Google Pixel 9 Pro XL Preview: The AI flagship has even more cool tricks, but at a higher price – Ultra-Sim

Google Pixel 9 Pro XL Intro

Google has finally done it – after years of selling Pixel phones that were cheaper than your iPhones and Galaxies, it now has two all-out “Pro” phones, and both of them are more expensive now.

With all this in mind, let us go back to Google’s 2024 big boy, the Pixel 9 Pro XL. What is new about it?

You have the usual hardware upgrade with a new and faster chipset, and you have an all-new look, but Google has really focused on AI this time around. Let’s decipher what exactly are these new AI features and what difference will they make in your life.

Table of Contents:

Google Pixel 9 Pro XL Specs

More RAM, a faster chip and faster charging

Before we dive in the new features, take a closer look at the hardware differences between the new Pixel 9 Pro XL model and the Pixel 8 Pro from last year: 

Google Pixel 9 Pro XL Design and Display

New design with flat sides and an even brighter screen

Google stuck with a similar design for its Pixel phones in the past few years, but the new Pixel 9 Pro XL finally shakes things up with an all-new look.

Google says this new Pixel is twice more durable compared to last year’s model, which the company seems to measure using drop tests. Since we don’t see any fancy new materials used (you have an aluminum frame and a Corning Gorilla Glass Victus 2 on the back and front), this seems to be all thanks to the new design and the flat sides, which absorb impact better.

The Pixel 9 Pro XL also comes with a matte glass back, so you don’t need to worry about smudges, and on the sides you have polished aluminum. Standard flagship features like IP68 water and dust protection are of course present too.

You can get the 9 Pro XL in one of these colors:

We will miss the cool blue “Bay” color of the previous generation, but hey, you now have a pink version instead.

In terms of buttons nothing has changed: the power and volume keys are on the right hand side.

Google is not very generous with the unboxing experience. You get a slim box where you will find the phone and a 3-feet (1 meter) USB-C cable, but no charger, no case and no screen protector on board. All of that, you will have to purchase separately, and most people probably would.

Okay, let’s get to the meat of it, the new features. Starting with the screen, you see the size is now 6.8 inches vs 6.7 inches on the previous model, but it is a very tiny difference in real life. Don’t buy the Pixel 9 Pro XL expecting a noticeably bigger screen than before.

The quality, however, has improved and especially the brightness. The 9 Pro XL reaches peak brightness of 3,000 nits compared to 2,400 nits on the Pixel 8 Pro, which was already one of the brightest phones we have ever tested. Unfortunately, there is no special anti-reflection coating, as we have on the Galaxy S24 Ultra, but still, this screen gets impressively bright outdoors.

The rest is all the same – Google calls this screen Super Actua, and the refresh rate can vary from 1Hz for static content to 120Hz. The resolution is also the same as last year, it’s a 1344p display, so definitely sharp enough.

Google Pixel 9 Pro XL Camera

A zoom camera on a compact Pixel, and we love it!

The number one reason for getting a new phone seems to be a better camera, so Google had to do something here.

But you don’t really see much improvement in the hardware. The main camera uses the same 50MP sensor as last year, the 48MP 5X zoom camera also seems to be the same, and the 48MP ultra-wide camera is the only one that gets a slightly faster aperture (f/1.7 on the new Pixel vs f/2 before).

So if you are just looking at the specs, you might think there is nothing new here, but of course this is a Pixel phone, which means it is all about the processing and the AI camera tricks.

First, colors and the overall look of images are improved with a new HDR+ pipeline and better Real Tone for more accurate skin color.

On top of that, you have all the new Google AI magic.

Add Me – This feature is specifically for your group shots when there is no one around to take your photo. With it, you first take one shot of your friends, and then trade places with them so you can also get in the frame, and they take your picture. The phone helps to get the composition similar for this second shot. Then, it will combine those two pictures, inserting you into the first group photo, so you are with the rest of the group and it seems like somebody just took your picture. We are curious to try this one. It sounds cool, but also potentially a bit finnicky.

Reimagine – This one is a Magic Editor feature, which allows you to do crazy things to a photo and change it completely. For example, you can just type “replace the background with a sunset” and AI will give you several different variations for a sunset background. Or you can add fireworks, or butterflies, or whatever else comes to mind. With such a profound transformation, you begin to wonder if this still qualifies as a “photo” or is it something that should be called otherwise. An “AI photo” maybe?

