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Comment by trulyrandom | Hacker News Reader

Can vouch for the Pixel line. I've had a Pixel 3a XL for a little over a year and it's been great. Stock Android, good display, great battery life, great camera, great security, reasonably fast and 3 years of updates. That's all I need from a phone. The Pixel 4a seems like a logical upgrade from the previous generation, sticking to the same principles.

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Only 3 years of updates? I've had some version of an iPhone since the 3 and have considered giving Android a go, but that's a big downside if true.

Coming from iOS, I can imagine that being a disappointment. 3 years of updates is a relatively new trend in the Android world. I used to complain about this as well, but now that it's 3 years, that's about when I usually buy a new phone anyway.

See: https://support.google.com/pixelphone/answer/4457705.

Only anecdotally, but old iphones (more than 3 years old, such as in my case the original iphone SE) have poor enough battery life expectancy that I'm not sure I'd call longevity a big win for iOS.

There is an easy fix for that: it costs 49 USD to change the battery of an iPhone SE in an Apple Store. Whether it's cheap or expensive is of course a matter of perspective. But an iPhone SE with a new battery is certainly better than most phones you could buy for 49 USD...

That is a good point. I've always been a little hesitant with repairs like that because I'm unsure how much longer it'll let the phone last, but at least the SE is still getting iOS 14, so... a while?

Sadly, 3 years of updates is really above and beyond in the Android world. Many get 2 years but most are abandoned even earlier.

This has gotten _a lot_ better since Google started contractually requiring OEMs to provide regular updates. My Galaxy S8, purchased through a carrier, is still receiving security updates (although probably not for much longer).

Security updates are nice but they all stop receiving new versions of Android way too soon. There's really no reason for this mostly. I mean some of the features in new versions of Android might require certain hardware like an onboard TPU, for instance, but mostly those versions of Android would work just fine on older phones.

Compared to what? Any other brand I never expect an upgrade. Even when they promise one. What it ships with is what it has forever.

iPhones

There are some advantages to vertical integration like iOS has.

For most of my friends, the disadvantages vastly outweigh them. As a simple example, you can't use uBlock Origin or another ad blocker with Firefox on iOS.

Perhaps I don't know what I'm missing, but I've just bought low end Androids thus far. Like the Motorola G series. I typically buy one that's about $150, and they tend to last 2-3 years before I crack the screen, etc.

I've never felt like they were slow or missing anything I needed.

The Pixel is all about the camera. There are a few other niceties compared to other budget/mid-range phones, but if a good camera isn't important to you then there's no reason to buy the Pixel.

I find that Pixel experience is also very enjoyable. You get almost iPhone level attention to detail and UX design, which is rare on low-end android phones. It sounds trivial, but it's just delightful to use the phone.

The camera on the Pixel a-series is a huge improvement over 'budget' Android phones. Getting timely updates and a couple years of support is nice too.

Except that nobody except Samsung and Google bothers to provide security updates post launch.

my pixel 3a xl is also stellar. Where's the 4a xl?

They went for a single model, which is an in between. 3a was 5.6", 3a XL was 6", the 4a is 5.8" They also got rid of storage SKUs too, there's now only a single 128GB version. Even the color too, down to a single color instead of 3.

Maybe it's due to COVID-19 and supply chain issues, but they're getting rid of all variations and focusing on delivering a single version.

Note that while screen is larger, 4a has smaller physical dimensions than 3a. Which is great, Pixel line is one of the very few high-specced medium size Android phones. I don't know of a single small Android device with good specs. They're all just phablets.

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