Customer Ratings & Reviews

I have been a Google Pixel user since they were Nexus. Each new model surpases the one before, specially the camera. But the new ones are very high tech, and more gorgeous looking. Great screen, long lasting battery, loud sound speakers (stereo) and now with a magnetic charging back (magsafe compatible) Keep them coming this good!

Coming from a Google pixel 6. The device is a similar size. In this case smaller is better for smaller hands. The camera takes very good photos which is why you would buy a phone like this. The zoom is not as powerful as an s24 but there's not nearly as much Samsung bloat. The device runs well not too different from the pixel 6 but still an incremental improvement. Will it be too different from another pixel only a year or two old? No but I've coming from a 6 or earlier it's a good buy.

Got the Pixel 9 Pro for a steller deal for just $600. The phone is beyond amazing at this point point, excellent cameras; telephoto, ultrawide, the selfie cam. Performance is also amazing, the haptic feedback also feels amazing. Overall excellent purchase, and this purchase feels even better now that the Pixel 10 Pro has almost similar specs to this one, specially the cameras being the same.

Perfect size! I have been an owner of pf the Pixel 5 for a very long time and had been holding off on upgrading since nothing quite matched that form factor. I was long overdue for an upgrade and while this is not as small as the 5, it is fairly close. The camera, screen, battery life and haptics are leaps and bounds ahead of the 5, as I had hoped. I don't plan on using the AI features until they have matured a bit, so my experience of over the last week has been AI-less and I'm still very, very impressed by this phone.

I like it a lot. It's a slight learning curve from Samsung galaxy a phones, but similar enough that I picked it up easily. The camera is great. The only thing I'm not the biggest fan of is the app drawer isn't able to be organized natively. You have to either make a home page that's organized or load a different launcher. Excellent rating for it being an open box item in perfect condition that had a screen protector on it already!

I upgraded from an 3a and I'm really impressed with the excellent photos, I'm not fond of the Gemini option but I think I've managed to shut that off. There are some other quirky things about this phone. some of them I think are just included in the new operating system. The default setup was backing up the phone into the cloud and deleting the photos on the phone that were over a few days old. I had to figure out how to stop that.. I'm happy now.

Does everything you’d expect it to do. Awesome feeling phone in the hand, gorgeous screening, stunning camera (especially the front facing one it’s the best I’ve ever used). The problem is at weird points the phone gets ludicrously hot. I open a non-intensive game and after 10 minutes of playing the phone gets to 44 Celsius. Google has got to fix the optimization issues on this processor ASAP.

Takes a little bit to get used to. But the phone is a great phone. The screen is clear and you can get bright enough. Even in daylights. The camera is phenomenal. The AI is pretty darn good. And there's a ton of features. And 7 years of updates, perfect.

The software on pixel has been always amazing. But the device heats really quick when use it for extensive tasks like taking a lot of photos or gaming. The camera quality is itself good but take about 3 seconds to process each photo. The AI is ok to have but not really useful in day to day tasks. The best part is it comes with free subscription to Gemini Advance for 1 year.

I love this phone is amazing, have a really good camera and system process

The device is very good. It feels very good to the touch and feels like a well built device.

I love the phone. I upgraded from a Pixel 4a and this phone as even better photos.

Very similar to the pixel 6 except with a bit more bugs. Camera quality is nice.

