Asus recently launched its Zenfone 4 Selfie range of smartphones in India. The Taiwanese brand launched three smartphones- Asus Zenfone 4 Selfie (ZB553KL), ZenFone 4 Selfie (Dual Camera Version) (ZD553KL), and ZenFone 4 Selfie Pro (ZD552KL) (First Impressions).
The Zenfone 4 Selfie range of devices is aimed at competing with devices such from Oppo and Vivo. Apart from Asus Zenfone 4 Selfie devices, the company also has regular smartphones such as mid-range Asus Zenfone 4 with gorgeous design, Asus Zenfone 4 Max for battery centric users, and a flagship Asus Zenfone 4 Pro. That said, these smartphones will land in India at a later date.
For now, we have the Asus Zenfone 4 Selfie smartphones from the company. And today, we have the base variant- the Asus Zenfone 4 Selfie (ZB553KL) with us for review. Here's our first look at the smartphone.
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Design and Display
The highlight of all the Asus Zenfone 4 smartphones is the design language. Asus has used its traditional design language, and the Zenfone 4 Selfie is no exception. The smartphone features unimetal body design and weighs just 144 grams. The volume rockers and the power button is placed at the right side, while the SIM card tray is present at the left side.
The Zenfone 4 Selfie comes with a 5.5-inch display. Below the display, there are three capacitive hardware keys, which also includes a home button. The fingerprint sensor is integrated into the home button, which unlocks the smartphone in a split second.
Design wise, the Zenfone 4 Selfie feels very good in hands, credit to Asus for keeping the design minimal and simple. The letdown comes in the form display though because this 5.5-inch panel has HD resolution, unlike the Full HD one seen on many smartphones releasing these days. But the display seems to offer decent sunlight legibility and vibrant colours. Sadly, the display of the Zenfone 4 Selfie is a fingerprint magnet, which affects the viewing angles.
Hardware, Connectivity, and Software
Being priced at Rs. 9,999, Asus is offering entry-level hardware in the form of Qualcomm Snapdragon 430 chip, 3GB of RAM, and 32GB of internal storage. Addition of an extra gig of RAM and double the storage would have made the device a compelling one, but this smartphone is all about its cameras.
In my brief time with the smartphone, the Snapdragon 430 SoC handled all the basic tasks with ease. That said, I did not test the device with intensive games. The smartphone features all the basic connectivity options such as 4G LTE, VoLTE, Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n, Bluetooth, GPS, and micro USB port. The smartphone has a 3000mAh battery with no mentioning for fast charging support.
The software side of things, the Zenfone 4 Selfie ships with Android 7.1.1 Nougat based Zen UI 4.0. Asus tweaked the entire UI this time around, and more importantly, the brand removed the entire bloatware it used to bundle in earlier iterations of the Zen UI, which is a welcome change.
Cameras
The highlight of the Asus Zenfone 4 Selfie is its 13MP selfie camera. Asus is competing with other Chinese brands such as Vivo and Oppo for the selfie race. But both Oppo and Vivo's presence is in the Rs. 15,000 to Rs. 20,000 segment and Asus has put this device under Rs. 10,000.
Specs wise, the 13MP selfie camera in the Zenfone 4 Selfie has f/2.0 aperture, and soft LED flash. The smartphone's camera app is tweaked a lot to offer various modes. The Asus SelfieMaster technology offers features such as smart beautification in selfies, videos, and live streams.
Coming back to the rear camera, the Zenfone 4 Selfie has a 13MP sensor at the back, which has a f/2.2 aperture, and LED flash support. Asus has added 3-axis Electronic Image Stabilisation (EIS) support which comes in handy while recording the videos. The rear camera can record videos of Full HD quality at 30fps.
The Zenfone 4 Selfie seems to be a great camera smartphone, at least on paper. We will be testing the cameras of the smartphone in coming days.
Conclusion
Overall, the Asus Zenfone 4 Selfie base variant seems to be a great contender in the sub-Rs. 10,000 price point, especially with its cameras. However, there are some letdowns as well such as the HD display, 3gigs of RAM.
The Asus Zenfone 4 Selfie is priced at Rs. 9,999 and is exclusive to Flipkart. The Zenfone 4 Selfie Dual camera version is priced at Rs. 14,999, but as a part of the Flipkart Big Billion Days, the device is available for just Rs. 13,999. Flipkart is already selling the smartphones. You can head over to the e-commerce site and grab the latest Asus Zenfone 4 Selfie smartphones.
