Google Pixel 4a 128GB Prices & Plans

Google Pixel 4a 128GB Review

The Google Pixel 3a was last year's most important phone. It proved you didn't need to spend over a grand to get a top-tier camera. It was an antidote to ever-climbing smartphone prices, a device that truly posed the question "why spend more?".

The Pixel 4a isn't quite revolutionary in the same way, but an evolutionary successor that builds on that legacy. Google has once again put one of the best smartphone cameras around into a comparatively affordable body. The same trick isn't quite as impressive the second time around, but it's welcome nonetheless.

And as more and more devices encroach on - if not exceed - the $2,000 mark, the Pixel 4a is more relevant than ever. Best in class photography is often a key selling point of pricier devices, and if a $599 phone can go toe-to-toe with the best of the best, it's fair to ask questions about what that extra $1,400 is buying you.

Pixel perfect

Like the Pixel 3a before it, camera is easily the Pixel 4a's most exciting feature. Put simply, it's a $599 phone with a camera that can rival - if not best - the camera in a $1,999 phone. It doesn't have every bell and whistle you'll find on a pricier device, but at $599, it's hard to complain. After all, camera quality tends to be the major compromise when buying a cheaper device.

The Pixel 4a shares its primary camera with last year's Pixel 4. In short, this means it's very good. No matter what environment you're shooting in, the Pixel 4a can get a great shot - and so consistently. It might not be the very best option for smartphone photography - that honour goes to the OPPO Find X2 Pro right now - but it's still a damn good camera.

If anything, the only major sacrifice you make by opting for a Pixel 4a over a pricier phone is the lack of other lenses. The Pixel 4a has just one camera, whereas other handsets in the same price bracket have as many as four. I really enjoy the flexibility of having access to multiple lenses on a phone, but it's understandable the Pixel 4a only has one given its price. While similarly priced Android phones may have more, anything other than the primary lens is rarely worth using. I'd much rather one amazing camera.

While the Pixel 4a might not have a secondary lens, it has a few software tricks that help compensate. Portrait mode - a popular feature on dual camera smartphones - for example, still works very well. You're able to adjust the amount of blur behind your subject, and can even make the background monochrome while keeping your subject colourised through a feature called colour pop. Neither feature is 100% perfect - portrait mode will occasionally blur something it shouldn't and colour pop can sometimes remove colour from your subject - but both work well for the most part.

Here's a portrait shot from the Pixel 4a:

And here's a portrait shot with colour pop:

And despite the lack of a dedicated zoom lens, the Pixel 4a's software assisted zoom works better than expected. You'll get surprisingly great results if you're only zooming in by a factor of two or so. Understandably, there's a limit to just how much software can do, and you'll notice pixel interpolation (where the software has tried to reconstruct the image using existing data) if you zoom in too far.

The image below compares zoom factors on the Pixel 4a:

The Pixel 4a also holds its own when it comes to lowlight photography, with Night Sight making a return. If you're in need of a refresher, Night Sight captures a number of photos over a few seconds and turns them into a brighter image. It's not a drastic improvement to the Pixel 3a, but the resulting images are a little bit brighter.

Here's a shot without Night Sight:

And here's the same shot with Night Sight on:

While the Pixel 4a does a great job in lowlight conditions, it's not the best phone for extreme darkness. While a few high end phones can still take a decent photo in a pitch black room, the Pixel 4a isn't quite cut out for that level of lowlight photography. Even the Pixel 4 does a better job, presumably due to the more robust processor under the hood. Night Sight will still capture some details, but you're not going to get a usable photo. 

Here's a shot I tried taking in my spare room with the lights off:

And here's the same photo from the Galaxy Note 20 Ultra:

Most of us aren't taking photos in this kind of darkness, but it's important to understand where the Pixel 4a's limitations lie.

The Pixel 4 introduced two cool new camera features last year - astrophotography and dual exposure controls - and the Pixel 4a is capable of both of these.

