The previous week has been one of many busiest I’ve ever had. I flew to Dallas, Texas, for a pal’s wedding ceremony, drove to Austin to go to an in-law, drove again for the marriage festivities, then flew again to New York, solely to go out to San Francisco the subsequent day for Google I/O 2023. The excellent news is that the brand new Google Pixel 7A has been in my pocket all of the whereas, by means of each leg and layover, and it is by no means felt restricted in any deal-breaking manner. This is a $499 telephone, and it is simply extra proof that you simply actually don’t need to spend much more than that to get an excellent expertise lately.
Is it the right telephone? No. There are options lacking right here that some of us would need. Also, battery life is simply OK, and the value has been hiked up $50 from last year’s model. To treatment this, Google is constant to promote final yr’s Pixel 6A at a cheaper price—$349—although you possibly can routinely discover it for sale at $299. That telephone remains to be an excellent purchase at both of these costs, however do you have to really feel the necessity to spend a bit extra, the Pixel 7A has nearly the whole lot you’d want.
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The Pixel 7A mimics the design of the Pixel 7 and Pixel 6 sequence that got here earlier than. It’s clear and distinctive, and it is easy to identify in a sea of iPhones and Samsungs—good in the event you need to really feel completely different. It is available in Charcoal (black), Sea (child blue), Snow (white), and Coral (orangey pink), the latter of which is unique to the Google Store. The blue is just a little too faint for me—it typically appears to be like white—however the Coral is drop-dead attractive. I like a flashy telephone.
The telephone’s body is fabricated from recycled aluminum, and the again is a plastic composite that not at all feels low cost. (It’s additionally one much less spot for cracked glass in case you drop the telephone!) The entrance is made with Gorilla Glass 3, a product which is a number of years outdated at this level and is not as scratch- and crack-resistant as trendy formulations from Corning, the corporate that creates the hardened glass. Using older Gorilla Glass is among the simple methods to deliver down the value of a handset. Safe to say, even when the again cannot crack as simply, it is price getting a case. This Pixel is IP67-rated for water and mud resistance although, so a drop within the pool will not destroy it.
Photograph: Julian Chokkattu
The 6.1-inch OLED display hasn’t proven any weaknesses, even after I stared at it whereas strolling in full solar (to not point out 94-degree warmth paired with disgusting ranges of humidity) in Austin. Is it as vivid because the Samsung Galaxy A54 5G, the Pixel’s closest competitor? No, however I hardly ever needed to squint to learn the show. You’re handled to a 90-Hz refresh rate as nicely, which implies the whole lot from enjoying video games to scrolling Instagram feels extra fluid, because the display is outputting extra frames per second than conventional 60-Hz screens. It’s a pleasant perk.
Performance is just not a difficulty both. The Pixel 7A packs Google’s Tensor G2 chipset with 8 gigabytes of RAM, the exact same stack that powers its flagship Pixel 7 and Pixel 7 Pro. I’ve by no means seen the 7A stutter in my time with the telephone. This chipset means you get entry to lots of the similar G2-specific software program options that debuted on the Pixel 7 sequence, similar to Long Exposure within the digicam app and Photo Unblur, which did successfully unblur some faces in my photographs of the dance flooring on the wedding ceremony.
The Pixel 7A is among the few sub-$500 telephones to function wi-fi charging, and it is about rattling time this began exhibiting up in cheaper telephones. It’s a lot nicer to plop your telephone on a stand as a substitute of trying to find a cable. That mentioned, the 7A does skip another niceties you might need appreciated to see, like a headphone jack, a microSD card slot, and a wall charger within the field (although you do get a USB-C to USB-C cable). The telephone can be restricted to 128 GB of inner storage; it would be good if Google took a web page from Motorola and started offering 256 gigs.
Google has lengthy had a lackluster in-display fingerprint sensor, and sadly the Pixel 7A follows that very same path. On my first day of use, I needed to put my thumb on the sensor a couple of instances for it to unlock. It bought drastically higher over time, however I nonetheless wanted to be extra aware and deliberate about finger placement than I used to be on different telephones such because the aforementioned A54. It’s simply not a fantastic sensor.
