PIXEL 5a REVIEW and Unboxing! By Droid Life

Hey, what's going on guys, welcome back Ellen here with droid life, so well, first, hey it's good to see everyone uh, but the big thing here we're doing today is talking about a new phone. That's right! Google has announced the pixel 5a 5g, which going forward we'll simply refer to you as the pixel 5a uh, but yeah it's its here. We've got one and uh. We should talk a little about it. So uh here is our uh pixel, 5a, unboxing and first look. So what is it that you need to know about this phone? Well, obviously, it's an series phone.

So it's going to be affordable. Obviously this one comes in black has 5g, and again it's not the pixel 6. It feels a little like we're. Releasing this kind of to just fill a little space before we go nuts and go pixel. Six, where you know google's gonna, give us their first processor and anyway, new design and all that stuff.

This one obviously from the box, still very much similar design to like this guy. This is a pixel 5. I don't. I don't actually have a 4a 5g around, so we're just going to do a little of comparison with this guy, but so anyways uh pixel 5 is a 449 dollar phone, the 5a 5g last year. Furthermore, I'm sorry the four a five eight, the four a gee.

Furthermore, I can't say this 485 g from last year was 4.99. Furthermore, I believe so. We got a 50 decrease in price um. The situation here is it's launching in the US and uh us and Japan, and it seems to be sort of limited. Although again, I don't really understand like why we would need to push this everywhere.

Since you know the pixel 6 really is coming in a very short amount of time. So again, 449 pixels, 5a, 5g, pre-order, now launches August 26th. You can be able to buy the Google phi um unlocked versions through the Google store. It works on all the US carriers, no 5g millimeter wave. But who cares that's not anywhere? It does have 5g support, though sub 6, I should say 5g on uh on all the major carriers and stuff like that.

So it'll work. If you uh, if you do want to buy one, it will work um. So, let's see what is new about this phone? Well, let's power it on and talk a little. Oh, you want to see. What's in the box, here's the phone! Well, that's doing its thing in the box: nothing special sim removal tool.

As always, this tells you where your sim tray is and how to put that in these. Just look like guides: don't care that is an USB to USA, basically like a transfer tool plug that into your old phone or new phone or whatever, and then there's an USB, cable, c2c cable here that you will use to help with that transfer process. And then this is a fast charger. This phone does have 18 watt fast charging, and this is an 18 watt, USB fast charger. These are pretty standard.

We've seen these with pixel phones for um quite some time so anyway, kick that out of the way leave the box there for fun, um, so here's the phone. This is going to be very familiar, obviously running android 11. Now it will run android 12 here shortly once that launches, probably in the next couple of weeks. I'd. Imagine if we stick to a past timeline, so three years of updates, um, and that includes OS updates and security.

I guess I should say at a minimum google sort of hinting at maybe they'll expand that, or maybe they've always said that um. So, let's see what else do we have for specs um well biggest display? We've got uh 6.34 inch, OLED, it's 20 by nine, it's full HD, and it is not 90 hertz. At least I don't believe so uh my spec list does not say 90 hertz we get in here and there's a high refresh rate thing. We will correct that um, so the previous 4a5g was 6.2 inch, so slightly bigger definitely feels like a bigger phone. Again here is uh, my pixel five, so definitely much bigger than the pixel five okay, uh 46 80 William hour battery in here, which is huge.

The previous one had a 3 800 William everybody, so a big jump in battery, but not necessarily a huge jump in size. So this thing with full HD and no 90 hertz, it might last for two days. We also have ip67 water and dust resistance. That is a first for the series. So you've got some protection.

You can get this thing wet, and it should be fine. Six gig ram, 128, gig storage, the snapdragon 765 g, which was in last year's so same processor, same ram and storage, titan m security chip. Obviously there's a fingerprint reader there USB on the bottom and then up top is that headphone jack, which we've seen in a series devices, because remember, google told us not that long ago that they're cheap phones for people, maybe who don't want to spend a lot, just use those, and then people who spend a lot have Bluetooth. I have note it's very, very weird um stereo speakers, though, so we have stereo speakers NFC and again that's sub five g. As far as the camera goes pretty similar to the uh 485 g, we have a 12.2 megapixel main shooter, which is your know the one that google's used forever, which they will finally be ditching. We believe with uh the pixel six, so f 1.7, there 77 degree fields of view, and then we have a 16 megapixel ultra-wide as well at f, 2.2, 117, degree, field of view and then up front there in the display you're not gonna, be able to see that there it is um that is an eight megapixel, selfie shooter, so um. Let me just boot past this, and we'll talk for just one more minute.

