The race for higher refresh rate displays is getting more competitive by the days. This year, we saw the arrival of a 144Hz standard for gaming smartphones. However, Asus ROG Phone 3 proves that this barrier has been surpassed already. The new Republic of Gamers smartphone comes with a 6.59-inch AMOLED display with a stock refresh rate of 144Hz. Now, a report reveals that there is a hidden 160Hz mode which is just above every other smartphone in the industry.
This has been found by the guys over at XDA-Developers after performing an ADB (Android Debug Bridge) command that enables the ROG Phone 3 display to run at an experimental 160Hz refresh rate. Everyone with basic knowledge of how ADB works can simply enable this feature. According to the report, the screen does indeed run at 160Hz and that some games, capable of 144fps, being technically fps-unlocked, can reach this amount of frames per second. Games like Mortal Kombat and Death Trigger 2 are optimized for 144fps on the ROG Phone 3 as per GSMArena’s report.
Of course, this is just an experimental mode, hence, it does not bring specific optimizations. Enabling this mode could cause issues with performance, display calibration, battery consumption, and even with the hardware. So, in the end, users should use it at their own risk. We don’t think that you wish to tinker your brand new smartphone, not even cheap, display just to enable an extra 16fps. Interestingly, the 160Hz mode becomes available in the Quick Settings toggle after performing the ADB command. Apparently, Asus was planning to implement this model, but for whatever reason, it has been neglected. If the company is not confident enough to enable this feature we believe that they had their reasons for it.
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ASUS ROG PHONE 3 SPECIFICATIONS
- 6.59-inch (2340 × 1080 pixels) Full HD+ 144Hz OLED 10-bit HDR 19.5:9 aspect ratio display, 270Hz touch sampling rate, 113% DCI-P3, 10000:1 contrast, dE<1%, 10-bit HDR, Corning Gorilla Glass 6 protection
- 3.1 GHz Octa-Core Snapdragon 865 Plus 7nm Mobile Platform with Adreno 650 GPU
- 8GB LPDDR5 RAM with 128GB (UFS 3.1) storage. 12GB LPDDR5 RAM with 256GB (UFS 3.1) storage. 12GB / 16GB LPDDR5 RAM with 512GB (UFS 3.1) storage
- Android 10 with ROG UI
- Dual SIM (nano + nano)
- 64MP rear camera with Sony IMX686 sensor, 0.8μm pixel size, f/1.8 aperture. 13MP 125˚ ultra-wide camera with f/2.4 aperture. 5MP macro sensor with f/2.0 aperture. 8k video at 30 fps, 4k at 60fps, slow-motion 4K at 120 fps, 1080p at 240fps
- 24MP front-facing camera with 0.9µm pixel size, f/2.0 aperture
- USB Type-C Hi-Res audio, 7-magnet stereo speaker with dual NXP TFA9874 smart amplifier, Quad microphones with ASUS Noise Reduction Technology
- In-display fingerprint sensor
- Dimensions: 171×78×9.85mm; Weight: 240 g
- 5G SA/NSA, Dual 4G VoLTE, Wi-Fi 802.11ax, Bluetooth 5.1, GPS/GLONASS/Beidou, Galileo(E1+E5a), QZSS(L1+L5), NavIC(L5), USB Type-C, NFC
- 6000mAh (typical) / 5800mAh (minimum) battery with 10V 3A 30W HyperCharge fast charging. Supports up to 30W QC4.0 / PD3.0 / Direct Charge adapter