Asus Zenfone 3S Max Review: Big Battery, Affordable Pricing

Asus is slowly and steadily gaining traction in the Indian Smartphones market with their Zenfone series Android Smartphones. The Asus Zenfone lineup of Smartphones offers the best Android experience both in terms of hardware and software, all at a very pocket-friendly price. This post is all about Asus Zenfone 3S Max Review!

The latest entry into the lineup of Asus Zenfone Smartphones is the Asus Zenfone 3S Max. The main highlight of the Asus Zenfone 3S Max is its monstrous 5000mAh battery, and apart from that, the device also features some really impressive hardware specifications. Overall, the Zenfone 3S Max is indeed one of the best contenders in the 15k rupees price range in India.

We finally got our hands on the latest Asus Zenfone 3S Max Android handset and after a thorough inspection, today we bring you a detailed review of the Asus Zenfone 3S Max Android Smartphone.

Asus Zenfone 3S Max Review:

Interested to know more about the latest Asus Zenfone 3S Max? Then go ahead and dive straight into our detailed analysis of the Asus Zenfone 3S Max.

What do you get inside the box?

The retail packaging of the Asus Zenfone 3S Max is decent. Not something to keep a memory of, but decent enough. Tearing off the plastic wrap and sliding the outer box

Tearing off the plastic wrap and sliding the outer box reveals the phone itself wrapped in plastic. Taking away the phone and lifting the lid reveals the other contents of the retail box that includes documentation regarding the device, a 5V, 2Amps charger brick and a plug-in port that goes in the charger, a SIM ejector tool, a USB cable for charging and data syncing, and surprisingly enough, a pair of Asus-branded earphones are bundled as well, something that is absent from almost every other budget-oriented Android Smartphones out there.

That’s all that you should be expecting to come with the retail package of your Asus Zenfone 3S

Asus Zenfone 3S Max Hardware Specifications:

Before we actually jump into the review of the Asus Zenfone 3S Max, let us quickly glide through the key Asus Zenfone 3S Max hardware specifications to get a clear picture of what’s powering the device:

•  5.2-inch IPS LCD display with an HD screen resolution of 720×1280 pixels and 2282 PPI.
• 1.5GHz octa-core Mediatek MT6750 processor.
• Mali T860 GPU.
• 3GB RAM.
• 32GB inbuilt storage with hybrid MicroSD card slot for storage expansion up to 256GB.
• Dual-SIM slots, Micro-SIM/Nano-SIM (secondary SIM can also be used to insert a MicroSD card).
• 4G LTE connectivity and VoLTE support.
• Android 7.0 Nougat operating system with Asus ZenUI 3.0 on top.
• 13MP primary camera sensor wth f/2.0 aperture and Dual-LED flash.
• 8MP secondary camera.
• Fingerprint scanner mounted below the display in the front.
• Inbuilt sensors include an accelerometer, proximity sensor, compass and gyroscope sensor.
• 5000mAh non-removable battery.
• Available color options are Black and Gold.

Asus Zenfone 3S Max Design:

The Asus Zenfone 3S Max features some really impressive built quality thanks to its aluminum unibody construction.

The top of the device features the 3.5mm headphone jack. To the right, you can see the volume rockers and the power ON/OFF button. The power button has a textured pattern on them, so it is quite easy to understand and use the button, even without constantly looking to know which button you are about to press.

The bottom of the device features the microphone port on one end and a mono loudspeaker on the other end, between them a micro-USB port is placed for charging and syncing purposes.

The rear portion of the device features the 13MP primary camera at the top left corner with a Dual-LED flash next to it. In the rear middle, the Asus branding is placed.

The 5MP front-facing camera, the earpiece and an array of sensors cover the top of the front portion along with a LED notification light, beneath which lies an Asus branding followed by the 5.2-inch 720p HD display and followed by the fingerprint scanner.

The device does away with capacitive navigation buttons as now they are placed within the display as software keys.

Asus Zenfone 3S Max Performance:

The Asus Zenfone 3S Max features a 5.2-inch IPS LCD display which is fairly adequate in size, however, Asus opted to provide a 720p HD panel for the display which leads to a poor PPI. Even though the display viewing experience is not worst, viewing angles and outdoor visibility is average at best.

There is the latest Android version 7.0 Nougat running on the device with Asus-built ZenUI 3.0 user interface on top. The latest ZenUI 3.0 interface brings many intuitive features such as “Game Genie”, which lets you live broadcast game plays over on YouTube or Twitch. Apart from that, you can use the forums to find more cheats and advice on games that work best on your Asus device.

The ZenUI 3.0 also features a theme store which can be used to customize the look and feel of your device software as per your likes. The Mobile Manager app within ZenUI 3.0 lets you do several tasks such as monitor power consumption, manage device notifications and diagnose memory and device issues.

The 1.5GHz octa-core Mediatek processor coupled with 3GB of RAM ensures a very impressive overall experience. The Asus Zenfone 3S Max can run high-end games like Asphalt 8, Modern Combat 5 and Nova 3 without breaking a sweat. Even multitasking is smooth with the Zenfone 3S Max, thanks to its hardware power and the latest software version that it runs on.

The fingerprint scanner that is placed beneath the display is really accurate and has ample space to place your finger conveniently while using it. The sensor registers fingerprint really quick and response times are also super-fast. After registering the fingerprint, you just need to rest your registered finger next to the sensor with no requirement of pressing the button.

Talking about the camera performance, the 13MP primary camera with its Dual-LED flash yields some really crisp and detailed photos when given with ample lighting. As the lighting condition goes dim, noise and lack of detail degrade the image quality of the rear camera. The camera performance is further improvised with the software features and modes that are inbuilt to the ZenUI 3.0 camera interface.

The 5MP selfie shooter may not be the best we have seen but gets the job done. Selfies taken from the Zenfone 3S Max are good enough for social media uploads but the performance could have been better. Overall the camera performance from both the rear and front sensors are just average.

Asus Zenfone 3S Max Battery Performance:

Unlike its competitors, the battery of the Zenfone 3S Max needs a special mention just because of its size. The 5000mAh battery is huge enough to dwarf battery backup performance of any competing Smartphones in its price range.

The huge size means that the battery on the Asus Zenfone 3S Max can easily take you through a day and more worth of battery backup when fully charged. No matter whether you are a heavy Smartphone user who is always into gaming, chatting and watching videos or someone who barely uses their Smartphone to pass time when bored, the battery backup will never leave you disappointed. During the review phase, the Zenfone 3S Max gave me an impressive battery backup of over 2 days even while consuming 4G data using the Reliance Jio network.

Asus Zenfone 3S Max Price and Availability:

The Asus Zenfone 3S Max is priced at Rs. 14,999 in India and both the Black and Gold color variants are currently available exclusively online via Flipkart.com.

Final Words:

Hope you found this super-lengthy and in-depth review of the Asus Zenfone 3S Max informative. If you like the Asus Zenfone 3S Max Review, do share it! I have tried to include and review almost every important aspect of the device so as to give you a better perspective of the Zenfone 3S Max, in case you are thinking to buy it.

For any further doubts or queries related to the device, please leave them as comments below.