Okay, we made it past all that fun, so uh welcome to your new pixel, here's, the pixel 5 uh, pretty large phone. Actually now that I'm holding it like this and again, I have to keep comparing it to the pixel 5, but this is like the perfect size phone. In my opinion, I mean it's the one I've been using for about a year now, but there you go, there's a good look at that anyway um. So all we really wanted to do was check out and just confirm that there's no 90 hertz! I really wish there was 90 hertz in this thing, but you can see uh, there's no there's no high refresh rate so um it is 60 hertz, uh, 450, bucks available right now, um, there's not really much else to talk about is android 11, you've seen this. I need to update some stuff and get going but uh.

What we will do is uh, I'm going to fast-forward in life, and I'll come back and join you in just a second- and you know, talk about my thoughts. Well, it has been seven days. I have been using the pixel 5a 5g for a full seven days, uh, mostly full time still been using the pixel 5, because I think we got android 12 in there a new beta in there, and I've got it attached to the old uh galaxy watch four, but this has been with me the entire time. So let's talk a little about some of those final thoughts. I just uh.

I just promised you so. The first thing I think there is to talk about is uh build design just the general feel I mean. Obviously, it's a pixel, a series: it looks almost identical to the pixel, 4a and 4a5g. It even looks you know quite a bit like the old pixel 5, just a little smaller, not this cool texture on the back um, and it's its not it's not just black. It's the color is actually almost black or something, and it definitely has sort of a grayish color to it versus this, which again is black.

So anyways um, it's plastic. You know it's got the fingerprint reader in the right spot. You guys are familiar with this camera housing. Furthermore, you got the Google logo on this side. Furthermore, you have your volume and power switch and the power switch kind of.

Has this like nice little sort of rigidity to it, so you can really find it um in hand. It feels like a Google Pixel phone, especially a 4a device, headphone jack up there. I mean, there's not a lot to uh to add. If you've read or held or used or read about um, you know a 4a device. This very much is a slightly ever so slightly bigger pixel, 4a 5g, so um a no-nonsense phone, not super heavy, not super light, not ginormous, because it has a 6.3 inch display, but it's also not a small phone. I mean you know.

I mentioned this earlier that this pixel 5 to me, with its 6-inch display and this size of body, feels about like the perfect phone in terms of size- and this thing is it's- you know it looks substantially bigger, and you notice it coming from this phone. If you're, using like a galaxy, s21 or something you're, probably not going to notice it so anyway, uh it's, it's pretty basic, doesn't feel super premium also doesn't feel super cheap. If that makes sense, okay, so well, I basically just described that this is mostly just a pixel 4 a5g. So, what's different um in my unboxing, I talked a little about this uh larger battery, slightly bigger display, ip67 water resistance for the first time in an series- and I mean that that's it from the 485 g to this, that that's it bigger battery, slightly bigger display and water and dust resistance. So, oh in the color, it's not just black! Again, it's almost black or something like that.

So the processor is the same snapdragon 765 g, which we had last year: 6 gig, ram, 128, gig storage, same camera with the 12 megapixel uh, normal shooter, a regular shooter and then the 16 megapixel. Widening I mean it is all the stuff is the same outside those three things so uh. Let's start, then, with the battery right, so you guys are probably going all right. Well has a bigger battery, it doesn't make a difference um, so we went from 3 800 William hour battery in the old one, the 4a 5g um to a 46 80 William hour battery in this. So we're talking almost a thousand Williams of extra juice.

That should mean significant jump, um and the 485g. If, if you've read our review, Tim had pretty, pretty excellent battery life there, so you would assume you would get it here and here's the thing. Just being honest with you, my battery life has been good, and I have no worries. Unfortunately, I use the UFE security app because I swapped out all my nest cameras around my house and started using toughie stuff because there was just a couple of products. I liked better.

