About a week ago, our review units of the Pixel 9, Pixel 9 Pro, and Pixel 9 Pro XL arrived in the office and I was only partially interested in checking them out. While I tend to like Pixel phones just fine, the last couple iterations have been devices I’ve largely lived without. For me, the superior processing power of the Galaxy S23 Ultra held more appeal over the past couple years.
Sure, the UI isn’t as fun or polished as Google’s take on Android, but it’s also not a stumbling block for Samsung’s phones as it once was. Instead, it was something I got used to as I settled in with life apart from Pixel for a while. advertisement These new Pixels are downright gorgeous And then the Pixel 9 Pro XL arrived.
Thinking I’d crack it open, take a look, and move on, I had no idea whatsoever the visceral reaction that awaited me when I unsheathed this phone from its packaging. (A quick note on that, kudos to Google’s more environmentally friendly boxing this time around – it looks good and is clearly easier on Earth.) Sure, the new Pixels look good in videos and photos, but holding this phone in my hands shifted something in me that I wasn’t expecting at all.
Unlike the past few Google-made phones, I knew my SIM was going in this phone immediately. This was before any tests or benchmarks were run on it: I just knew I wanted this device in my pocket. advertisement I don’t know if it’s the flat screen (coming over from the still-curved Galaxy S23 Ultra), the flat, metal sides, the ultra rounded corners or the soft-touch glass back that got me; I just know it got me.
Always glad to return to Pixel software And as I continued the setup process and began setting things up, I had that always-comfy feeling of returning home. Every single time I leave Google’s in-house phones and return, I remember very quickly why Pixels have had such a hold on me for so long. Google’s software, UI, animation, and experience across the board is just so stinking good! advertisement At this point, it’s not like other companies have atrocious UIs.
It’s just that Google does it so much better. You can totally get used to something else, but every time you return to Google’s vision for Android, you remember very quickly how good it is to use a Pixel phones versus any other Android device out there. Early thoughts on performance, battery, and cameras However, a great hardware build and pretty software can mask underlying issues that have plagued Pixel devices in the past.
So, as I transferred my SIM to the Pixel 9 Pro XL, I still wondered if gaming would be sub-par, if issues would persist with my car’s Bluetooth connectivity and if general cellular service would be worse than what I’ve become accustomed to with Samsung’s phones. advertisement So far, so good on all fronts. I’m showing a screen time estimate of about 6.
5 hours on a charge, I’ve yet to have a single connectivity issue, and though the Tensor G4 inside the Pixel 9 Pro XL isn’t that big of a leap from Tensor G3 in terms of raw performance, I’ve been pleasantly surprised with how well it handles difficult titles like Call of Duty: Warzone. To be fair, the game only allows me to turn the “visual quality” to medium, but I have everything else cranked up to full-blast and it runs smooth as butter with a nice, constant 60FPS during gameplay. And from what I can see, I’m not losing much in the way of visual fidelity, either.
Other games like PUBG Mobile allow me to crank things all the way up as well and there are no performance issues I’m seeing as of right now. advertisement Moving on to the cameras, we’ll have plenty more to say in the coming days about this setup, but I’m quite impressed by the new Zoom Enhance feature, the Reframe, Reimagine, and just the overall beauty of the images I’ve already captured. I get it, it’s a Pixel and that’s par for the course, but there’s one camera feature I was most anticipating, and it does not disappoint.
Google didn’t spend a ton of time on the new Dual Exposure upgrade for Pixel 9’s video camera, but it is without doubt my favorite new part of the camera setup on Google’s phones. As the name of the feature says, it takes two versions of every video – one at a higher exposure and one at a lower exposure – and stitches these together basically in real time to make you videos look so much better than before. It’s not a quirky feature you have to leverage the cloud for or a hidden setting you need to find: it’s just part of the general video experience, and it is awesome.
Even in extremely challenging lighting conditions, this video camera is truly impressive and simple to use. Take a look at a basic video I shot that contains some very challenging lighting situations: Notice the people at the table when I pan over to the area with the massive windows and notice the fact that you can see a blue sky with clouds and still make out everything in the foreground of the video as well. Again, this isn’t a post-production thing or some finicky setting: it’s just how the video camera works now! There are so many new camera features to play with and test, but I already know this new Dual Exposure feature will be my favorite.
I’m excited to see how the reviews go from folks who spend a lot of time with other phone cameras, but I also just know that I can already see a massive difference in my video quality as a big-time amateur, so I’m very happy with it. There’s a lot more for me to discover and test on the Pixel 9 Pro XL, but regardless of all the hardware superlatives and the software wins, there’s something very intriguing about this phone that I almost can’t put my finger on. I sincerely have not enjoyed picking up and using a phone this much in years, and I’m incredibly excited to see if the magic lasts through the honeymoon phase for sure.
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