Pixel 9 Pro Fold and the Pixel 9 family review: All grown up and glowed up

Google has been refining its smartphone strategy for years from the Nexus to the pixel lineup and with the pixel 9 series it feels like the company finally has something good enough to truly rival the iPhones meanwhile the Google pixel fold has just been waiting in the shadows watching and waiting while Samsung goes out there and has the experience of a Lifetime Building a mainst streamy uh foldable device and with the pixel 9 Pro fold which is a really crap name for the basically the Google pixel fold 2 Google feels poised to take over the title of the best foldable out there after having watched Samsung go through his adventures so in this video I'm going to cover our thoughts on the pixel 9 the pixel 9 Pro the 9 Pro XL and the 9 Pro full that's a lot of devices and those names are great so let's start with the fold for all intents and purposes this is basically the pixel fold 2 and it's just a lot easier to say so if I say pixel fold to this is the phone I'm referring to even though it's real name is officially the pixel 9 Pro fold just bear with me we only received our review unit of the pixel 9 Pro fold about a day ago so we'll need a bit more time to evaluate things like battery life performance underload as well as durability but that always always takes longer than the typical review window anyway and we'd rather publish a proper report on that about a year later which by the way our reviewer Sam Rutherford did last week with the original pixel fold that said there's already a lot that we know about the pixel fold 2 to form a pretty informed opinion about how it Stacks up against the competition and its predecessors so let's dive into it now our typical reviewer for the pixel fold series who's our house foldable expert Sam Rutherford is off on Parental leave so you've got me here but as much as he's having a new baby Sam took the time to lay out his thoughts and share his Impressions so far as a hardcore pixel fold owner and lover so we're coming together this is a bit of a cooperated effort here first things first the pixel fold 2 pixel9 Pro fold this thing feels really nice it's super thin and it's got an improved General build that not only feels more premium than before thanks to a matte finish as well but the bezels have also been tidied up and everything just looks less like a class project and more like something a bit more ready for the mainstream we at least the people with $77.99 to spend on a foldable now the internal screen is where there are some slight tweaks the aspect ratio here is more squarish than before so it's a bit more one to one the tweaks here don't really mean a lot because they're only very SL slight compared to the original your viewing experience isn't going to be majorly different Sam feels that the changes made here were for Google to achieve better compatibility with apps and for multitasking and gaming rather than for watching movies The other big thing about the pixel full 2 that we wanted to pay attention to in our so far limited time with it is the camera performance and I can tell you already at least in terms of the hardware and specs Google's kept basically the the same sensors set up here so you'll see a very similar experience to the original pixel fold and when Sam compared the Galaxy Z fold 6 that was reviewed last year in July against the original pixel fold Google still came out ahead so with largely the same system as before it's probably a safe bet to say that Google still has the edge in photography here now Google did say that it upgraded as ultra white camera here to enable macro focus and added many pro levels software features across all of the cameras you also have new features like the handsfre astrop photography and made you look now mi look is probably useful if you've got someone that needs to be distracted by the front screen as you're taking a photo so this is ideal for people with kids or something else honestly can't think of what other situation this would be helpful and if you know leave a comment down below and tell me where you think Ma look would be useful but I don't think a dog's going to react react to your screen if it has a moving animation on it I will say that in the Hands-On where we tested this feature out it was effective in getting me to smile so maybe I'm a child okay again like I said we have had very limited time with the pixel 9 Pro fold so the only other things I would say we're able to notice so far is that the displays are a lot brighter than before I really like that the external screen for the pixel full 2 is basically the same as the pixel 9 Pro which is possibly one of my favorite devices this year but we'll get to that soon it's also very much cooler than before which is a trend we're seeing across the pixel 9 series now on the pixel 9 Pro fold that's thanks to a vapor chamber built in as well all that said it is still very expensive like I said at $1,800 so if you're considering this and our Impressions right now don't do it for you definitely dig into our full review oning gadget.com for the full breakdown of things like performance and battery life and proper camera samples moving on to the pixel9 pro series and I have been blessed by the Google Gods with a pair of pink pixel Pros I don't think everyone else has these and I am loving the look of these phones I would say that the pink ones are my favorites but I think there's also other color options that you might like including a green or Sage or whichever Google marketing word you want to use just I just love that they did colors really well this year now you may not be a fan of the shiny edges of the pixel 9 pro and pro XL but I like them though I have to agree that over time they just give off this kind of fingerprint stained look that isn't the most premium and you'll just have to clean it a lot all the time thankfully though the backs are at least kind of a matte finish this time and don't seem as slippery as the last few pixels were so they don't just slide off your couch whenever they feel like it I guess now the standout this year for the pixel Pro is the fact that there is a smaller pixel Pro handset and the pixel Pro XL is just a slightly larger than last year's model but for all intense and purposes the one to compare last year's model to is the pixel9 pro XL because they're just largely more similar the good news is that even though the size of the pixel9 pro is a significantly smaller it doesn't compromise much you're getting a slightly smaller screen maybe a slightly smaller battery correspondingly everything else though is about the same as the 9 Pro XL which means you're getting the same camera experience the same processor the same general software experience I don't think there's differences in the wireless charging or the charging speeds except for the larger one is compatible with the 45 W charger that may or may not come in the box and can charge just a bit faster I just looked at the spec sheets to confirm actually the 9 Pro XL despite having a bigger 50 60 milliamp hour battery actually charges up to 70% in 30 minutes compared to the pixel 9 Pro which has a 4700 mAh battery and charges only up to 55% in 30 minutes both using the 45 W USBC charger that Google makes that it so separately so I don't know what gives but for some reason the larger phone with the larger battery charges faster and that is another small difference between the two that said you're not going to care because why weirdly enough in all of our tests the 9 Pro lasts forever it just lasts 25 hours on our battery test or 27 whatever it is it just beat every other thing in the competition on