Pixel 9a: The latest A-series phone with Google AI smarts at an unbeatable value | Hacker News Reader

Pixel 9a: The latest A-series phone with Google AI smarts at an unbeatable value

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45 pointsmeetpateltech84 comments

I recently got a Pixel 8a since my Nova 5t died from water damage and I wanted to try GrapheneOS, I wanted a smallish phone with eSIM and it was one of the cheapest phones long term when comparing OS update support length. I still prefer the Nova ergonomics with the fingerprint sensor on the power button and the power button below the volume but aside from that:

The notch is not an issue at all, it appeared larger to me in pictures.

The camera focus has not died on a motorcycle without vibration damping and the phone itself has not died to rain. The plastic back is also nice since I don't have to worry about it cracking.

GrapheneOS has only been problematic with Revolut from which I migrated and Sparkasse's online banking application, although their 2FA app works fine so I can still do everything in browser. Migrating away from them ATM. Past that GrapheneOS has been a joy to use. Very powerful yet simple.

Battery life is kinda iffy and the slow charging is a bit annoying at times.

To me the 9a looks like more of the same essentially so I don't know if I'd spend 550 Eur on it but I'm pretty happy with my 8a for ~330. Though realistically most of my love for it is probably GrapheneOS.

I recently upgraded from a galaxy s8 to a pixel 9 xl because I wanted to try Graphene myself as well. It's been a huge jump that I'm still getting used to but I'm a fan of GrapheneOS. There's some learning I needed to do but I do love the security features that both Graphene and Android OS have implemented since Android 9

> GrapheneOS has only been problematic with Revolut

That's odd, did it complain about anything? I use GrapheneOS on my Pixel 8a and Revolut works without any problems for me. It's also on this list of banking applications that have been verified to work on GrapheneOS:

https://privsec.dev/posts/android/banking-applications-compa...

For me they blocked me via the Play Integrity API for using a modified OS. Writing them got me nowhere and there are 100 other similar services so I moved on.

Apparently it's been fixed:

https://grapheneos.social/@GrapheneOS/113869402100735005

But I honestly can't be bothered if they're trying to block me.

I wish this 'a' series kept audio Jack. I have a 4a which is the last one with audio jack.

edit: Otherwise I don't see any value in all these internet dependent AI features. Performance is more than enough even on older phones (4a for example). Google's camera is the main feature that piques my interest.

Same here, I listen to a lot of music and I refuse to buy e-waste earbuds with tiny ass non user replaceable batteries that will fail in a few years at best while delivering audio quality on par with $30 wired buds.

Dongles are a pain in the ass and keep disconnecting if you look at them the wrong way (walking, gym, &c.). If it wasn't for the camera quality I'd already have moved to something else, when the phone dies I might go back to a dedicated audio device

I use dongles and have been reasonably happy (yes, I'd rather have a jack, but the dongles are good enough). Have you tried a few brands? The best ones I found have been Best Buy's Insignia brand. They do eventually break, but they tend to last about 2-6 months or longer for me, which isn't too terrible given the price.

I tried anything from 0.5$ aliexpress to the apple dongle. The apple is fine but in europe you get something like 50% of the maximal volume which isn't enough in a lot of situations depending on the headset.

I tried two jack-to-usb-c adapters in $5-$10 range (tbh there's very little choice) and it's not great.

- first was working with Pixel 6 but no longer with Pixel 8

- the other works with Pixel 8, but sometimes cuts the output for 0.5s (I think it cuts the output after a silence, but not always); also occasionally there's terrible thrashing for a few sec depending on how the cable is rotated

Plus in any case, you always have some white audio noise at low volume levels (and when paused etc) which is annoying when I want to listen not very loud in the evening.

If someone has a good adapter to recommend, which works with 8+, I'm all ears.

Edit: just read about Apple adapter in another thread, gonna give it a try.

buy a better bluetooth headset or wearable bluetooth audio. I had an LG 730 set that lasted me for close to 6 years. ear buds are an apple meme.

but I agree with the general sentiment: outside of a good camera, I can't see a real advantage of the Pixel, and the AI is less than $0 value for me -- I don't need something data mining me in realtime more than most phones already do.

Can't you just buy USB-C headphones?

didn't headphone jack removal come also because the DAC (Digital-Analog Converter) made interference with the Cellular Modem? Or is it just propaganda I read about online?

They still need an audio DAC and amplifier for the internal speakers, so no.

100% propoganda.

There are multiple switching power supplies in that phone that produce tons of noise already and it's all abated.

AI on phones is its 3D TV moment. Phones are commodities now and like computers, don't need to be upgraded for several years. So phone vendors need a new selling point.

