Google’s latest Android smartphone isn’t a big leap forward, but the steps it takes make it worth a look.
. Instead, at a first glance, the smartphone looks nearly identical to the one it’s replacing. The differences between them are subtle even when you take a long look under the surface.and immediately feels good in the hand. It’s a little taller than the iPhone 14 Pro Max but 40 grams lighter, which made a bigger difference than I expected. When you’re reading a long article or holding your phone while watching a video, every gram counts.
Reading long-form stories on the go is easier because of the Pixel 7 Pro’s large, high-resolution display.Last year, Google introduced the Tensor chip, a custom-designed processor developed specifically for use in Pixel phones. The Pixel 7 Pro features the Tensor G2, which is slightly faster on paper but powerful and energy efficient in practice. The move from an off-the-shelf part to a bespoke one paid off as the Pixel 7 Pro runs Android 13 flawlessly.
My tests—conducted indoors and outdoors in various lighting conditions—show that Google’s relentless investment in computational photography continues to pay off, especially in an era when it makes its own chips. There’s a lot of fancy processing work happening behind the scenes, so all I needed to do to get a great photo was framing my shot and hitting the shutter button.