The venerable Pixel line of phones has entered its ninth generation - and this time, Google was keen to offer a model that packs all the features of a typically phablet-sized Pro model into a more modest-sized chassis. The Pixel 9 Pro is a normal-sized, flagship phone that seemingly makes no compromises to meet its reduced dimensions, sharing identical specs to its larger brethren minus the physical screen size. To me that sounds like a perfect device, and indeed, I found almost nothing to fault with this pocket-sized wonder. This is the one to have. - Unboxing & Setup Mimicking other smartphones, Google’s unboxing experience is spartan but organized. A charger, USB-C cable, SIM tool, and a USB-C cable are included alongside a very short quickstart guide. Initial setup is a breeze, especially, if you’re coming from another Android phone. You’ll be prompted to power-on your old phone and connect to the Pixel 9 Pro to transfer your data over either wirelessly or wired - the latter is definitely better for large transfers as the wireless option slowed down significantly after just a few gigabytes of data. Otherwise this worked flawlessly transferring data from a fairly recent Android phone. The remainder of the initial setup sets your Google device and account preferences, including how you want to configure Gemini (an AI-based Google Assistant replacement; the classic assistant is still available), Google Wallet, face unlock, and more preferences. Once setup is complete, apps identified during the data transfer (and any other apps you had downloaded previously) are downloaded from Google Play to update them to the latest version. - Screen & Sound The Pixel 9 Pro packs a gorgeous OLED display with bezels so thin that, if you use any kind of phone case, you might be tricked into thinking there’s none at all. With about a 20:9 aspect ratio and just a small punch out for the front-facing camera (I would’ve liked to see a completely hidden one, but I’m nitpicking), the 495-PPI display can get insanely bright, pushing nearly 3000 nits and making it wonderfully viewable in bright daylight. Colors are of course incredibly vivid while remaining very accurate, and adaptive brightness constantly adjusts to the environment, though it does take an extra moment to adjust when moving into darker places. By default, the Pixel 9 Pro runs at a 120Hz refresh rate, which is dynamically changed as needed to preserve battery life. You can enable 60Hz as a developer option for additional battery life if you prefer, but the high refresh rate makes a difference in just how fast and fluid the phone feels in use, making the most of Google’s latest Tensor processor. The front-facing earpiece speaker and a bottom-facing speaker offer stereo sound, and these speakers get pretty loud with little distortion at high volume. Though the EQ seems tuned for speech, bass reproduction is good when listening to music. There’s no headphone jack, as expected, so you’ll need to use a USB-C headphone adapter (not included) or a Bluetooth device if you want to listen privately. - Performance Google’s Tensor chip, now in its fourth generation, differs from previous iterations by focusing on efficiency and “real-world” performance rather than pure speed. To make up the gap (and to power more on-device AI functions), Google paired the Tensor G4 with a whopping 16GB of RAM, which is only bested by a select handful of gaming-first phones that sacrifice daily usability for game performance. Even so, gaming on this phone is a great experience with high fidelity details, but it does fall short of its competition and can occasionally throttle. Speedy or not, the focus on real-world use has paid off. I’ve been using the phone for about a week and still can’t get over just how immediately responsive everything is. There’s no hesitation or delay switching between apps or any number of browser tabs, and the Pixel 9 Pro seemingly has no limit to how far I can push the device. This is a seamless Android experience - helped immensely by the fact that as a Pixel device there’s no OEM-preinstalled bloatware or OS customizations to contend with. - Camera Google’s work with AI has been integrated into the Camera app on the Pixel 9 range, and while the high quality sensors and optics on the Pixel 9 Pro are fantastic in their own regard, the AI-enabled post-processing makes this phone’s pictures stand out better than with any other flagship phone I’ve seen. Semi-professional grade photos are achievable with little effort, as the app continuously stitches shots together from the phone’s rear cameras and depth sensor, and only saves the result once you press the shutter. The rear cameras feature a 5x optical zoom and the Camera app continues harnessing AI for a super-scaled, up to 30x digital zoom that looks quite a bit better than you’d expect. Though I wasn’t too surprised I could capture great portrait photos and panoramas with minimal distortion, what impressed me is how well the phone does in low-light shots. Night Sight works magic to bring details out of the shadows, and no doubt more AI integration here is helping extrapolate what little data the sensors can read to deliver fantastic results. One area that’s been quite improved from previous Pixels is the front-facing camera, which delivers excellent shots on par with, or arguably better than, their prior flagships’ main cameras. For once you’ll want to freshen yourself up before taking a video call on mobile - it captures that much detail. See the attached photos for examples of the camera’s capabilities - the steeple shot is a particularly good example of how much detail is captured in a 16x combined optical and digital zoom, and the low light shot of a puppeteer comedian was at 5x zoom from a far distance in the crowd, quickly snapped from the hip. Extremely impressive results! - Gemini With AI integration comes Google’s latest upgrade to the classic Google Assistant - Gemini. As an AI skeptic I was hesitant to enable at first, especially as it feeds all of your data into Gemini’s algorithms and integrates across most, if not all Google applications, but after using it for a week I’ve come back very impressed. Gemini integrates seamlessly into the experience and is a much more powerful tool than the classic Google Assistant. With continued conversation enabled (and subscribing to Gemini Advanced), Gemini becomes an all-in-one personal assistant that helps organize your digital life. It has largely the same functionality as Google Assistant but with the ability to use much more natural language when asking it to perform tasks, and generative prompts are useful to push through things like writers’ block - for example, asking Gemini for help coming up with technical interview questions for job candidates was a breeze. Some of Gemini’s most impressive feats come with Google Workspace integration. Gemini is able to search through your email and Google Drive to find conversations, documents, photos, and more by simply describing what the content is, and nearly every time it found the item I was describing without any reference to its name or metadata. Google Workspace is predominantly for business users and such managed accounts, but its capabilities are nonetheless very impressive for both work and personal environments. [Full disclosure: I did not use Gemini or any other AI tools to generate, nor assist in writing or editing, any part of this or any of my reviews posted to Best Buy.] - Battery & Charging Google’s focus on power efficiency for the Pixel 9 generation has absolutely paid off in battery life. Starting from a full charge in the morning, I have never gotten the phone below 50% battery most days - I saw 40% once with heavy use through the day (navigation directions, etc) - and that’s with default screen settings including dynamic brightness and up to 120Hz refresh. I was able to go off-charger from morning to 10pm the next day when I finally got a 5% remaining notification. Impressive stuff. While some may lament the fact that the Pixel 9 Pro uses the older Qi charging standard (maximum 15 W, typically more like 5 W) rather than the updated Qi v2, the USB-C port supports power delivery for 27W rapid charging, which is enough to bring the battery from 0 to 75% in about 30 minutes. The convenience of wireless charging is preferable all the same, and a slower overall charge rate is generally better for a battery long-term, though even as it ages I’m still plenty happy with more than a full day’s usage. Excellent stuff. - Bottom Line A flagship phone with top-line specs in a normal-sized package is all I could ever ask for, and Google’s Pixel 9 Pro delivers exactly that. More than anything, I’m stunned this all fits within the smaller form factor. Sizing down usually means compromising on one or two key specs or features, but the Google phone team has made no sacrifices for people who want a standard-size phone. Better yet, the smaller size comes with a slightly smaller price than the Pixel 9 Pro XL models, lopping $100 off at each storage capacity. I genuinely struggle to find fault with this flagship phone, and though some may balk at the $999 price tag, I don’t think there’s a better pure Android experience out there, and certainly not in a device that fits this well in-hand and in the pocket. Highly recommended!

