My Reivew of Google Pixel 6 Pro
I don’t often do reviews for phones, but due to some bad luck I recently found myself on the market for a new one. Since I just bought a new one, I thought I’d give you my impressions of it.
Earlier this year, I had an unfortunate accident with my phone. It wasn’t a super old phone. Mere months since I bought it. Unfortunately I had a moment where, while taking it out of my pocket, the phone snagged temporarily and I ended up dropping it in a parking lot. It hit almost perfectly on the edge of the phone, missing the case and the screen protector. It didn’t break the glass of the display. It broke the display itself so a massive line of permanently lit up pixels went all the way up the screen.
In all the time I’ve owned a “smart” phone, I’ve never broken a screen like that. Only once before had a broken the screen at all, and that was a more normal screen break. Since I’d been fortunate for years, I got complacent about my warranties and protection plans. So, long story short, I was in the market for a new phone.
I’ve been buying Google phones since the Nexus days. I really don’t like Apple phones, or Apple in general if I’m being honest. Yes, Google is spying on me. A lot. This is true for pretty much any Android device unless you go with a “deGoogled” version of Android, like Lineage. Unfortunately I’m required to carry a phone for work, and to have access to work related stuff the phone OS needs to be approved by our corporate IT department. So far that list includes official Android and iOS only, so I’m stuck with the “Googled” version of Android unless I want to carry two phones around with me at all times. By buying directly from Google, I avoid third parties spying on me on top of Google spying on me.
This year, Google shipped the Pixel 6 and the Pixel 6 Pro. I’ll confess I was a little nervous with this release as it’s the first phone to use Google’s proprietary Tensor SoC. Even Google wasn’t really trying to hype up how fast it was in comparison to other SoCs on the market. If Google isn’t trying to brag up a new processor, is it going to be any good? All other specs on the phone seemed to be comparable to other phones in the same price range, so that SoC was really the only thing that I had any major concerns about. I still felt like I was gambling when I hit the “Buy” button on the Pixel 6 Pro.
I know you’re all able to read reviews of phones that are going to be a lot more comprehensive than mine, so I just want to give you my impressions of the device. We’re not talking benchmark territory here. Just subjective opinions.
First thing I noticed is that the phone is heavier than I expected. It’s not an anvil or anything, but it’s over 2oz heavier than my last phone. That difference was noticeable to me immediately upon picking up the phone. The device feels good, but it’s definitely heavy.
The screen is nice. I don’t know all the nits and ppi and irs of it all, and honestly I don’t care. I think we’ve gotten to a point in display technology that all of that is academic anyway.
The speakers are surprisingly good. I had a Pixel 2 XL years ago, and the speakers were absolute garbage. I don’t know if that was just my phone or all of the Pixel 2 XLs, but utter garbage. The Pixel 5 sounded really good. Surprisingly good compared to the Pixel 2 XL, so I wasn’t sure what to expect with the Pixel 6 Pro. Thankfully I was pleasantly surprised. I still don’t sit and listen to music on the phone speakers, but they sound good enough to do that in the short term if I wanted.
Speed. This phone has it. Lots of it. It’s noticeably faster than the Pixel 5 I had before. I don’t know how it compares to other flagship phones in actual benchmarks. Again, I don’t really care. Subjectively, this phone feels fast. I don’t wait for anything. I tap an icon or button, and there’s no wait. The UI is crazy responsive. The only time I’ve noticed any stutter of any kind is in the camera app, which I think is pretty weird.
Speaking of the camera, one of the software features that I could go on and on about is the Magic Eraser. Technically this feature is in the Google Photos app, but sue me. This feature is amazing, frankly. I’ve literally spent hours on this phone just removing stuff from my pictures. Then I put it back and remove it all over again. Honestly, I think I’d have considered upgrading to this phone just for this feature alone.
I’m happy with the phone. Very happy with it. If you’re in the market for an Android phone, I’d highly suggest considering it as an option.
Day 36 of the #100DaysToOffload 2021 Series.
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