Google announces successor to Pixel 2, the new Pixel 3 smartphone

NEW YORK—Google announced the Pixel 3 at its event in the Big Apple today. With something like two-dozen different leaks and an entire lost box of devices that went up for sale on the black market, the Pixel 3 is probably the most-leaked smartphone of all time.

Design

The mostly metal backs of the Pixel 2 and Pixel 1 were one of the few unique hardware features of the Pixel line. Now the Pixel 3 is just another fragile glass phone, which feels like a downgrade. The back panel still has a two-tone look thanks to two different treatments on a single glass sheet. The top is normal glass, while the bottom has a matte coating on it.

As expected, Google is releasing two different devices with totally different front designs. The Pixel 3 has a 5.5-inch 2160×1080 OLED display, with sizable straight bezels on the top and bottom of the phone. The Pixel 3 XL has a 6.3-inch 2880×1440 OLED display with an extremely tall display notch and a large bottom bezel.

New front-facing speakers on both handsets are 40 percent louder than those on past Pixel smartphones, and Google will include six months of YouTube Music with Pixel 3 smartphones so users can experience the new speakers.

Cameras

Google is still only using a single 12.2-megapixel camera lens on the back this year, but the Pixel line has never disappointed in the camera department. Google's cameras have topped the competition for some time thanks to "computational photography"—an approach that aims to make up for the limited lens size of smartphone cameras with algorithms and computing power.

One of the new features, dubbed Top Shot, picks out the best shot after taking a burst of photos. When you snap a photo on either the Pixel 3 or Pixel 3 XL, a bunch of photos are taken in rapid succession. Top Shot recognizes the best of all those shots—the ones where your subject's eyes aren't closed and the ones that are the least blurry. Another new feature called Super Res Zoom uses multiple photos and AI to create a crisper, higher-quality zoomed-in photo even without the use of optical zoom.

A single camera may live on the back of Pixel smartphones, but Google added a second camera to the front. This is primarily to achieve ultra-wide angle shots, so you can fit more into your selfies and similar photos.

Google also added Playground AR technology to the Pixel cameras. Similar to Snapchat and other AR features, Playground lets users insert animations, moving images, and other interactive features into their photos and videos.

Specs, accessories, and the Google Assistant

Other specs for both models include a Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 SoC, 4GB of RAM, and 64 or 128GB of storage. The Pixel 3 gets a 2,915 mAh battery, while the bigger Pixel 3 XL has a 3430mAh battery. There's no headphone jack or MicroSD card, but both designs are rated IP68 for water/dust resistance. Google's (and HTC's) squeezable Active Edge feature returns, so if you want to call up the Google Assistant, just give the sides a squeeze.

The glass back means wireless charging is supported this year, but Google is taking things a bit further with the Pixel Stand. This $79 accessory charges the phone in an upright position and kicks it into an ambient display mode that makes it work like a Google Assistant smart display. That means the Pixels will show information like time, weather, calendar appointments, and more. When docked, the handset's UI adjusts so you can more easily see it from across a room as well. Plus, just like a smart display, it is always ready to take your "OK Google" commands.

The Pixel smartphones will receive all the new features of the Google Assistant, including things like the new on-screen smart home hub that lets you control all of your smart home devices even when you're not home. Another interesting new feature demoed at today's event could help users answer only the most important calls for them. When you receive a call on a Pixel 3 smartphone, a feature dubbed Call Screen can use the Google Assistant to answer the call and ask who's calling and why. Real-time responses are transcribed on the smartphone's screen, so you can then decide to pick up the call, send it to voicemail, or mark it as spam. It sounds like a practical adaptation of Google's Duplex technology, but it's unclear if Call Screen actually runs on the same tech needed for Duplex.

The Pixel 3 and Pixel 3 XL come in white, black, and "not pink" color options and are available for preorder today starting at $799. It'll be available widely in the US on October 18 and will arrive in 12 other markets on November 1.