I feel we all get swept up in popularity trends. It can be difficult to swim against that stream once a general consensus has been agreed upon. I have to be honest here, as an editorialist, I happen to enjoy those situations where I can shine a light on a topic, and maybe poke at that popular trend.

Whether I’m responding to a mega-youtuber about a jack-of-all-trades phone, correcting a popular Android blog about audio, or explaining how camera crop factor works when people flip out about a 3X zoom, I enjoy ruffling a few feathers to spread better data on complicated subjects.

The Pixel 4 was one of the worst kept secrets of 2019. It may be one of the worst kept secrets of all time. Now that it’s finally arrived, the tech community is in first stage of impressions and reviews. What makes the Pixel 4 different, we knew pretty much everything about the phone a month before it launched. Google isn’t facing a community just beginning to form opinions on the new Pixel, they’re facing a community that has already made up its collective mind on the Pixel.

It’s pretty clear that Google is setting their sights on Apple as the primary competition. For better, and for worse. When Apple does something, it seems to motivate a LOT of the decisions made by Google’s hardware team.

When the original Pixel launched, we all lovingly joked about it being “Google’s iPhone”. For a hot minute, I really tried to get the nickname “gPhone” to stick.

With the Pixel 4, it would seem Google took those early sentiments to heart. The Pixel 4 seems a purpose-built iPhone competitor, the closest way to recreate an iPhone-style experience, but in the Android ecosystem.

It’s entirely fair to compare Pixels against the phones Apple released this year. What’s frustrating though, is seeing folks cherry-pick one or two features to declare a winner, and to highlight “worth”.

Phones should be judged holistically, and any phone can win or lose a showdown if we move the goalposts to align with a user’s pre-determined bias. The common criticism I see now, is declaring the Pixel 4 unworthy to compete even against the cheaper non-pro iPhone 11. It’s a causally delivered verdict, folks kind of nod along. It’s a surface statement that sounds good, and throws a thumb in the eye of Google.

“The Pixel 4 can’t possibly be worth $100 more than an iPhone!”

The issue is, that statement doesn’t really hold water…

Buying a phone IS subjective. Every individual has different needs and wants, but tech “fans” love having it both ways. Saying “users should buy what they want” in one breath, then pontificating on “worth-it-ness” with the next breath.

It’s true. Phone reviewing and phone ownership is highly subjective, but there are data points we can highlight to guide the discussion. We shouldn’t be trying to declare winners and losers. We should be trying to make sure a consumer can find the exact right fit gadget for their needs.

I’ll take this showdown! It’s actually kind of a fun debate.

Is the Pixel 4 “worth” a $100 premium over an iPhone 11? I say it is.

First, let’s eliminate some of the subjective reasons someone might choose one over the other. We can’t put an exact price on ecosystem, or how much someone might value iOS over Android, or vice versa. We can also be fairly sure that the two phones will likely receive excellent support over three years of ownership. The iPhone likely getting a few more maintenance updates past that point. One COULD argue though that the Pixel is less likely to get CPU throttled as it ages, so I’m going to call long term device health a wash.

We’re looking at pricing first and foremost. $100. That means the smaller Pixel 4 against the base model iPhone 11.

We can’t fully quantify the personal preferences of a user as it pertains to phone size. I would happily pay a PREMIUM price tag for a smaller “Mighty Mouse” phone, but I’m likely in the minority. Bigger FEELS like it’s more “worth it”.

Acknowledging that, I still have a handful of points that I think support the Pixel’s price hike over the iPhone 11.

The Screen is Better

First and foremost, when using a smartphone, what do you interact with the most?

The screen on the Pixel 4 represents three major advantages for the most used aspect of a smartphone. It bests the iPhone 11’s resolution by almost 1 Million pixels in a smaller surface area. This helps with image details and font, especially when on-screen items and font are set to smaller sizes.

The Pixel 4 also uses an OLED. The iPhone 11 LCD is a high-quality display, especially for a “cheaper” phone, but we live in the age of “Dark Modes”. To get the full benefit of a darker display, true deep blacks, and better battery life, OLEDs reign supreme.

Not only does the Pixel 4 use an OLED, it’s a high refresh rate display. The screen can scale up to 90Hz to make movement ultra-fluid. It’s a feature which will likely find more adoption next year. Alongside gaming phones, Google and OnePlus are driving this tech early on smartphones aimed at mainstream audiences THIS year.

Overall, it’s a wonderful effect. An extremely high contrast, high quality, higher resolution display with a silky-smooth visual feel. That’s gotta be worth at least a $50 premium, right? In Apple-land, moving from an LCD to an OLED on an iPhone is a minimum $300 price increase.

The Radar is Nifty

Both the iPhone and the Pixel use Face Unlock as the only biometric security system, but Google is bolstering that by including radar hardware to encourage gestures. The early reactions, focusing on music controls and silencing alarms, are a bit underwhelming. It’s early days, for a new technology, on one phone. A phone we can be confident won’t sell in the same volume as the iPhone.

