First of all, can we talk about something for a second? Google is the worst company on Earth at keeping things a secret and I don't think it's on purpose like some people think. it's an intentional leak. and oh, they're They're letting stuff get out about their phone so that's free press. No.

I think they're just bad at it. Like really, really bad at it. So everything about the phone is already out before it even comes out. That's just the way it is with Pixel phones.

Now, Pixel anything. Anyway, this is the Pixel 7A You've probably heard about it or seen some things. Uh, and it turns out pretty much everything you've seen is true because it's a Pixel. But really, what you should know is this is the new mid-ranger from Google and it's a bit more expensive than the previous one.

7A costs 499 and it's very similar to the Pixel 7. let's talk about it. So first things first. yes, the price did go up.

The pixel 6A was 449 that release. This is the 7A so there should be a good reason to add 50 more dollars. So let's just start with what's new which is wireless charging and a new 90 Hertz display. Honestly, these are welcome features.

Wireless charging is a nice one for convenience. I Will say it's definitely not fast wireless charging. It's only seven and a half Watts here. So I've noticed literally when I'm navigating and this is wireless charging in my car and it's got high brightness GPS Stuff going.

It just holds its charge. It doesn't lower or go up. It just stays the same. But hey, if you have a wireless charger sitting around at the desk at work or at the bedside or something like that, it'll definitely be good for a trickle charge overnight, which not every phone in this price range can say they have.

so that's good. And then the 90 Hertz display is a funny one because it's actually off by default on this phone. like when you first take it out the box and start using it. It's a 60 Hertz phone, but you can go into the display settings and turn turn on smooth display.

Suddenly, it's 50 percent more frames and it's dramatically smoother. About as smooth as the Pixel 7 was. It's also the same tensor G2 chip and the same 8 gigs of RAM. So performance feels pretty similar to the Pixel 7.

At 90 Hertz it makes a big difference. I Do not enjoy using this phone at 60 Hertz. for this price, it did seem a little bit choppier like it was dropping frames and actually operating at 45 to 55. Hertz So yeah, turn on that 90 Hertz Build Quality wise, that is where you'll see at least on paper.

It does take the small step down from the Pixel 7. uh, plastic back and the the rails are still metal which is nice. and it is also IP67 instead of ip68. but honestly, you'd be hard-pressed to notice.

Just like using this phone, holding it. there's no creaking, no bending. No, nothing screams low quality about this build at all. So I think that was well done and this is a slightly smaller 6.1 inch flat display still 1080P and it's up to 90 Hertz Like I said and it does have some serious color shifting and banding when you get off axis, but honestly, you know it's still bright.

It still looks good enough for this price. it's Gorilla Glass 3. And also even though the display is slightly smaller, the slightly thicker bezels just bring it right back up to basically the same size of a phone as the Pixel 7. So it feels like another fair trade.

And then there is a new set of colors. This This little light blue is called C as in Ocean it's the C but there's also a charcoal and snow which are the black and white ones. and there's also a red like coral colored one. That one is an online only Google Store color.

Pretty fire actually. but you know Channel sponsored Dbrand will let you spice it up. I've never actually shouted out the Jerry rig everything tear down skin because usually Dbrand has to wait for someone to actually do the tear down. Luckily though, they were able to pull some strings and get this one made ahead of time so it's ready right for launch.

And this is a rare first look at the inside of the phone on camera through this skin and it's it's 15 off too along with everything else on their site. right now for you guys, as long as you go to Dbrand.com MKBHD and use code Everything but bottom line, it still very much looks like a pixel. the metal wraparound visor, the pill cut out for the cameras, the antenna bands in the right places, the slot speakers, the buttons are still very clicky I mean if this is they've done the hardware well. this is a very good trade-off for the hardware price and then do I really even need to get into the software because this story kind of writes itself.

They do all the same software stuff in the A series phones as they do on the more premium pixels which I like not everybody does that so all the same features all the same stuff that I like about every other pixel is also here. I've called the Pixel the smartest smartphone in the world because of how good Google assistant is, how good the voice to text is with all the on-device transcription, the incredible voice recorder app, the Google Assistant stuff that screens calls and waits on hold for me, the now playing feature that hears songs in the background wherever you go and identifies them for you, the material you stuff throughout everything that identifies your wallpaper and matches your system colors to it. and of course the promised three years of software updates which hilariously isn't the longest promise support in the industry anymore. That actually goes to Samsung's phones which promise like four to five years of support, but nevertheless, no surprises here.