Yeah, I hate this move. I own good, low Ohm headphones than can be powered by a phone, but they are all 3.5mm jacks.

For what it's worth, outside of the sheer photography parts, with the better processors and memory multi-task is actually usable (no crashes nor leaving the apps in unstable states).

Wireless charging also had an unexpected (to me) effect of freeing the USB port while charging, which is great with Qi2 mobile batteries when plugging headphones or external storage. I don't know if the 9a gets it, but display mirroring is also surprisingly useful, especially for people who don't want to network their TVs.

None of it is critical, and the audio jack is really missing, but I think we're getting decent features aside.

Same here. I kept my 4a for ages for the same reason until it died on me (power button stopped working).

I'm now on a Pixel 8 and am hauling around a USB-C to 3.5mm adapter as I don't want to put up with the logistics of keeping wireless headphones charged.

It works OK(ish), but often comes loose when putting my phone in my pocket while listening to music and little annoyances like not being to turn the volume as far down as I used to be able to on the headphone jack. Definitely a downgrade in user experience.

In German there's a nice word for this: Verschlimmbesserung.

At this point I believe google is personally trying to rub it in my face that they can do what they want.

I have been a user of android for 15+ years and have had a pixel 4a for the past three years and was happy with it. In january they had a cryptic announcement that some 4a's needed a software update to deal with an unspecified battery issue. The three options provided weren't described well and once you choose you can't change your mind. The software really nerfed the battery on the phone and it often refuses to charge or lies about the level of charge, and it needs to be charged five times a day.

I opted to go with the $100 discount and I was going to get an 8a (list $499). At the time the google store had it on sale for $100. They took three weeks to issue the discount code, just after the sale ended, so it was kind of a charade. Fine. I go to redeem it ... and they won't just accept my credit card which they have on file and routinely charge things against it. It turns out, to use the code you have to send a picture of your credit card and front and back of your driver's license!

Last night I bought an 8a without the discount code because I don't want to send that info. And today they announce the 9a at the same price. F me. This has pushed me to degoogle my life more. I'm going to install grapheneOS and I'm seriously considering dropping google fiber and go back to spectrum (which is its own horror show, but doesn't have the power of google).

I recently bought my wife a Pixel 8 ($500) and myself a Moto G Stylus ($175). The Pixel has a better camera, but that seems to be about it.

Something I like about my Moto is that it has a sdcard slot. That means I can sync up my entire music library (~600GB). That means I only need a small phone service plan ($15/mo). It also means I get to listen to all the Wilco I want while riding my bike down by the river where there's shoddy reception. There's also a headphone jack, which still comes in handy.

My lament is that as phones get more expensive, they seem to get less useful/interesting.

I haven't seen a worthwhile innovation in phone design in at least 5 years. Everything is such a marginal gain for a smaller set of use cases. I got my kid a $150 Moto G Power like 4 years ago because it had a giant battery that lasted 3 days. That's an actually useful feature. It still runs everything just fine and has a fingerprint reader. Not much need for anything else.

Motorolas seemed cool when I was looking for a phone recently but their update support policy was very short. Whether it matters is another question but still..

The 2010's were an exciting time because every year new phones would come out that would be double the power of the previous generation (I still remember trying out an iPhone 3GS when it came out and it was noticeably faster than my iPhone 3G). But I would say starting in like 2016, the progress slowed down and it's now much more incremental.

I now recommend to my friends and family to get lightly used phones that are 2-3 years old. Personally I recently upgraded from an iPhone 11 to an iPhone 15 and the only reason I did so was to go down in screen size from a "Pro Max" to just a "Pro". I imagine I will keep this device for the next 5-7 years and by then the reason I'll be getting a new phone probably won't be because they are noticeably faster.

But I gotta say I like where phones are now. I remember in the 2010's you had to plop down some serious money to get a super fast phone, nowdays I can buy a $150 phone on Amazon that would probably be a great phone for at least 4-5 years.

3 year old phones often have degraded batteries, which is a large part of the reason why they're so available and so cheap. You can put a new battery in for ~$50 and get a fabulous value.

I have the same phone. SD card AND headphone jack is basically unheard of on so called "flagship" phones. The camera is definitely a step down though.

The phone even has a stylus with a built in slot, although the screen itself is not presssure sensitive, the experience is like tapping on a Palm PDA.

$175? Was it with a carrier plan?

Unlocked. It was a 2023 model I bought in 2024. There are some screaming good deals if you don't mind buying one model older at the right time. I cannot stress enough how much I don't care about OS updates as long as my apps continue to work (not many, mostly from F-Droid).

