Google Pixel 7 review: reborn and mature, hard to beat

Google has launched Pixel 7 and Pixel 7 Pro on our market, compared to last year the two smartphones arrive immediately available to Italian users and to tell the truth they have already been sold out since the opening of pre-orders. We have seen the Pixel 7 Pro review, now I will tell you about the base model, Google Pixel 7the smallest and cheapest, but in some ways even the more interesting of the two.

The first aspect that matters about the Pixel 7 is its size. It is not compact, for heaven’s sake, but placed close to the big brother the proportions appear very different, I would dare to say, more human. Ergonomics is a crucial point for this product because smartphones that are not frying pans can be counted on the fingers of one hand (you can find them in the gallery just below).

It is well built, resistant to water and dust with IP68 certification and Gorilla Glass Victus front and back, the oleophobic treatment is perfect, it can be held in the hand without too much effort and those 197 grams of weight, so concentrated, communicate solidity and robustness. Yes, that’s it, it’s a very heavy smartphone in relation to its size, a bit like the iPhone 14 Pro.

The design is very different from the Pixel 6 predecessor, it immediately appears as a much more refined productstreamlined also on the front with still not symmetrical but reduced frames and a satin aluminum chamber bar.

Personally I find it nicer than the Pixel 7 Prowhich has chrome borders and chamber bars, but tastes are tastes.

Pixel 7’s display is a 6.3-inch FullHD + OLED in 20: 9, supports HDR10 +, the refresh rate reaches 90 Hz and is not LTPO. The declared peak brightness is 1400 nits, just below the Pixel 7 Pro, actually putting them side by side is a big difference.

Just like on the Pixel 6, the 7 also suffers from blue shift, that is, it shows blue and red reflections when you look at it outside the vertical and it does so in a particularly accentuated way, beyond the norm. In consultation with some colleagues, I realized that this is probably a problem with my unit, at least with this evidence.

It is a good display, nothing striking but discreet, certainly not the strong point despite it being there anyway some improvement over last year’s model. While I have sharply criticized the Google Pixel 7 Pro’s display handling, nothing can be said here, it is not a variable refresh rate display and the software dynamically handles it between 60 and 90 Hz exactly as it should.

AUDIO AND MULTIMEDIA

Pixel 7 can rely on two fairly full-bodied and powerful stereo speakers, it does not shine particularly but it gets along, even here however there has been a slight improvement compared to the Pixel 6. However, we must consider that we are talking about a 649 Euro smartphone, obviously there are better products but it cannot be said that his direct rivals have better cards to play. Always nice is the “Adaptive Audio” function that adapts the sound according to the acoustics of the environment in which the smartphone is located and does so by analyzing the reverberation with the ambient microphones it is equipped with.

On the visual side there is the HDR10 +, the screen is not very bright but the color profile is correct and faithfully reproduces the color profiles of the visual contents.

I don’t have much to add compared to what was said in the Pixel 7 Pro review: Pixels are also bought for constant and lasting updates (3 major updates and 5 years of security patches) as well as timely and in advance of all other smartphones with the green robot.

The user experience is very pleasant, with attention to graphics and supported by a haptic feedback present and with many shades of intensity. Everything is intuitive, easy to understand even if it is not completely automatic, like many AI functions that learn from the user’s habits and optimize consumption, performance and safety.

If you are looking for nice features and extreme OneUI completeness then this is not the smartphone for you, but personally I have never heard anyone go back after trying a Pixel (apart from the disastrous beginnings of Pixel 6 and 6 Pro).

Here, this is important to say, Pixel 7 and 7 Pro are not riddled with bugs and glitches like their predecessors. On the other hand, Google has thought of them as an iterative evolution of the sixth generation, so they can count on all the baggage of optimizations and fixes that have been released in the last 12 months. They are mature smartphones.

• display: 6.3 “FHD + OLED, 20: 9, 416ppi, refresh rate up to 90Hz, Corning Gorilla Glass Victus, always-on, 1.000nit (HDR), 1.400nit (max), contrast> 1.000.000: 1, HDR, 16 million 24-bit colors
• processor: Google Tensor G2 with Titan M2 security co-processor
• memory:
  • 8GB of LPDDR5 RAM
  • 128 / 256GB internal UFS 3.1

