TL;DR
- ASUS has quietly revealed the ROG Phone 9 FE in one country.
- The phone is effectively a ROG Phone 8, featuring a Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chip and the firm’s AniMe Vision lighting.
- The new handset is available for ~$890 in Thailand, but there’s no word on a wider release.
ASUS launched the ROG Phone 9 series late last year, offering a gaming phone line with a ton of horsepower and plenty of features. What if you want something a little more affordable, though? The company has quietly launched the ROG Phone 9 FE in one market.
ASUS stealthily unveiled the ROG Phone 9 FE in Thailand (h/t: Android Treasure), and it has a lot in common with the ROG Phone 8. Starting with the design, the phone looks very similar to recent ROG devices. The device also has last year’s Anime Vision lighting on the back (featuring 341 LEDs), AirTrigger keys for gaming, and an IP68 rating.
Dive under the hood, and you’ll find an older Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chip instead of the brand-new Snapdragon 8 Elite. But this is still a beefy processor backed up by the brand’s GameCool cooling system. That chipset powers a 6.78-inch 185Hz OLED screen (FHD+, Gorilla Glass Victus 2), featuring 2,500 nits of peak brightness and 1,600 nits in high-brightness mode.
What else does the ROG Phone 9 FE offer?
The ROG Phone 9 FE has a 5,500mAh battery which is in line with the ROG Phone 8 line but a slight drop from the mainline ROG Phone 9 handsets. Fortunately, you can take advantage of speedy 65W wired charging (USB-PD) or 15W wireless charging.
The camera system also looks like it’s ripped from the vanilla ROG Phone 9 or Indian ROG Phone 8. Thee’s a 50MP main camera (IMX890, gimbal stabilization), a 13MP ultrawide shooter with a free-form lens, and a 5MP macro sensor. Switch to the front and you’ll find a 32MP selfie camera, featuring an RGBW color filter for improved low-light snaps in theory.
Other notable features include a 3.5mm port, Bluetooth 5.4, ROG UI atop Android 15, Wi-Fi 7, and a variety of AI features (e.g. transcription, call translation, wallpaper generation).
The ASUS ROG Phone 9 FE is available in a single 16GB/256GB variant in Thailand and will cost 29,990 baht (~$890). We’ve asked ASUS about a wider release and will update the article when it gets back to us with an answer. We’re not sure how pricing in the US or EU would compare to the standard ROG Phone 9, which retails for $999 and €1,099. It’s also worth noting that the standard ROG Phone 8 can be found at a cheaper price these days.