Pretty much the same story for me. I have a Motorola, wife insisted on a Pixel costing 3 times as much. I don't see anything like 3 times the value.

There are trade offs going both directions:

- The most irritating is the Magnetometer and GPS are both better in the Pixel.

- The Motorola comes with headphone jacks, dual SIM and SDCard, better battery life.

- Fingerprint reader on the Motorola is better.

- Both use the Googles phone app, but Google turns off the call recording on Pixels but it works on the Motorola. Go figure. I use that feature when getting avoid from people like the tax office, so that's a hard no go for me.

- Cheap Motorola's don't have wireless charging, but USB cables are everywhere, wireless chargers not so much.

- I suspect the Pixel's camera is better - but I've never noticed.

Add that all up and for me the Motorola is the better phone; at 1/3 the cost of a Pixel. The "unbeatable value" claim in the headline did cause an eyebrow twitch.

Serious question: does "AI" in a product description make you want to buy it more, or less?

depends on who. For the average HN person? I imagine it's a wash, some yes and some no. For the average person? I think they see it as a benefit.

Personally? It annoys me a bit because I assume the AI is being done server side and is used to artificially differentiate products.

Less. It means that at best there's stuff I'm going to have to waste time disabling, at worst the product will have that crap using resources all the time for no benefit.

Makes me want to buy it less for sure, since the maker is clearly focusing on a feature (set) I don’t want to use or support. In the worst case, the AI stuff cannot be disabled and will annoy me on a daily basis.

Absolutely less. Like, "Will not purchase unless there is no alternative" less.

less. you don't know how happy I was when I read about the new Siri was getting delayed.

I associate it with marketing and privacy invasion, in most cases.

I keep griping about this, but I hate that features that we used to just love that were a more traditional ML now have to have "AI" branding slapped over it. The image search on iOS where I can just search "beer" and find a glass of beer I had a month ago is absolutely incredible, but it was early enough to not get hit with the "AI" branding. If that feature, or any other ML features that all smartphones have today, came out now, it'd be labeled "AI". It's a broad term that has now been shoved into everything, even in places where it may technically apply, but feels over the top.

Mostly irrelevant to me. Maybe a tiny bit more *if* that means it comes with more RAM at the base price (as with "Copilot+ PC"s starting with a minimum of 16GB).

Less.

If the AI features ran totally locally, it would be a different story but there’s no way I want features to be locked behind having coverage/a subscription etc.

With Pixel it doesn't really matter to me. I'll install GrapheneOS the minute I get it out of the box.

As for other vendors -- definitely less. I just want a decent phone with good software and minimum bloatware. I see all these AI features as bloatware.

Nobody asked Microsoft to put an unremovable Copilot button next to the cursor in every Office app. Shoving AI into everything has little to do with what customers want, and much to do with checking a box re: org strategy and investor PR.

It guarantees some amount of RAM.

less. far less in most cases.

1) the phone is already data mining the shit out of me; this is just paying more money for something that's going to destroy my privacy more effectively.

2) AI adds no value to what I need this phone to do: take pictures, calls, text, web browsing, and a few other apps as needed.

3) the utility of AI is still dubious in general -- Copilot and ChatGPT still get enough shit wrong I cannot trust it in a work context, and the code they provides is basic but wonky in weird ways. the utility or marginal utility here is effectively non-existent.

Getting the macro focus is pretty interesting.

It was to some of us the main differenciator with the non-a series, and for comparison the iPhone 16e also didn't get a macro mode. Given how solid the previous a series were, this looks like a really good phone.

Dimensions: 154,7 mm (height) × 73,3 mm (width) × 8,9 mm (depth) or: 6.1 in (height) x 2.9 in (width) x 0.4 in (depth)

Weight: 185,9 g or: 6.6 oz

A bit lighter than the previous versions, though I do miss the days where tha 4a was just around 145g or so.

Almost same weight as 8 and 8a - FWIW I have 8, and the size and weight are very comfy, as a previous 3a owner (I "downgraded" from Pixel 6 which was too big and too heavy to fit in one hand and in the pocket, though I actually gotten used to it at home as a "tablet"). Using Spigen Liquid Air case.

I liked my Pixel 6a and 8 a lot when I had them. That said, the "AI" features I liked the most were the onboard transcription and the at a glance music recognition. The music recognition was seriously good and since it always ran in the background on device, it was always there when you picked up your phone.

The assistant changes were unimpressive and invasive IMO and I felt like I could never take advantage of Google's main suite of features because I didn't trust them or their privacy policies. Apple does a lot more on device and I respect them more from a privacy perspective, so they won me as a customer.

