Asus launched a phone that it doesn't want to sell

Asus launched its latest phone, Rog Phone 6 and Rog Phone 6 Pro, in early July in India. But with the announcement, Asus did not mention when the phone would be going on sale. 

We called Asus Rog Phone 6 the first Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 1 smartphone in India. But we did not know back then Asus would be putting the sale of the phone on indefinite hold.

Fast forward almost two months; there is no sign of Rog Phone 6 in India. Other phones have launched after Rog Phone 6 and have gone on sale since then. It's almost like Asus itself forgot about the phone.

OK, Asus did not totally forget about the phone

Asus have been sharing promotional tweets for the phone occasionally in the month of August, as you can see below:

We can also see many users asking about the phone's launch date in the replies. But Asus Twitter handle only asks the users to wait for an official announcement, and nothing more. 

There isn't even a Flipkart listing for the phone

Usually, when a phone launches and is supposed to go on sale on Flipkart in the future, there will be a product listing for the product. In the product listing, we can click on the "Notify Me" button to get a notification in the mail when the product goes live on sale. 

But for Rog Phone 6, we cannot see a product listing. We don't even know a product feature page on Flipkart. And Flipkart doesn't even mention this phone in the upcoming sales section. 

The product is listed on the Asus India website. It shows the Notify Me in the product listing. 

Why launch phones when no one can buy it? 

This is the question we want to ask Asus. Asus launched this phone back in July in India. We can't mention it as a launch, but it could be said only as an announcement. 

But why announce the product when there is no intention of selling the product anytime soon? 

The phone was launched as India's first Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 1 phone. But two other phones went on sale in India now, the OnePlus 10T and iQoo 9T. 

One more thing to note is that something like this has happened before, with the Asus 8z launch in India. Despite teasing the phone for a long time after its global launch in May 2021, Asus took its time to get the phone to the Indian market. When it finally launched here in India almost a year in February, all the hype and interest in that phone died out as the phone came here as an outdated phone and did not manage to sell it well here. Will Asus repeat this blunder with Rog Phone 6 too?

Also, Asus is rumoured to launch a new version of Rog Phone 6 on the global market, Rog Phone 6D and Rog Phone 6D Ultimate. Both are the Dimensity 9000+ versions of Rog Phone 6 and Rog Phone 6 Pro. 

We have asked the brand about the cause of the delay in the sale of the phone; we will update the article with the inputs when we receive it.

Whatever the reason for the delay, I hope Asus sorts out the issues and brings the phones on sale as soon as possible.

• Upcoming phone launches in India for September 2022