The Pixel 9 Pro is my second Pixel phone and my family's 4th. I made the jump to the Pixel phones when I switched carriers to Google Fi and after I started having problems with *physical* SIM cards in Motorola phones on Fi and I have not been disappointed in that decision yet. Side-by-side, the Pixel 8 and the Pixel 9 Pro are identical in size and weight for anyone who might be making the jump from 8 to 9 Pro. They could *almost* even use the same phone case and screen protectors. The 9 Pro has a solid feel to it. It is a little less "rounded" on the edges compared to other Pixel models. Where that is most notable is on the camera face. Previous "jut out cameras" on Pixels curved into the body of the phone. On the 9 Pro, the camera looks like it was a superglued Lego piece on the back of the phone. In a phone case, that doesn't matter much, but if you don't use a case, the lens/flash casing on the camera seems like it could easily snag or catch on things as you pull it from your pocket or purse. Regardless, I have average sized hands and the phone fits very comfortably in my hand and can reach nearly every corner of the phone one-handed with my thumb with relative ease. The aluminum body is sleek and comfortable. Now for the fun stuff... Inside, the Pixel 9 Pro sports a Tensor G4 processor which is a model step up from the 8's that had Tensor G3 processors. The 9 Pro has a slightly brighter screen than the previous series and has the same Gorilla Glass Victus 2 as the 8 pro. Google did not add any additional onboard storage (128GB) and, like previous models, does not support additional storage via microSD, however, Google bumped the memory up to 16GB for the Pixel 9 Pro which is a significant upgrade. The battery capacity is comparable to previous models of its size, which has me a bit concerned as just recently I started to suffer from unidentified battery drain on my Pixel 8. [Likely a misbehaving new app or possibly a result of a change in lifestyle that has me using the phone a bit more frequently as I travel.] Regardless, you can get a whole day out of the phone no problem (unless you plan on watching streaming TV on the phone all day long). The battery is fast charging (27W) and Qi wireless charging (21W) capable. Given the Tensor 4G is supposed to be more energy efficient, I hope that the battery life is improved even if the capacity is about the same as my Pixel 8. The main camera is a very good "triple camera system" similar to the 8 and 8 pro with improvements to night/low light photos and videos as well as a wider field of view plus optical quality zoom at .5x, 1x, 2x, 5x, and 10x--per the specs. I find it very nice that when you take a standard photo, the screen has quick buttons for .5x, 1x, 2x, and 5x zoom so you don' t have to pinch/drag the zoom slider. By default the phone takes 12MP quality photos. If you go into the settings, you can bump that to 50MP which is huge (figuratively and literally). 50MP resolution is beautiful on this camer...um, phone. You can also save pictures in RAW format. There are SO MANY FEATURES with the camera that I cannot share them all other than to say the Pixel 9 Pro might actually be a camera first, and a phone second. Cool features like "palm selfies," dirty lens warning, time lapse for astrophotography, Ultra HDR, "add me" (where you can add yourself into a photo), long exposure, action pan, Magic Editor, Best Take, etc. and even 8K Video Boost make this the most advanced Pixel camera system to date. The front camera is 48MP offering incredible quality, zoom, and even a strangely invasive auto selfie mode that identifies faces and counts you down from three to take perfect selfies...if you are into that kind of thing. While the camera and hardware specs of the Pixel 9 Pro and my old Pixel 8 aren't that much different, the Pixel 9 was built for AI. I am not super excited about that, but I also must admit that I have used the Google Assistant ("Hey Google...") for years now so I need to get over the idea that really Gemini is just an enhancement of Google Assistant. I like how you simply LONG PRESS the power button to get Gemini to pop up. You don't need to "Hey Google" the device...although I think you still can. Long press the power then simply as the phone to do something like "open my email" or "text Stephanie to pick up milk on the way home." Obviously, you can get really creative with the AI functions and pretty much just talk to your phone all day long if you want. A SIGNIFICANT IMPROVEMENT from the last Pixel is the improve fingerprint reader and facial recognition. I have had problems in the past with the fingerprint reader. The ultrasonic fingerprint scanner is much faster and more accurate. Call quality is very good (but is of course dependent on a number of factors including network and carrier) and volume options are solid. Video quality is great for video calls or recording video. The phone takes a physical SIM or an eSIM. The slot is at the bottom of the phone. THERE IS NO AUX PORT FOR HEADPHONES ON THE PIXEL 9 PRO. :-( Charging is a mixed bag on this phone. Technically Pixel took a step backwards, but charging times are still pretty good. 15 minutes on a 27W charger should boost your battery by about 25%. 30 minutes gets you 50%. It will take about 90 minutes to get a full charge. This also assumes you don't have any weird battery charging settings turned on. For example, you can "slow charge" overnight based on the time your alarm is set for. This supposedly helps preserve the life of the battery. Overall, this is a rock solid and FUN phone. The components from processor to display to memory to storage to camera are all an improvement and very top-of-the-line. Add 7 years of guaranteed OS and security updates, plus features like satellite SOS to connect with emergency services when out of range of a cell tower and you cannot go wrong with this phone. Increased security features (such as password protected private space to install apps and store content that only the owner of the phone can access) and Wifi 7/Bluetooth 5.3, a noise canceling microphone, and NFC to do tap and pay...this phone is built to last. The software enhancements for photos, AI, and more make it a joy to use. [Be sure to check out Pixel Studio image generator, try AI organization of your screenshots, and let Call Notes help summarize your phone calls.]

