After many leaks, some of which were done by the company itself, Google’s flagship phones, the Pixel 4 and 4 XL are out. As expected of any new Pixel phones, they run the latest vanilla Android, Android 10 with a few interesting features up it’s sleeve.
At first glance, from the front, the phone has one of the weirdest form factors characterized by a larger bezel on top (forehead) compared to the bottom. Could be a turn-off for many but Google decided to go with this design for purposes of showing off it’s new technology. The phone comes equipped with radar technology among many sensors like Infrared at the top. Radar technology in smartphones is a new thing that aims at perfecting air and motion gestures alongside the fastest facial recognition so much so that Google didn’t include any other security features for example the popular in-display fingerprint scanner in favor of this new technology.
Facial recognition thanks to radar technology works faster than on any other phone that comes with similar features in that the Pixel 4 can detect when it’s user is approaching and unlocks the phone instantaneously the moment the user picks it up even without bringing it closer to the face for scanning. Air gestures are nothing new in smartphones considering the fact that LG’s own recent flagship highlighted similar but Google Pixel 4 not only uses Infrared sensor for this but radar as well to make such gestures precise and faster in apps that support them. The Pixel 4 can turn off notification or alarm sound when user approaches and also allow users to swipe off the notification without touching the phone. These gestures are also available in media apps like gallery and music apps for example Spotify. However some apps have been tested not to work well with them possibly due to some software issues expected to be fixed by future updates.
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The Pixel 4 also features a 90Hz P-OLED display that boosts fluidity and responsiveness throughout UI element compared to majority of phones that max out at 60Hz. Since the phone runs Android 10, navigation gestures are pretty prominent here with swipe at the edges taking the user back to previous screen/app and a swipe from the bottom, back to home screen. The navigation bar laid over apps is also available for use.
In the camera department, the Pixel 4 expected to fall in the footprint of the previous Pixel which was arguably the best at photography, missed a few key features that have been popular on flagship phones. Google opted not to include a ultra-wide sensor suggesting that telephoto is more useful. Essentially, unlike majority of flagship phones that ship with three camera sensors, the Pixel 4 only ships with two, one a regular 12.2 mega-pixel, f/1.7 sensor and another a 16 mega-pixel, f/2.4 telephoto one. A depth sensor is also included right above the flash. On the front it features an 8 mega-pixel f/2.0 sensor for selfie shots.
As earlier mentioned, the regular Pixel 4 is the smaller one at 5.7 inches while the Pixel 4 XL measure in at 6.3 inches. Underneath they house similar specifications with both powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 with 6GB of RAM with on-board storage configurations of either 64GB or 128GB. The smaller one is equipped with a 2800mAh battery while the big one has a 3700mAh battery.
The Pixel 4 comes in three colors, Oh So Orange, Just Black.and Clearly White. The regular Pixel starts at $799 while the Pixel 4 XL starts at $899.
