HomeReviewsAsus ZenFone Max M1 Review: Can it beat the competition?

Asus ZenFone Max M1 Review: Can it beat the competition?

The ZenFone Max M1 will face a lot of heat in this budget segment from its competition. But does it have all the materials to make it a successful budget smartphone? Let's find out.

Pros

DisplayBattery Operating System

Cons

PerformanceRear Camera

Asus recently launched its latest budget-centric smartphones, the ZenFone Max M1 and ZenFone Lite L1, in India. The former comes with a price tag of Rs 7,499, while the latter is priced at Rs 5,999.

The ZenFone Lite is targeted towards first-time users, while it is the ZenFone Max M1 that will face a lot of heat in this budget segment. But does it have all the materials to make it a successful budget smartphone? Let’s find out.

Key Specifications:

Display: 5.45-inch IPS (1440 x 720 pixels), 18:9 aspect ratio, 400nits brightness

Chipset: Octa-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 430

RAM/ROM: 3GB RAM, 32GB storage (expandable up to 256GB)

Rear Camera: 13-megapixel sensor, 4P lens, f/2.0, 1.12um, 0.03s PDAF, Flash

Front Camera: 8-megapixel sensor, 3P Lens, f/2.2,1.12um, LED Flash

Battery: 4000mAh

Operating System: 8.1 Oreo with ZenUI 5.0

Connectivity: dual-SIM, VoLTE, GPS, GLONASS, 4.0, microSD card, port

What we like about the ZenFone Max M1

Asus Zenfone Max M1

Starting with the first thing we liked about this smartphone is its design (Click here for Asus Zenfone Max M1 picture gallery). You get a metallic finish at the back and rounded edges around the corners make it comfortable to hold in your hands. The gives a pretty standard look if you ask us, though it sure feels lightweight. It is not slippery in nature and it sure looks good when you hold in your hands.

Another we liked about the ZenFone Max M1 is the display. The phone features a 5.45-inch HD+ display with a screen of 1440 x 720 pixels, 18:9 aspect ratio. The display delivers good colour output and the viewing angles are decent as well. Whether be it playing games or watching some movies, you will not feel disappointed. The outdoor visibility of the phone is pretty decent as compared to other smartphones in this price segment.

Asus Zenfone Max M1

The company has added a 4000mAh battery in this smartphone, which delivers some good results. On a normal day when you are using the phone for basic tasks like Facebook, WhatsApp, checking emails and more, the phone comfortably lasts a day with some battery juice still left in it. When you stretch the performance, it still comfortably last a day.

Lastly, the user interface is smooth and easy to use. We liked the fact that the company has cut down on the bloatware, which gives more storage and for its potential users. There two apps that we found to handy, Mobile Manager and Power Master. The Mobile Manager helps in scanning the device, control data usage, clean the unwanted apps and cache files, and manage secure & permissions of the apps. Then there is Power Master app that allows to reverse charge, increase lifespan when the battery is low and one can also prevent apps from auto-starting. Apart from this, there is twin app support, the Game Genie that optimises the games and more.

What we didn’t like about ZenFone Max M1

One area where the ZenFone Max M1 is slightly weak as compare to its competitors is the performance. The brand has opted for an octa-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 430 chipset. The phone is able to handle basic tasks quite effectively, although when start performing some computing-hungry task then it starts to show some sign of lag. The phone is able to handle most of the casual games without breaking a sweat, though it is simply not meant for some high-end games. We wished, Asus would have gone with a newer as most of its competition has now switched to newer processors both from Qualcomm and MediaTek.

Asus Zenfone Max M1

Another area where the device struggle is the camera department. It is equipped with a 13-megapixel rear camera with f/2.0 aperture, 1.12-micron size, PDAF and LED flash. For the front, there is an 8-megapixel shooter with f/2.2 aperture, 1.12-micron pixel size and LED flash. In our testing, we found out the phone was struggling to lock focus on the subject, especially, when you want to click some macro or close up shots (Click here to check the camera samples of the Zenfone Max M1). We also felt the photos were not bright enough and the colours looked a bit dull in this one. The low light performance is average as well and the photos were grainy and noisy in nature. Interestingly, the selfie camera performed better as compared to the rear and we liked the as it was able to differentiate between the subject and background and blurs out the latter without any bleeding around edges.

Verdict

The Asus ZenFone Max M1 comes loaded with a good design language and the display looks bright. The user interface is clean and the battery performance is on par with the rest of the competition. However, using a chipset of 2015 has its own share of hits and miss. It would have been better if the company opted for an advance chipset like a MediaTek Helio P22, which is present in Lenovo K9 and Xiaomi Redmi 6, or even Snapdragon 435. Event Realme is offering a better Snapdragon 450 chipset with its Realme C1 budget offering. The camera needs some fine tuning and overall, if you are considering to buy this smartphone, then you should check for its competition first.

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