We’re nearly a month away from the next Made By Google event, but the company’s already gone ahead and revealed the Pixel 8, Pixel 8 Pro and Pixel Watch 2. The reasons are simple:
- That’s just how Google does things now, and as a marketing strategy it honestly works pretty well. We’re all going to be tuned into the event regardless.
- Apple’s got its own little event coming up next week.
Mind you, Google isn’t disclosing specs or pricing or any of that good stuff — that’s for the rumor mill to untangle. Instead, it offered a teaser video with the Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro giving us the full-body 360 over on YouTube. Oh, and if you head over to Google’s store to, say, buy a Pixel 7, the two new handsets are sitting at the top, with the Pixel Watch 2 out front for good measure.
Obviously we knew all of them were coming, but with the iPhone 15 event kicking off in a few days, why the hell not? When you’re dealing with the kind of market share Google is currently fighting for in the smartphone space, every little built helps.
Not enough? How about an entire landing page? Again, there are still plenty of unanswered questions, but we get a closer look at the rounder phones, along with a rehash of some older (but still very good) features like Magic Eraser for photo editing and Live Translate. As for the Pixel Watch 2, Google notes, “Pair it with your new Pixel phone to get even more personalized help, safety features and health insights.”
Beyond the more rounded edges, the Pixel 8 isn’t a huge departure from its predecessor’s design — understandable, given how big a jump the Pixel 7 was. The second iteration of the Pixel Watch also looks similar. Google’s long-awaited debut smartwatch was good, but it left a lot of room for improvement.
All will be revealed on October 4 in NYC. See you there.
