Google GOOGL +0.25%’s Pixel 2 XL is the best smartphone I have used this year, or at least it should be. Its camera is head and shoulders above the competition, its battery life is stunning and it has easily the best real world Android performance I’ve ever experienced. But for now both my review and recommendation of the Pixel 2 XL and Pixel 2 remain on hold until Google clears up some serious problems…
Much has been written about the Pixel 2 XL’s display and with good reason. I’ve had the phone for nearly two weeks now and it simply isn’t good enough - not for a phone starting at $849. But that’s far from the only issue, so let’s break everything down:
Google first promoted then defended the Pixel 2 XL display by claiming it is mapped to the sRGB color spectrum to maximise its color accuracy. It’s a strange boast because a) sRGB is a much narrower spectrum than the P3 wide color gamut the display supports and which most rivals use, and b) colors are not accurate.
As the graph shows below, sRGB shies away from the extremes of the color spectrum. The knock-on effect is some colors which appear outside the spectrum are lost. Notably icons look washed out and textures flat, not just compared to reigning champ the Samsung Galaxy Note 8 but even the smaller Pixel 2 which is supposed to have the same sRGB mapping.