Comprehensive Guide to the Google Pixel Tablet: Is It a Viable Rival for Apple's iPad?

Comprehensive Guide to the Google Pixel Tablet: Is It a Viable Rival for Apple’s iPad?

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Key Takeaways

The Google Pixel Tablet can function as both a tablet and a smart home display, but it falls short in delivering value as the latter.
The tablet performs well for basic tasks, but struggles with third-party apps, which limits its overall functionality.
The included speaker dock and magnetic charger are convenient features, but the limited and confusing Hub Mode detracts from the overall experience.

Is the Google Pixel Tablet an iPad competitor or a new take on Google’s languishing smart home displays? The answer to that question is in the eye of the beholder. But either way you look at it, the Pixel Tablet is a little disappointing in both regards.

Google Pixel Tablet

7/ 10

$399 $500 Save $101

Brand

Google

Storage

128 or 256GB UFS 3.1

CPU

Google Tensor G2, Titan M2 security coprocessor

Memory

8GB LPDDR5

Operating System

Android 13

Battery

27Wh

Ports

USB-C

Price

$499

Colors

Hazel, Rose, Porcelain

Weight

17.39oz (493g)

Front Camera

8 MP, ƒ/2.0 aperture, fixed focus, 84-degree field of view

Dimensions

10.2 x 6.7 x 0.3in (258 x 169 x 8.1mm)

Pros

Responsive touchscreen
Camera on horizontal side for landscape use
Integrated magnetic dock was great

Cons

Hub Mode is limited and can be confusing
Third-party Android tablet apps can present problems

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$399 at Amazon $499 at Google Store $499 at Best Buy

A Tablet, Speaker, and Smart Display

Hannah Stryker / How-To Geek Hannah Stryker / Review Geek Hannah Stryker / LifeSavvy

The Google Pixel Tablet is a hybrid product. On one hand, it’s an 11-inch tablet computer that can handle most portable needs. With its included speaker dock, however, it aims to transform into a smart home display, showing information while charging for its next use.

It’s a clever idea from Google. Tablets need a spot to sit and charge anyway, so why not put the screen to use during those times as well? The problem is that the quirky nature of Google’s smart displays carries over to the Pixel Tablet and it didn’t produce much value in that mode.

As far as portable computing use is concerned, the Pixel Tablet performed well for the basic tasks but still fell short where most Android tablets fall short: with third-party apps.

At the time of publishing, our review units were running Android 13 with some enhancements for tablets. In addition to the ability to switch between eight user profiles (perfect for a tablet sitting in the middle of a multi-person home), there is a new swipe-up feature that allows you to bring up your dock. Here, you could quickly swap between apps or drag in a second app to enable split-screen mode.

It’s Apps That Hurt Pixel Tablet

Hannah Stryker / How-To Geek Hannah Stryker / Review Geek Hannah Stryker / LifeSavvy

Overall, the metal construction with a ceramic coating feels great to hold and looks good enough to my eyes. The Pixel Tablet trounces many cheap Android tablets without pushing past $500 (for the 128GB version). Then again, that typically hasn’t been hard to accomplish.

The disappointing part is the software. Downloading Netflix and MLB apps on my first run, I was instantly greeted with areas of the apps that appeared to be phone apps. When used in landscape, which the center camera and the case stand emphasize, only a narrow strip of the screen was used for certain parts of the apps—like the show details area for Netflix.

This wasn’t a universal problem with every single app, but it usually reared its head in some way, at some time. I never saw a narrow strip of the screen with the Apple Music app, for example, but it was constantly stretching views instead of utilizing the screen size in a more optimized way like the app does for iPad.

It’s one thing to spend $150 on a low-end tablet and not get a perfect experience, but as the price hits $500 or $600, it would be nice if people didn’t need to worry about some of these software considerations.

Thankfully, paired with the four stereo speakers, watching a movie on Netflix or a TV show on Max was an enjoyable experience. As long as the video was in full-screen, you didn’t run into any odd format issues.

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It’s Only a Dock, But It’s Cool

Hannah Stryker / How-To Geek Hannah Stryker / Review Geek Hannah Stryker / LifeSavvy

After the first week with my Pixel Tablet review unit, I noticed that it was always near full charge and never notified me that it was dying. I realized it wasn’t amazing battery life, though one of our review units lasted over the advertised battery life over the span of three days. It was that I was constantly docking it on its base when I wasn’t using it.

The Google Pixel Tablet only charges to 90% while on the dock to help extend the life of the device’s battery. It also takes roughly four hours to go from dead to fully charged while on the dock. There is a USB-C port on the left side of the tablet that you can use to quickly juice up the device in about two and a half hours.