The other issue I had - and I don't know if this is an Android across the board issue or a Pixel thing - was that apps would _regularly_ need force kills and restarts. Mind you, this was on a Pixel 8 when it was their flagship phone. Things just didn't work as well. It was one of the things I was more pleasantly surprised by when switching to iOS. Apps generally run better and crash/bork way less.

The other thing that I don't blame Google or Android for is that iOS apps just seem to have more attention put into them. Larger market share for most app audiences and I assume fewer targets to deal with so I've just had a much better experience with the actually software. Datadog's mobile app is notably better on iOS for me than it was on Android, for example.

I am glad that Google has consistently released a well priced quality phone though. the A-series is a real bang for your buck smartphone.

Really considering switching from iPhone this year. Been using iPhones since 3G.

The AI integration doesn't add much to the assistant usefulness for me but I do like even the previous Google Assistant way more than I've ever found Siri useful. Apple has just been behind on the digital assistant game for years before the LLM integrations came along.

Same. I can just launch the Gemini app, but maybe the integration saves a tap or two.

Eh maybe if you actually use it a lot. But if you don't then accidentally activating it gets annoying.

Not even that. The rare things I use an LLM for I'm not even doing on my phone so there's no use in the integration at all and IIRC you lose some functions the old GA could do that Gemini can't.

why are you considering the switch? just AI features or did Apple's monopoly break it for you?

Apple feels stuck. Only incremental improvements, no real innovation, no risk... Also, some improvements turned out to be real bad.

If that's what's disappointing you about the iPhone, it's WAY worse on Android. Google were the ones that pushed me to switch to an iPhone after almost a decade on Android. Stuff not "innovating" is a feature in a mature, well-designed system. Google does the polar opposite and changes things constantly just for the sake of change (well, it's internally so some PO can get a promotion). Most of their UI changes don't even come in app updates, they'll have both interfaces installed on your device but only toggle one on from a server-side flag tied to your account/device, so one day some app will completely change without you having updated anything, then a week later it might just go back to the old UI. They'll deprecate any app or feature you like and replace it with something else, insisting it has the same feature set when it doesn't. Everything feels like a constant beta you're paying to participate in.

The iPhone's new Photos app was a controversial change, but it was so infamous because it's such a rare exception to their standard of changing very little. Open up your Messages app or Settings and it looks and functions basically exactly as it did on the first iPhone in 2007.

Been on an iPhone since the original and mostly until maybe the XS got a new model every other year, since the XS I've been on a 4-5 year cycle, with a 14 Pro to replace my XS.

I also have a Pixel 7 that I use primarily as a home phone stuck on a cheap very few minutes pre-paid plan. I've used it at home on wifi a number of times just to try it out. I think it's... fine? App quality is definitely a negative as I find as a Mac user that some of my favorite developers are better at making iOS apps, or their app is simply not available on Android at all and the alternatives are not nearly as good.

If not for that I probably wouldn't care from a usability perspective, but I still think Apple's focus on privacy and security tend to win out overall. That said, I now carry around a camera with me 90% of the time so I suspect I will be downgrading to a standard iPhone when I upgrade next if the camera carry continues. When I need super pocketable, I use a Ricoh GR, when I need small but great a Fujifilm X100VI, and when I want to go big I have a Sony a7cr full frame camera (still a small camera but FF lenses are much larger than APSC lenses)

I tried carrying a camera around, but honestly I didn't even remember about it most of the time. Taking the photo with the phone was easier, and they already were synced with my digital photo library. I would really like to carry around a camera and switch to a flip phone... but it's not for me unfortunately.

> With Google AI

This is not a selling point, FYI

Take out the Google and it'd still be true. People need an AI phone like they need a "Smart TV".

> With .* AI

I recently switched from 4a to 8a because google killed 4a's battery with a recent os update. Other than 8a being bigger and heavier I don't notice much difference and I think 9a is going to be the same story.

Throwing this one out there, since AI × phones is a topic here...

Really super glad that the latency has improved greatly on the AI assistant, fairly recently too. I've used voice to set timers while cooking for years, and I used to count seconds in my head while it processed.

I feel like general responsiveness has massively improved, down to two seconds. It also has considerably better visual feedback, which is much faster to assess than listening for its reply.

Looks like an iPhone 13 but with a larger screen size. If it was the size of the iPhone 13 mini then it would be a good replacement as Apple only sells iPhones with 6.9 - 6.1 inch screen sizes.

On each release, these phones are getting ridiculously bigger to the point that even the 'A' series from Google and the 'SE' series from Apple are now "phablets".

