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Google’s Pixel Fold one year later: I can’t wait for the sequel

Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge

Iwasn’t sold on the era of foldable smartphones until I tried the Pixel Fold. For one, we get a fairly limited selection of folding phones to choose from in the US compared to China. And the cramped, too-narrow outer display of Samsung’s Galaxy Z Fold series has never worked for my large hands. So Google grabbed my interest immediately when it introduced a squat, passport-shaped folding phone.

I’ve used Pixels for years, so I’m well acquainted with Google’s strengths and weaknesses. The software is clean, you get some genuinely handy Pixel-only features (the Recorder app is a blessing in my line of work), and the camera performance is unbeatable — at least for still photography. But on the flip side, performance never measures up to Qualcomm’s latest Snapdragon chips, the devices tend to run a little warm, and there are sometimes odd hardware quirks. (Did you know that every Pixel 8 and 8 Pro has tiny bumps under the display only visible in just the right light? Now you do.)

Going into the Pixel Fold, I knew there would be additional tradeoffs. Foldable phones are heavy. Their cameras don’t measure up to the best traditional phones. And several years into this form factor, they often remain wildly expensive. Samsung and Motorola offer lower-priced flip versions, but no such luck if you’re a Pixel fan.

However, it took practically no time at all for the Pixel Fold to overcome those collective downsides. It’s far from a perfect gadget, but this is a case where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. I’ve grown to like a lot about the first-gen Pixel Fold, but there are also some nagging frustrations that I hope to see rectified in the upcoming Pixel 9 Pro Fold.

It’s easy to ignore the bigger screen
The first thing I learned was that when you’ve got an adequate phone on the outside, you won’t open the inner display as frequently as you might expect — at least once the honeymoon phase wears off. The Fold’s exterior screen is perfectly usable for most of what I do with a smartphone. I usually unfold it when I want to watch YouTube, Netflix, or check the news with The New York Times app. Sure, I’ve multitasked with two apps at once on occasion — and Google has made that workflow easier with software updates — but it’s not a common scenario. I’m still mostly using the large canvas to focus on one thing a a time, albeit with far greater immersion.

This thing desperately needs a brightness boost

From day one, my primary gripe with the Pixel Fold has always been its display brightness — or lack thereof. Only a few months after its release last year, the $1,700 device was outshined by the significantly more affordable Pixel 8 series and Google’s new Actua / Super Actua displays. They get extremely bright and are no trouble to use outdoors. With the Fold, I’ve constantly got the brightness slider up over 80 percent, which doesn’t do its battery life any favors. It can be a struggle to see this phone when the sun is shining, and the very reflective inner screen only makes things worse.

If there’s one weakness I’m relatively confident Google is going to fix the second time around, it’s this lack of pop. All indications are that the company will bring its latest (and brightest) display tech to its second-gen foldable.

The other key improvement I hope to see is a lighter frame. The Pixel Fold is one seriously hefty phone, even for me — a 6’1” man with big hands — and can get taxing to hold over time.

The battery life has gotten me by

I wasn’t expecting miracles from the Pixel Fold’s battery endurance. Is it fair to want that from any foldable? Plus, Google’s Tensor chips have never been known for efficiency. But even on days when the large display barely got any use, the Fold did… fine. It wasn’t always a lock that there would be much juice remaining when I got home after a long day, but the phone almost always made it. Like other Pixels, the Fold can sometimes charge at a snail’s pace when you’re actively using it while plugged in. Overall, its stamina is trounced by the more conventional Pixel 8 Pro, but that’s to be expected when you’re pitting two screens against one.

Source: https://www.theverge.com/24211366/google-pixel-fold-one-year-later-review
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