Earlier this month, Google officially launched the Pixel and Pixel XL. While the company has launched, technically speaking, phones in the past, this year is certainly quite a bit different. Gone is the Nexus brand, and instead the Mountain View company has replaced it with the Pixel brand, pushing into a world where it designs its own phones, and those devices are more of a true combination of hardware and software.
The Pixel and Pixel XL are, quite frankly, true competitors from Google. Up to this point the company has simply let other companies use its mobile operating system, Android, as they see fit, with the Nexus devices really standing out for the vanilla experience they offered. The software available on the Pixel is still vanilla Android, but Google has optimized it to work with the hardware, which should hopefully make for a smooth experience not only right out of the box, but for as long as the owner is using the phone.
There is a lot to like with the Pixel phones when looking at the specs. There's the AMOLED displays, one measuring in at 5 inches with an FHD resolution, and the other measuring in at 5.5 inches, and packing a QHD panel. They both have a 12.3-megapixel camera on the back, which, even after real world testing, stands out as one of the best, if not the best, cameras available in a smartphone. It offers a powerful processor under the hood, and so on and so forth.
The Pixel phones were a long time coming, but now that they're here it was worth the wait.
For those who have been able to get their hands on the phone, anyway. I've been wanting to write up this question for awhile now, ever since the phones launched, but with inventory being what it is, I ended up waiting a bit longer. The more people that have the phone by Google, the better the feedback can be, after all.
I'm still waiting to get mine (hopefully next week), but there are a few things that I would change already. That includes the exclusive launch with Verizon. Don't get me wrong here, the commercials that I've seen from the Big Red carrier promoting the handsets have been pretty great, and even the ads from Google itself, which ultimately end up showing the Verizon logo at the end, are stellar. But I do wish more people had the opportunity to get the Pixel -- from their carrier of choice. Google obviously felt compelled to ink up a deal with Verizon at launch, but availability and options are always great for consumers.
The other thing I'd change? That bottom bezel on the phone's front. It's as big as the iPhone's, but at least Apple's devices have that physical Home button (now a "button") to warrant the necessary space. The Pixel phones just have a big bezel below the display. It's not awful or anything, but, while I’m fine with the bezels on the sides, that one on the bottom is certainly prominent for no discernible reason.
But, what about you? Is there anything about the Pixel and/or Pixel XL that you'd change, after you've spent some time with the handsets? Or are the phones by Google just about as close to perfect as you'd like? Let me know!
