Google Pixel 4

With an extra camera, new design and radar-sensing abilities, is Google’s new flagship model now the best smartphone around?

The first thing you notice when you pull the Pixel 4 out of its box is its updated design. Google has ditched the two-tone look of its previous three generations and instead opted for a simpler single-tone colour scheme, available in black, white and orange. Whatever the colour, the phone is surrounded by a softly-curved textured black trim, with a coloured power button and volume rocker on the right edge. There’s no notch on the screen, but the selfie camera and earpiece speaker are located inside a chunky top bezel.

Elsewhere, the Pixel 4 is sandwiched between protective layers of Gorilla Glass. The new rear camera module is square and distinctly iPhone-like, with the two cameras, infrared sensor and dual-LED flash arranged in a diamond.

It has dual front-facing speakers but there’s still no 3.5mm headphone jack. Sadly, Google hasn’t included an adapter in the box, either. There’s no fingerprint sensor but you can unlock the Pixel 4 using your face or with a PIN or pattern lock.

The screen is 5.7in from corner to corner, with a new refresh rate of 90Hz. In technical testing, we measured peak screen brightness at 430cd/m2 (candles per square metre) in automatic brightness mode, promising readability in most sunny environments in the UK. The screen’s sRGB coverage in the phone’s ‘Natural’ colour mode is at 90.5%, which is very good.

Inside the Pixel 4, you’ll find a Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 processor and 6GB of memory. Both the Pixel 4 and 4 XL come with either 64GB or 128GB of internal storage, but it’s worth noting, you can’t expand this via microSD.