Well, Jon Prosser has done it again and leaks of the Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro are now a part of the internet. We’ve been keeping an eye on his YouTube channel (Front Page Tech) and his personal Twitter account since the leak of the Pixel Watch, but there’s only been Apple-related news for the past few weeks. That changed today as Front Page Tech released an episode 100% dedicated to Google’s upcoming flagships – the Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro.
You can see in the video that this is a wild departure from what Google has been doing in their past few phones. Going back to the Pixel 4, Google has stuck with a very similar design language for their phones with a plain back and square camera bump. At this point, assuming the Pixel 5a comes bearing the same look, we have a total of 6 phones that look basically identical: the Pixel 4, 4XL, 4a, 4a 5G, 5 and 5a. That’s a long run and one clearly ready to be disrupted. Take a look at the renders below.
For Jon Prosser, the process is similar to what we saw with the Pixel Watch. He has access to tons of hands-on photos and videos, but he’s trying to keep his source fully protected. To do this, he shares the same photos and videos with a guy who’s great at 3D renders and shows all of us a rendered version of the actual thing. It’s sort of genius, honestly, and I have a lot of respect for what he’s doing, here. That being said, I feel quite confident that these renders aren’t just close to what he saw: they are likely spot-on.
This is early hardware, and things could easily change by launch time, but assuming these images are in the ballpark of what Google is doing, this is a massive departure for Pixel phones. Gone is the square camera bump and any likeness to any other phone currently out on the market. It really does look like Google is designing a phone to do what they are wanting to do instead of aimlessly aping another popular design. The camera hump on this thing looks a little crazy, but I’m totally into the two-toned look and seeing a phone from Google that doesn’t’ look like an afterthought.
Speaking of that camera hump, I’m inclined to think that we’re looking at a fully-redesigned camera system in the Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro. Though the leaks don’t talk at all about this, there’s no reason for Google to include such a huge camera hump if not to include far-superior hardware with this version of the Pixel. Combined with the new Whitechapel GS101 custom silicon inside, under-display fingerprint scanner and hole-punch camera, it really feels like Google is ready to try and make a splash in the smartphone world again. I’ll be frank: it’s about time. The Pixel 4XL was a miss and the 4a, 5, and 4a 5G have all been ultra-safe plays.
Google is about to ship its own custom silicon and to do it in the right way, it needs a bold take on smartphone design. If this is actually it, then I think they’ve achieved that goal. Alongside the Pixel Watch, this new phone could be a big step in the right direction for Google’s mobile hardware department. I could actually see Google choosing to tease this device at I/O in the same way they did when they announced the Pixel 4a and teased the Pixel 5 and 4a 5G. It would be subtle, of course, but why not go ahead and let people know that something big is coming? Either way, we’ll know more in the coming months, so be sure to stay tuned and get connected via the newsletter below if you’d like to avoid missing anything in the future.
