Asus’s chairman, Jonney Shih, has effectively put the company’s phone ambitions on ice. At a recent Taiwan event he said, in translation, “Asus will no longer add new mobile phone models in the future,” and described the company’s approach as an “indefinite observation” of the smartphone market. The message is blunt: expect no new Zenfone or ROG Phone launches for the foreseeable future, and perhaps never again.
Why this matters
Most people think of Asus as a PC and gaming brand, but its phones mattered in two corners of the market: compact flagships (the Zenfone line) and purpose-built gaming handsets (ROG Phone). The ROG phones in particular pushed mobile gaming hardware — big batteries, shoulder triggers, aggressive cooling and audio that actually sounded like it mattered. Losing one of the few vendors that treated gaming phones as more than a marketing angle narrows choice for enthusiasts.
This isn’t just nostalgia. Fewer competitors means less pressure on prices and fewer experiments in form and features. Folding and alternative form factors still move forward, but they’re now concentrated in the hands of a smaller set of suppliers — Samsung’s prototypes and foldable roadmap are one kind of response to a shrinking pool of mid- and high-end Android rivals. For a sense of where foldables might go next, Samsung’s recent tri-fold work shows how a smaller set of players is pushing big hardware bets Samsung’s tri-fold prototype.
A business decision, not a sudden whim
Asus’s retreat feels deliberate. Shih linked the shift to AI: the company is “going all in with AI,” reallocating R&D toward AI servers, robotics and smart glasses. Financially it’s easy to see why — the firm reported a big revenue bump in 2025 driven by server business growth — and chasing higher-margin, enterprise AI gear is a sensible corporate pivot.
Shih also promised the company will continue to “take care of the brand’s mobile phone users,” suggesting software and warranty support for existing phones will persist. But his words left no doubt that the cadence of annual new phone releases is over.
Market forces that pushed Asus out
A few structural trends make this less surprising. Smartphones are a mature product: annual spec bumps feel smaller to buyers, and people hold phones longer. Component-cost volatility — memory and display prices, for example — has changed the old assumption that new parts would steadily get cheaper, tightening margins for makers chasing razor-thin profits. Combine that with rising competition from Chinese OEMs and you get a squeeze that’s hard for a mid-sized vendor to survive.
That last point is important. Brands such as Vivo and others have been pushing aggressively on specs and pricing; Asus was always stronger in niche design and engineering than in global distribution and marketing muscle. If you want to see a Chinese contender growing into global markets, look to reports on devices like the Vivo X300 Ultra.
What gamers and niche buyers should do now
If you bought a ROG Phone because it was purpose-built for mobile gaming, there are still a few specialized makers left (and some mainstream flagships will handle most games perfectly well). But the loss of Asus as an innovator matters. Asus tested ideas — large batteries, multiple cooling approaches, gamepad accessories — that other manufacturers were slow to copy.
For buyers weighing alternatives, the usual flagship suspects provide raw power; niche makers and gaming hardware startups carry the experimental torch. Keep an eye on companies that emphasize mobile gaming hardware and on the accessory ecosystem that fills in what phones stop offering.
A broader industry reset
Asus isn’t the first to shrink its phone ambitions — LG did this a few years back and never returned. The pattern suggests phone lineups will consolidate further, leaving a handful of large, well-capitalized vendors to set the terms of hardware innovation and pricing. That’s likely to push more experimentation into peripherals, AR/VR headsets and AI-infused devices rather than the next twelve smartphone models of the year.
It’s worth noting that Asus’s pivot aligns with a larger push toward AI-enabled products across the industry; software and services tied to AI are becoming the growth engines for many hardware makers. Google’s recent moves to add agentic booking and AI features to its services highlight how the industry is betting on AI-driven capabilities as a differentiator rather than raw silicon specs alone Google AI Mode.
So is this permanent?
Shih didn’t issue an absolute, forever ban on phones — he left the door open to return if the market changes. But the tone was clear: Asus is prioritizing areas that look more profitable and strategic today. For users, that means stocking up on support information for current phones and, if you’re a fan of ROG’s approach, getting ready to choose from a narrower field next time you upgrade.
If nothing else, Asus’s move is a reminder that the phone business is brutally pragmatic: novelty and engineering bravado don’t pay the bills unless they can be turned into sustainable sales and repeat customers. Asus is following the money toward AI servers, robotics and glasses — and the phone market just lost one of its more inventive players.