The Taiwan based MNC Asus launched yet another variant in their Zenfone series, called Zenfone Max, a compact one this time, both interms of specs and price as well. Unlike Zenfone Zoom, which was announced recently, Zenfone Max appears to be having mediocre specs.

On the outside, Asus Zenfone Max looks like another typical Asus phone with shiny metal bezel on bottom. This device is a curvy shaped phone with metallic finish having leather rear back cover. So, you wouldn’t find any fingerprint issues or slippery issues while holding this device. Overall, looks wise you’d feel better using it. Coming to display, Asus Zenfone Max has a 5.5 HD LCD display (1280×720 pixels, 178 degree viewing angles at 267 pixel density) with Corning Gorilla Glass 4 protection to avoid screen damage. Even though you would notice this rear while watching HD videos and gaming, but having HD display on 5.5 screen vs FHD would give you a difference in display quality. Nevertheless, you wouldn’t find any hitch with touch sensitivity or viewing angles in this device. Even though FHD displays for 10K are available in the market, Asus choose to make that sacrifice to fit in. Coming to dimensions, Asus Zenfone Max measures 77.5 x 156 x 10.55 ~ mm and weighs 202 grams in hand along with battery inside. With leather material, metallic body and massive battery, this device is little bit heavy as we are seeing more devices with less than 200 grams weight in hand.

Under the hood, Asus Zenfone Max features a 64-bit 1.2 GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 410 SoC coupled with Adreno 306 GPU. This device has 2 GB RAM, 16 GB Flash storage which can be expandable up to 64 GB using MicroSD Card. Asus also offers free 5GB lifetime web storage to its users. Again, coming to the core, these are average specs compared to rivalry these days. That said, you would find rarely any hitch using this device. You can use it to watch HD videos, play some decent Games too. Its storage also expandable, so you can store your multi media stuff as well. This device runs ASUS ZenUI 2.0 on top of Android Lollipop 5.0. Even though having older version of Android could be a downside, but if you aren’t into software, you can use this device without any issue. Also you can expect an OTA update soon.

Coming to Camera section, Asus Zenfone Max features a 13 MP primary (f/2.0, 0.03 sec laser Auto focus, Dual LED Real Tone Flash, 5P Largan lenses) Toshiba sensor camera on the back using PixelMaster 2.0 Technology. Other features of this camera include light speed shots with laser auto focus, built-in auto mode with zero shutter lag, Super HDR mode with 4x brightness and color contrast, Low light mode for better shots in night times. Coming to the front, it has a 5 MP 85 degree wide angle lens with 140 degree selfie panorama. You can use this device to take decent selfies with your near and dear ones.

Now we came to the interesting part of Asus Zenfone Max, which is battery. This device packs a huge 5000 mAh battery with 38 days of standby time, 37.6 hrs of 3G talk time, 32.5 hrs of Wi-Fi web browsing time, up to 22.6 hrs of video playback time. This device can be used as a powerbank using which you can change other devices via OTG.

Coming to Connectivity, Asus Zenfone Max is a 4G enabled dual SIM (Micro-4G + Micro-3G) device supporting Bluetooth 4.0, WiFi 802.11 b/g/n, Wi-Fi Direct, OTG, GPS (GLONASS, AGPS & BDS).

As you can see, this is a mid range smart phone available for ₹9,999 price. That brings us to the next question, Should You buy it? Well, the answer depends on your need pretty much. If you are an adventurer/traveller or who want long battery back up but doesn’t that much crazy about core specs, you can take a look at this device. On the bright side, it has great battery, nice camera and bigger display.

Spec Sheet

• 1.2 GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 410 SoC coupled with Adreno 306 GPU
• 2 GB RAM, 16 GB Flash expandable up to 64 GB via Micro SD + Asus 5GB lifetime free web storage
• ASUS ZenUI 2.0 on top of Android Lollipop v5
• 5.5 HD IPS display(1280×720, @267 ppi) with Corning Gorilla Glass 4 protection
• Dimensions – 77.5 x 156 x 10.55 ~ mm; Weight – 202 grams
• 13 MP (Auto focus, f/2.0, LED flash, Pixel Master) primary camera, 5 MP (Auto focus, f/2.0, 140 degree selfie) camera on the front.
• Dual SIM (Micro 4G + Micro 3G), OTA, Bluetooth 4.0, Wifi 802.11 b/g/n, GPS, wifi direct
• 5000 mAh battery with 914 hours of standby time
• Accelerator, E-Compass, Proximity, Ambient Light Sensor, Hall Sensor
• Black/White color

What do you think of this device? Do let us know in comments!