Review: Google Pixel 6a – Best Budget Phone?

Are you worried about buying a phone with good specifications but not wanting to spend a large amount of money? Cast your burdens aside as Google brings a new model to the PixelA series, the Google Pixel 6a. It not only provides a low-cost device, but it also produces high-end smartphone performance with its in-house Tensor chip, its excellent camera, and vibrant design.

Unboxing

The Google Pixel 6a comes in a small box with a one meter USB-C cable, a SIM card removal tool, and a USB C (male) to USB C (female) adapter. This helps to move files easily from a previous phone to the newly obtained one. This keeps down the stress level when switching devices.

Appearance 

Like the Google Pixel 6 and 6 pro designs, this new product has an across-the-back camera bar, which divides the back of the phone into two sectors: the brighter-toned sector and the duller sector. Amazing, right?

The change in the back frame material from glass to plastic makes it less slippery than the Pixel 6/6 pro. It has been designed to hold the features of the Pixel 6 in a smaller body (6 x 2.8 x 0.35 inches 6.1 inches OLED screen) as opposed to the 6.4 inches of the Pixel 6, giving a lower weight of 178g (vs 270g of Pixel 6). The front also comes with Corning Gorilla Glass 3.

For its display, the product offers OLED panels with a 1080 x 2400 pixel resolution, which gives a deeper black and better contrast while watching videos. It has a 60Hz screen refresh rate, down from the Pixel 6’s 90Hz.

The Pixel 6a, does have a less powerful battery than the Pixel 6 (4410mAh vs. 4680mAh), which provides up to 6 hours of screen usage and supports a charging speed of 18W.

It sports a pair of speakers with a bottom stereo speaker and a speaker at the top, which also functions as an earpiece. However, like many other phones it lacks the earphone jack. It does produce good sound quality, so there is no concern about that.

Camera

The Pixel 6a is provided with a rear camera showcasing a 12.2MP sensor and a 12MP ultra-wide lens. Even with the hardware quality being lowered, the Pixel 6a boasts to have a better picture image than other phones, giving its high-tech photo processing capability. This would mean that it would have better photos than that of its iPhone counterparts (SE 2022).

It also produces more accurate colors, has a wider viewing area, and includes a Night Mode functionality. With its processing capability the Pixel 6a gives more clarity to portrait images. In terms of video capacity, this phone can shoot 4K video at up to 60 frames per second. With its 8MP selfie camera, the Pixel 6a stands to produce high quality images even in dim lighting.

When it comes to storage, the Pixel 6a has a non-expandable internal SSD of 128GB and 6GB RAM, which is excellent for a low-cost phone.

Performance and Network

Like the Pixel 6/6 pro, the Pixel 6a uses the in-house Google Tensor chip. This chips production was focused on intensive AI functions, as evidenced by the Pixel 6as high-end Speech-to-Text functionality. Adding to this is the live video caption that translates the languages of videos and also a live translator for texts. The Speech-to-text function also helps with transcribing a recording to text.

Android 12 provides a unique interface with icons that reflect the special phones design. The Pixel phone would also offer users automatic Android updates till 2025 and security updates till 2026. The gaming capacity is also a splendid feature, sporting the Mali-G78 MP20 GPU. Users will get a good gaming experience for sure!

Internet services like downloading, surfing the internet, and even streaming online is greatly supported with an increased speed using the 5G built-in connectivity and that’s just the icing on the cake.

Final Thoughts

The Google Pixel 6a is a great budget phone that checks all the boxes for anyone in need of a new phone that doesn’t break the bank. It has all the great features any android user will want and includes software updates to last a few years moving forward. This phone can be purchased from the official Google Store, and on Amazon. The current price starts at US$454.99 and goes up based on individual needs. For more information about this phone, check the official website.