so what we’ve got ourselves here is the battle of the mid-range android heavyweights to freshly launch some 400-pound smartphones that offer impressive value for money on the left here you’ve got google’s pixel 4 here which finally launched after months and months of speculation and on the right the very impressive oneplus nord the pixel 4a is just about the cheaper of this pair at 349 quid but you do have a bit of a weight on your hands if you fancy one because it won’t be available until october the first on the google store the oneplus nord on the other hand will cost you a round of drinks extra this starts at 379 quid but it does go on sale from august the 4th so good news for any impatient types the big question of course is which one is best for you well let’s do a full side-by-side comparison with the pixel 4a and the oneplus note to see how they stack up for camera tech performance battery life everything else you need to know and from all the latest greatest tech please do plug subscribe and ding that notifications bell cheers now let’s start with the design and when i first got my mitts on the oneplus note i gotta admit i thought it was a really nicely compact smartphone compared with a lot of the handsets i’ve handled in 2020 it’s
just 6.44 inches but the pixel 4 it is even more hand pleasing at a positively dinky 5.8 inches and when you size the two of them up side by side like this it’s quite clear that the google pixel 4 is the one to go for if you’re after a mini mobile now if you flip these phones around to the back you get quite a different design on both of them too with the node you get this absolutely stunning marble blue finish although it is available in a straightforward black if you’re still embracing your inner emo meanwhile the pixel 4 is only available in the one color unfortunately which is rather simply titled just black so clearly everyone at google is still going through that awkward my chemical romance fears and i’m definitely a fan of brighter bolder colors so it goes without saying the oneplus nord in this mobile blue finish is my preferred version uh and also it’s a lot harder than the google pixel 4a as well you actually get gorilla glass 5 front and back uh whereas of course the google pixel 4 is just plastic here on the back and both these ones are actually pretty good at hiding greasy fingerprints and other smudgy marks and things like that uh you might expect that it appears more easily on the glossy arse here on the oneplus store but actually they do show up a little bit here on the pixel 4 here despite that dark matte finish when you want to unlock your phone you’ve got an in-display fingerprint sensor here on the oneplus nord nice and nippy and responsive but i had no issues with that whatsoever since i got it now actually get a rear mounted physical
fingerprint sensor here on the pixel 4 a very old school and again nice and responsive just a quick tap of your finger to that sense and again it’ll straight in here on the oneplus nord as well you’ve also got the alternative option of face unlock as well which is something that you don’t get supported on the pixel 4 it’s quite handy if you’re you know you’re messing around in the kitchen your fingers are a bit grubby again just tap that power button scans for you and boom straight in so now let’s talk software and naturally you get the latest android 10 on both of these smartphones otherwise slightly different geysers now first up one of the best bits about the software on both these smartphones is the fact that they are very well supported so the google pixel 4 of course naturally you’ll get three years of os updates and security updates thrown in there as well and the oneplus note as well not far behind two guaranteed years of os updates and three for the security again that’s just a good bit of added peace of mind something you don’t get from quite a lot of other manufacturers now the pixel 4a as it is of course a google branded handset does support a very stock version of android 10 although you do get a few pixel exclusive features on here that you won’t find on other android smartphones so for instance you’ve got google’s recorder app which can actually transcribe audio just like that pixel 4 flagship very handy for students and if you’re
doing interviews things like that and of course you’ve got that infamous now playing feature which can listen in 24 hours a day and uh pick up on any songs that are playing in your vicinity and jot them down now oneplus thankfully hasn’t tinkered with the best android elements on there so as you can see here you’ve got full-on dark mode you’ve got those great gesture navigation controls all the good stuff but oneplus has slathered its usual oxygen os launcher on top of android which to be fair retains a very stock look and feel while also adding in a few great bonus bits the best to these is probably the game space feature something you don’t get on the pixel 4a which can block notifications and fine-tune your performance etc etc while you’re gaming very good for keeping you focused now with both of these phones we’ve also got a form of always on display as well it is actually always on in the case of the pixel 4a as you can see there with the oneplus you do have to actually tap the screen in order to bring it up again that’s really handy just for seeing if you’ve got any weight notifications or anything so you know whether to bother unlocking your smartphone now when it comes to streaming video well both of these phones boast a gorgeous oled display the node is of course bigger but either is perfectly comfortable for enjoying a good bit of netflix disney plus whatever over a long lazy afternoon the full hd plus resolution keeps images nice and sharp on both of these smartphones and you’ve got full hdr support on the likes of netflix as well so you can really indulge in those nice sharp contrast the natural
