There is very little left before the presentation of the new Pixel 9 range, although, to be honest, few surprises are expected; leaks, including official ones, have made sure of that. The Pixel 9 can even be purchased at a discount in Europe, although it has not been technically presented.
We already know almost everything about the new design, software and AI functions that the new Pixel 9 will bring, and now it’s the turn of another important element: the processor. However, it must be said that this is the part in which the least changes were expected, and the publication by Android Authority of the first technical tests confirms this; if we are looking for more power, the new Pixel 9 will not give it to us.
All Pixel 9s will be based on Google’s new processor, the G4 tensor; In its promotional material, the company calls it a “game-changing” chip and the next generation of mobile phones “the most powerful yet.” Today’s leak confirms this, technically; yes, the Tensor G4 is Google’s most powerful processor to date, but that doesn’t mean much in the context of the smartphone market.
The tests published by the media reveal a slight, and sometimes very bad, improvement in performance over the Pixel 8. Concretely, the Geekbench multi-core test is almost identical, with a difference of only 2.9%, which in real-world use will probably be negligible. In single-core performance, the improvement is more noticeableby 10.7%, although this is explained more by an improvement in energy efficiency than by an improvement in pure performance.
And the big difference between the Tensor G4 and its predecessor, the Tensor G3, is the basic configuration. The Tensor G3 was based on a “4+4+1” layout, with four low-power Cortex-A510 cores, four balanced Cortex-A715 cores, and a more powerful Cortex-X3 core. The Tensor G4, on the other hand, uses a “4+3+1” layout, with four Cortex-A520 cores, three Cortex-A720 cores, and a Cortex X4; these are the new cores designed by ARM, whose greater efficiency allows for increased frequencies.
In other words, Google chose to remove a core that wasn’t really being used, in exchange for making the current cores a bit more powerful. This is reflected very well in the tests, with multitasking barely affected and superior performance on a single core. Additionally, the Pixel 9 should heat up less and consume less battery
However, this means that Snapdragon and Exynos-based phones should have no problem outperforming the Pixel 9 in terms of raw power and performance. This is inevitable, since the Tensor G4 is based on the same Samsung production process used by previous Google chips.
The design is also very similar, with the same components used in the Tensor G3 such as the same machine learning accelerator (for local AI functions), the same processor for the cameras and the same video decoder. The revolution desired by the company will not take place until next year, when it is expected that Pixel 10 launches new Tensor G5 with the TSMC manufacturing process.
All of this isn’t to say that we won’t see improvements with the Tensor G4, far from it; it’s just that the improvements will be technical, not performance-related. For example, the Pixel 9 is expected to get a much-improved modem, Samsung’s new Exynos Modem 5400, which will consume up to 50% less power and eliminate the issues that the Pixel 8 had. We should also see improvements to 3D graphics thanks to a new GPU, though its impact remains to be seen.