ASUS is now rumored to be working on a cheaper ROG Phone 9 variant that would give gamers the benefits of the newly announced model of the phone while paying a lower official price point.
If you’re unfamiliar with the ROG Phone series, they’re not generally super affordable when it comes to phones. ASUS tends to go all out and packs each iteration with the current year’s top specs. From the flagship Qualcomm Snapdragon mobile platform to large amounts of RAM and storage. On top of that, it does a lot of work to make the phone as gamer-friendly as possible. Thanks to things like the AirTriggers and ASUS’s top-notch gaming software features.
The downside to all this is, of course, the cost. The ROG Phone 9 series (which hasn’t yet launched in the US), will start at a base cost of $1,000. That gets you the standard ROG Phone 9 with 12GB of RAM and 256GB of storage. Then there’s the $1,200 ROG Phone 9 Pro which bumps the RAM up to 16GB and the storage up to 512GB. The biggest and baddest of them all is the $1,500 ROG Phone 9 Pro Edition, which has 24GB of RAM and 1TB of storage. it also comes with the AeroActive Cooler X Pro in the box.
Just about everything else is the same, save for the AniME Vision display on the back. The standard model has fewer mini-LEDs than the two Pro models. But they all use the same display with the same refresh rate. They also all sport the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite mobile platform. This is where a cheaper ROG Phone 9 might differentiate itself, assuming the rumors are true.
A cheaper ROG Phone 9 has seemingly been spotted in the Wi-Fi Alliance database
While ASUS hasn’t confirmed a less expensive version of its latest ROG Phone, a device with a similar ROG Phone model number has been spotted on the Wi-Fi Alliance database by 91mobiles. According to those reports, the device is being labeled as the “ROG Phone 9 FE,” a name that popped up before back at the end of October. There are two key things to note about this device.
First, the model number is listed as ASUS_AI2401_N. This is almost identical to the model for the ROG Phone 8 which is listed as ASUS_AI2401. So the “N” part of the model number would seem to be the difference here. The other thing to consider is the “FE” part of the name. ASUS has never released an “FE” device before. Samsung does though, and these are generally less expensive versions of its main Galaxy S flagships. Not too unlike what Google does with the Pixel A series phones.
It’s also worth remembering that ASUS may not actually name it the ROG Phone 9 FE. If it even releases the phone at all.
The phone may come with a Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 3
ASUS has a few courses of action it could take to lessen the cost of its current gaming phone. With a cheaper model in the works, one big factor to lower the price could be using last year’s flagship mobile platform. In this case, the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3. This is the mobile platform that was used on the ROG Phone 8 series. As Android Central points out, it’s likely the most convenient way to bring the price down and offer something more affordable.
That being said, there’s no guarantee that this is what ASUS will do. It could also offer a phone with less RAM and storage. However, it seems more reasonable that ASUS would keep the RAM and storage the same as the base model ROG Phone 9. ASUS launched a less expensive version of its ROG Phone devices once before with the ROG Phone 6D. This device came with a MediaTek Dimensity 9000+ instead of the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1. It also has a slightly lower peak brightness on the display.
Most of everything else was the same though. RAM options were set at 12GB and 16GB, while storage was set at 256GB. These were options you could get with the standard ROG Phone 6. So the only real major difference was the chipset. ASUS might go this route with a less expensive version of the ROG Phone 9 series. This is all speculation, of course, until ASUS officially announces something. It’s also unclear what markets ASUS would launch this phone in if it ever comes out.
