Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL

The Pixels

You won't find dual-lens cameras or edge-to-edge screens on the  Pixel 2 handsets but, instead, Google focused on making these the smartest phones ever. The versatile Google Assistant that summons with a squeeze and a new object-recognition feature in the camera app that's truly impressive.

Available either through Verizon or unlocked, the Pixels offer top-notch performance and battery life, as well as excellent photo quality. Other one-of-a-kind smart features are on the way, including Pixel Buds headphones you can use as a universal translator. However, the designs of these pure Android Oreo phones are anything but sweet, and we wish carriers other than Verizon sold these sequels directly.Available either through Verizon or unlocked, the Pixels offer top-notch performance and battery life, as well as excellent photo quality. Other one-of-a-kind smart features are on the way, including Pixel Buds headphones you can use as a universal translator. 

Design

I measured the top and bottom bezels of the Pixel 2 at over 0.6 inches, compared to 0.2 inches for the Galaxy S8.  It's not all bad news, though, as the two front-firing stereo speakers get nice and loud, offering richer audio than the speaker on the bottom edge of the Galaxy S8. If you like a phone be easy to use with one hand, you'll prefer the Pixel 2's more-compact dimensions of 5.7 x 2.7 x 0.3 inches, versus 6.2 x 3 x 0.3 inches for the Pixel 2 XL. The Pixel 2 weighs a fairly light 5 ounces, compared to 6.2 ounces for the Pixel 2 XL.

The Pixel 2 XL also has a much more modern vibe, as its 6-inch display covers much more of the phone's face. The top and bottom bezels measure a more eye-pleasing 0.4 inches and 0.35 inches thick, respectively. This handset also sports stereo speakers above and below the screen.

Around back, you'll find Google’s trademark two-tone design on both phones, with a stripe of black glass across the top around the camera and flash, and sturdy aluminum covering the bottom three-quarters of the phones. The fingerprint sensor is positioned right in the center, beneath the stripe, making it easy to reach.

Google offers a range of colors for the Pixel 2, including Just Black, Clearly White, Black and White (which reminds us of the cookie), and Kinda Blue. The Pixel 2 XL comes in Just Black and Black and White.

Unfortunately, neither the Pixel 2 nor the Pixel 2 XL features a headphone jack. Google includes a USB-C dongle in the box, but you're probably better off just going wireless.

Google Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL: Specs Compared

	Pixel 2	Pixel 2 XL
Price	$649	$849
OS	Android 8.0	Android 8.0
Display	5 inches (1920 x 1080 pixels)	6 inches (2880 x 1440 pixels)
CPU	Snapdragon 835	Snapdragon 835
RAM	4GB	4GB
Storage	64GB, 128GB	64GB, 128GB
Rear Camera	12 MP (f/1.8)	12 MP (f/1.8)
Front Camera	8 MP (f/2.4)	8 MP (f/2.4)
Battery	2700 mAh	3520 mAh
Headphone Jack	No	No
Charging	USB-C	USB-C
Size	5.7 x 2.7 x 0.3 inches	6.2 x 3 x 0.3 inches
Weight	5.01 ounces	6.2 ounces

Google Pixel 2$649.99 Verizon

Google Pixel 2 XL$849.99 Verizon

Google Assistant: Squeezable and smart

When I first heard about Active Edge on the Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL, I thought it was a gimmick. But after using it just for a few minutes, I changed my mind. With a firm, quick squeeze toward the bottom of the phone, you can activate Google Assistant, which is faster and more accurate and versatile than Siri.  Voice commands can stream to your tv and control you home. Google’s hardware and software work well together across its growing array products. The Google-owned Nest thermostat also works with Google Assistant, so you could say, "Set the temperature to 68 degrees."

With the Assistant just a squeeze away, you can tell the Pixel 2 to snap a selfie, view all the photos I took that day, or boot a Radio Playlist on Spotify. Sure, I could do all of this by saying, "OK, Google," first, but I found it more convenient and less awkward to use Active Edge.