Moving away from 16:9 screens to a ridiculous 21:9 was a mistake. Now phones are getting bigger (longer) just to have the same screen width as they would have had from an iPhone 7 Plus or Galaxy Edge from ~10 years ago.

Does anyone find the android voice assistant useful? I use multiple LLMs on a daily basis, but have found google workspace/search to be exceptionally bad (as bad as siri).

I thought it was called Gemini? Is it Google AI now? Or Gemini Nano? Live? Flash, vertex, studio?

Is this better than a used Pixel 8 Pro (which is cheaper)?

>It comes in two fun colorways

I'm all about getting excited and hyped, and I know they're just doing their jobs but (1) I can't help but feel a weird kind of uncanny valley/dissociation at some of the language choices and (2) non-evil Google was beloved in part because their interfaces, displays, communications etc used language that was engineering speak adjacent which carried a quality of sincerity that you just can't find in their modern prose.

So sure, I'll learn about "colorways", we're inventing the new future. But for better or worse this form of communication trains my brain to be alert to these "wait, what?" reactions. Another one:

>great for brainstorming new ideas or practicing something you want to say.

...Something I want to say? Wonder if they were watching Daniel Sloss before drafting that sentence.

In the real world, who uses the term colorways? It's dumb marketing-speak.

used all of the time in sneaker-land.

I'm still rocking a Pixel 5 simply because I haven't been able to find light, reasonably sized phone, that I can carry relaxed without a case.

Honestly, I don't like the squareish shape, it feels like an imitation Iphone. Just come back to the exact same form, only with newer hardware, please.

if I didn't drop my Pixel 2 and bust it up good I'd still be on it. Pixel 5 was a decent replacement, but ended up passing it off to the wife while I was able to get a deal on the 7.

Still holding onto my 6, but will likely switch to the 10, 10a, or 11 when they come out.

The feature I'd love to see is Qi2 support. A little silly that major phone manufacturers are so slow at adopting it.

It’s truly ridiculous to me that no major phone manufacturer has adopted Qi2 support. There’s already plenty of charging pucks with Qi2 that are substantially cheaper, yet somehow no Android phones have it supported. The best you can get is cases with the magnets built in, but the charging is still the crappy 7.5W…

Somehow they managed to make it larger in every direction, larger than all previous 'a' models.

Turns out that unlike the joke in Futurama (where Amy has a tiny phone dwarfed by its enormous charger), phones are going to just get bigger and bigger. They're already too big for human hands, and still no end in sight.

The change in trends happened around the same time phones became a viable alternative to laptops.

One people started using a phone as their primary computing device, the inconvenience of a larger device to carry around became less than the convenience of having a larger screen.

Futurama predates modern smartphones. In fact quite a lot of classic Futurama hasn’t aged particularly well for modern audiences. It’s still a fantastic show though.

I don't disagree with you (except that imo phones are still not, and never will be, a viable alternative to laptops). But it's still annoying to have a handheld device which is too big for any reasonable person's hands.

> except that imo phones are still not, and never will be, a viable alternative to laptops

For our kinds of uses, I completely agree. But for a lot of people, most if not all of their computer usage is done inside a web browser.

For example, my mum sold her laptop because she never used it and, being a nontechnical individual, finds a phone much less confusing to use and maintain than a laptop.

As long as people continue to use their phones in lieu of a PC, they'll continue buying larger and larger phones :(

I hate it and I feel like there's a not-insignificant market of people that want to go back to small phones.

The Moto X (2013) was, in my opinion, the perfect smart phone. The curve of the back and the rubberized texture were so comfortable in the hand. Never once dropped it.

I drop my Pixel all the time because it's so light and thin and slippery. Drives me crazy.

I went from a 5a to 7 and don't like the size. So when I saw 9a I was like hell yeah time to upgrade. Nope.

They got smaller until the Pixel 8 and have gotten bigger since. Fortunately the Pixel 8 is supported until 2030; supposedly anyway.

https://www.gsmarena.com/compare.php3?&idPhone1=11903&idPhon...

Is that true? It looks thinner, especially the camera bump.

The logical progression of Android phones is for them to become so large that they house one or two iPhones inside and perhaps some snacks.

The Unihertz Jelly 2 has a 3 inch screen. Android offers choices. Apple meanwhile will tell you to buy an Apple watch if you want a smaller screen, with their usual "take it or leave it" dismissiveness. RIP iPhone Mini.

I've been using Pixels since they were Nexuses--in no small part because they've remained smaller than the trend for Android flagships--and I cannot fathom bringing Unihertz novelty phones into the same comparison. It's like extolling the virtues of unicycles to someone trying to buy a car.

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