colors and everything too and by default i definitely noticed that the colors were a little bit warmer a little bit punchier here on the oneplus node but that’s because the vibrant color effect setting is activated by default because you dive into the google pixel 4 here color settings and it’s adaptive by default but you can switch that up to boost it if you do like those warmer hues unfortunately one option that you get in the oneplus note that you don’t get in the pixel 4 here is to do with the refresh rate you can boost it from 60 hertz to 90 hertz for a really silky smooth finish absolutely gorgeous stun and stuff makes that performance seem all the better and sadly here on the google pixel 48 it tops off at 60 hertz as you don’t get any of that gorgeous 90 hertz action i’m sure it’s certainly not an essential feature but it is very much a nice to have that of course one disadvantage of the nord compared with the pixels in fact you get this big fat dual selfie cutout wedge there in the corner whereas it’s just a single dinky little orifice here on the pixel 4 ear that said if it does bother you at least here on the oneplus node you do have the option of hiding it from view it’s not exactly an elegant solution it basically just squishes the screen a bit but it’s there if you want it and that’s an option you don’t seem to get here on the pixel 4 here you’re stuck with that orifice whenever you go full view as for the audio where you do get a so-called stereo speaker set up here on the pixel 4 here that earpiece is actually used for media as well but it’s very very tinny let’s face it it’s that bottom firing speaker that is pulling the real grunt of the weight here uh and it gets the oneplus note is just a
bottom firing mono speaker setup works absolutely fine both of them are still perfectly loud and clear on that top volume so fine for you know kicking back with some youtube or netflix action while you’re working in a busy kitchen something like that if you dive into the sound settings here on the oneplus note you’ve also got an audio tuner which can dynamically change the audio effects depending on what you’re doing watching a movie listen to some music etc just to really get the most out of your sound uh unfortunately you don’t get that kind of option or any kind of equalizer anything here on the pixel and both of these phones offer the brilliant live caption feature as well which actually throws up text uh dynamically while you’re watching a video or something it’s not quite perfect but it’s great if you are hard of hearing gives you an idea of what’s going on and now let’s move on to performance where the oneplus note is once again the victor you’ve got qualcomm snapdragon 765g chipset packed in there whereas the pixel 4 it makes do with the snapdragon 730 and while google is pretty generously stuffed six gigs of ram into the pixel fourier you get eight gigs as standard in the oneplus or you can actually upgrade that to 12 gigabytes if you throw some more cash oneplus as way so the snapdragon 765 g inside the oneplus note is more naturally suited to gaming on the go that adreno gpu has been given a bit of a boost and i found that yeah you get a perfect frame rate on the likes of call of duty on those high detail settings no worries whatsoever that said i have tested out call of duty again on those
very high detail settings here on the pixel 4a and again it ran perfectly smooth no worries whatsoever so it’s definitely giving you a competitive edge if you are a bit of a mobile gaming fan that said over time the oneplus note should fare better with the latest android titles another benefit of that 765g chipset is the fact that it comes with a built-in 5g modem as well so the nord is fully 5g ready when those networks do eventually roll out across the country in the case of the google pixel 4 as the nor 5g support so you don’t get that bit of future proofing now one of the potential drawbacks of the pixel 4 is dinky size is the fact you’ve only got a 3 140 milliamp cell stuffed in there with 18 watt fast charging and that’s compared with the mighty 4 115 milliamps stuffed inside the nord which busts faster 30 watt fast charging however the oneplus nord’s battery does actually drain pretty quickly it’ll just about see you through a fairly intensive day although you will just about be scraping it on occasions as i have in the case of the pixel thankfully that battery drains much slower so you’ll easily get a full day of use even with lots of stuff on the go but one feature that you’ll find in the oneplus note that you won’t find on the pixel that i absolutely love is the optimized charging what this does is it makes sure it doesn’t overcharge the oneplus node’s battery if you leave it plugged in overnight which of course most of us are guilty of doing so hopefully over the long term that’ll just prevent any damage which will of course reduce your battery life in the case of the pixel fourier you’ll just have to get into good habits and try not
to leave it charging all night long and both these smartphones come with 128 gig of storage as standards that’s the base level uh but neither offers microsd memory card expandability sadly and now let’s take a look at the camera tech and as you can see it’s a very different setup on the oneplus node compared with the google pixel 4 here of course you’ve got this pretty much standard quad lens setup here on the oneplus whereas the google smartphone actually comes packing just a single rear camera lens which is a very rare beast indeed in 2020.