• security updates: minimum 5 years
• safety: Google One VPN (coming soon, at no extra cost)
• connectivity: 5G, WiFi 6e, Bluetooth 5.2, NFC, USB-C 3.2 gen2, GPS, Glonass, Galileo, QZSS
• dual SIM: yes, Nano SIM + eSIM
• function for phone calls: Clear call to reduce environmental noises such as wind and traffic through machine learning
• audio: stereo speaker, 3 microphones, noise suppression
• fingerprint sensor: below the display
• face unlock: Yes
• resistence: IP68
• cameras:
  • front: 10.8MP, f / 2.2, 1.22um pixels, FF, FOV 92.8 °
  • rear:
    • 50MP Octa PD Quad Bayer, f / 1.85, 1.2um pixels, FOV 82 °, 1 / 1.31 “sensor, OIS, EIS, Super Res Zoom up to 8x
    • 12MP ultra wide angle, 1.25um pixel, f / 2.2, 114 ° FOV, lens correction
    • LDAF, OIS, EIS
    • video up to 4K at 60fps, 10-bit HDR

• battery: 4.355mAh with 30W charging (up to 50% in 30 minutes), autonomy over 24 hours (up to 72 hours with Extreme Battery Saver), Qi certification, Battery Share, wireless charging
• material: Corning Gorilla Glass Victus with matte aluminum frame
• colors: Obsidian, Snow, Lemongrass
• dimensions and weight: 155,6×73,2×8,7mm for 197g

While the Pixel 7 Pro received marginal improvements in terms of user experience, the same cannot be said for the Pixel7, which really is. reborn from last yearactually configuring itself as a completely different smartphone.

We have already said about the display and audio, but now the fingerprint reader and haptic feedback are also associated with the improvements, now the same as that of the Pro, therefore absolutely level. A welcome novelty is the unlocking with 2D face recognition, it is very fast even if clearly not as safe as the fingerprint reader.

All the telephone and connectivity parts are also good, reception is more than good, you support a physical sim and an eSIM. Everything ok with WiFi 6e and Bluetooth 5.2, there is also the video output on the Type-C, just a pity that Google has not developed a real desktop mode for the moment.

PERFORMANCE AND AUTONOMY

Google Pixel 7 is equipped with the second generation Google Tensor, a SoC that follows the first Tensor by partially modifying its components. The two X1 performance cores remain, the intermediate cores change with an upgrade from Cortex A76 to Cortex A78, the TPU renewed and the GPU, now a Mali G71 to MP07.

It is undeniable that there has been some downsizing in terms of raw power and the benchmarks confirm this. However, unlike what happens on the Pixel 7 Pro, here the lower resolution and refresh rate of the screen make the task easier for the GPUso in the everyday experience there are in fact no major slowdowns, lag and frame loss in games, despite the smaller amount of RAM.

Paradoxically, the lower specs of the Pixel 7 are its winning weapon: fewer pixels, fewer display updates, less RAM and consequently fewer apps in memory and less consumption in the background. The result is an autonomy that in fact matches its older brother despite a significantly smaller battery.

About 5 and a half hours of active display, the day ends and giving up the AOD goes even further. Charging with cable instead reaches 30 watts, 20 watts wirelessly, they are not excellent values, there is not much to add.

Google Pixel 7 has a more standard photographic sector than its older brother, however it manages to field a nice improvement over the Pixel 6, especially on the front camera which is completely new. Instead, the two 50 MP rear cameras with optical stabilization and 12 MP fixed focus and 114-degree FOV are confirmed.

Selfies certainly of a level but also the main camera and the ultrawide are confirmed as true aces, certainly thanks to the Google software that has been refined over time to extract all the potential from these new sensors. The real advantage of Pixel 7 is to arrive on the market with all the experience of the predecessor, so from day one the performances are solid, reliable, like Pixel.

Even the videos are more than good, there is no tele but with the 2X digital zoom there are no significant quality losses, top stabilization and reference image quality. There remains the problem of noise in the shadows, who knows if Google will ever be able to find the square.

As on the flagship, here too there are the new AI functions such as unblur photo, skin tone improvement, 2X digital zoom without loss of quality (and super res up to 8x), guided selfies, improved processing algorithms for photo at night.

Google Pixel 7 is proposed to 649 Euro of price list for the basic cut 8/128 GB, goes up to 749 euros for the 8/256 GB variant. Prices that have not risen since 2021 and smartphones that instead put the turbo in terms of quality going to file all those defects of the previous model and among other things, getting considerably closer to the big brother Pixel 7 Pro.

In fact, the photographic sector and the display partially change between the two models, which however on the top model is not exploited properly. And I tell you, the 7 Pro is a great smartphone but I had to give you dispassionate advice I would certainly say Pixel 7.

Google has put together a mature, reliable, beautiful product, with all the crimes to guarantee you a truly enjoyable user experience.