I decided to let a blind jury weigh in. My partner, a professional photographer, took photos with each camera of a plant in a colorful vase in natural lighting. She labeled each photograph A, B and C, and I sent the photos out to 30 people and, without revealing which phone each letter corresponded with, asked them to vote for their favorite. (Before reading the results below, take a look and make your own vote.)

Photo A was taken with the Samsung phone, photo B with Google’s Pixel, and photo C with an iPhone 7. Out of 30 votes, 19 voted for the iPhone, eight voted for the Pixel, and three voted for the Samsung phone. People seemed to gravitate toward the warmer color profiles produced by the iPhone.

Comparisons With the Competition

Based on features alone, the Pixel is decent compared with Apple’s iPhone 7 and Samsung’s Galaxy S7. Here are some highlights:

■ What sets Pixel apart is its compatibility with Project Fi, Google’s experimental wireless service. You pay at least $30 a month for a package that includes unlimited minutes and messages and 1 gigabyte of cellular data. You can pay $10 more for each extra gigabyte of data or get reimbursed for the cellular data you don’t use.

The best part: In the United States, Project Fi relies on cell networks from Sprint, T-Mobile and U.S. Cellular; Project Fi also works in more than 135 countries, and you pay the same rate no matter where you travel. In my review of Project Fi this year, I found the service to be reliable and the overall package to be a good, frugal option.

■ The Pixel’s fingerprint sensor, for unlocking the phone, is annoyingly on the back of the device rather than on the face. So when you’re on the go, you will probably be using two hands — one to hold the phone and the other to place your fingerprint on the back — to unlock the Pixel.

■ In speed tests run with the mobile app Geekbench, the Pixel was about 20 percent slower than both the iPhone 7 and the Galaxy S7.

■ The Pixel wasn’t designed to be water-resistant though Google says it is resistant to water sprays. The Galaxy S7 and the iPhone 7 survived a dive into a pitcher of water.