our video rundown battery test which is wild so I'll get to the point right the pixel 9 Pro is arguably the highest scored Android handset we've reviewed in years like I don't remember us ever awarding anything a 9 four not even an iPhone I don't think gets about like an as high a score which means we were pretty blown away and that was Matt Smith are UK bureau chief doing the review independently coming to that conclusion in my time with the pixel 9 Pro I've really liked it too I like that I have not only what runs like a premium high-end uh Flagship but also feels like one that sits nicely in my relatively small hands now Matt Smith has bragged in his review that he has fairly large hands but then at adds that he also finds the larger pixel 9 Pro a little hard to maneuver sometimes like he had trouble reaching for the topmost corners um and so he didn't actually like that the pixel9 pro XL screen is ever so slightly larger than the pixel 8 Pro and that is why we brought a score down slightly another reason we dinged the pixel9 pro series just a little bit on the overall score too is the cost Google has raised the prices of the overall pixel9 Series this year and they're now in line with flagships from Samsung and Apple I know they were meant to see them as more premium flagships in line with the competition right now but I don't know that we're ready to see the pixel series as the topend like not cheaper than anyone else series that Google wants us to see them as I think I'd still like Google to have been able to give us a bit of a savings on the pixel just to encourage a bit more Shoppers to invest because yes Google has comeone very far but just that little bit of a bonus would have encouraged even more people at least on the Android ecosystem side of things to buy these things because I know a lot of people out there are very curious about these phones now should you decide to splurge though not only are you getting a very nice build and a long-lasting battery on both phones you're also getting a very nice display arguably the nicest that we've ever seen from a pixel device as well as solid performance like I said these phones all run cool thanks to the tensor G4 chip we're getting really nice AI features uh and if you buy a pro you're getting a year of Gemini advance for free I I personally love the pixel screenshots app I haven't used it a lot in part because Google has made it that easy to just Port over your entire photos database which is a security and privacy issue I get it but you are able to manually select screenshots from your library and then add them to the screenshots app at least for the pictures that have existed since before you owned a pixel9 pro I will also shout out the pixel studio app that allows you to play with AI to generate the cartoonish non-photo realistic picture and that is a feature that is controversial we have seen other Publications like The Verge managed to create some horrifying and problematic images with this so it's clear Google has some work to do at least on the AI front in general neither Sam nor Matt nor myself really found Gemini live to be a more effective way to communicate with Google's assistant as opposed to the Google Assistant just yet and there will be a little bit of time I think before Google really refines that into the experience that everyone will embrace but for now you always have the option to change back to the Google Assistant another thing that the pixel 9 series brings that by the way is you know very familiar because Apple's already done it is SOS emergency calling via satellite and I actually tested this feature out a few times once I was just never able to connect I think because I was in a train but when I did do it as intended outdoors I found the interface actually surprisingly more helpful and more informative than Apple's as to how to keep the line of sight with a satellite so it is interesting to see Google bring a potentially life-saving feature to the pixel 9 series however it's not clear yet what sort of satellite Partners they're working with or whether those will cost you money in the long run so it's something we'll have to wait and see but it sounds like the industry is broaching this together and maybe we'll see this become a taken for granted feature in future we don't know where Google always stands out with the pixel series at least for me is is cameras and I know there are people out there who don't like the pixel phones cameras but I love them and I like that they're you know maybe they seem a little oversharpened or maybe in you know some form they're not very vibrant in terms of colors you don't see that on the pixel screen compared to say an iPhone or Samsung screen but I love features like portrait mode or video boost or even the silly magic editor features that seem a little trite but they do bring pictures that are very easily and quickly sharable to Instagram and social media for most people that don't want to fuss around too much with the camera settings the pixel will take a good picture almost every time I personally love the idea of the new adme feature that allows you to hold the phone in a group photo setting and then have someone in the shot before come out and swap off with you so that everyone in the group gets to be in the photo which is nice and I think it's a nice imp implementation of an idea now can you use a tripod or put the phone down set on a timer or ask a passer by yes you can there's so many ways to get around this issue but the fact that Google has taken the time to add this feature and maybe it has funny results like lots of other reviewers have made themselves clones and even Matt Smith took photos of two Matt Smiths next to each other it is fun and it's funny unintended and not the most useful but it's nice to see the tech work right okay maybe it doesn't maybe it doesn't always work very well I know that haime Riviera uh did post a couple of examples where somehow the height difference between him and his son uh was largely exaggerated still it's something that Google can easily fix with a software update in future and I still remain convinced that Google has some of the best camera software out there and so if you're looking for something that will take great pictures all the time especially at night and then zoomed up situations and you like some fun editing features maybe playing around with AI the pixel 9 Pro Series is it a quick word on the pixel9 we have a beautiful lovely green review unit that Sam spent some time reviewing and his takeaway is that this should be your go to Android phone if you don't want to splurge on a higher end Flagship top-of-the line one you're getting a great camera experience you're getting all the same software features except for maybe the Gemini Advanced ones and again in a similarly solid body body there's also longlasting battery on the pixel 9 although things like battery life are are stuff that we want to see in a year whether they continue to last long because these things tend to deteriorate over time but for now we are very impressed with Google's pixel 9 and 9 Pro and 9 Pro fold series and family of phones so you can always go on over to engadget.com to draw Off full written reviews of every single thing I've mentioned today they come complete with camera samples much more in-depth testing and for now now I just want to know are you add me or n leave a comment below for more in-depth reviews on smartphones laptops tablets other things in the world of consumer technology make sure you subscribe to and Gadget and until next time stay vibing skiy yeah let me know when you're ready as more premium flag shits flag game over there AER right there