Asus ROG Phone 9 and 9 Pro arrive with SD 8 Elite, bigger batteries and better cooling

Last year, the Asus ROG Phone 8 took a big step towards becoming more practical for everyday use with an IP68 rating and a telephoto camera. But Asus hasn’t forgotten that this is a gaming phone, so the new model this year increases performance on all fronts.

Asus ROG Phone 9 series

The Asus ROG Phone 9 and 9 Pro are powered by the Snapdragon 8 Elite, which is paired with up to 16GB of LPDDR5X RAM (9,600Mbps) and up to 512GB UFS 4.0 storage on the vanilla model and up to 24GB and 1TB on the Pro (there are other differences that we will get to). According to Asus, the 8 Elite has a 45% advantage in CPU performance, a 40% faster GPU and a 40% faster NPU, compared to the 8 Gen 3 inside the previous ROG Phone.

The improved cooling system now features a 57% larger graphite sheet, which helps keep the new phones running several degrees cooler compared to the 8-series. There is an improved active cooler too, but it’s more than just a cooler. As usual, the Asus ROG series excels when it comes to first-party accessories.

The in-box AeroCase as well as the optional Chill Case feature “Audio Redirection”. They are shaped so that the sound from the bottom-firing speaker is redirected forwards. Combined with the front-firing top speaker, you get a better stereo experience.

There’s more – the AeroActive Cooler X Pro has a subwoofer, so that you get 2.1 sound with it (this was present on the AeroActive Cooler 7, but was removed from the Cooler X last year). The Cooler also has two hardware shoulder buttons to go with the AirTriggers that are on the phone itself. The cooling performance has been improved as well with larger fan blades (+12.5%) and more thermal compound, resulting in 29% better cooling.

Like last year, the Asus ROG Phone 9 and 9 Pro have 6.78” AMOLED displays with FHD+ resolution, 1,600 nits brightness in high brightness mode (2,500 nits peak) and 107% DCI-P3 coverage. This year’s upgrade is that you can enable a 185Hz refresh rate from the Game Genie (up from 165Hz last year). This will only be supported in select games.

But there is a second display on board, sort of. Now both models have AniMe Vision – a grid of mini-LEDs that can be used to customize the look of the phone. The ROG Phone 9 has 85 LEDs (the previous vanilla version just had four RGB LEDs), while the ROG Phone 9 Pro has 648 LEDs – that’s almost double the 341 LEDs that the 8 Pro had.

There is some method to Asus’ madness. The AniMe Vision on the Pro has enough resolution to render text in Chinese and Japanese. And you can upload GIFs to add animations instead. There is one more trick on this AniMe Vision display – games! There are four retro games (based on Breakout, Snake, Invaders and one more) that you play on the back of the phone using the AirTriggers.

Back to more practical features, the Asus ROG Phone 9 pair is equipped with 5,800mAh batteries, that’s 300mAh more than the old model. The battery should last at least 4.5 hours of heavy gaming. Asus says that it will retain at least 80% of its original capacity after 1,000 cycles (that’s three years of daily charging). Charging is rated at 65W over USB-C and 15W wirelessly. The extra capacity slows down charging a bit, 0-100% is done in 46 minutes over a wire (up from 39 minutes on the old one).

Let’s talk about the camera. Both phones use a 50MP main based on the 1/1.56” Sony Lytia 700 sensor. The 6-axis hybrid gimbal stabilization has been improved and now corrects +/-5°, up from +/-3°. The 13MP ultra wide camera on the back and the 32MP selfie camera (with an RGBW sensor and a 22mm lens) are the same.

This only leaves the telephoto module – the Pro uses the same 3x 32MP module (1/3” sensor) from last year, while the vanilla model doesn’t have one (even though the ROG Phone 8 did). Instead, there is a 5MP macro camera on the vanilla ROG Phone 9.

A few more things worth mentioning are that, of course the ROG Phone 9 and 9 Pro have a 3.5mm headphone jack. It was tuned by Dirac and supports high-resolution binaural technology called Dirac Virtuo. Wireless options include aptX Lossless and the phone is certified for both Hi-Res Audio and Hi-Res Audio Wireless. We mentioned the Chill Case, that is a passive cooling option with a built-in vapor chamber to help the phone spread out the heat and reduce temperatures by up to 17%. This case also has the Audio Redirection feature.

Asus will deliver two OS updates to the ROG Phone 9 and 9 Pro and will issue security updates for five years, which is one year extra compared to the ROG Phone 8.

Asus ROG Phone 9 Pro

Asus ROG Phone 9

The Asus ROG Phone 9 and 9 Pro can be pre-ordered starting today. For Taiwan, Hong Kong and mainland China, they will start shipping tomorrow. In Europe (including the UK), shipping will start in December. The US launch is set for January 2025, more details to follow. Other regions will see the new models later on. The prices are below. Note that the Edition model comes with an AeroActive Cooler X Pro bundled.