Google Pixel 10a review: This feels familiar

Usually, Google’s “a” variants of its Pixel phones represent great value. This year it’s a bit different. While the Pixel 10a is still great compared against its direct competitors, it has a fatal flaw: it's almost identical to last year’s Pixel 9a, which you can now pick up for $50 less than the 10a. And I'm not sure grabbing the newer version is worth even that small amount extra.

On a day-to-day basis, there’s little-to-no difference between the Pixel 10a and Pixel 9a. 

Battery charging is better, but if you charge your phone nightly and don’t spend hours playing hardware-demanding games, you likely won’t notice. The Pixel 10a also adds Satellite SOS in Australia, meaning you can call emergency services while out of cellular range. This is unlikely to factor into your purchasing decision, but it will be important for a small subset of buyers.

And that’s pretty much it for the big ticket items. Both phones are as fast, look alike, are IP68 water and dust resistant, have the same storage options, and even feel the same in the hand. They have the same cameras, chipset, and Pixel software features. The display is almost identical, with the only difference on paper being an 11% boost to peak brightness for the 10a. Given the Pixel 9a is now around $50 cheaper than the 10a, Google is asking a lot of its customers here.

The Pixel 10a cameras are close to top-tier for this price range. During the day, photos are clear and colour accurate. Colour accuracy is actually not that common in this day and age of calculated over-saturation, but it's always refreshing to see.

Photos at night are pretty good on well-lit streets. You can get some slight colour distortions in the halos around bright lights, but for the most part, shots are fast with good detail. Night mode takes a little longer than on more-powerful handsets. Your patience will usually pay off, but there's a definite lighting limit – e.g. a poorly lit street will come out with solid detail (as long as nothing moves too fast), but an unlit expanse of park on a cloudy night is beyond the Pixel 10a's capacity. Night mode selfies are pretty grainy, but that's to be expected for this price range.

The 13MP ultrawide lens is handy for quickly zooming out and works well, despite its low MP count, though you'll be relying on the main 48MP lens for most shots. And the phone excels at extreme close-ups, particularly during the day.

Overall, the Pixel 10a's cameras are fantastic for a phone starting at $849 – but here's where I once again remind you the Pixel 9a offers the same experience for $50 less.

One of the biggest boosts for the Pixel 10a is charging speed – and I'm using "biggest" generously here. Wired charging is up to 30W vs. last year’s 23W and wireless is 10W vs. 7W. This should translates to less time needed plugged in or on your charging mat, but given it has the same hefty 30+ hours of battery life as the Pixel 9a, most of the time you'll just be charging it when you sleep, anyway. It’s always nice to see battery improvements year-on-year, but this particular one shouldn’t be a headline upgrade.

Both phones also have two storage options: 128GB ($849) and 256GB ($999).

Performance is smooth and snappy for this price range – it even runs some decent PC ports like Dredge without getting too hot. And streaming games feels no different than on premium phones.

This was all expected because the Pixel 10a is running the same Tensor G4 chipset as the 9a, which is disheartening and hopefully not indicative of future releases. Each year, Google’s Pixel “a” phones have generally come with the same chipset as their more-expensive siblings. It's been one of the biggest draw cards for the product line and it'll be disheartening to see that change.

As you’d expect Gemini integration is still pretty overt, particularly when it comes to image editing. The “reimagine” feature isolates the subject of a picture with varying success and will change the rest based on your prompts. But after some initial low-effort lols, you’ll probably forget it’s there.

Magic eraser is a bit more useful for editing photos, as is photo unblur. These work ok, though the former often fails or requires multiple attempts to get something decent.

As a smart assistant, Gemini is improving, potentially even competing with the outgoing Google Assistant in terms of its ability to parse and respond to voice prompts. This is just as true for anything using Gemini, but at least it’s not a step backwards in terms of functionality anymore – it merely burns significantly more energy in some far-off data centre for, in my books, the same day-to-day convenience.

For my tastes, the physical design is best in class for the lower mid-range (along with the Pixel 9a). The sides are aluminium, which helps give it a premium feel. The rear plate is plastic, which I actually prefer to glass – it’s lighter, not prone to shattering, and if you use a case, then who cares what it looks or feels like? Even if you don’t use a case, the plastic has a nice matte finish that won’t show up fingerprints or scratches as easily as something more glossy.

Sadly, there’s still no built-in magnets for Pixelsnap compatibility or other magnetic chargers and accessories, but you can doubtless find a case that adds this feature.