• Night mode can be slow without great benefits.