Astrophotography is Night Sight on steroids. If you're in a dark enough location, you can use the Pixel 4a to take photos of the night sky where stars are more pronounced than viewed by the human eye. As with Night Sight, this is achieved by taking a photo over a longer period of time. But while a typical lowlight photo needs just a few seconds, you're looking at a couple of minutes for astrophotography. As such, you'll want a tripod or another way to prop your phone.

You'll also want to wait at least 90 minutes past sunset, minimal cloud cover, and as little light pollution as possible. Astrophotography mode will work in a city, the results just won't be as good. These strict requirements make the feature a little niche, but it is kind of incredible a phone can take these kind of photos.

I didn't have a chance to test the astrophotography mode outside of the city, but here's a shot from my balcony.

The stars aren't super clear in the resized image (and there's a lot of cloud movement), but here's a 100% crop that showcases some of the fine detail: 

Dual exposure is a little more practical, especially for anyone who loves tinkering with photos. When framing up a shot, you're able to adjust brightness and shadows. Other smartphones only let you adjust brightness. In short, this gives you more granular control over how your final photo turns out. If a shot seems too bright, you can make the shadows more dramatic without dimming the entire image.

Here's a shot with automatic exposure:

And here's a shot where I used dual exposure to tone down the brightness to add more dimension to the sky, while bumping up shadows to prevent the overall image from getting too dark:

Catchless 

More affordable phones often have a catch. There's always something that's missing. After all, there has to be a reason it's so cheap, at least comparatively speaking. Fortunately, that's not really the case with the Pixel 4a.

A plastic back in once again the most notable compromise made by the Pixel 4a. And honestly, it's fine. Nice, even. It certainly isn't cheap plastic. It's a reassuring build that still has a bit of heft to it. You're not going to mistake it for glass, but it's also not going to shatter like glass. And considering many affordable devices are now touting awful glasstic backs - plastic finished to look like glass that often embodies the worst of both worlds - I appreciate that the Pixel 4a doesn't pretend to be something it's not.

Plastic build aside, the Pixel 4a ticks every box you'd want from a phone. Despite rocking a midrange processor, it's perfectly snappy. It never felt sluggish during day-to-day tasks, and holds its own with both 2D and 3D games. If you're comparing to a higher end device like the Note 20 Ultra, you might notice apps load a fraction faster, but not significantly so. I've certainly got no complaints.

Battery is also great. While it's not up there with the best of the best, the Pixel 4a should consistently last a day with a comfortable enough buffer. For the most part, I was able to get between five and six hours of screen time from the Pixel 4a per charge.

The Pixel 4a is a comparatively small phone, which personally, is a welcome change. It's about the same size as the new iPhone SE, but with a much larger 5.81-inch screen. It's kinda adorable, especially when compared to supersized flagships where displays just keep seeming to get larger. I've found the Pixel 4a to be the perfect compromise phone. You can comfortably use it one-handed without readjusting the phone or straining, but the screen is still large enough that it doesn't feel restrictive. The extra inch-and-a-bit makes watching video and extended reading a lot more comfortable than on the iPhone SE.

A key benefit of picking the Pixel 4a over most other more affordable smartphones is guaranteed updates. Google says the Pixel 4a will get three years of major operating system updates and security patches, which is identical to the promise it makes for top-tier Pixel devices. This means you'll be getting updates - including new features - until at least August 2023. The Pixel 4a will also be first in line for those updates, and as such, will be one of the first devices able to get updated to Android 11 later this year.

This kind of support is rare in Android flagships, and almost unheard of in more affordable Android phones. The only other Android devices that come close are those part of the Android One program, which get two years of major operating system updates, and three years of security.

Given the more affordable price point, there are however a few omissions worth noting. There's no water-resistance, no wireless charging, and storage isn't expandable. The first two are nice to have, but not essential. Expandable storage would have been useful, but it's more forgivable given the Pixel 4a has 128GB of internal capacity. Especially given the Pixel 4a only has 64GB and was $50 more expensive.