now single shooter on the google pixel 4 is a 12 megapixel effect whereas here on the oneplus nord it’s a 48 megapixel primary lens using sony’s imax 586 sensor it does shoot at 12 megapixels by default you can quickly boost up to that maximum 48 megapixel resolution little top of that icon up there now both phones are all great but the google pixel 4 ear is unsurprisingly better at shooting everyday photos when it comes to the color capture the pixel just about edges out the oneplus offering impeccably natural hues in any kind of conditions when it comes to the hdr smarts the oneplus note performs quite admirably certainly better than previous oneplus effort certainly doesn’t do itself a disservice but in the case of the google pixel 4 again it’s the winner you’ve actually got full control over the darker elements you can brighten those up separately to the rest of the photo and
give yourself a nice gorgeously balanced shot when you need it and when it comes to proper low-light shots well the pixel’s nightboard is again the winner hands down somehow managing to once again serve up photos with accurate colors as well as sharp detail while everything looks that little bit warmer on the oneplus nord and it’s a thumbs up for the portrait smarts on both the oneplus note and the pixel 4 here as well from the pixel 4 you did really well with that single lens setup as it doesn’t have the depth sensor that the oneplus nord does we still got that gorgeous blocky background effect i love these stuff of course with that multi-lens setup here on the oneplus note you do also have an 8-megapixel ultra wide angle lens that you can play around with slightly obviously distorts the image and you get slightly warmer colors too but you know it does offer a bit of extra flexibility for those who want it and you do also have a dedicated macro lens on the oneplus nord as well which i’ve got to admit i find pretty much pointless and if you took the oneplus node and the pixel 4a into video mode as well we can ship to 4k resolution footage on both of these handsets decent image stabilization actually have a dedicated stabilizer mode here on the one plus node uh strong audio pickup and everything as well so great looking stuff let’s finish up with my favorite part of these uh camera comparisons the selfie camera of course you get modest eight megapixel effort here on the google pixel 4 whereas the oneplus note actually upgrades that to a 32 megapixel effect but all the same i found that
certainly in strong light and things like that you actually get better detail out of the pixel fourier deals with that sort of stronger light definitely a lot better than the oneplus nord does but again with the nord you get that extra camera lens flexibility so you can actually swap to a separate i believe it’s eight megapixel and ultra wide angle lens so as you can see that just gives you a little bit more uh breathing space good news if you’re trying to get some background action on the go or shoot you and a whole bunch of mates having fun in a post plague apocalypse whatever and there you have it my lovelies that’s how the fresh new google pixel 4 is stacks up against the also pretty damn fresh oneplus nord and the question is of course which one do you prefer as you can see they offer a very different proposition for a very similar sort of price so please do slap your comments down below my full oneplus node review is live right now if you want to go check that out i’ve also compared with a whole bunch of other sub 400 pound 5g phones including the likes of the moto g5g plus the real me x50 5g as well go check that out for more sexy comparison action my google pixel 4a review is inbound so stay tuned for that have yourselves a lovely day people cheers love you
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