The Pixel 9 Pro is the “regular sized” pro model in the 9-series lineup this year. In the past, you had to buy the XL version to get all of the Pro features, but now thankfully, for the most part, you get all of the features of the 9 Pro-XL in the 9 Pro, with the exception of the screen on the 9 Pro being a 6.3 OLED (more one-handed friendly). All other features such as the AI, RAM, cameras… all match the larger sibling. Along with the phone you get the standard items including a USB-C charging cable (no charging brick, though), and a sim tool. You can order a 256 gig storage version of this model, but unfortunately, they stuck with 128 gigs as standard for the base price (boo). The 9 Pro feels premium. It’s solidly built and has new more flat/squared edges along with a flat screen. This causes it to resemble “other” phones from the front, but it does look and feel really nice. The back has a camera bump now shaped like an elongated pill form instead of a visor that goes across the entire screen. I like the new version better, though it does protrude a good bit, so I’d suggest having a good case and even a screen protector for the camera lens area to help protect everything. A neighbor had ordered this exact model for their Son and received it before I got mine, and asked me to set it up for them, so I have the benefit of being able to have set up two Pixel 9 Pros – and both setups went without a glitch. Out of the box, you of course want to run any and all updates to the OS and phone to make sure all important tweaks and updates are installed – manually check for all updates in settings, and make sure to update your apps as well once done, then reboot. Once done, note that the screen resolution is auto set at 960 x 2142 pixels, which saves battery, but if you want, you can crank it up to 1280 x 2856 pixels in settings to get a little more resolution and detail, at the expense of a little more battery power being used. This screen is nice and bright with deep blacks and rich, though realistic, colors. In auto brightness mode it can go up to 3000 nits of brightness so you can see it really well outdoors, but even in normal manual brightness you can adjust it to just about any setting. The 120Hz refresh rate keeps things running smooth on screen but it will adjust depending on what you’re doing, to save battery. An ultrasonic fingerprint reader unlocks the phone faster and more accurately than the older versions. The 16 gigs of RAM also helps keep things running smooth. The Tensor G4 processor is really just a minor update over last year’s G3 processor and it’s not among the most powerful, but for most people, it will do everything they need it to do, even with some gaming, and does not overheat like previous versions. A Titan M2 security co-processor helps keep things more secure. Like the larger sibling, the 9 Pro now has three cameras on the back including one that has a 5X optical zoom (yes!), with a new zoom enhance feature that will clear up heavily zoomed photos after the fact. So now, you have the 50 megapixel main camera, an updated 48 megapixel ultrawide camera, and the 5X zoom 48 megapixel tele camera. All of them take really nice shots which are what Pixels are known for. Realistic colors and good dynamic range detail in shadows and highlight areas make these probably the best cameras in many ways of any phone, currently. The newly updated front facing camera is now 42 megapixels and is sharper and has better colors than previous versions. Video can be cranked up to 4K 60 frames per second with a new AI feature allowing you to upload the video and have it sent back at 8K resolution (though this does take a while). The only hiccup is that when using the zoom during video recording, you might see just a small amount of jerkiness as the phone switches lenses for zooms. Nothing major, but of note. The amount of AI features in this year’s 9-series models is crazy-good. The main show stopper is “Gemini Live” which allows you to literally have a conversation with the computer pretty much as you would with any human (scary, but neat). Gemini live has been able to answer all kinds of questions for me from travel inquiries to trivia, help me write the text for an email or letter, and tons more. It will tap into Google’s assistant when needed to control phone features. The ONE thing, though? You only get Gemini “live” for one year when buying a Pro model, and after that, you have to pay monthly for the full live feature. Ok, I really think Pixel buyers should at least get two years of this! Hopefully their policy will extend this as time progresses. Anyway, aside from Gemini, you get a range of other AI features that allow you to put yourself into photos called “Add me” so you don’t have to get strangers to take a photo – just take one of your friends, have one of them step over, and take one of you superimposed into the photo so it looks like you were there in the original. AI also will be able to enhance zooms to make them clearer, clean up night shots, remove unwanted items (or people) from photos with “Magic Editor”, and add backgrounds to photos, and more. “Pixel Studio” lets you create AI images of pretty much anything you want (except people, so far). Live translation helps you communicate if you are with someone who doesn’t speak your language (works pretty well, too), can you can even have the Pixel take notes of calls you are on. If you don’t like AI all of these can be quite a bit overwhelming, but they are really nice to have if you do want them, and they do for the most part work as advertised once you get the hand of how to use them all. Another not quite AI feature is satellite SOS texting, so if you wind up in the boonies and have no cell service, you can use satellites to send an emergency text should you need help. Handy, though I’m not sure if there’s a firm amount of free use time decided yet, and it may become a pay feature after two years or? Battery life is pretty good – better than previous Pixel models. The new processor and other tweaks along with the screen help extend the battery (4700 mah), so it’s definitely a full day phone so long as you don’t use it full throttle the entire day, but if you do, having a portable charger isn’t a bad idea. The charging speed is only mediocre when plugged in, and slightly slower when using wireless charging. It would be nice to see Google up the wattage on charging so it would be faster. Oh, and yes, it’s also a PHONE! People do actually still make calls. This will be subjective to the service you use, where you use it, and many other factors. I’m in Atlanta where generally, cell service is good across the board. I’ve been trying this out inside of a brick ranch style home in the suburbs, and so far, no dropped calls. So the updated modem/antenna seem to be very good on the Pixel 9. Again, your experience may vary, but I can say that on the Pixel 8 I did drop a handful of calls, and using the same service, I haven’t dropped any on the Pixel 9 in the short time I’ve had it, but I’ve called around a bit to test it even deep inside the house. Overall I really like the new Pixel 9 Pro. The size is manageable. The body and design updates are nice, and the screen is very nice. Cameras are of course “Pixel great” as usual for a Pixel, and the AI features though almost overwhelming in choices, are really nice to have and can take your phone use to a new level. Complaints? A couple: The biggest – having only 128 gigs as base storage in 2024 is NOT what I’d like, as I really do think the Pro models should come with 256 gigs as standard. Gemini Live should be at least a two year free service, as I’m just not sure people will be paying a fair amount monthly beyond the free period. Also, the new text SOS feature should be a lifelong feature as it can save lives, and not just limited to two years (as I understand it now). I do recommend the Pixel 9 Pro. It’s a good size, and aside from the issues above, it’s still a very good phone for most. If you need a larger screen and better battery, go with the XL version, but this should suit many users. Thumbs-up.