At $599, it's not surprising the Pixel 4a doesn't have 5G. No phone at this price-point does yet. The cheapest 5G phone we've seen to date is OPPO's Find X2 Lite at $749 outright. There is however a Pixel 4a 5G coming later this year that should be priced at $799, if you consider 5G a must-have. At this stage of the rollout, 5G is far from essential given the limited coverage and use cases. That being said, if you are planning on keeping a phone for three or four years, 5G could certainly be nice to have from a future-proofing perspective. It's hard to predict the future, but as it stands, I can't imagine you'll be missing out on much by not having a 5G phone - at least for the next year or two.

Pixel 4a vs. iPhone SE

While the Pixel 3a was ostensibly uncontested last year, the Pixel 4a is squaring off against the iPhone SE in the fight for midrange supremacy. The pair are similar in their attempt to democratise high-end hardware, but take fundamentally different approaches.

The Pixel 4a's focus is clearly on the camera. It's the same photography experience you'd get on a flagship phone. The camera on the iPhone SE certainly isn't bad by any measure, but it's a stepdown from the iPhone 11 - at least in terms of lowlight.

On the other hand, the iPhone SE brings down Apple's best processor to an affordable price-point. The iPhone SE is powered by Apple's A13 chip, which is the genuinely the fastest mobile processor around. The cheapest iPhone has a better processor than the most expensive Android phone. While the Pixel 4a isn't a slouch when it comes to performance, the use of the A13 bodes well for the iPhone SE's longevity.

The iPhone 6s, which launched in 2015, will still be updated to iOS 14 this September. That's five years of major operating system updates, and a minimum of six years of security and stability updates. By that math, it's likely Apple will keep supporting the iPhone SE until 2025 at a minimum. That's two years of extra support when compared to the Pixel 4a.

If you keep your Pixel 4a for the life of its software updates, the effective cost is $200 per year. If you keep your iPhone SE for the life of its software updates, the effective costs is $149 per year for a 64GB model.

Of course, the Pixel 4a has a few other things going for it. The design is a little more modern than the iPhone SE, it has more entry level storage, and the battery life is better. That, and it has a headphone jack. The iPhone SE has a few perks too, such as a glass back, water-resistance, and wireless charging.

The Pixel 4a feels like less of a compromise than the iPhone SE, but both are great options. There's really no right or wrong answer here, it just comes down to what features you value more.

Google Pixel 4a - Final Thoughts

Last year, the Pixel 3a asked "why pay more?". This time around, the Pixel 4a yells the same question. While the Pixel 4a is an iterative improvement, the context around the device has changed. Flagship device prices keep climbing, with both the iPhone 11 Pro range and Galaxy S20 family coming in at higher price points than their predecessors. We're also living in somewhat tumultuous times, with Australia slinking into recession. While it may have been easier to justify dropping four figures on a top-tier device this time last year, that's a much harder decision right now.

There's a stark contrast between the Pixel 4a and the top-end of town, made even more pronounced given it was unveiled the same week as the Note 20 Ultra. While the Note 20 Ultra has a lot of fancy features that sound nice on paper, there's the question of what exactly they're worth. Do you need 50x zoom, a 120Hz display, or an S Pen? The entry-level Note 20 Ultra costs three times as much as the Pixel 4a, but it certainly isn't three times better. None of this is to say that those features don't have merit. For some they will make a more expensive device worth it, even if it's not great value.

Instead, the Pixel 4a is entirely about the value proposition. It boils the essentials down into a simple package that does more with less. You get a top-tier camera, smooth performance, and a reliable battery in a slick little piece of kit. Anything that's missing doesn't impact the overall experience in a meaningful way. Once again, Google has made the most sensible smartphone you can buy.

Google Pixel 4a Camera Samples