You can also adjust the sensitivity level of the squeeze required and allow the Active Edge feature to work when the screen is off.

Displays: An Update Makes the Pixel 2 XL Better

While Apple charges $999 for the privilege of owning a colorful OLED display and enjoying its wide viewing angles and perfect blacks on the iPhone X, and while the OLED Galaxy S8 starts at $750, you can get this screen tech on the Pixel 2 for $649

The Pixel 2's 5-inch screen isn't the sharpest, at 1920 x 1080 pixels, and it's much smaller than the 5.8-inch Galaxy S8, but it produced an excellent 148 percent of the sRGB color gamut..

The Pixel 2 XL's 6-inch screen sports a sharper, 2880 x 1440-pixel resolution. This panel registered a slightly lower 130 percent of the color gamut, but its colors are just about as accurate on paper. The Pixel 2 XL's display scored 0.26 on the Delta-E error test (0 is perfect), and the Pixel 2 hit 0.29.

The Pixel 2 XL's had some issues at launch. We found that there is a blue tint present on the Pixel 2 XL's panel at off-angles and that there was some graininess when viewing solid colored backgrounds. The Pixel 2 XL was also reportedly suffering from burn-in issues, with the icons at the bottom of the display staying on the screen even when they're not supposed to be present.

Fortunately, a new update from Google promises to provide more saturated hues via a new mode, and it should also mitigate burn-in.

The Pixel 2 XL is the phone you want to have outdoors, as it registered a higher 438 nits on our light meter, compared to just 346 nits on the Pixel 2. The Galaxy S8 notched 437 nits. The smartphone category average is 433.

Similar to the Galaxy S8 and Note 8, the Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL offer always-on displays, which show you the time and notifications at a glance. But the new Pixels go even further, with a Now Playing feature that can recognize music playing in the background and automatically display the title and artist.

From there, you can double tap the track to learn more about the song or to play it. It sometimes took 30 seconds or more for Now Playing to kick in, but it's not designed to replace Shazam; it's more about serendipitous discovery.

Google Lens can recognize everything from landmarks and restaurants to movie posters and even phone numbers on signs.

While the cameras on the Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL take great-looking images, that's not what really makes the photo experience stand out. That would be Google Lens, an object-detection feature in the Camera and in Google Photos app.  With Google Lens, the Pixel 2 can recognize landmarks with ease. Just snap a photo, then tap on the lens icon on the bottom of the screen; Google Assistant will then display an information card on the building with info from Wikipedia.

Google Lens worked pretty well on a business card; the phone easily picked up the email address of the contact and his phone number.

Google Lens will be coming to other Android phones later, but for now at least, it's a Pixel exclusive.

Cameras and Image Quality: Great, but no iPhone 8 killer

Considering the Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL sport single rear 12-megapixel cameras, you might think that they're snapping pics with one arm tied around their backs compared to dual-lens camera phones. Nope. They aren't, and that's because these phones are smart enough to offer a Portrait mode (bokeh effect) through software that works even on the phones' front 8-MP camera. Unfortunately you can't preview Portrait Mode results in real time, as you can with the iPhone 8 and Galaxy Note 8; the bokeh effect is applied after you take the shot.

In terms of overall image quality, the Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 Plus give the best camera phone, the iPhone 8 Plus, a run for its money. But they don't surpass it.

If you're an Android fan and you've been jealous of Apple's Live Photos, you'll like  the Motion photos feature on the Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 Plus. It captures a few seconds of video with each image and plays it back with a loop-like effect, as I noticed in one shot I took that had moving cars in the foreground.

Performance: Faster real-world speed

With the same Snapdragon 835 processor as the Galaxy S8 and the same 4GB of RAM as the Galaxy S8 and S8+, the Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL might be expected to offer the same performance. Actually, they're faster in real-world tasks.