This has been a pleasant surprise and a big upgrade for me. Google really went all out with AI built into this phone, plus improving their overall design and hardware. To be honest, I wasn’t totally impressed with their showcasing of the Pixel 9, but after having some hands-on time with it, I think they undersold it. For the past week, I’ve been using the device full time and here is my experience so far… The built quality of the phone is on another level. Super premium design, weight, and feel in the hand. Its unfortunate that I always have a case on, but lately when I’m at home I take the case off when I’m in an area such as the living room just to take in the feel of it. The camera visor is a designed well and I think actually adds to the aesthetics. The hardware in the device also gives it great performance! Its designed for on-device AI processing, which a lot of benchmarks don’t currently test for, so don’t trust the numbers. Using the phone is snappy and honestly the fastest phone I’ve ever used, including AI processing. I used the Pixel 8a recently and was highly impressed with its’ power and performance vs price, but the 9 Pro is on a different level. For someone who has a high-end desktop and laptop for serious multitasking, its nice to have a smartphone that meets my expectations. Here is my opinion on some of the features. I love having both Face unlock and a fingerprint scanner on the device. Unfortunately, both could use some improvements. Face unlock works great in a decently lit room, but in dimmer area’s it won’t register my face. Thankfully there is a fingerprint scanner, the newer ultrasonic scanner doesn’t need that bright light, but since I have a screen protector on it doesn’t seem to be AS quick or accurate. Don’t get me wrong, it works great most of the time, but there are enough times to notice I need to re-adjust my finger to get it to work. From what I’ve seen, users who don’t have a screen protector get amazing results from this, but there is no way I’m using this phone without a screen protector. And yes, I even enabled “Screen protector mode” in the settings. Next, I love the WiFi 7 compatibility since I recently upgraded my home mesh network. My 3 year old phone was getting an average of 157mb down/32mb up in my office. This Pixel 9 pro gets 415mb down/ 922mb up with the new 6Ghz technology. Screen brightness has been good, no issues with outdoor usage and I’ve never had to put it on the highest brightness setting yet. Battery life has been solid, no issues getting me through the day but don’t expect 24 hours of battery life if you are moderate phone user. The cameras are top notch and work quickly like the rest of the phone. It’s a pet peeve of mine when a phone is slow loading camera and taking a quick shot, I’ll even sacrifice quality if necessary for that quick shot at times, but so far with this phone I don’t have to. Double-click the power button to load the camera and for selfies you can even show your palm and it will start the selfie timer, small innovations like this go a long way in my book. Now for the meat and potatoes of the Pixel 9 Pro, the AI. I’m quite impressed with the AI functionality of the device and how quickly it can handle on-board processing, which is important to me. I don’t always want my data sent off to their cloud and stored there. First Gemini Advanced is really good. While I assumed Gemini was the smaller player in the AI game, I have to give credit where credit is due. The natural conversation and quick responses from Gemini advanced are mind blowing, it feels like you’re almost having a conversation with an intelligent human. Then comes the photo AI which really takes the phone to another level. There is a lot to go over but I’ll summarize the AI I have used in bullet-points to simply: - Google Lens – Use on a photo or screenshot to select an object or scene to get matching Google searches on for additional information without knowing any specifics. Also, can automatically (and instantly) translate text in an image for you. This will be great for my upcoming trips to Mexico! - Magic Eraser – Very impressed with how it works, especially for an early version of AI. See attached pictures for example I took. One picture I took of 2 trash cans and an orange bucket. I was able to easily remove the bucket and one trash can while camouflaging the other trash can! - Magic Editor – True AI where you can edit/erase/modify pictures even by describing what you want to do with sentences. In my jeep picture, I selected the blue jeep and asked it to turn it red, all done from the Tensor 4 chip. Not bad! Very effective way to edit photos on the go. - Add Me – Nice photo option but not something I’ll use often. I could see myself having more fun with it than using it for real-life situations. - Pixel Screenshots – It could not distinguish between “Mexico” and “Mexican” from a screenshot nor could it process some photos that are politicized, I assume per bias which Google has been historically known for. I took a single screenshot of a news article that had the words “Kamala” and “Illegals”, and it won’t search “illegals” but it will find “Kamala” from the same photo. There are other news-related screenshots that show the words “Denver” “gangsters” and “stabbing” which it does not locate, but other words like “Starlink” that aren’t a negative effect of the current events pulls up just fine. So you may expect some bias and/or censorship from their AI. Overall is a great phone with excellent hardware and one of the first with extensive AI built into it. You can safely say it’s the latest and greatest smartphone currently out, at least as far as performance and features. Yes, the Face unlock and Fingerprint unlock could be improved, and maybe with some software updates it will be, but other than that the performance is solid. The AI is pretty amazing as well and I look forward to using the camera AI features in Hawaii next month for our honeymoon. The screenshot feature didn’t work quite as well as I was hoping for and it seems like it’s been programmed to not be neutral (non-biased) in its results, and I tested many words in the search so I’m pretty convinced of it. If it weren’t for this, the phone would be a hands down perfect device for me. I still gave it 5 stars because Gemini is only one aspect of Google that should not affect their phone rating, because there is plenty more good to the phone. Other than that, pictures are high quality, phone is very responsive, Gemini Advanced is great, and battery lasts all day…great combination for a smartphone.

