Reviews: Expensive Google Pixels are among the best Android smartphones
The Pixel and Pixel XL are worthy successors to the Nexus line and are among the best Android smartphones available. That’s what reviewers conclude. They praise the update policy and the camera, but the high price is an obstacle.
On Tuesday, the first reviews of the major technology sites appeared in the countries where the Pixel devices became available. The attention for the devices is great: they are the first smartphones that Google has designed itself, although the manufacture has been outsourced to HTC. With the Nexus line, Google had much less influence on the design and execution.
ArsTechnica has some comments on the glass back and the fact that the Pixels only have a single mediocre speaker, where the Nexus 6P had two, for example. The site links the look of the Pixels to that of the HTC One A9 and Desire 10, noting that they all resemble the iPhone. Google emphasized the camera qualities when introducing the Pixels and ArsTechnica confirms the claims: the camera can easily compete with that of the iPhone 7 Plus, while it has two cameras.
The Verge also calls the camera very good and praises the speed. According to the site, photos taken look very attractive, partly due to Google’s image processing algorithms; the images of the iPhone 7 would seem a bit more natural. The site notes that, according to Google, camera quality is one of the features that has benefited from developing hardware and software in-house, and the same would apply to battery life.
According to The Verge, the battery life is significantly shorter with the Pixel than with the XL, but the site does not provide specific figures. ArsTechnica does, in a benchmark of the site, the Pixel lasts ten hours on a charge when browsing, the Pixel XL lasts 45 minutes longer in the same test. The iPhone 7 and 7 Plus score significantly better with more than twelve and thirteen hours. WSJ notes that the XL can easily last through a workday, the Pixel has only 10 percent left by 8 p.m., and the iPhone 7 and 7 Plus can last an hour longer in testing.
Engadget points out that the Snapdragon 821 is clocked at 2.15GHz instead of the standard clock speed of 2.4GHz, but the site claims that Android still feels faster than most other high-end smartphones this year. The site is amazed at the Google Assistant’s voice control and usability, and Wired even calls it the best personal assistant right now. All reviewers agree that it’s a big plus that the user of the Pixel can get new updates as soon as possible. At the same time, all sites cite the high price as the biggest stumbling block and according to Gizmodo, the high price is unjustifiable.