2026 may have seen its first big smartphone casualty as Asus has announced it will not be launching any new phones in 2026, although it promises this is not the end for phones like the Zenfone 12 Ultra and ROG Phone 9 Pro.
A report by Digitimes originally stated that Asus' Taiwanese distributors had claimed that they could no longer buy Asus phones, with their industry partners saying Asus had wound up its smartphone division as of the end of 2025.
Asus' current phone line-up
Asus' most recent phone was the Thailand-only ROG Phone 9 FE in February 2025, but that was the same month that we saw the globally-launched Zenfone 12 Ultra. A month prior, the ROG Phone 9 series launched, using many similar components but with the gaming focus that you'd expect from a Republic of Gamers-branded device.
While now a year-and-a-half old, and no longer available directly from Asus, the Zenfone 10 remains one of the only truly compact Android phones in recent memory. We had hoped Asus would launch a direct follow-up to this phone, but its focus on the Ultra Zenfone models apparently meant no sequel. And now, the announcement of no 2026 updates makes the chance of a new mini Zenfone look even more remote.
A difficult climate
Asus as a whole is doing well enough, thanks to continued demand for its other products like its PC and laptop parts, or its excellent ROG Ally gaming handheld (even if it's raising its prices for the new year). But the Android phone market, while full of competitors, is dominated by a handful of brands. And despite the quality of its products, Asus ain't one of 'em.
It's possible that Asus only wants to take a breather from launching phones for a year, deciding that it wants to escape the annual refresh cycle to instead focus on more substantial but less frequent upgrades. But it's hard to deny that this could easily be the start of Asus exiting the smartphone business after just over a decade of operation.
You won't find any of Asus' phones on our best Android phones guide, but don't let that fool you into thinking that its phones are bad. The smartphone world will be poorer without Asus and its phones, and I can only hope this year without new phones is a temporary state of affairs for Asus, rather than a quiet exit.
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