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The Terrific Pixel 3 XL - Best Android Phone - Reviewed!
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May 29, 2025
There are a lot of Android phones on the marketplace, but few can hold a candle to the terrific Google Pixel 3 and its big brother the Pixel 3 XL. Between its spectacular camera - with a special shout out for Night Sight, as demoed - zippy speed, crisp screen and fast charging, it's a darn good device for any level of user. Tech expert Dave Taylor of https://www.AskDaveTaylor.com/ joined #teampixel and got a chance to spend some quality time with a new Google Pixel 3 XL. Which means lots of testing and lots of demos. In this review, he highlights and demonstrates all the major features and capabilities. Check it out at https://store.google.com/ or https://www.bestbuy.com/ #teampixel #giftfromgoogle
View Video Transcript
0:00
Is this the best Android phone on the market? Let's find out
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Dave Taylor here and I'm looking at this. This is the Google Pixel 3 XL. So it's the same as the
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Pixel 3 with a larger screen. And holy cow, this is a really nice phone. This is, I think, the best
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Android phone on the market, including its competitors from Samsung. Now, let's talk about
0:29
this and I got lots of demos so stick with me here. First off we have a 2.5 gigahertz octa-core
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Snapdragon 845 CPU with an Adreno 630 GPU 4 gig RAM and either 64 gig or 128 gig of storage
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That's a lot. There's a lot going on inside here. It's fast. It does not however have a card slot so
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it is not expandable memory. Now, one cool thing, it's running Android 9.0 Pi. Pi. I gotta say
1:01
they could have come up with some better names for the ninth version of Android, but they're doing it alphabetically, and I guess they couldn't think of any other candy or sweets
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or confections to start with the letter P. So it goes. But I kind of like Android 9. It's taken a
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little getting used to because I keep switching or swiping up when that's not the right gesture
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So there's a little reprogramming of your brain to get used to it, but there's a lot to like
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Notably, it's just very smooth with things like pulling down the notifications and status updates and stuff
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So, of course, it also includes a really nice camera, but I think a lot of that's just the hardware of the Pixel
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So it's an integrated hardware software. We'll get back to it, though
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So, 6.5 ounces, 184 grams. it's one third of an inch thick and let me take it out of its case because I have it in the google
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case take it out of the case and it is super thin so you can see that it is a nice thin phone
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with a really weird feature I don't really get why it has this bright orange power button
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I wonder if that just means that I got somehow I ended up with a prototype or something I mean
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why is this button orange? Who knows? It doesn't really matter. I'll put it back in the case later
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So let's see. So the screen, this is a, let's actually bring up a photo or something so you
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can get the full benefit of the screen. This is a 6.3 inch P-OLED screen with 16 million colors
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running at 1440 by 2960 for a very impressive 523 pixels per inch
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That is a lot of visual density. That means that you just have really crisp and clean view
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And if you're watching a video, it looks great. And because Pixel 3 comes from Google and Google runs YouTube
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the Pixel 3 is also a certified HDR device for YouTube. So your videos are going to look good as they are from any source
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So really very, very nice, bright, crisp screen. So let's talk cameras
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Now, before I give you the camera specs, let's see some output. So first off, here's a photo of a farm and you can see the reflection of the barn in the stream
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It's crisp. It's warm. There's a lot of detail in the photos
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Here's another one. This is actually using playground mode in the local coffee shop And so playground is this sort of 3D VR stickers service that you have in the camera app
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that you can go and put things in. And then if you're doing videos
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actually some of them can bounce around and stuff. Personally, I don't think I will ever use it again
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after this one demo, but you might find this to be terrific. Obviously it is for the Snapchat group
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So it is pretty fun. Next one, and this is actually the really cool one
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This is for a demo of Night Sight. And Night Sight is really kind of mind-boggling
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Here's a shot straight out of my front window at night. And then here's the exact same shot when I turn on Night Sight
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Now, this is a feature that Google has added through a software upgrade
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And as you can see, it's phenomenal. It does a great job with night shots or with any shots where there's very little light available
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And it does this by taking a group of photos, interpolating all the data and mushing them or merging them all together into a single photo
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Now, there's no noise. There's no junk that you normally get from low light photos
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It is quite remarkable. And finally, let's do a little bit of streaming video video stream
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I had to go there with that joke. But here you go. It's a stream video
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and you can see it's just really crisp and nice. Now, to be fair, the barn is a little blown out
5:07
there with the illumination, but this was a particularly difficult one because the moving
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water was actually in shadow. So, those are the demos. Let's talk about the specs on the camera
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So, the rear-facing camera is a 12.2 megapixel at f1.8, and it gives you the effective 28mm
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focal length. And as you can see, it does pretty darn nice. You can do video in 30, 60, or 120
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frames per second at 1080p. And if you want to jump up to 2160p, you can still do it at 30 frames
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per second. That is a lot of data to be writing and actually processing in this phone. That's why
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you really need that octa-core Snapdragon. So it works really well. And already demoed night sight
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demoed playground. There's a bunch of other features. It's so just the camera is really
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absolutely one of the, you know, selling points of this phone. This is a great camera on this
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And then the forward-facing camera, the selfie camera, is an 8 megapixel f1.8 at 28 millimeters
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or depending on what you're doing, an 8 megapixel f2.2 at 19 millimeters. So they have this sort of
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group selfie thing, which I haven't actually experimented with, but you can find some examples
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Just look for hashtag team pixel and you can find examples of that. And it's a super wide angle. And
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then I think they actually do some processing on it to make it not look quite so distorted
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Because when you get down to really, really short focal lengths, then you get into some really weird
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fisheye effects. So the forward facing camera, believe it or not, can actually shoot 1080p video
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at 30 frames a second. Again, since most of these phone companies design their phones so that the
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rear-facing camera is the better one, having that all in this hidden little notch, and yes, there's a
