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Phones · Google Pixel

Google Pixel 3 XL

8owners with an opinion
33%of verdicts positive
0/1positive/negative since 2024
3 yrslongest happy owner
1happy after 3+ years

Praised for performance; criticized for reliability and display.

What people wrote

Likes itOwned 3 years
For fun today I booted up my Pixel 3 XL and it works just fine. It was slow at first, probably as it synced a bunch of stuff, but after that it was about as snappy and useful as I remember it. Everything still works. I used that for 3 years before the Pixel 6 Pro. Before that I had a Pixel XL for 3 years. I still have that phone too in my device collection. I'm getting the Pixel 8 not because the 6 Pro has any problems (personally I've had none), but rather because I have a bit more disposable income to spend on tech and I'm excited about a phone with a 7 year software support window (with incidental coverage to support 5 years of accidental damage). If all goes well, I hope to take advantage of more than 3 years of that, assuming some insane new development doesn't happen in the interim.
Doesn’t like itOwned 2 years
I find people have wildly differing opinions on what normal wear and tear on phone is so it's hard to judge from anecdotes if it's a build quality issue or if they're rough on their phones or on the other side if I'm personally very delicate with my phones. For my contribution to this anecdata the only Pixel phone I've had die is my Pixel 3 XL that started having weird charging issues and refuses to turn on and charge unless I let it completely passively drain then recharge it after that it only works for a bit, that happened after about 2 years maybe. Tried having it looked at by uBreakIFix and they had nothing. Other than that my Pixel 6 is doing great but I keep it in a case 99% of the time and don't abuse it.
Doesn’t like it
I upgraded from a Pixel 3XL to a Pixel 7 Pro XL. I've been generally happy. But... Back in September 2019, my Pixel 3XL had a problem doing an OTA update. I spent hours with Google support (both live and over email). Their only suggestion was to reset the phone and restore from backup. The problem is... I had had the 'backup' option in settings enabled, the whole time I had the phone. I thought it was being backed up regularly. But I could not create a backup from my phone. I tried rebooting the phone, but the 'Backup Now' button was still greyed out. Based on some information from the web, I disabled my PIN. That caused my Google accounts to be logged out, but DID enable the 'Backup Now' button. However, the backup failed. I tried doing a backup via adb, which also failed. IIRC this was before Google Authenticator had the ability to transfer 2FA codes from one device to another. So, without the ability to restore from backup, a reset would mean I needed to recreate 2FA codes for tens of services, which is pretty time-consuming. I wasn't the only person with this problem: https://support.google.com/pixelphone/thread/13519859?hl=en I really like Pixel phones, and just ordered a Pixel 9. But for the foreseeable future my parents will continue getting iPhones.
Neutral
It's only two datapoints, so perhaps not interesting. I've noticed the Google Store is now doing this as well - almost overnight trade-in values have tanked. I traded in my son's cracked screen Pixel 3 XL 64GB in December for a new Pixel 7. I received a $271 refund, which was $6 higher than their on-line estimate. I was puzzled then. I was even more puzzled now when I needed a new phone and had a perfectly good condition Pixel 6 Pro that I was offered $122 on a few days ago. I opted to sell it instead. Either manufacturers/carriers were juicing trade-in offers for sales, or some bottom has dropped out of some market. I've always assumed some third party like Assurant or whomever are the ones actually purchasing these phones to refurbish and sell onward.