Auto Frame – This one is again about AI, which has now learned the golden rules of composition and is ready to suggest ways to recompose your imperfectly composed images to something much closer to those golden standards.

Video Boost – This one we know from last year, so it’s not new, but rather an improvement. The way it works is the same – you select a video to “boost” and the system sends it to the Google Cloud, where it gets processed by some supercomputers and in a few hours, you get back an improved version of that video. Google says the processing now takes less time though and your 4K video now returns upscaled to 8K quality. Google even promises this 8K final version is so good, you can take 30MP photo snaps out of the footage and they will look amazing. Again, this all sounded very cool last year, but in reality we almost never used that feature. Let’s see if all the improvements make it worth the hassle and extra processing time. 

Of course, you can expect to see our PhoneArena Camera Score for the Pixel 9 Pro XL. The camera score is our extensive camera benchmark which tests every single camera on a phone in various conditions and gives you a number to quantify just how much of an improvement it really is.

Under the hood, the Pixel 9 Pro XL is powered by the Google Tensor G4 chip, just as all other Pixel 9 series phones. It also has 16GB of RAM, which is an impressive amount. Google says is allocates part of that for AI tasks, which seems like a reasonable thing to do, so you can expect AI to work faster on the Pixel 9 Pro XL compared to previous Pixel editions.

We will be testing the overall performance of the Tensor G4 chipset very soon, so check back here in a while for benchmark scores and more details.

Google Pixel 9 Pro XL Software

Speaking of updates, Google maintains its commitment for seven major OS updates, which is absolutely fantastic and definitely future-proofs the Pixel 9 series in a big way.

Next, let’s see what exactly is new in terms of features, and you can bet it’s a lot about AI.

Pixel Studio – this is your AI image generation lab. Type what you want to see, and AI will paint it for you. You can further refine the image to be in a specific style – cartoon-like, cinematic or something else. 

Weather app – we can’t believe it either! It took Google nearly 20 years to finally admit that a native Weather app is a nice thing to have. This new Weather app has all the hallmark Pixel design quirks and it looks very detailed, and honestly, long, long overdue.

Screenshots app – this one is a cool idea. It collects all of your screenshots in one place and puts the power of AI to help you search that library. This is great. We know we use screenshots to just remember things, and having AI search for that sounds very useful.

Satellite SOS (*only in the US) – a year after Apple, Google is the second company to bring Satellite SOS to its phones, first on the Pixel 9 series. And just like Apple, Satellite SOS will be free on the Pixel 9 phones for the first two years and we don’t know what the price will be after that.

Keep Magic List – a collaboration between Gemini and the Google Keep note-taking app, you can create “magic” lists. The way this works is you can ask Gemini things like “what ingredients do I need to make tacos”, and get the list right in Google Keep.

Call Notes – this one uses on-device AI to create a neat summary of your conversation. Note that the other party will be warned that the call is being recorded.

The big change is in charging. Google has a new 45W charger that it recommends, but be warned that none of the Pixel 9 phones suppot the full 45 watt speeds. The Pixel 9 Pro XL is the fastest of the new models, and it maxes out at 37 watt speeds.

This is still great. The company says you can get a 70% charge with a 30 minute top-up. Compare this to the 50% charge that you get in a similar time with the previous Pixel 8 Pro model.

Wireless charging is also on board, but the speeds have not changed. The Pixel 9 Pro XL wireless charging goes up to 21 watts, but only if you use the Google Pixel Stand 2nd Gen. With a regular Qi charger, the max wireless charging speed is limited to 12W.

Summary

The Pixel 9 Pro XL has a new design, faster chip, faster charging and a few new AI tricks, but at least at first sight it does not look like a massive upgrade compared to the Pixel 8 Pro. And it costs more too.

Who is it for? With all the new AI features, Google remains a step ahead of Apple AI and if you want a clean Android with the fastest updates in the industry, Google is the go-to brand for that. Be warned, however, that many of the coolest new features like conversational AI with Gemini Live are free only for the first year and Google plans to charge you a monthly fee after that.

Should you upgrade? If you already own a recent phone, the answer is probably a ‘no’, but this is based on our first impressions, so we definitely need to test the phone in depth to give you a final verdict. Expect that in-depth review to come soon.

Meanwhile, what do you think about the Pixel 9 Pro XL? Is this the upgrade you’ve been waiting for?