Typically, I don’t have a place to put my iPads, so they just lay wherever I used them last. But they’re almost always dead or dying the next time I pick them up. Similarly, it’s not that they have bad battery life; it’s because they don’t have great standby life—the battery life leaks out when not in use.

I loved the idea of the Pixel dock when I first saw it, and it was great in use as well. It certainly could be better with dedicated volume buttons and a louder, more robust speaker, but it did the trick. My sole concern with the dock was minor: it looked out of place when the tablet wasn’t attached. It also had no real functionality without the tablet, either, since it couldn’t act as an independent Bluetooth speaker.

I suppose it’s hard to argue for a more capable magnetic dock and not complain that its $129 price is too expensive . Currently, the dock ships with the Pixel Tablet. Who knows if that will be true forever, however. Either way, adding a second dock to another room increases the cost of the tablet even more. Especially considering the Nest Hub (2nd gen) display only costs $99 and has been on sale for much lower before .

Google Pixel Tablet Charging Speaker Dock

Grab a second or third charger dock for the Google Pixel Tablet to keep it charged throughout your home.

See at Amazon Best Buy

Hub Mode is Limited and Confusing

Hannah Stryker / How-To Geek Hannah Stryker / Review Geek Hannah Stryker / LifeSavvy

I have used every smart display Google has released over the years and still have a hard time navigating each interface. Most of the time, it feels limited in what it will show on the screen at any one time, and I’m usually left wondering if I’m swiping on the wrong part of the screen or the function is just not available.

I felt those same frustrations on the Pixel Tablet in Hub Mode as well. I constantly asked myself why the Pixel Tablet didn’t more closely mirror the experience already present on the Nest Hub. I don’t have a good answer, really. Beyond navigation, swiping right or up from the bottom to get different clocks and controls, there was also the problem that Hub Mode didn’t currently make full use of the 11-inch screen size.

Hopefully, Hub Mode on the Pixel Tablet is merely a start and not the final implementation of the feature. As is, it was disappointing and not worth buying for alone. As a feature you mostly ignore, or only use as a clock, I would describe it with a deflated sigh as, “Whatever.”

Don’t Expect the Normal Pixel Camera Quality

Rear camera: 8 MP, ƒ/2.0 aperture, fixed focus, 84-degree field of view
Front camera: 8MP, ƒ/2.0 aperture, fixed focus, 84-degree field of view

As with most non-smartphones—whether it’s an iPad or a Samsung-made Android tablet—the cameras on the Pixel Tablet appear to be more of an afterthought. One of Google’s greatest strengths with its Pixel phones is the incredible picture quality (partially thanks to the search giant’s computational photography features). While some of that post-processing does happen on this device, it doesn’t compare to what you get from the Pixel 7 Pro or even the Pixel 7a .

In short, the front-facing camera is good enough to use on Google Meet or Zoom video calls, but don’t expect a masterpiece if you try taking pictures of your next vacation.

Google’s Kickstand Case Is a Must-Have for Movie Watching

Hannah Stryker / How-To Geek Hannah Stryker / Review Geek Hannah Stryker / LifeSavvy

In addition to the Pixel Tablet review unit, Google sent along a pre-production version of its first-party case . While I can’t fully evaluate the case as it’s not final hardware, I can say that the kickstand made all the difference when watching videos.

Once taken off the charging stand, the Pixel Tablet falls flat unless it’s propped up against something—as with all devices. Adding the kickstand ensures the tablet sits upright, whether you leave the gadget sitting on your kitchen table or sitting in your lap while on the couch.

The added benefit is that, while the tablet is propped up using the kickstand, your hands don’t muffle the four speakers on either end of the Pixel Tablet. Manually holding the tablet up and blocking one or more speakers didn’t provide a great listening experience.

Google Pixel Tablet Case

Add a kickstand to your Google Pixel Tablet while also protecting the device from minor drops.

See at Bestbuy Google

Should You Buy Google Pixel Tablet?

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Hannah Stryker / How-To Geek Hannah Stryker / Review Geek Hannah Stryker / LifeSavvy

As a direct iPad competitor, this first-generation Pixel Tablet doesn’t have the breadth of apps that Apple does. It could be disappointing in the long run. Additionally, if you want a new, large, smart display, the Pixel Tablet will probably be disappointing, too.

If you utilize it as mostly a general-purpose tablet for streaming and occasionally as a smart home display, however, the Google Pixel Tablet could still be a solid value. It handles the most common tablet tasks, like watching videos, with better-than-average performance. Its speaker dock and magnetic charger proved handy for keeping the tablet ready to go. It is a solid start, but only a start.

Google Pixel Tablet

7/ 10

$399 $500 Save $101

$399 at Amazon $499 at Google Store $499 at Best Buy

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Comprehensive Guide to the Google Pixel Tablet: Is It a Viable Rival for Apple's iPad?