For another year, Google’s next-gen phones are out in the wild months ahead of their grand reveal at a fancy event. Just a day ago, the Pixel 8 Pro was unceremoniously leaked, and now, the standard Pixel 8 has also received the same treatment. OnLeaks and MySmartPrice have shared reported renders and a 360-degree video depicting the upcoming Google phone from all angles.
The design changes are subtle, but easy on the eyes. Just like the Pixel 8 Pro, the corners are once again more rounded on the Pixel 8. The frame is metallic, and there’s a horizontal camera strip at the back with a metallic luster on top. Akin to the Pixel 7, we get two cameras on the Pixel 8, sitting in a pill-shaped cutout.
MySmartPrice
Another small aesthetic tweak is the earpiece grill at the top, which is now more prominent than what we saw on the Pixel 7 and Pixel 7 Pro. If the current-gen Pixels are any indication, the Pixel 8 is going to offer an excellent in-hand feel. Talking about in-hand feel, though, it appears that Google is once again pandering to the small phone loyalists.
Look, it’s a small-ish Pixel!
As per the latest leak, the Pixel 8’s dimensions are 150.5 by 70.8 by 8.9mm. For comparison, the Pixel 7 comes in at 155.6 by 73.2 by 8.7mm. Google’s designers have managed to shave a good 5mm from the height and also made the phone narrower by about 2.4mm.
That might not sound like much, but it creates quite some difference when you actually hold a phone in your hands. Plus, those rounded corners and curved sides will certainly make it comfortable in your palm and also in your pockets. Here’s a scaled dimensions comparison between the Pixel 8 Pro, Pixel 7, and Pixel 8 to highlight the size difference:
Nadeem Sarwar / DigitalTrends
I am definitely excited to see that Google believes in the cause of small phones. I also feel optimistic that the company’s engineering team found some merit to approach the form factor. Small phones are a double-edged sword, and so far, Google’s Pixels haven’t quite managed to ace the balance between raw performance and battery efficiency.
The Pixel 6 was a battery nightmare in the early days following its release, and the Pixel 7 suffered from similar problems. It took a healthy few months of optimizations via software updates to fix the nagging issues.
MySmartPrice
With the phone’s dimensions shrinking further, there’s a chance that the raw battery capacity might condense further on the Pixel 8. Another issue is heat management. With shrinking space under the hood, the chances of fitting an efficient thermal management hardware like a heat sink become a challenge.
As a result, phones tend to heat under stress, even while charging. For all it’s worth, I’m genuinely excited about the Pixel 8 coming out as a small-ish phone, but I am dearly hoping that battery and heating concerns have been addressed.