The ASUS Zenfone 8 Hands-On Review: A New Compact Direction
by Andrei Frumusanu on May 12, 2021 1:30 PM EST- Posted in
- Smartphones
- Asus
- Mobile
- Zenfone 8
GPU Performance
GPU performance of the Zenfone 8 is interesting given that’s it’s currently the smallest Snapdragon 888 device we have at hand. We’ve had determined that the Snapdragon 888 is a quite power hungry SoC, so combining this with a smaller phone which has a lesser thermal envelope isn’t quite the recipe for success.
Throughout the benchmark scores, we can indeed see that while the Zenfone 8 outperforms the Zenfone 7 Pro quite easily when it comes to the peak performance, the new smaller phone actually regresses its sustained performance to below the levels of its predecessor once the device heats up and becomes thermally saturated. ASUS has quite reasonable thermals here and the phone doesn’t exceed 42-43°C peak skin temperatures which is a reasonable and good behaviour, it’s just that the resulting power levels here mean that the SoC and GPU have to throttle quite a bit.
The end results aren’t bad, and the phone is still plenty competitive, it’s just that it doesn’t really showcase any performance advantage over the last generation of devices.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
66 Comments
View All Comments
MrGutts - Thursday, May 13, 2021 - link
So let me get this right, the smaller version has a headphone jack but not the much larger unit?arashi - Sunday, May 16, 2021 - link
The larger unit is literally the old version with updated SoC. Laziest upgrade.Kangal - Tuesday, May 18, 2021 - link
The new QSD 888 isn't that much faster than the QSD 865, due to throttling. And the QSD 865 itself isn't that much faster than the QSD 855. Basically having QSD 855 in 2022 is still considered luxury/"flagship" level, unless you're in the iOS Market. With that said, the new "high-end" level chipset, QSD 780, is around the QSD 860 level. So that's a bargain. Maybe that's what ASUS should've gone for instead.After a year (or two), we should see a better, newer and optimised AndroidOS version, that is running on the next platform ARMv9. So I expect a good performance leap up from the QSD 888+, similar (probably better) to the performance leap from the Early QSD 845 to the Later QSD 855+.
XMight - Thursday, May 13, 2021 - link
Looks cool phone, the kind I would use, but, has 2 drawbacks:1. no sd card slot. Its not the problem that 128 GB is not enough for me, its just having the possibility to store data outside internal memory and access it fast without plugging the phone in a PC.
2. No FM radio in Europe. I'm tired of this, honestly. I look forward when Europe will force by law, like US, phone manufacturers to include FM radio. I really enjoy FM radio and even if I have unlimited plan, FM radio sounds way cooler and it feels more real-time than internet radio with apps with lots of ads and bloatware. Radio on Nokia 5 sounds really cool. I waited for Sony 5 III, which could have been my next phone, but no radio. Sony 10 III has no gyro, and I look at the stars with the phone through stellarium.
And the whole issue is that there isn't a single phone on the market that has: SDCARD, FM RADIO, dualsim, GYRO, Snapdragon CPU, IP rating, 3.5mm, small form-factor at the same time. So, I will stick to my Nokia 5 and Sony XZ1 compact combination for a few more years. I really hate this marketing crap the companies are pulling for forcing people buy something they aren't 100% satisfied with at the moment so they will feel incentivized when a new phone with something they wanted appears, but misses something else they had before.
msildoja - Monday, July 5, 2021 - link
Totally agree with the second part. No good compact phone on the market. Purchased xperia 5ii but returned it as it was too long. Went for asus zf8, but it has so poor battery life compared to xpetia 5ii. Sad. Reall no good phones available after sony ditched the compact series.yetanotherhuman - Friday, July 9, 2021 - link
Yeah, it's incredibly tiring. I recently got a new phone, but it was too big. I left it in the box and carried on using my 4 year old phone instead.patel21 - Thursday, May 13, 2021 - link
Hi Andrei,Wouldn't a 870 or even 865 make more sense in a compact phone like this which isn't able to use 888 to its fullest?
They could even shave off a bit from price and the battery would also last longer
sheh - Thursday, May 13, 2021 - link
Roughly the same size as the S10 and S20.A good start, but shaving extra 2-3mm width and 10mm height would be welcome.
tkSteveFOX - Friday, May 14, 2021 - link
Strange, other reviews praise the camera for the price, but I also looked at their photos and more willing to go with your assumption.Ultrawide especially was lacking in fine detail even in broad daylight, and there's too much sharpening going in postprocessing. The main camera looks decent, but got to be expecting better than IMX686, however the front camera is miles better than anything in that price range.
SolarBear28 - Friday, May 14, 2021 - link
This is pretty much the size and price I'd want for my next phone. My 2018 Galaxy A8 is a fantastic device and still getting quarterly security updates. I'd like to stick with Samsung for their Good Lock and One Hand Operation apps but they don't makes any good phones under 6" anymore. The S21 is a fantastic device but slightly bigger and slightly more expensive than I'd like.