Google Highlights Price, Camera Features in Latest Pixel Smartphones

Google highlighted advanced Pixel camera features, the first Pixel smartwatch -- integrating Google and Fitbit technologies -- and a unified Pixel ecosystem design theme on the company’s hybrid in-person, virtual Made by Google launch event from Brooklyn, New York, Thursday.

The company introduced the latest Pixel smartphones -- Pixel 7 ($599) and Pixel 7 Pro ($899) -- at starting prices that undercut by several hundred dollars competitive offerings from Apple and Samsung. “We want people to give Pixel a try,” said Brian Rakowski, vice president-product management, “so, while phones in this tier typically start at $799, we’re starting the price at just $599." The Pixel Pro 7 is priced “much lower than other flagship devices,” he added. Preorders began Thursday, with phones due in stores in a week.

Carrier promotions take costs down even further for customers, said Rakowski (see report, this issue). In the U.S., consumers can get a Pixel 7 Pro with up to $899 back with an eligible trade-in, he said, though the Google website maxed out the trade-in value at $750 Thursday, plus $200 in Google Store credit.

Google broke from traditional smartphone design with a zirconia matte finish on the Pixel 7 that gives a “silky” touch that “feels good in the hand,” said Isabelle Olsson, design director-home, wearables and color, materials, finishes. The Pixel 7 Pro has a high-polish aluminum finish modeled after jewelry and watches, she said. The 6.3-inch Pixel 7 Pro comes in a new “hazel” green color; the 6.7-inch Pixel 7’s new color is a yellow “lemongrass.” Both phones have horizontal aluminum “camera bars” to bring more attention to the cameras, she said.

The Pixel 7 Pro’s triple rear camera system includes a 12-megapixel ultrawide lens, 50-megapixel wide lens and 48-megapixel telephoto lens with up 30x zoom, said Alexander Schiffhauer, group product manager, referencing “computational photography” combining hardware, software and machine learning. Additional phone features are Cinematic Blur; Guided Frame to help blind and limited-vision users take selfies; and Real Tone, that's said to represent dark skin tones authentically, even in low-light photography.

The new Pixel phones have multiple layers of verifiable security via Google’s custom Tensor SoC and a dedicated Titan M2 security chip, which is derived from the chip used to protect Google Cloud data centers, said Jen Fitzpatrick, Google senior vice president-core systems and experiences. Titan M2 meets the same protection guidelines Google uses for banks, carriers and governments, she said. Google will provide five years of security updates for the Pixel 7 series to keep it protected over time, she said.

The phones and watch have Google’s Protected Computing, which reduces the amount of personally identifiable data on a phone, de-identifies data “so it’s not linked to you” and restricts access to data using end-to-end encryption and secure enclaves, she said. With Protected Computing, features such as Live Translate, spam detection in messages and Smart Reply provide intelligent personalized experiences without any data leaving the device, she said. Health and wellness data collected from sleep patterns “is never stored by or sent to Google,” she said.

The debut smartwatch in the series, Google Pixel Watch, is the first WearOS device to combine Google technology with health and wellness insight from Fitbit. The watch has a round face and curved form and comes with six months of Fitbit Premium and three months of YouTube Music Premium; fall detection is due next year, said James Park, Fitbit CEO.

Park cited things the Pixel Watch can enable users to do by integrating with Google activities: adjust the temperature of a Nest thermostat from the Google Home app; listen to YouTube music; set a Google Photos image as a custom watch face; see notifications from Gmail and Google Calendar; swipe a fare at a turnstile using Google Wallet; get turn-by-turn directions on the Watch from Google Maps; and send messages and set timers via Google Assistant, he said. The Pixel Watch is on preorder at $349 for the Wi-Fi model and $399 for the LTE version, with availability next week, he said.

Google’s first Pixel Tablet is on the slate for 2023. With rounded corners to match the Pixel design theme, the tablet will be paired with a charging speaker dock and is designed for watching shows, doing video calls, playing games and looking at photos, said Rose Yao, vice president-product, Google Nest. Price and availability weren’t given.