There are many things we use our phones for — especially now when we're having to hold Thanksgiving and Christmas gatherings over Zoom — but one of the most important is taking pictures of our surroundings, our family, our beloved pets, and that weird moth outside that looks a little too much like a tiny demon. The camera experience has improved across the board over the last five years, since the first Pixel crashed the scene and snatched the photography crown away from both Samsung and Apple, and the Pixel 5 is still holding onto a slim lead over its competitors with its post-processing magic.
And while Cyber Monday is giving us a variety of smartphone deals, but none are as good for a shutterbug as the $50 off the Google Pixel 5 available at Amazon, Best Buy and B&H. The deal was also available at the Google Store, but it's already sold out.
Ready to take the best pictures ever?
While there may not be an XL version of the Pixel 5, this compact model is all you need: you get a 6-inch 90Hz screen, all-day battery life, Google's clean software, and the special processing sauce that Google uses to make every photo you take look as good as possible. Oh, and not only will this phone get three full years of software and security updates, it'll get them in a timely manner, something Samsung can't seem to wrap its head around.
As someone who has spent most of this year on the Google Pixel 4 and then the Pixel 4a, the Pixel 5 at $650 is a tantalizing prospect. The Pixel 4 had a nice screen, but that forehead where the Soli senor set was ridiculously huge, and battery life was mediocre at best and half-a-day at worst. By comparison, the Pixel 5 is the first Pixel so far to have a proper all-day battery life, and the bezels are nice and thin on all sides. You also get the IP68 water resistance that I've sorely, sorely missed on the Pixel 4a. As someone who gets caught in the rain semi-regularly — thanks, Florida — you appreciate miss waterproofing until the sky's about to open up and you remember "Oh, crap, I left the waterproof sleeve at home!"
Another benefit of the Pixel 5 is wireless charging, which is actually fast and reliable this year! If you're not a Pixel fan or a charger nerd like me, you probably don't remember the drama we've had for the last two generations of Pixels where only some wireless chargers would work, but the Pixel 5 has 15W wireless charging, and it's the same 15W EPP wireless charging that LG phones have used for years, meaning that finding compatible chargers is no longer a game of Russian roulette! In fact, there are a couple of good 15W wireless chargers for the Pixel 5 on sale at Best Buy and Amazon you should pick up after you buy your new Pixel 5.
$650 for the Pixel 5 doesn't sound like a huge discount when the phone debuted at $700 a month ago, but seeing any discount on a month-old phone is impressive, and unlike the Pixel 4 which was totally overpriced at launch, Google did the sensible thing up front and priced the Pixel 5 reasonably to begin with. $700 is a reasonable price for the Pixel 5, and $650 sweetens the pot enough to make picking up that Sorta Sage sexiness a sensible move this Cyber Monday weekend.
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