ROG Phone 5 comes in regular, Pro and Ultimate editions, up to

(Pocket-lint) – Asus has announced the new version of its dedicated gaming phone, the ROG Phone 5. There will be a number of different versions of this phone, with three variants of the regular device – and a Pro and Ultimate version too.

All the devices share a similar design, coming in black or white, with a contrasting side button. The rear of the phone gets an RGB area, with lighting to allow you to customise and get notifications from that logo. 

But it’s only the regular phone that has the RGB logo, with the Pro and Ultimate versions getting a ROG Vision RGB display on the rear that can do a whole load more, like show logos and other animations. You’ll be able to use the Armoury Crate software to customise and control these RGB areas.

All the devices sit on the Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 5G for all the power you could want. That’s a great foundation, but the ROG Phone 5 then goes on to offer different levels of RAM depending on what device you choose.

The regular version of the ROG Phone 5 will start with 8/128GB for €799, then step up to 12/256GB for €899 and finally offer 16/256GB for €999. 

The ROG Phone 5 Pro will come with 16/512GB and cost €1199, while the ROG Phone 5 Ultimate gets a whopping 18/512GB will be €1299 – but that also comes with a gift box full of goodies.

The Samsung Display-supplied OLED screen runs at 144Hz and comes in at 6.8-inches, although the phone is only 2mm taller than the previous version. It is topped by Gorilla Glass Victus for protection. The cameras are basically the same as the previous phone, with a 64-megapixel main camera, along with an ultra-wide and macro lenses.

There’s a 6000mAh battery, split into two cells, supporting 65W charging, with the promise that it will out-last leading competitors such as the Xiaomi Mi 11 or Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra when playing leading games. There’s two Type-C ports on the phone, one on the bottom and one on the side.

A 3D vapour chamber and a graphite sheet are in place to aid cooling, while the SoC – system on chip – has been moved to the centre of the phone, rather than sitting at one end as in normal phones. We saw a similar move from the Legion Phone Duel, the advantage being that you can then add an accessory fan to directly cool the SoC by clipping it onto the rear of the phone.

There are dual stereo speakers, as well as a 3.5mm headphone socket, equipped with a DAC and AudioWizard deck to customise the audio to your preference. On top of the audio, there’s a haptic engine which can add some tactile feedback, for example. to give you a more immersive feeling in shooters.

To boost your gaming performance, on top of the core hardware, there’s a full range of motion controls that you can map to button presses, meaning you can use a gesture to carry out specific in-game functions – as well as air triggers on the top of the phone, allowing taps on the frame of the phone rather than using on-screen buttons. 

The ROG Phone 5 Pro and Ultimate expand on this offering adding two more touch areas on the rear of the phone so you can add more buttons.

There’s certainly a lot happening on the ROG Phone 5, on top of being and Android 11 device. The good news is that it’s going to be widely available (full prices and dates still to be confirmed), and the entry-level device is affordable, while still offering plenty of power.

Writing by Chris Hall.