This is the new Pixel 5. Google sent us one before its release and i'm going to take you through everything new with the Pixel 5 including my first impressions of the device. Let's dive in. First, holy crap, the sort of sage color looks really nice in person. It's this nice looking subtle sages color that gives the phone a really nice new look. The power button has a metallic look to it that matches the G on the back which is new and not something i think we've seen before on a Pixel phone. A lot has been made around this phone having a 100% recycled aluminum body but also having wireless charging and reverse wireless charging for devices like the new Pixel Buds.
Google accomplished this by cutting a small hole in the back of the aluminum body of the phone for the wireless charging components and then applying a coating to the entire back of the phone to make it look seamless. When you touch the back it's obvious that the material you're touching doesn't feel like pure aluminum. The finish almost looks like stone it's not cool to the touch like metal would be and it's got some sparkles and texture to it which make it look really interesting.
Another thing i really like about this material is it's not slippery so for those who don't like to put a case on their phone you're really going to appreciate the coating that Google put on the back here because it's just easier to grip than say if the phone had a glass back for wireless charging like the Pixel 4 last year. I found that coating to be a little bit more slippery than this one. Now another thing that's really interesting about the Pixel 5 is i don't know if you'll be able to see it from here but there's not actually a speaker that you can see or feel at the top of this phone.
Google has hidden it underneath the screen and in my limited testing it seems to work pretty well, though I'm not sure if it's on equal footing with the Pixel 4 from last year in my limited testing so far. Now another obvious difference with the Pixel 5 compared to last year's Pixel 4 and 4 xl is the upgraded aesthetics.
There's no large forehead holding face unlock and soil sensors and we now have a Pixel imprint sensor on the back like in earlier generations of the Pixel line. This allowed Google to create a truly all screen hole punch design that i think looks really slick it looks like a phone from 2020. The bottom bezel is even slimmer on the 5 than it is on the 4a that was just released earlier this year. The Pixel imprint sensor works exactly as you'd expect i love the placement on the back of the phone.
It just lines up right with where your finger would be when you hold the phone and it's wicked fast and overall i feel like with Android there's just much broader support for using a fingerprint sensor as an authentication method within apps than there is for face unlock, however with all that said, I still haven't made up my mind about whether or not this is a step backward from last year's face unlock it worked really well. It was wicked fast but again there is broader support for the fingerprint sensors overall so this is definitely something that i'm going to explore in subsequent videos on the Pixel 5.
Alright, what else is new with this phone? Let's talk specs for a second. The Pixel 5 sports a 6 inch diagonal display but is only 5.7 inches tall and like i said before with the Pixel 4a, the size of this phone and the screen for me at least is about the perfect size and it's made me rethink my choice in terms of always going for the larger phone size.
You get a lot of screen with this design while still having it being comfortable to hold in one hand. Like last year it comes with an OLED display with around the same Pixel per inch or ppi that the Pixel 4 had with 432 ppi. The display supports HDR and also features Google's smooth display technology which allows the display to go up to 90 hertz for a smoother scrolling experience which is definitely a plus and something i've loved having on my Pixel 4 xl.
The phone weighs a little bit less than the Pixel 4 last year coming in at 143 grams, to me it feels solid but not too heavy it's just about right for one-handed use. The battery got a huge bump in the five to 4080 milliamps compared to just 2800 milliamps in the Pixel 4 last year which did not have great battery life. So far my impressions of the battery life of this phone are it's pretty good if not excellent. Last night when i put the phone down on the charger after a normal day of use it had about 48% battery left over.
Today i woke up with a hundred percent at 8 30 a.m it's now uh 7:37 p.m at night, so you know 11 hours later and this phone has 68% battery left on it which is much higher than my Pixel 4 xl would have at this point with normal day-to-day usage so, so far, my very limited testing with this phone, the battery life seems like it's going to be pretty good on it, however, of course that's something that we're going to test over the many weeks to come.
Alright last few specs to talk about. The Pixel 5 got to bump up to 8 GBs of RAM and has a snapdragon 756G chip in it which still should make the phone perform well and in my limited testing i can't really notice a difference in performance between the Pixel 5 and my Pixel 4 xl that i've used as my personal phone for the past year.
Now one of the most important things about Pixel phones and really any smartphone nowadays for that matter is the camera and the Pixel 5's camera did get some upgrades. You now have a 16 megapixel ultra wide camera on the Pixel instead of telephoto. Google is simply using the super zoom technology for zooming.
Now we've done some limited comparisons between both the Pixel 4a, Pixel 5, and Pixel 4 XL from last year. And i've got to say it's pretty hard to tell the difference between a lot of the photos they take now we'll of course keep testing this out but i'd say i think the difference between the Pixel 5 and the Pixel 4a is mainly going to be that ultra wide camera and some new video capabilities.
The selfie camera on the Pixel 5 now has two modes: 1x and 1.4 x, which is a nice improvement. Like with the back cameras it's hard to tell the difference between a lot of the selfies from the Pixel 5, 4a, and 4xl. Now another thing that got a significant upgrade with the Pixel this year is video.
You can now shoot 4k at 60 frames per second and Google has also added new stabilization modes and in my limited testing so far they actually work really well. In the main camera UI you now have toggles for slow motion time lapse and of course for the new stabilization features.
With stabilization you have standard, locked (for far away subjects), active for heavy movement, and then cinematic pan for smooth panning shots. Cinematic pan is my favorite so far and it works really well for creating those smooth panning shots.
I think this mode is going to be really useful to a lot of people out there and so far it's definitely my favorite. Far away, which produces a bit grainy footage as you'd expect when you're zooming that far in also produces some pretty impressive stabilization as well. Now we haven't had a great use case yet to really test out the active mode so we'll be sure to include that in our full review of the device.
One other thing to note about the video quality, while testing in cloudy and somewhat low light situations, you are going to notice more noise on the image and less detail, which is to be expected but something we're going to continue testing out and we're going to benchmark the video quality of the Pixel to the new iPhone coming out. Alright so what are some other things to know about the Pixel 5. If you're coming from another Pixel device, the transfer process is really seamless and took me about 10 minutes to copy everything over from my existing Pixel. Another thing that i like that i don't think i've talked about before about Pixel's and Android in general is the work profile option.
If you work for an organization or go to a university that uses g suite, you can install a separate profile on your phone that your organization or university will have remote access to but it's separate from your personal apps. Google even gives you a really nice toggle to turn off your work apps on weeknights and weekends to help make it easier to switch off work. Alright let's go through a few more impressions before we wrap up.
The squeeze for assistant feature found in the Pixel 4 last year is absent from the Pixel 5 this year. The only way to trigger the assistant on the device is by swiping up from the sides or saying the trigger word. I think the vibrations for notifications on the phone have been somewhat improved. I at least don't notice as much buzzing coming from my phone with the case on it with the Pixel 5 as i did with my Pixel 4 xl also with a case on it.
Last thing i'll mention is as always, i love the Pixel cases. Google uses a washable fabric made from recycled plastic water bottles in total 70% of the case is made using recycled materials and i think it looks great and i love that pop of color that Google uses for the power buttons. The case also supports wireless charging and reverse wireless charging and it just has this fun look to it.
Now we're going to have much more on the Pixel 5 in the coming months. Since phone's life spans are so short we're actually going to do a one month later review of the phone that will come out just before the holidays and then of course a six months later review of the phone sometime next year. Thank guys .
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