TechRadar Verdict
It's very hard to recommend Asus Zenfone Live at this price point. It just has one stand-out feature aimed at live streaming, and it still doesn't justify the old set of hardware running inside.
Pros
- +
Light weight and handy
- +
Good display for outdoor viewing
- +
Pedometer
Cons
- -
Mediocre performance
- -
Average camera
- -
Heating issues
- -
Bloatware apps
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Asus recently unveiled the Zenfone Live smartphone in India, which was being teased days before its launch with hashtag #GoLive. It is being touted as the world’s first smartphone with real-time beautification technology for live-streaming.
Asus Zenfone Live comes with company’s unique hardware optimised for live beautification app named BeautyLive that fixes blemishes and beautifies the face in real time. It does not have the best hardware in its segment but the smartphone is unique in its own way, which might be one small reason to consider the smartphone over its competitors.
The growing trend of live videos has took over the conventional medium for mass connect. Sensing the emergence of the medium, Asus has become the first one to add a flavour to the live streaming trend. Looking at the overall offering, the Live feature feels gimmicky for the price it comes for. So if you are not confident about your looks and want to add up artificial beautification while live streaming, then this can help you.
I have been playing with the Zenfone Live from few days now, and here is what I have learnt after experiencing the device.
Display
The smartphone comes with a 5-inch IPS LCD display with HD (720p) resolution. The display gets pretty bright in outdoors, which I feel is the best thing about this display. It can be viewed from extreme angles even in bright lighting conditions.
Apart from this, the display doesn't produce the best colours, and looks slightly dull when compared to competing smartphones in the category. Still, Asus has given an option to tweak the colour tones in the display settings, but it’s not that effective.
The display has a black border on the sides, which looks slightly odd considering the level we have reached in a smartphone design. I would not call it a bad display but it is not an outstanding display either. It doesn’t look very crisp and punchy, but still gets the job done.
Design
The Zenfone Live has a typical iPhone like design, and it’s something that’s already seen on many other phones. But that doesn’t mean the phone looks bad or ugly in anyway, it has a very handy and lightweight design, which seems perfect for one handed usage. Unlike many phones in this range, it has a plastic build, which Asus says has a metallic finish on top. The rim surrounding the edges is made up of sturdy metal and has a rounded finish for better in hand feel.
On the front, it has a 2.5D curved glass to give it a seamless in-hand feel. Asus has incorporated the capacitive navigation keys at the bottom bezel, but sadly they aren’t backlit. Volume rocker and power/lock key is on the right that offer tactile feedback. You can also double tap the volume rocker to open up the camera from the lock screen. SIM tray is on the left, 3.5mm audio jack is at the top, while the loudspeaker grill and micro USB port reside at the bottom.
The camera module is baked on the top left corner along with a LED flash right below it. Being a live stream centric smartphone, having a front LED flash is pretty evident.
The best thing about the design is its thinness and light weight. It weighs just 120 grams and is 8mm thick. And the biggest downside is the absence of a fingerprint sensor, which is now a norm on most smartphones these days.