The Google Pixel 9 Pro is the latest flagship from Google. As a long time Pixel/Nexus user, I’m always excited to get my hands on the latest offering in the Pixel line. The build quality of the Pixel 9 Pro is great, as expected. Google has really leaned into the sleek and premium design this time around. It’s available in 4 distinct colors, Obsidian, Porcelain, Hazel, and Rose Quartz. The polished aluminum frame adds to the premium feel but at the cost of making it a bit slippery in the hands. Google’s Tensor G4 chip promises smooth performance and efficient power usage. The fingerprint scanner is beyond belief. One of the best upgrades to the whole 9 line! The 16GB of RAM and multiple storage options, ranging from 128GB to a whopping 1TB, give you all the options you need. It would have been nice to see 256GB considering the starting $1,000 price tag. The 6.3-inch OLED display is bright (3000 peak nits) and vibrant, with a resolution of 2856 x 1280 pixels and a refresh rate that can go up to 120Hz, it might be the most beautiful screen I’ve seen yet. I’m not a huge camera person, but the specs here are high. It’s a triple camera setup, featuring a 50MP main sensor, a 48MP ultra-wide lens, and a 48MP telephoto lens with 5x optical zoom. The zoom is nice to see and comes in handy when trying to capture your kids on stage or on the field. Google’s AI-powered features are fun and offer some cool real world use cases. The Google Pixel 9 Pro is a fantastic all-around smartphone. The build quality, hardware features, camera setup, and overall performance don’t disappoint!