On our video-editing test, in which we transcode a 2-minute 4K video clip to 1080p in the Adobe Clips app, the Pixel 2 took 2 minutes and 55 seconds, compared to 4:07 for the Galaxy S8. Next, we opened up a 5.1 MB PDF file. The Pixel 2 took just 2 seconds, compared to nearly 6.41 seconds for the Galaxy Note 8. The iPhone 8 took 0.74 seconds.

The Pixel 2 didn't fare as well on synthetic benchmarks. On Geekbench 4, which measures overall performance, the Pixel 2 notched 6,282. That's a little bit behind the Galaxy S8's score (6,295) and well short of the Galaxy Note 8's showing (6,564). The iPhone 8 was in another league, at 10,170.

When performing everyday tasks, like running two apps side by side in split-screen mode, the Pixel 2 felt snappy and responsive. I played the demanding Warhammer 40,000: Freeblade game — busting up tanks with my mech — without any lag.

Battery Life: Excellent

Both the Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL beat their Apple and Samsung foes in endurance. These runtimes far surpass the  smartphone average, and they beat the respective times of the iPhone 8 and the Galaxy S8
The Pixel 2 XL easily makes our list of the longest-lasting phones. Plus, you can expect even longer battery life should you choose T-Mobile for your Pixel 2 or Pixel 2 XL, as we've found that phones tend to last longer on that network.

One bummer, though, is that neither the Pixel 2 nor the Pixel 2 XL supports wireless charging. You'll need to plug in a USB-C cable if you want juice. Google claims that you'll get up to 7 hours of power in just 15 minutes.

Android Oreo: Minor (but welcome) upgrades

It's no surprise that Google's own phones are the first to ship with the new Android Oreo software installed. The updated OS doesn't offer dramatic improvements, but there are some worthwhile new features.

The new picture-in-picture mode isn't one of them. Although you can already run two apps side by side, picture-in-picture lets you exit an app and still see a floating window of one of the supported apps, such as YouTube and Google Maps.

The app shortcuts feature, which is similar to the 3D Touch feature on iOS, is more useful. You long press an app icon to activate various shortcuts without having to open the app.

Similarly helpful are the notification dots. When you log press an icon that has a dot on the upper right corner, you'll see the waiting notification without having to open the app. This came in handy for the Gmail app.

 With Google's new ARCore initiative, compelling augmented reality apps will be making their way to certain Android Oreo phones, such as the Galaxy S8. The apps will be hitting the Google Play store this winter.

Oreo has lots of other features, including ones under the hood to optimize performance and battery life, as well as to enable stronger security.

Accessories: Not your average add-ons

With a lot of phones, the accessories are an afterthought, but not with the Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL. The new Pixel Buds ($159) are wireless headphones that let you carry on a conversation with someone else in their native language. Leveraging Google Translate and Google Assistant, these headphones help you say phrases in any one of 40 languages, and your Pixel 2 will utter that phrase aloud so that the person you're speaking with can understand you.

Another new accessory on the way is Google Clips, a pricier $249 camera that you can attach to pretty much anything to record video of loved ones, allowing you to keep your hands free. Because it uses machine learning, the Clips camera not only knows when there's a person in the frame to take a shot, but it can also learn who your friends and family members are over time.

If you're looking to get into virtual reality, there's also a new version of the Google Daydream View headset ($99), which offers improved comfort and optics with a wider sweet spot for content and increased resolution.

If you own other Google gear, such as the Google Home Mini (which you can get for free right now when you order the Pixel 2) or Chromecast, the Assistant's powers multiply. In a way, Google is starting to pull away from other Android phone makers, because the company is creating its own Apple-like universe

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The Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL also benefit from faster performance than the Galaxy S8, stellar front and back cameras and long battery life. The iPhone 8 Plus remains the king of camera phones. But if you want a pure Android experience, you'll love the Pixel 2 XL. The Pixel 2's bezels are just way too big and it's screen too small for me to take this phone seriously.

Credits

Dr. R Longwell

and Rob Taylor