Google has a few new pieces of hardware in the works, namely, two additions to its Pixel smartphone lineup. The company helds its annual Made by Google livestreamed event, where it showed off the forthcoming devices.
Leading the charge is the Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro, which the company described as “built with AI at the center” for en even more personalized experience. While the phones look pretty similar to their predecessors – tweaked just slightly with softer edges and a metallic finish – developers have introduced a few new features thanks to the AI capabilities of the Tensor G3 processor.
Among the features is a time-saving tool that uses AI to generate summaries of webpages, picking out key points. It can also read aloud and translate webpages so that users can opt to listen to articles on the go. AI has been utilized to revamp Pixel’s approach with speech-to-text recognition, making transcripts more accurate across multiple languages.
The company is also advertising a 50% reduction in spam calls thanks to AI that doesn’t merely filter out suspicious callers but actually answers the phone for you. “It will silently answer calls from unknown numbers with a more natural-sounding voice to engage the caller,” Google’s description of the feature reads.
Other improvements arriving in the Pixel 8 come in the form of a brighter screen, an increased refresh rate of up to 120Hz and an overall lighter phone. Every camera on the Pixel 8 Pro has gotten an upgrade, along with new controls that allow users to adjust shutter speed, ISO and more.
Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro aside, Google also announced its new smartwatch, the Pixel Watch 2. That device has received its own slew of upgrades, including better performance, a longer battery life and new health and safety features such as an advanced, AI-powered heart rate detector. Constructed from 100% recycled aluminum, the watch is 10% lighter than the original and has a new quad-core CPU.
Google’s Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro start at $699 USD and $999 USD, respectively. The Pixel Watch 2 begins at $349 USD. All three devices launch on October 12.
In other tech news, TikTok began testing an ad-free subscription plan.