📦 UNBOXING: Inside the box, you’ll find the Pixel 9 Pro, a USB-C to C cable, a SIM ejector, and some basic documentation. No wall adapter is included, which I’ve come to expect at this point. I do want to point out that the box for the Pixel 9 Pro was surprisingly very small, and they use a lot of recyclable packaging, which I actually appreciate. In fact, a case that I purchased for my Pixel 9 Pro came in a larger box than the phone, so I think it’s worth celebrating Google’s efforts to be more eco-friendly. 💪 BUILD: The Pixel 9 Pro feels great in the hand. It has an aluminum housing with gorilla glass, and the weight feels great in the hand. I don’t find it to be unwieldy to hold, especially considering I came from a larger phone and wanted to try a smaller phone. The power button and volume buttons are on the right side of the phone, making it harder to take one-handed screenshots by thumb for right-handed users. Left-handed users can take one-handed screenshots with multiple fingers. As a right-handed user, I tried to enable the quick-tap gesture for screenshots by tapping the back of the phone twice, but this was incredibly unreliable. Hopefully this can be fixed in an update. At the bottom, you have a USB-C port that supports USB 3.2 gen 2 capabilities, and a speaker and nano SIM slot. The phone also supports e-SIM, which is how I ended up using it, but it’s nice to have a physical SIM if you need to buy a prepaid SIM during international travel. And on the back, you have 3 cameras housed within an elegant camera bump that lets the phone rest flat without rocking. And of course, Qi wireless charging is supported, but not Qi2 support, so if you have Qi2 or MagSafe accessories, you may want to get a case that will add these magnets. And of course you have the high resolution OLED display on the front with a selfie camera and a fingerprint sensor under the display. Both the selfie camera and fingerprint sensor can be used to unlock the phone, making unlocking a very frictionless experience. However, I do want to point out that adding a tempered glass screen protector genuinely seemed to inhibit the fingerprint sensor’s accuracy to a significant degree, and re-calibrating my fingerprints did not seem to help. While this might not frequently be an issue if you allow face-unlock, it is more likely to cause you problems when you try to unlock your phone in dark environments. I woke up in the middle of the night, and because it couldn’t unlock by face due to the dark environment, I had to unlock it by fingerprint which was very finicky with a tempered glass screen protector installed. But because it uses Gorilla Glass Victus 2, you might find that going without a tempered glass screen protector is something you’re willing to do. 📱 DISPLAY: The Pixel 9 Pro has a 1280 x 2856 LTPO OLED at 495 PPI, so it’s very crisp and clear, can reach an insane 2,000 nits of brightness for HDR and 3,000 nits for peak brightness, and supports refresh rates between 1Hz and 120Hz. In my unscientific opinion, this is an excellent display. I took it to the zoo under the bright outdoors and never had an issue with visibility. I’ve been running it under the out-of-box High Resolution mode instead of the Full Resolution mode, especially because it’s already very crisp while also saving on battery. Animations and motion look very fluid, especially because of the high refresh rate support, but the display will also save battery by dropping down to as low as 1Hz when there are only static elements being rendered. 📷 CAMERA: The camera system has to be one of the most sought-after aspects of Pixel phones. In my testing, images were sharp and vibrant with excellent contrast thanks to Pixel’s image processing pipeline. The 5x optical zoom produces impressive results, and even the digital zoom can produce impressive results at far distances thanks to computational photography. I also enjoyed the video boost feature that improves lighting, stabilization and reduces noise. But more than that, Google has introduced so many new photo features that there is likely to be something that you may not find on competing products. Whether it’s the photomoji, pixel studio, the “add me” feature that lets you add yourself into a picture so you never have to be excluded, and much much more. Those who want more refined controls over the capture process will also appreciate the Camera app that gives users much more control over things like aperture, shutter speed, ISO and exposure. And there are many more advanced controls that can help you capture excellent photos and video. 🔋 BATTERY: Battery life on the Pixel 9 Pro has been fantastic. As someone who has typically been using larger phones for a while partially because they often deliver more battery life, I decided to downsize to the Pixel 9 Pro, and I’m glad to report that I have had an awesome experience with the battery life on the Pixel 9 Pro. While I don’t have scientific tests to share, I can say that the Pixel 9 Pro can get me through a full day of mixed usage, and I also really appreciate that it is quick to top-up. Google claims that they can charge to 55% in about 30 minutes using Google’s own 45W charger. However, Google says the phone can charge at a 27W rate over USB-C PD, which typically means a 9V/3A charger. Unfortunately, because they don’t include a charger in the box, this may leave a number of Pixel 9 Pro owners without fast charging. Moreover, if you want to charge wirelessly, you’ll be able to achieve up to a 21W rate only with Google’s 2nd generation Pixel Stand, or a 12W rate with Qi-Certified EPP chargers. 🧠 SOFTWARE / PERFORMANCE: During my time using the Pixel 9 Pro, I never felt it slow down. It was very responsive, and that’s one of the most important elements of using a phone for me. Seldom did I run into crashing apps or weird UX glitches, and I think it’s fair to expect a handful of occurrences. It’s been years since I’ve come back to experience Android for my daily phone, and I’m delighted by what I have experienced on the Pixel 9 Pro. There are so many AI features on the Pixel 9 Pro that it’s frankly hard to list them all, but I think it’s hard to deny the value that Google is bringing to the table with features like Call Notes, Call Screen, Spam Blocking and so much more. Honestly, the hardest part is discovering all of these features, but I highly encourage using the Pixel Tips app to discover the many Gemini-powered AI capabilities that the Pixel 9 Pro brings to the table. 🧐 CONCLUSION: Overall, the Pixel 9 Pro is a superb Android phone in my experience. It delivers on all the basics, and then packs a punch with a ton of AI-powered features that bring meaningful improvements to people’s lives. And as someone who has been mostly outside of the Android ecosystem for around 6 years, there’s no doubt that this experience has left a very positive impression on me.

