VentureBeat's Evan Blass says he knows the date for the launch of Google's next smartphone, the Pixel 2: October 5. The ever-reliable leaker also says the device will come with a new SoC from Qualcomm, a "Snapdragon 836."

Google's second-generation Pixel handsets, powered by Snapdragon 836 SoC's, will be unveiled on October 5th. — Evan Blass (@evleaks) August 24, 2017

The report lines up well with how Google did things last year. The Google Hardware division held an event around the same time—October 4—where it unveiled the Google Home, Google Wi-Fi, Daydream VR, a 4k Chromecast, and the Google Pixel phones. This year, in addition to the phones, Android Police claims Google will also launch a new Chromebook and a smaller version of the Google Home. It would not surprise me to hear about a few other devices as well.

Blass also mentions a "Snapdragon 836" SoC, an SoC that must be "1 better" than the typical Snapdragon 835. Again, this lines up with last year, when the Pixel phones introduced the Snapdragon 821 over the 820. We're not sure how the 836 is different from the 835, but if it's anything like the 820-to-821 jump, there won't be much difference. Last year, some revisions of the 821 had a slightly higher clock versus the 820, but that was it.

We're expecting Google to introduce two phones at the event, the Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL (not official names). Google still doesn't do its own manufacturing, and this year the phones are being made by two different companies using two different designs. The Pixel 2 XL is being made by LG, and it has a modern-looking slim bezel design with a 5.99-inch, 1440p OLED display. The smaller Pixel is being made by HTC, has bigger top and bottom bezels, and has a 4.97-inch 1080p OLED display. Both will have squeezable frames like the HTC U11, dual front-facing speakers, an always-on display mode, no headphone jacks, and 4GB of RAM.

Listing image by Android Police