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notch, is actually quite remarkable. And in fact, let's look at that notch just for a second. And
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what I'll do is I'll just zoom in on the picture of my cats again, and you can see there's the notch
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on top. So it's just like the iPhone 10 and everything. And you know what? It's not a big deal
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You really don notice it 99 of the time And if you do notice it then honestly you can sort of move things around Obviously I can move this image around so I can actually see what would be behind the notch
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To gain this additional screen real estate, I think it's a worthwhile trade-off
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Now, let's see what else. So, on the back, they have a fingerprint sensor. So
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it's no facial recognition, nothing swanky like that. Fingerprint sensor works perfectly fine. I
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find it to be quick and accurate. Bluetooth 5.0 and it's Qi wireless charging. In fact, let's go
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ahead and put it on the Google Pixel stand and the wireless charging super fast. It is tuned and
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designed specifically for this stand and the phone has additional features that kick in when you're
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on the stand that are pretty cool. It does not, however, the phone does not have that little 3.5
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millimeter jack that people like because it doesn't have an audio jack. Now, this is modern
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phone design, so you're just going to be using Bluetooth, but it does include little USB-C
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earbuds. So, you can use USB-C. There's also a USB-C dongle or adapter in here. So, if you really
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want to, it's clumsy, but it works. But they figure, and I agree, that most people are just moving over
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to Bluetooth by this point. So you can live with it. It is USB-C charging if you're not doing
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wireless. But honestly, if you're going to get the Pixel 3 or the Pixel 3 XL, get the Pixel stand
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because it's not much of an additional investment and it charges so fast on the stand that there's
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really no reason you'll ever be plugging it in again unless you need an emergency charge on the
9:00
road or something. So while we're talking about charge, it is a 3430 milliamp hour battery. So
9:07
that's pretty big and it's under two hours for a full charge. And I will say that when I have it
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in standby mode, it seems to last forever. I mean, two days later, I'll pick up the phone when it's
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just been sitting there and it's still at 60 or 70% charge, which is remarkable. Now, if you're
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using it aggressively, then you're going to find that there's different characteristics. So if I'm
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streaming video, it's roughly 10% an hour if you're doing streaming video on full brightness
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with the audio out. So, you know, depending on your usage case, it's going to last you a day
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but it might not last you 24 hours. In fact, it's probably not going to last you 24 hours
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So really not much else to talk about. I am really, really a fan of this phone. This is
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really nice. And Google has a very nice case and you can actually, this comes with different designs
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but you can actually send them a design and you can have a custom case. Imagine how fun it would
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be to have a picture of your cat on the back because, you know, not only is the internet
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designed for cats, but the universe is designed for cats. My cats are not around, so that's good
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they probably are sitting in the sun watching me, but you know, the case, it's simple, it's
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protective, it's very slim, it has a nice big opening for the port for your USB-C charging
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which is nice, and of course, in the case, it still does wireless charging, which is super
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important, and then the only other thing I want to say is the Pixel stand is an absolute, just
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no additional investment As you can see it is a very simple design It comes with a USB to USB cable and then on the other end it also has its own charger So if you plan this out correctly you have the charger and cable that comes with the phone And then a charger and cable that comes with the Pixel stand
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So between the two, you've got work and home set. And, you know, nice and flexible
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And I think it's just a simple design. And because it works so fast, it's totally worth it
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Now, there have been some rumors in the biz that the Pixel 3 will only charge on the Google Stand
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That's nonsense. It charges on any Qi charging stand. How fast it charges is a function of the stand's design and circuitry
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And by the way, this works perfectly well for any other wireless charging phone
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So yes, my iPhone XS has charged on this Google Stand. Mea culpa
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So the phone itself comes in three different colors. I suppose I should take it out of the case again
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Cases. They're a necessary evil, I suppose, but also a bit of a pain in the butt
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Okay, now, here we go. So this, Google has three colors for the Pixel 3
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They have clearly white, just black, and this color, which is not pink
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To me, actually, it does look pink, but I guess that's sort of the wry irony of their naming scheme
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Yikes. The stand is white. So maybe, I don't know, maybe this is just clearly white
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But you look at it and it's white. So all good. Now let's talk about price because that's the only thing left
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But wait, before we get to price, do me a favor and subscribe to my channel
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I really appreciate it. Feel free to share this video with other Pixel fans or other Android users
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and most importantly, give me feedback. Leave a comment. Let me know how this review went
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what you wish I would have covered but didn't or what I covered and you didn't care about
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That's fine. And I really appreciate all that. Cool. Now, Google Pixel 3 XL is $899 for 64 gig
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or $999 for 128 gig and you can pick it up at Best Buy or the Google Store
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and then the Pixel Stand is an additional incremental $79 and this very nice Pixel case from Google is a little bit expensive at $50
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but this is again, you know, it's one of these things that it's just a no-brainer
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If you're spending $1,000 on a phone, then spring the extra $150 for all the other accessories and you got a full set
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So, this is a really great phone. I am a real big fan of it
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it is the first phone I've used in a long time that's really tempted me to switch from my much
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beloved iPhone to the Android platform and specifically to the Google Pixel 3. They've
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come a long way with the Google phones. This one is not like earlier generations that were
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you know, sort of me too devices. This is a really, really elegant device and really nice phone
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that you probably want to try to get in your hands to try out to see just how good it is
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The real standout is that camera. Holy cow, what a nice camera
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So with that, this is Dave Taylor. I will catch you in my next video and that's all we got