The EUF app is well a good app. It has a battery drain issue, and so, when I flip open battery here in a second you'll, see what I'm talking about. So, if I go into my battery stats, section you'll notice, I've got an hour screen on time today the battery life's going pretty well today. But if I go into battery usage, you see that my ambient display is using a lock, because I haven't used the phone a ton today, but look at that right. There toughie, for some reason it's just always the top of the list and in a couple of battery screenshots, which I'll show you right now you'll notice.

Again if it is king, twenty percent you fee, secure and- and you know if you, google, that you'll find Reddit threads where everyone's complaining about it. So it is an issue. So what I'm getting at is, I do believe the battery life on this phone is going to be nuts and last a very, very, very, very, very long time. If you don't have that app installed, you can say you can see my son. I played a lot of Pok?mon Go this weekend.

It was eV community weekend for those who know and uh the battery life was fine. I mean here it is at tap there. Here it was at 11 35 at night I had lots of hours of screen on time, almost six hours and still 22 left, and that's with that battery drain. If you flip it back a day, again played a lot with my son um and here's that ugh draining things and this one wasn't so great, but I had five hours of screen on time by seven o'clock at night I was down to 16, so what I'm getting at is. I don't believe the battery life will be an issue for anyone.

I think this will last well over a day um. Furthermore, I just had my issue so anyways good battery life, don't install the UFE security app. Oh sorry, one other thing there uh the battery has 18 watt uh or the phone has 18 watt fast charging wire charging. I don't know if we're calling 18 watt fast anymore, fast, charging uh, no, no wireless charging uh. Let's talk display, though so display, is another one of those improved areas or changed areas.

So we went from a 6.2 inch display to a 6.34 inch display the difference there is that is quite minimal, we're still full HD we're still AMOLED. We are still well we're still at 60 hertz, so no 90 hertz upgrade. That is unfortunate because we've seen Samsung and OnePlus now release this sort of mid-range devices in this. In this realm of where the pixel 5 a5g is sitting with 90 hertz display, so I kind of wish google would have bumped that up. I know, then it kind of puts it right next to the pixel 5.

, but come on the pixel 5 is going away soon we got pixel sixes coming. It seems like a missed opportunity to go 90 hertz to really get that smoothness um. That said, I've used the phone, a ton and the 60 hertz hasn't killed me it's been okay, I mean I, you know, I noticed it jumping back and forth between a high refresh rate and this, but it's been fine. You know, we've got really great color reproduction. On this thing, the brightness is decent.

The touch sensitivity is about as good as I've used in a while. Like this, this is a nice panel. It's a big bright panel with good colors, which is kind of what you want. It just doesn't have that sort of next level, 90 hertz, that you know we're sort of hoping. Furthermore, it's uh, it's a good display.

I've got no complaints other than you know. I wish things look just a bit smoother now as far as ip67 stuff yay thumbs up that I don't really know what else to say there I didn't take it swimming or drop it in a pond or something like that, I'm you know I'm taking google's word for it there. I don't think they would slap the rating on there if it wasn't. So, if anything, the takeaway there is yeah water resistance, you can get more water on it and for this level of phone we don't see that often, so that's nice, um water resistance in an phone. That's under 500.

We would love to see that okay, so with those uh change stuff out of the way. What else is there to talk about with pixel 5a 5g uh camera again, we'll throw some pictures up right now, um same cameras as the 4a 5g same as the 5. And same processor and same ram, you should get the same results uh, that's not a bad thing. The pixel 45g has an excellent camera, as does the pixel 5. Both have those cameras from Google that we really, really like uh they're those cameras that you trust indoors and poor lighting outdoors and good lighting.

You can shoot pictures of the stars with them. I mean the Google, even though these cameras are well, maybe not the wide angle, but the regular 12 megapixel camera in here. It's kind of old okay. It is old and we're. Finally, going to get a new camera with the pixel six, but this is still using the old one.

It's totally fine. We trust it. We believe in it. Furthermore, we know it's limitations. Video is not going to be king here, but stills are gonna, be pretty good, so um, you know it.

