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That was while using it as my primary device, with or so emails, messages and push notifications, two hours of browsing in Chrome, four hours of Spotify via Bluetooth headphones, 40 minutes of Into the Badlands from Amazon Prime Video, and three photos.
For comparison, similarly sized iPhone 11 Pro lasts 32 hours and the Pixel 4 XL lasts 26 hours under similar conditions, while the majority of smartphones in can last at least 24 hours with heavy usage. The Pixel 4 is one of the first smartphones to ship with the latest version of Android 10, complete with system-wide dark mode, full theming support for changing colours, icon shapes, typefaces and more, and vastly improved gesture navigation.
The Pixel 4 also has the same new on-device natural language processing that was so impressive on the larger Pixel 4 XL. Google Assistant is much faster and works without an internet connection for many tasks.
Motion Sense uses radar to track motions around the phone. The technology is more impressive than the functionality currently. To use Face Unlock developers need to update their apps to support the new unified biometric system built into Android, with only a small handful having done so currently. Given Monzo is saying it will take a while to implement, you can probably forget your traditional banking apps working soon. Google has made a name for itself with some of the best smartphone cameras on the market, and the new dual-camera system on the back of the Pixel 4 is no different.
That is to say it has fantastic still image quality, even in very difficult lighting conditions. Google is still the market leader with its Night Sight ultra-low light mode, but others have caught up considerably. New for this year is the ability to independently adjust the brightness of the background and foreground, which works very well. Portrait mode is improved, as is the up to 8x zoom thanks to the extra camera on the back.
You'll be lucky to get two or three hours of screen time out of the device. Adjust the exposure balance of your photos before you take the shots. When you need to rebuild trust in a relationship. With 90Hz forced on, the Pixel 4 is a gloriously smooth device. We do support an eSIM on some make and models. Don't believe the naysayers.
The selfie camera is relatively wide angle and pretty good, too. Not so good is video capture, which caps out at 4K at 30 frames per second, not the 60fps rivals manage.
The Google Pixel 4 is a potentially great phone hampered by really poor battery life. The screen is good and big enough. The camera is amazing. Motion Sense is novel and Face Unlock is seriously fast. But the Pixel 4 suffers from the same issues with G Suite, limited scenarios in which the screen works at 90Hz, lack of third-party app support for Face Unlock and no gaze-requirement for unlocking the phone as the Pixel 4 XL. If only Google had given it a bigger battery the Pixel 4 could have been one of the best smartphones on the market.
Far from it, in fact. Like previous Pixels, Google's camera technology, which still largely takes place on the back-end thanks to machine learning and artificial intelligence, continues to impress. The Pixel 4 series has a premium feel in the hand, haptic feedback is top notch and the latest Android 10 software is super responsive.
While some will criticize the basic design, I prefer the simplistic color approach. Yes, the Pixel 4 has issues, but is still easy to love. The aesthetics of the series will feel like familiar territory for most Pixel users, with a larger bezel on the top of the device now containing the 8MP front camera, face-unlocking technology and the " Soli " chip that gives the phones radar capabilities. Despite attracting fingerprints as expected, the style is pleasingly simple, with a metallic frame that helps with grip.
The camera module on the rear of the Pixel 4 devices is now squared, at a glance like the new iPhones , which looks great while housing the new double-lens setup. So far so normal. But unlike prior models, there is no longer a fingerprint sensor on the back and the notch has been completely filled in by the top bezel. Unlike some others in the market, the phone retains a squared design, with only slight curving off the edges. The display on both of the new Pixels is a double-edged sword—great performance with limited brightness.
It's impossible to argue with the inclusion of a screen with a 90Hz refresh rate, which is thankfully becoming an industry standard. Much like the recently-released OnePlus 7T , it enhances smoothness when scrolling through websites or playing games.
It means the screen is refreshed 90 times a second. But unlike most other devices, Google's mode is dynamic, meaning it downgrades to 60 Hz if brightness dips below 75 percent. The company says it does so to preserve the battery, but a spokesperson told Engadget it will soon roll out fresh updates that will "include enabling 90hz in more brightness conditions. In reality, the majority of Pixel 4 users are already likely to have their brightness levels topped out, unless they are sitting in a dark room where a lower light is preferred.
Despite great color accuracy and sharpness, testing by DisplayMate shows that screen brightness sits at about nits, which is below the iPhone 11 nits and Samsung S10 1, nits. It's very noticeable when placed beside other high-end devices.
Google has brought "Ambient EQ " into the Pixel, which adjusts display colour temperatures to mimic the environment, and it works as advertised. Initially, brightness was always at percent when outside, although I admittedly became more used to lower brightness levels over time. Thanks to an upgraded 6GB of RAM and a Qualcomm Snapdragon which isn't the latest chipset but still performs well , performance on the Pixel series is better than ever. Multi -tasking and switching between apps is extremely snappy, and there were zero issues with slowdown, crashing or unexpected stalling on the new devices during the week's use.
The Pixels run on the Android 10 mobile operating system OS and will always be among the first to receive security updates from the company. The Pixels also include a redesigned Google Assistant that is both quicker at opening apps and more efficient at answering queries. The menu can be accessed by squeezing both sides of the smartphone , but is optional. Honestly, it's not something I frequently use on any device. There is a Google Hub sitting in my kitchen, and that's great, but the voice-help experience doesn't always translate to mobile, in my opinion, and I have little interest in speaking to the handset out loud in public.
The new Pixel series touts "on device" artificial intelligence including "Live Caption," which captions speech in audio or video in real time.
A new "Recorder" application is able to quickly transcribe text and sounds from audio and store it in a searchable format. It's actually quite amazing and is a game changer for anyone who frequently transcribes audio. Yes, it's mostly going to be journalists and businesspeople , but it's still a really neat use of Google AI. While there is the option of using the traditional PIN number or pattern passcodes , face unlock is impressively quick on the new Pixels, even if it comes at the expense of other forms of biometric identification, such as the in-screen fingerprint scanner, which I have personally come to prefer in recent years as the back-end technology has improved.
It's my go-to password experience, so having it missing on the new Pixels was a real downside. By taking advantage of the Soli radar chip that is embedded in the front bezel, the Pixel 4 actually works by proactively hunting for your face as you are reaching for the phone, meaning it opens astoundingly quickly, even in the dark. Security concerns raised after users found it still worked with the user's eyes closed i. The Pixel 4's face unlocking is processed on the device, without scans ever leaving the phone or being shared externally, and are protected by a scarily-named "Titan M" security chip.
The tiny Soli chip enables what Google is calling "Motion Sense," which are a set of gesture controls that work by tracking the human hand inside the phone's radar bubble. On the new Pixels, the feature lets you skip songs and snooze clock alarms by waving your hand in front of the screen, without ever actually touching the phone.
Yes, like a Jedi.