The Google Pixel 9 Pro brings a refined design and an impressive blend of form and function that offers a premium experience. In terms of form, the device features a sleek, minimalist design with clean lines, rounded edges, and a matte or glossy finish that feels smooth in the hand. The rear glass panel is curved, adding to its ergonomic appeal, while the sturdy metal frame gives it a solid, high-end feel. The camera bump, though noticeable, is not overly pronounced, contributing to the phone’s balanced aesthetics. In terms of function, the Pixel 9 Pro delivers exceptional performance. Powered by Google’s custom Tensor chipset, it offers smooth, lag-free multitasking and an overall responsive experience. The 120Hz OLED display is vibrant, crisp, and bright, making media consumption and gaming a delight. The colors are vivid and accurate, and HDR support adds to the visual appeal. One of the standout features is the camera system. With advancements in computational photography, the Pixel 9 Pro continues the Pixel legacy of delivering excellent photography and video quality. Low-light performance is particularly remarkable, thanks to improved night sight and post-processing algorithms. The AI-based software also excels in real-time image enhancement, making it easy for users to take stunning photos without needing to be professional photographers. Battery life is solid, lasting through a full day with moderate use, though it may vary depending on individual usage habits. Fast charging is supported, along with wireless charging, ensuring that the phone is ready to go when needed. Overall, the Google Pixel 9 Pro strikes a perfect balance between form and function. It offers a premium design, top-tier performance, and an exceptional camera system, making it a worthy choice for anyone looking for a high-performance smartphone with a focus on AI-driven software features.