It's a good camera. I, if you buy this phone you'll, you'll, you'll, have a'll, have a good camera. Now, as far as performance goes 765 g, again, 60 gram, 128, gig storage, nothing special going on it is a snappy little phone. I do. I do have zero complaints about um using it again.

That touch responsiveness, I said, is really, really excellent. On here um I mean you can see it just tracking really nicely with my finger. It's an it's a snappy phone there. There are no issues there, maybe this slight hiccup here and there, but that I feel like that's just android, maybe uh, it's been tuned very well um. I yeah I haven't had to like to reboot it a bunch.

You know, like my pixel 5 over here running android 12 beta, I reboot like twice a day. This thing I, I honestly don't think I've rebooted in the entire time. I've had it so uh fingerprint readers are great, the buttons all work. If you want to fire up the camera sort of quick, I mean that was not quick at all, but it opened the first try um it's its fine! The performance is fine. Again, it's a processor.

We know we've used a lot, it's good starting to quickly run out of topics here, there's not a lot new here, uh, it's just a lot of the same stuff with just those tiny tweaks. I talked about earlier um software android 11 on here. Uh, obviously android 12 is not on here, because android 12 is only in beta once this goes live, probably well today or the 26th. When you can buy this thing, uh, I'm sure you'll just be able to sign up for it. In fact, I could probably try to sign up for the android 12 uh beta, while we're here on air um, either way android 11, so we're good there.

We know we get monthly security patches for three years. We know we get three years of OS updates, because that's what google delivers till pixel, we also have pixel feature drops so when google releases those big updates that introduce new features, this will be a part of that, so you'll get new features throughout the life of owning it, and you know for a 450 phone. That's that's pretty good, not only you get monthly, you get OS updates for three years, and you get regular feature drop so google's constantly trying to improve their phone, and- and on top of that you know this is google's experience. So you have an always on display. You've got the weather and the date, and this will change a little with android 12.

You've got that um. You know you can tap to wake you've got you know. Google's gestures down here. You've got their pixel launcher, which isn't super customizable, but it's pretty solid. Their look for android, which again keeps changing from one OS to the next, but you've got you know all those other gestures and stuff built in.

Even though they're buried like that double tap on the camera, I just showed you um tapping to check phone lifting to check the phone flipping uh, pressing the power button to get into uh device controls, because remember we do that still on android 11. I haven't set that up on this phone- sorry uh, but also to get to google pay. You can uh turn on the swipe on the fingerprint reader track session. I mean you know you guys have seen this stuff. This is android 11, that's been out for well a year now, um! So not a lot, not a lot else to say there.

Android 11 is good. Android 11 is totally fine. Android 12 is awesome, so I cannot wait and again. If you buy this phone, you get android 12 before anyone outside you know other pixel users. So again I know kind of short review here.

Normally we would do a big written thing, but there's just I'm just being honest: there's not a lot to cover here. So what we've got is the pixel 5 a5g. It costs 450 dollars. It comes in this color. Only what it feels like is google knows the pixel, 6 and pixel 6 pro are coming, and so those are dramatically different approaches to their phones, and they needed like sort of a slight bump or upgrade to you know the series to keep it alive until we get a 6a next year whatever, and so they went.

Look we're not going crazy. We're going to save all the new stuff for the six, and so, let's just tweak this one slightly bigger display slightly bigger battery, we'll throw in the water resistance, and we'll cut 50 bucks off it, because we're using all the other old components like the processor and ram and all that stuff right in the camera. So that's kind of what you got. You got this phone that probably I can't imagine it exists for that long, uh and from a sales perspective. But if you buy, you still get support for three years and all that so not a bad buy at all works on all the major carriers has subbed 65g.

You can buy from the Google store, also through Google phi August 17th, which should be today that you're watching this at first um is when pre-orders open, and then it hits stores on August 26th. So if you were interested in this phone, I think it'll be a good phone. If your budget is, you know, 500 bucks or under solid, solid phone. I know. OnePlus and Samsung are also selling solid phones around this price point.

But it's google and you sort of know what you're getting up here, which is really important and uh in here in the software, which is also very, very important so uh, that is our pixel 5a 5g review. If you guys have comments, questions drop, those in the comments, and we will try to get back to you. Enjoy life, peace.

Source : Droid Life