Despite the rumors about the closure of the Zenfone line, ASUS is not going to abandon it yet and is preparing a new flagship smartphone – Zenfone 11 Ultra. Information about it was published by insiders Evan Blass and Mukul Sharma, which allows us to evaluate the design of the model and its expected characteristics.

Zenfone 11 Ultra will have a similar design to ROG Phone 8 and ROG Phone 8 Pro with a large camera unit that protrudes noticeably from the body, relatively thin display bezels, and a front camera notch.

The same applies not only to the design, but also to the screen and other characteristics. Zenfone 11 Ultra will have a 6.78-inch LTPO AMOLED display with a resolution of 2400×1080 pixels, an aspect ratio of 20:9, and a refresh rate of 1 to 144 Hz. The only difference here is in the refresh rate, which is less than the 165 Hz declared in ROG Phone 8. However, we can assume that the maximum brightness will be at the same level – 1600 nits in normal mode and 2500 nits in automatic mode.

For the Zenfone 11 Ultra platform, ASUS will also use the top-of-the-line Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 processor with Adreno 750 graphics, up to 16 GB of LPDDR5X RAM, and up to 512 GB of UFS 4.0 storage. The leak doesn’t specify this information, but given the ROG Phone 8’s specs, it’s likely that the Zenfone 11 Ultra will also feature the latest Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 5.3 wireless protocols. The device will also have the ability to connect wired headphones via a 3.5 mm jack and stereo speakers with Dirac settings.

Zenfone 11 Ultra will have three main cameras:

• 50 MP wide-angle Sony IMX890 with gimbal-type optical stabilization;
• 13 MP ultra-wide-angle camera with a viewing angle of 120°;
• 32 MP telephoto with 3x optical zoom and optical stabilization.

The front camera in the smartphone is 32-megapixel with an RGBW sensor.

The built-in battery in Zenfone 11 Ultra will have a capacity of 5500 mAh with support for fast wired charging up to 65W and wireless charging up to 15W.

In general, from the characteristics and design, we can conclude that the Zenfone 11 Ultra is almost a complete copy of the ROG Phone 8. This is a new strategy for ASUS, which previously released compact 5.9-inch models in the Zenfone lineup, the latest of which was the Zenfone 10. At the same time, it is still unclear whether ASUS will continue to produce more compact smartphones or whether the rumors are true and the ROG Phone team will be developing the entire mobile business, while the Zenfone line will remain only as a rebranding of gaming models.