Last week was the big launch of the Pixel 9 series. Pre-orders are now over for the vanilla Pixel 9 and 9 Pro XL, and they’re on sale now. You can still get credit from Google and Amazon ($150 for vanilla, $275 for XL). The smaller Pixel 9 Pro and Pixel 9 Pro Fold are still available for pre-order, launching early next month.
These are the two models available from this week: the Google Pixel 9 and the Pixel 9 Pro XL.
This week we wanted to focus on what you can get instead of a Pixel 9. How about a Pixel 8a? Featuring a Tensor G3 and only 8GB of RAM, it’s going to lack a lot of the on-device features that the 9 series brings. Still, it’s a small Pixel phone, and it’s a lot cheaper than the Pixel 9. It also comes with 7 years of support, like its more expensive siblings.
Samsung’s Galaxy S24 trio offers more direct competition, and all three models are currently $220 cheaper. All three get 7 years of software support, just like the Pixels, and they share a number of AI features, often driven by Google itself. Still, One UI does offer some advantages (e.g. DeX, Good Lock), and you can squeeze more storage for less money. That said, the Galaxy S24 phones are light on RAM compared to their Pixel counterparts, but that shouldn’t be a problem for AI.
Right now is a terrible time to buy a new iPhone: The iPhone 16 series is still a few weeks away, and once they arrive, prices on current models will plummet. We’ll revisit the Pixel vs. iPhone conundrum in a month or so.
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