After Google’s launch event today in San Francisco, I had an opportunity to get my hands on its new Google Pixel and Google Pixel XL phones. My initial impression is that they are decent-looking, well-made phones. Google took a more active role in creating these phones than previous Nexus devices, taking the lead not just in hardware selection, but design as well. Using quality displays and not having a camera bump on the back were decisions driven by Google.

Google Pixel

I say that both as a complaint and a compliment. Both phones are extremely well made, with the aluminum back, glass rear window, and glass front forming a shell that really feels like it’s worth the price tag. The design is also extremely derivative, to the point that I almost picked up someone’s iPhone on a display table thinking it was a Pixel.

The iPhone and Pixel share similar bezel sizes, but the iPhone has the excuse of having a hardware home button. Nothing takes up this vast amount of space on the front of the Pixel. The only unique part of the design is the glass window on the rear, which both allows RF signals to escape and serves as the camera lens.

You will find a minor change to the iPhone design on the sides, which starts as a rounded edge on the Pixel but is interrupted by a bezel around the perimeter of the back. This is an HTC-made device by the way, which Google will freely admit if you ask.

At least with the higher price tag comes a set of top-tier specs. The highlight is probably the storage solution, which uses UFS 2.0. We didn’t have a chance to run a storage benchmark, but hopefully they’ll be somewhere near the speed of high-end Samsung phones. The days of Google phones having slow storage should be over.

The Pixel phones will be one of the first devices to run the Snapdragon 821 SoC, which has a top speed of 2.4Ghz but Google chose to clock the chip back down to 2.15GHz. This makes it just a minor revision to the 820.

The best reason to buy a Pixel might actually be the software. Google is keeping the Google Assistant exclusive to the Pixel phones, at least for now. Long pressing on the home button activates the Assistant, which will pop up and answer questions. On a phone it looks a lot like it does on Google Allo, showing a chat-style interface that contains your questions along with the results.

There are smart reply responses that allow you to drill down on the result, too. For instance, saying “show me restaurants nearby” will show a carousel with results, and then “Italian,” “Chinese” and other restaurant types will be shown as smart reply options.

This is also the first device to launch with Android 7.1. The new build of Android (still called Nougat) is mostly a collection of minor APIs that enable Pixel features. There are things like a “Shortcut launcher API” which can somewhat replicate Apple’s 3D Touch on the home screen, but as far as we know this doesn’t work yet. There’s also “Night Light” mode (which turns the UI brown), circular icon support, and support for fingerprint scanner gestures. Some improvements to existing Android 7.0 features are included, like Seamless Updates and Daydream VR.

There are tons of aesthetic changes on top of this, like solid white System UI buttons, circular home screen icons, and a redesigned settings app. Inside the settings app is a “support” tab that offers a 24/7 link to Google support. A new “screen share” option even allows support to see your device.

We’ll need a lot more time to test out the camera properly, but Google promises this will be one of the best cameras on the market. The camera app did start-up very fast, but we’ll have to see how consistent that is after more usage.

At first blush, the hardware is fine. It’s just so much like an iPhone that it doesn’t even seem “new.” It lacks excitement and identity. The software looks interesting though, and I look forward to digging in for a full review. But no matter what, Google’s update speed automatically makes this one of the best Android devices currently available.

With prices starting at $649 for the 32GB, 5-inch version, Google is positioning its Pixel phones to compete with Apple’s and Samsung’s flagships. This will no doubt disappoint Nexus fans who were hoping for a more affordable option. It’s also a questionable strategy, considering the lack of brand awareness around Nexus/Pixel among the general public and Google’s lack of retail exposure. Its alignment with Verizon should help, but I imagine it will be difficult to convince someone looking to buy an iPhone or Galaxy phone to buy a Pixel instead, especially when its premiere feature, the one advantage it has over every other Android phone, is timely software and security updates—not exactly a sexy selling point. For those who do value up-to-date software, and who do not want to tinker with custom ROMs, the new Pixel phones are the new price of admission.

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