We’re exactly a week away from the unveiling of Google’s hardware innovations, but have already got a peek at the press renders of the upcoming smartphones. And they fit quite well with all previous leaks and rumors. Thanks to Evan Blass from Venturebeat, the picture(render) you see above is reportedly the new Pixel smartphone, and he also confirms the existence of a Pixel XL.
Google, as reported before, is rebranding the Nexus device lineup and now clubbing them under its own ‘Pixel’ brandname. The smaller of the two new devices that’re expected to make a debut on October 4th is the Pixel which will sport a 5-inch 1080p display, with the larger Pixel XL sporting a brighter 5.5-inch Quad HD display.
According to reports, the Pixel smartphone will be powered by a quad-core 2.0 Ghz(64 bit) processor, coupled alongwith 4 GB of RAM and 32 GB of on-board storage. On the camera front, the Pixel is said to host a 12-megapixel rear and an 8-megapixel front shutter for your selfie needs. Other hardware features of the smartphone include a top-mounted headphone jack(Google is not getting rid of it yet!), a fingerprint scanner on the back and a USB-C port at the bottom.
There are the basic specifications of the Pixel smartphone seen above, but one thing that stands out and is sure to catch your eye are the software updates or to be more specific ‘launcher updates’. Google while phasing out the Nexus branding is also upgrading the launcher to reflect the same. As reported earlier, the company is now readying itself to introduce a new ‘Pixel Launcher‘ and this is our first look at the same — in action.
Right off the bat, you’ll notice that the Google search bar has surely been replaced by a Pill shaped icon, but we’re still to see the animations and other features included in the same. The app launch icon has been nixxed in favor of a simple upward gesture(marked by a small arrow), which reveals the complete app drawer.
The Pixel launcher also does away with bold and bulky app icons in favor of new materialistic and minimal circular icons. And the biggest change that you might have noticed are the navigation icons, which though redesigned, also fall in line with previous leaks from AndroidPolice.
If you notice the home button, it’s no longer a hollow circluar icon but has now been replaced with a solid circle and a ring around it. This change has been made to inculcate the capabilities of the upcoming smarter Google AI, the Assistant. Yes, very much like Google Now, you would now be able to access and command the Assistant right from your Pixel launcher.
Though we have no confirmation on the pricing but earlier reports have shown that the Pixel line-up is expected to be available at a hefty price as compared to Nexus devices. And why wouldn’t they be, they’re Pixels after all. The new smaller Pixel smartphone is said to be made available at a price tag of $649.
