Google’s new Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro phones look impressive but I am worried Google has thrown away a key competitive advantage compared to previous years. The tech behemoth went big this week with the splashy launch of its new Pixel smartphones that promise smarter software and cameras as Google continues to push artificial intelligence (AI).
If you fancy erasing people or noises from photos and videos or even clicking and dragging people around the frame to compose the perfect shot, these could be the phones for you. The Pixel 8 Pro in particular stands out for its big 6.7-inch screen, triple cameras with 5x telephoto zoom, and long software support – spec for spec, it’s a direct Android competitor to the iPhone 15 Pro Max.
The Pixel 8 Pro’s screen is one of the sharpest and brightest ever on a phone, it has a premium feeling matt glass rear, and Google’s most powerful chipset yet, the Tensor G3. But I worry that by stuffing its latest phone with trivial new things like a temperature sensor that Google has driven up the price of its best phone to the point that it’s not as attractive a buy as Pixel phones have been for the last three years or so.
I don’t need to measure the temperature of food, water, glass, and all the other things the new Thermometer app supposedly lets you do. I thought Google had learned not to put weird hardware features on its Pixels, like the baffling sonar on the Pixel 4 that let you skip music tracks by waving your hand over the screen.
More useful are things like Magic Eraser that debuted on the Pixel 6, which lets you erase unwanted people and objects from photos. It was a great reason to buy the phone, but today you can use Magic Eraser on any phone in the Google Photos app. Google tends to offer new features on Pixels then slowly allow other phones to use them later – annoying if you bought the Pixel thinking that feature was exclusive.
Google’s big flip flop
Since it ditched the plucky Nexus brand and launched the first Pixel phone in 2016, Google has yo-yoed each year between the Pixel either being very expensive or a genuine tech bargain. The regular Pixel 5 cost £599, as did the Pixel 6 and Pixel 7. That price point made these phones easy to recommend as go-to Androids with high-end performance and features.
The Pixel 6 Pro and Pixel 7 Pro from 2021 and 2022 were more pricier at £849, but that still undercut the most expensive Pro Max iPhone and Samsung’s Galaxy Ultra by hundreds of pounds. It meant the Pixel Pro was a canny buy – a bit of a premium phone bargain. Now the Pixel 8 Pro costs £999, it’s the same as the iPhone 15 Pro.
If someone can afford to fork out a thousand sheets on a new phone, it’s hard to see many opt for the Pixel over the iPhone given Apple’s extreme popularity. The Pixel is excellent – in many ways I prefer Pixels to iPhones – but it’s easier for Google to shift handsets if the phones win on price. That’s why the cheaper Pixel A series is so easy to recommend.
I hope I feel differently after I have used and reviewed the Pixel 8 Pro. It’s certainly great that Google is offering seven years of software support – that’s longer than Samsung or Apple promise, and a genuine reason to go for Google this year.
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It’s just a shame that Google – a company with billions in the bank – couldn’t keep its Pixel phones as competitively priced as before. If history is anything to go by, you could comfortably buy the Pixel 7 Pro at a big discount today and be confident it’ll likely end up with a lot of the features Google is touting as exclusive to the more expensive Pixel 8 Pro.
You can pre-order the Pixel 8 Pro now direct from Google.
Be one of the first to get your hands on the all-new Pixel 8 Pro, and Google will bundle in its brand-new Pixel Watch 2 smartwatch (announced alongside the Pixel 8 Pro and priced at £349) for free. Both devices will ship on release date on October 12, 2023
…you can get the same incredible giveaway from Very UK, which offers an array of payment plans for those who want to spread-out the cost of the flagship Google Pixel smartphone
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