Google pixel a series smartphones always offer in­credible value in the midrange category and they are so special to tech enthusiasts. I am really excited about the upcoming Google Pixel 6a because it's coming with Google Tensor chip and the design is crazy new this time. Pixel 6a will be the first to have tensor SoC in the a series lineup. Google started teasing about the pixel 6a long before its release date. Now we know almost everything about the design, specifications and price. Only time will tell about how good the user experience will be with the pixel 6a. In this article I am going to give you as much information as I can so that you can make a decision about choosing the right smartphone for you.




Inside the Box
Google is doing minimal packaging here with the pixel 6a like the pixel 6 from last year. The box is pretty thin and light because there is no charger included in the box. You will get a type-c to type-c cable and a type-c to type-a OTG connector for data transferring purposes. I like the fact that they are including the usb OTG connector but including a slim powerful charger would look more right and useful to most customers. I really don't like it when companies aren't including stock chargers in the box.

If you use some other third-party chargers then there can be safety issues and you will not be able to get the most out of it. Don't make the box slim, instead make the charger slim, which is more innovative. The phone has a white peel with labels for the in-display fingerprint sensor, controls and ports. You will get some paperwork in the box too. Overall, the packaging is just crazy simple, nothing really cool other than the phone to get excited about.


Design and Build
Google completely redesigned the pixel 6 last year but the pixel 5a didn’t make it with the new look. This year the pixel 6a is getting that new design from pixel 6. I like the new design and it’s the camera portion that gives the pixel a new identity. The bump on the rear side is really prominent, which has a camera visor kind of look. The sensors are lined up there like an array and that camera bump is the main unique defining factor for sure.

This new design makes the pixel 6a stand out from the rest of the midrange smartphone market. The pixel 6a shares the same design and form factor with the pixel 6, which is pretty exciting because pixel 6a is not a flagship. Luckily we are going to get a metal frame here, which is what makes the midrange category deliver a premium flagship like experience. So there are a lot of cool unique aspects going on with the pixel 6a and design is certainly one of them. The build quality also has an especial touch on its own to make you remember about the uniqueness of the device. The weight will be around 178 grams, which seems pretty light and comfortable for a 6.1" device. Gorilla Glass 3 on the front and plastic on the back.

Glass back would look and feel more premium, though. The pixel 6a has a 8.9 mm thin body, which is not that thin to me. I would like something lower than 8.5 mm in terms of frame thinness. It will come with an ip67 dust/water protection for the safety and longevity of the device. Overall, build and design seem phenomenal for the price.


The Display
They are using OLED tech for the display. It’s a 6.1 inch compact display which will fit in perfectly in-between small and big displays. It has 83.0% screen-to-body ratio, which is kinda budget oriented. Not only just oled but also HDR support for the pixel 6a. I know some cheap phones come with oled displays that are pretty bad at their lowest and highest brightness but I think pixel 6a's display is going to be pretty decent in quality with good color accuracy even though it's a midrange smartphone. The resolution will be 1080 x 2400 with 429 ppi density. There will be always on display feature and a lot of other high-end features. The oled display is protected by corning gorilla glass 3, which is not the latest but will provide decent enough protection.


Hardware Specs
The new design is pretty special but other than that nothing really that high-end stuff in the hardware department because they are going backwards. You know how well those old 12 megapixel cameras were in older pixel smartphones. Google was polishing and pushing their limits on computational photography with that old sensor. But when they used the new 50MP samsung GN1 sensor with the pixel 6 lineup, the image processing algorithm was way too much as the hardware was already good. So pixel 6 was over processing captured images. But with the pixel 6a they settled using the old trusty 12.2 MP, f/1.7, 27 mm Sony IMX363 sensor. So there's no doubt that the pixel 6a will have an excellent camera but we will see how well it couples with the Tensor chip. The camera will have OIS, PDAF and HDR. The secondary camera is also a 12 MP wide-angle sensor with 114 degree field of view. For video you can do 1080p at 240fps and 4k at 60fps max. Secondary camera is a 8 MP, f/2.0, 24 mm sensor with google's processing algorithm. Front camera will do 1080p at 30fps max, which is not good enough in my opinion. Lacking in 60fps video recording for the front camera is an important thing to consider as people are into vlogging nowadays - they want options.


Google Tensor - A12
Google is making their own custom silicon chip in collaboration with Samsung. This isn’t something like Google is manufacturing these SoC in-house instead they are designing them to get as much control as possible. This in theory opens up a whole new limit of what google can do with its dominating power in software, data processing and AI departments. This chip in 6a is based on 5 nm fabrication which is a crazy advanced tech. It has 2 x 2.80 Ghz, 2 x 2.25 Ghz and 4 x 1.80 Ghz cores which in total making it an octa core CPU. The GPU is Mali-G78 MP20. Google has already introduced some crazy appli­cations like magic eraser and live text. Now they're upping the game of low light, portrait and hdr shots.

They were not that good in capturing nicely balanced videos that most people will appreciate like their life-like image processing with incredible hdr and contrast handling. So we can hope that google is improving their video processing algorithm and probably pixel 6a will have better video taking capabilities. Pixel 6 is coming with Android 12 with all of its UI glory and smooth eye-catching animations. Probably pixel 6a users will get 5 years of software update, which is incredible for a midrange smartphone.


Features
The speaker setup will be stereo in pixel 6 but no 3.5 mm audio out this time. I don’t like this portless direction that companies are moving towards because you’ll have to stop at some point where old ways are better than new. For connectivity wifi 6e, bluetooth 5.2, NFC and a lot of 5G bands for better coverage and carrier aggregation. There is an under display optical fingerprint sensor, which I hope they developed for a faster response time as the old pixel 6’s sensor was slow. The battery is Li-Po 4410 mAh that supports only 18 watt fast charging.


Conclusion
The Google Pixel 6a will surely be a hit this year like any other a titled devices from google. Google is working hard to fix bugs that were introduced with the brand new Android 12 update so that the next devices with A12 can have a smooth user experience out of the box. A series devices were always special because of their low price tag and they had so much to offer considering the price. This time they settled with 449 USD, which is higher than 5a but still very promising. Check the official webpage to explore more.

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