The radar sensor does add to the cost of the phone, but it already provides an ergonomic benefit in one of the simplest interactions we likely perform dozens of times a day. When propped up in my office, there is zero contact with the phone to unlock and go directly to my homescreen. A Jedi-like wave of my hand, and the phone is open and ready for use. The phone is already starting the verification process as I’m reaching for it.

Someday I’ll tell you the story of how I silenced an alarm, without touching the phone, while I was eating fried chicken and my fingers were covered in grease. Actually… That’s the whole story… It was really cool…

Apple gave up on alternative interactions like 3D touch. There is no “other” use on an iPhone. Whether someone individually feels that functionality is “worth it”, we shouldn’t omit it from the bill of sale.

Radios Aren’t Apple’s Strong Suit

Maybe one of the most critical components of a data connected pocket computer, how well does it STAY connected?

Apple used Intel radios again this year, and while improved, the 11 Pro still doesn’t compete at the same level as a premium Android phone using a Qualcomm radio. Worse, for the non-pro iPhone 11, it uses a weaker set of antennas further reducing signal stability.

It’s early days for Pixel testing, but we’re already seeing better signal reception on Google’s hardware. Some people might value that, knowing their phone can make better use of cell carrier and WiFi infrastructure.

Advanced Audio Codecs are an Android Thing

This is a minor point after the radio discussion, but premium phones are increasingly pushing consumers to wireless audio options.

Apple has no solution for higher quality Bluetooth streaming or compression. All iOS devices transcode through AAC compression to send to headphones. Pay for Amazon HD or Tidal, rip your music to lossless FLAC, it all gets re-squished through AAC.

You can invest in higher quality headphones (and you still should), but pairing those headphones with an iPhone will always limit the signal. Using a Pixel means having proper support for APTXHD and LDAC.

While I still think cabled headphones are the top solution for price/performance and signal stability, the scientific quality of LDAC likely surpasses the threshold of human hearing to discern differences in quality.

Apple ushered in the modern era for consumer digital audio, but they haven’t led that industry for a long while.

It’s not difficult to rationally consider a few differences between the two phones and see where Google can make an argument for a $100 price premium. An individual then decides if THEY value those differences enough to PAY the premium, but the price from Google isn’t a baseless cash grab.

After that, the two phones put up a fun fight.

The iPhone 11 has a 10% larger battery than the smaller Pixel. iOS has a reputation for better battery life brand new, but my one-year old XS now has a menu “feature” to enable CPU throttling. Google’s OLED power draw in dark mode will likely get nuked by the 90Hz display, but at least we get a little eye candy for that higher battery draw (which we can disable when we want better battery life).

iOS runs more efficiently on less RAM, but the Pixel 4 does have 50% more RAM than the iPhone 11. That has to have some cost associated on the spec sheet.

Comparable fast charging. Comparable wireless charging. Comparable “dual” speakers (neither has real, matched, stereo speakers).

Dual cameras. I prefer a wide shooter over a zoom, but other folks will certainly disagree. Otherwise, both phones should be top tier auto-mode shooters, with almost NO out of the box consideration for manual mode or pro mode use.

Both phones are glass on glass sandwiches with IP68 ratings. Water resistance that instantly fails after a compromising drop, so both phones require a case to mitigate daily life abuse.

iPhones will retain value better over time, but there will be more aggressive sales on a Pixel over the first year of the phone’s life.

Value is HIGHLY subjective, but the onslaught of review titles like “Is the Pixel 4 WORTH IT?!?!?”, is more than a bit exhausting as a tech enthusiast. Titles meant to trigger a reaction, and largely masking an implied conclusion “no the Pixel 4 is not worth it”. All before the phone has seen real-world use from folks other than tech reviewers.

I’ve used this metaphor before, but I wish we could talk about phones more like we talk about cars. There are numerous options and vehicle types at every price point. Coupes, roadsters, sedans, minivans, trucks, SUVs. Maybe your daily driver phone needs to be a heavy-duty turbo diesel? Maybe you want a pretty (and impractical) exotic convertible? Most consumers have needs and wants somewhere in the middle of that vehicle spectrum.

We accept this with laptops. There’s a huge variety of form factors and performance tiers. From cheap tablets to sleek multi-mode options, heavy rugged modular kit, insanely powerful gaming rigs, and professional mobile workstations. We don’t act like two companies “win” in the laptop space. It would be nice if we weren’t turning every phone review into an implied comparison against a more popular phone we’ve determined SHOULD win.

I can’t tell you how to spend your money. I’ll never try to tell you how you just spend your cash. The only team I’m really rooting for is #TeamCompetition.

That said, if we want to give the Pixel 4 another brutal fight, let’s see how the $1000 Pixel 4XL faces a fight against the $1000 LG V50.

Stay tuned…