You don’t want to miss this £220 discount on the versatile and practical Google Pixel 7 Pro that we reviewed

When searching for a quality smartphone, it's easy to just stick with our Apple or Samsung models, but phones like the Google Pixel 7 Pro make a great case for branching out. Sure, Samsung phones are reliable, and iPhones are great for photography, but you'd be surprised by the excellence that Google offers. We'd sum it up as versatility. We'd also sum the phone up as a bargain thanks to the £220 discount available at Amazon today, which knocks a very respectable 26 percent from its RRP.

The Google Pixel 7 Pro sports a brilliant camera for snapping great pictures, a speedy processor to make smartphone gaming a blast, and a whole heap of customisable settings that let you tailor your preferences exactly how you like.

Of course, it's all well and good seeing that, but we all want a bit more information when picking out our new phone. After all, it's easy to fall in love with it at first only to change your mind later. That's why we've gone a step further.

In order to figure out how the Google Pixel 7 Pro performs, we had one of our tech experts, Kyle Purves, use it as their main phone for three months. They tested every aspect of it, from the settings and user experience, audio and video performance, all the way to pushing its gaming capabilities. As such, Kyle now has a very clear idea of the strengths, weaknesses, and quirks of the Pixel 7 Pro. Read on for the full review.

You can read our full review of the Google Pixel 8 here.

The Build

As someone who only replaces their phone every few years, I always get surprised at how much bigger the newer model is compared to my previous one, and the track record is still going strong now with the Pixel 7 Pro. Naturally, it took a bit of an adjustment period to get used to the new size, but after a few days, it felt completely normal to me. What still surprised me, however, was the weight. Despite being a fairly large, modern phone with plenty of inner components that could justify bulk, the Pixel 7 Pro is notably lightweight for its size. It's not the lightest phone I've held by any stretch, but I expected it to be heavier, so it's quite a pleasant surprise.

One oddity I experienced from shifting over from a Samsung phone was the button placement. The volume controls are below the on/off button, meaning for about the first week I kept turning my screen off whenever I wanted to turn up music. This isn't really a downside, but it is something I felt was worth noting. Of course, now that I've used the Pixel 7 Pro for months now, it feels completely natural, and any other layout feels odd instead.

Whenever my butter fingers would strike, and the phone would drop, it always managed to come out unscathed. I gave it a case pretty quickly, but even so, I'm confident that the Pixel 7 Pro can survive small drops without much issue.

The screen quality is excellent, with a display that's honestly better and brighter than most laptops I have used. I've had no trouble enjoying YouTube videos, and the visuals remain great when gaming as well. I attribute both of those to the great refresh rate of the Pixel 7 Pro, but that's getting more into the performance of the phone. Speaking of which...

The Performance

The benefit of testing out a phone for a couple of months is that it gives you an accurate picture of how well the battery holds up. Sure, when we first get a new smartphone, the battery feels like it lasts forever, but you get a clearer idea of it after a couple of weeks. Luckily, I'm glad to say that the Google Pixel 7 Pro holds up in the battery department. Even with constant use and watching countless videos, I would typically only need to top it up once a day. Whenever I would play a more intensive game, I would see the battery drain faster, but not by a dramatic amount. Plus, once it came time to charge it, the speed was quite impressive. The time taken depended on whether I was using a power bank or an adapter directly, but regardless, it would usually take less than an hour to reach 100 per cent from low charge.

As mentioned earlier, I decided to try gaming as a way to push the Pixel 7 Pro to its limits. For this, I picked out a couple of large games I've been meaning to try out: Honkai Star Rail and Genshin Impact. Both are multiplatform, meaning I was able to compare the performance of the console and PC counterparts, and I was shocked by how well everything ran. Both are quite large downloads, roughly 14GB and 30GB respectively, at least according to my storage, but I didn't have to worry about space. Even though I have the lower 128GB total storage space model, I still have plenty of room remaining afterwards, so that's already a plus for the Pixel 7 Pro.

The first game, Honkai Star Rail, is a turn-based RPG, which I thought would be well-suited for touch controls. Sure enough, it plays like a treat. While I won't go into game specifics here, the frame rate is comparable to other versions, and I only ever noticed a slowdown when excessive visual effects were on screen, and that would usually only last for a moment. The audio quality remained excellent, and the load times were effectively non-existent, so I feel confident in calling this case a success.

The second game, Genshin Impact, is an open-world action game, which I thought would be a bit more challenging to run. I did have some trouble with the controls, but I'd put that more on the fault of the game and the gamer. In terms of performance, I was still quite satisfied. There were occasionally slow loading times, but the frame rate rarely if ever dropped. In fact, the only performance difference I felt was a major step down from the other versions was the audio. At around half volume, combat noises would cut out or become crunchy during busy fights. Below that threshold, the phone was more than capable of keeping up, but it appears the in-built speakers struggled after a certain point. Even so, this is a pretty niche situation in what I considered to be one of the more intensive games I could find for mobile play, so I'm still willing to call it an overall success; it was not a dealbreaker whatsoever.