So really, my only two question marks when I got this phone were battery and cameras. So battery would be kind of interesting because it's roughly the same size battery as the Pixel 7, so would it have the same battery life or not? But then also cameras because For the first time in a while there's new cameras in here, all new cameras that we've never seen in a pixel before. so a departure from the tried and true. So first for battery 4 385 milliamp hours, 18 watt charging kind of slow and seven and a half watt wireless charging even slower and then total battery life I'm gonna say average at best, so it's a full day of use, but definitely nothing more even at 90 Hertz which is fine, you know it's mid-range so I got quite a few days with the the three to four hours of screen on time at 90.

Hertz with my typical usage and I'd have like 10 left at the end of the day. So I'm not really worried about it dying before the end of the day unless it's crazy heavy, but even then the wireless charging can kind of save you if you want to prolong its death a little bit. We'll see how this ages over time, but for now I'm giving it a C plus battery life if that makes sense. But let's talk about these cameras.

Okay, so Pixel 6A last year played it super safe with the cameras because it used the same 12 megapixel sensor from the previous like four years of pixels in a row that Infamous IMX 363 sensor that did so well. This one has a brand new 64 megapixel main camera paired with a 13 megapixel Ultra wide and a 13 megapixel selfie camera. So when I first started testing it, I mean I'm thinking, all right, well, this new sensor. keep up with the old, tried and true Pixel 6A because we all know how good those old cameras were.

But pretty quickly it became clear that Google has done the work to tighten up the processing with the new sensor and actually sort of match it this time and take advantage of the actual larger sensor. So it's not just about the megapixel count. Matter of fact, this 64 megapixel sensor bins down to 16 megapixels by default every time, and there is no way in Google's app to take full 64 megapixel photos. but it's more about the larger size of the sensor which can bring in more light and give a more shallow, natural depth of field.

So yeah, Pixel photos look pretty good for a 500 phone. There are tons of dynamic range without being too Hdre and actually kind of feels like they've evened it out a little bit so it's a little less contrasty, but it still has that famous contrasty pixel look. and then that F 1.9 Max aperture combined with the new sensor means you can take close-ups of things and have a really shallow depth of field. and you can take better low-light photos with faster shutter speeds at night with night sight.

There is no macro mode I noticed, but you can get pretty close up probably I'm gonna say like five inches away from the subject and still be fine. not too much fringing. The ultra wide here has a lot of the same characteristics, but it's particularly distorted and warped at the corners. I feel like this.

This is something like I would expect Google to improve more with their software. Maybe they'll update this over time, but for now the Distortion look is pretty noticeable. but it is wide and then the Selfies they look like pixel selfies. Honestly, very solid.

No complaints. Tons of range. that's a good selfie camera. For video you can do 4K 60 from the main camera which the Samsung a54 I just tested I don't think could even do that.

but then it's 4K 30 from the other cameras which is fine, looks normal it. This is a top three mid-range smartphone camera, but hold on to that thought. All the rest of the little parts of this phone I've tested were right in line for this price. The haptics were pretty good, not as good as the more expensive pixels, but pretty good.

The optical fingerprint reader is just a beat slower than the super fast ultrasonic ones, but none of the pixels have particularly fast fingerprint readers anyway. so this is par for the course. and when the sun hit it I could also see that it was slightly angled to the right. Not sure if that's normal or not.

I Just know I Haven't seen it like that before, but let's be real here for the A series. it all comes down to the price point and this one has gone up so it is still mid-range but it's like upper like premium mid-range at 500 bucks. Verizon Is also going to sell a millimeter wave version and theirs will be 550 bucks. Classic Verizon but still premium mid-range right? This is a good phone and I think a lot of people will get it and really like it, but for the price I Would actually rather go for the pixel 7.

it is six months older yes than this brand new A series phone, but it's gonna have the same specs. It's the same tensor chip and same RAM and everything, but it will have more capable cameras on the back and the front, a faster 20 watt wireless charging, and then a bunch of the smaller little things. better haptics, better speakers, and a cheaper phone. It's actually glass on the back like there's just a bunch of little things.

that add up to a better experience. overall. it's thinner, bezels, better accessories because it's six months old already. It's also ip68 instead of IP67 and this phone is like 5.99 standard and it was when it came out, but it's regularly on sale for much less than that.

If you can get this phone pixel 7 for in the 500 to 550 range, I would take this over the 7A but I guess that's just the middle child effect because Google is now trying this sort of newer thing where they're offering more things at once more pixels for different prices. They're keeping the 6A in the lineup at 349, which I think is a really good deal and so now you can get a pixel anywhere from 350 bucks to 1800 bucks. Choice is yours. 7A is kind of right in the middle.

Let me know what you think about this phone and whether or not you'd get this or the older seven. In the meantime, thanks for watching! Check out all the new stuff on the channel if you haven't already and I'll catch you guys in the next one. Peace.