It is worth noting that while I found gaming to run quite smoothly on the Pixel 7 Pro, there was a minor issue. These games often lead to the phone getting quite warm, noticeably on the screen itself. I don't consider this a major weakness, especially since it would only occur after an hour or so of gameplay. It's also not unusual for handheld devices to do this; the Steam Deck and Nintendo Switch are quite similar. Even so, I feel it is worth noting. As such, I'd say the Pixel 7 Pro is more ideal for short gaming bursts rather than longer sessions at a time.

Let's talk audio for a bit. Some phones feel like they need to be paired with speakers or headphones in order to get decent sound quality, but the Pixel 7 Pro is more than capable of standing on its own. The sound quality is excellent, to the extent that I rarely pair it up with speakers as I prefer how it sounds by itself. It could do with a bit more bass, but it's still excellent for listening to music, videos, and podcasts.

As for the camera quality, I've found it to be fantastic. It's easily an upgrade over my old Samsung phones, with next to no graininess noticeable. I'm far from a photography expert, but I can tell the difference in how my photos have improved with the Pixel 7 Pro. The amount of detail and clarity still present when zoomed in was especially impressive to me. All of this remains equally true for shooting videos as well.

The User Experience

It's all well and good talking about how a phone performs, but it's arguably more important to know how it feels. From its user interface to the customisability, it's crucial that we enjoy how the phone feels to navigate. Thankfully, the Pixel 7 Pro excels here.

Mine initially came with haptic feedback fully turned on, meaning that every touch of the keyboard would give a small vibration and sound response. Personally, I'm not much of a fan of touch feedback, but the range of settings allowed me to easily adjust that down to zero. If I wanted to, I could easily set it to be on slightly, or ramp it back up again. If you enjoy the click-clack sound of typing on a keyboard, you can even add that to it.

The selection of settings is vast and ensures you can tailor your phone exactly how you like it. You can add magnification options, adjust how text is displayed, enable audio descriptions, and much more. In the end, I actually turned down the refresh rate to 60 Hz from the initial 120 Hz, as it was softer on my eyes and improved the battery even further.

With so much customisation on hand, it feels redundant to discuss the user interface, since you can change it up to match your preferences. That said, I think the default style is fantastic and easy to understand at a glance, so you may not even need to adjust anything.

The downsides

Despite having used the Pixel 7 Pro for months now, I still feel as though my typing isn't quite right. Even with adjusting the settings, I always find myself mistyping a character every few lines. That could be down to me trying to type too fast, but it's never been as much of an issue on any of my previous phones. Instead, I can't help but shake the feeling the spacing of the keys feels a bit off, being ever so slightly too large even when adjusted. Of course, a couple of misspelt words aren't a dealbreaker, but it's one of the minor annoyances I've experienced that keep me from completely adoring the Pixel 7 Pro.

Verdict

While it did take me a bit of time to shake off my Samsung habits, I really came around to enjoy the Google Pixel 7 Pro, to the point that I'll definitely be looking at other Pixel models in the future. A lot of the UX felt a bit strange at times, but the range of settings made it easy for me to make the phone truly my own.

I'm really pleased with the performance of the Pixel 7 Pro as well. The audio and visuals are both brilliant, and while I wouldn't consider it a fully-fledged gaming phone, it does a really great job overall. I wouldn't usually consider myself much of a mobile gamer, but thanks to this phone, I can't seem to put Star Rail down...

If it isn't clear already, the Google Pixel 7 Pro gets a hearty recommendation from me. It's not a perfect phone, but its shortcomings are really just a collection of minor gripes that don't detract much from the overall experience. It's convinced me to consider trying other non-Apple and Samsung smartphones in future, and I think it's a great starting point for doing so.

What else to consider?

Who tested it?

Kyle Purves is one of our tech writers, well-versed in testing out various electronics. They most commonly review speakers and other audio gear, but as someone in their twenties, they make constant use of their phone. They've mainly used Samsung phones in recent years but opted to try something new for a change.

How we tested it?

The Google Pixel 7 Pro was an upgrade I made over my previous phone, meaning it wasn't just a standard product to test, but the actual phone I use day in and day out. As such, I've now had months of experience using it. I've watched countless hours of videos, listened to many, many Spotify playlists, and even played a handful of games as well, all so that I could get a clear picture of everything this phone is capable of.

Kyle Purves is a Tech Product Writer for What’s The Best, with an avid interest in all things gaming and tech. They have plenty of experience testing out a variety of electronics and devices. Out of work hours, they can often be found playing through an RPG like Pokemon or Persona, or trying to catch up with their ever-expanding list of shows to watch.

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