Google Pixel 4a vs Apple iPhone SE: Best phone under $400? By Pocketnow

It's been a fascinating year, who would have thought that apple and Google would actually go head-to-head in the mid-range market? Apple already threw down the gauntlet earlier this year with the iPhone SE, and we've seen a number of cheaper devices come out since then, but perhaps no more was anticipated to take it on than the Pixel 4a. So how do they stack up? Well, this is pocket now, and I'm Joshua verger. What's going on everybody, this is the Pixel 4a up against the iPhone SE. This might be the smallest versus that I've ever done. Well, quite literally, these two phones only come in one size and in either case comfortable handling is clearly key. The iPhone SE draws from a design.

That's now rather dated bringing back the iPhone 7 is design, cues that include the signature home button. Now my red edition is a glass on glass phone, and it's striking, despite being of a rather diminutive size. It also retains many of the tropes of the iPhone since the original SE. There's no headphone jack. This time, though so it's updated in that sense, but at least there are stereo speakers.

Unfortunately, Apple did stick to an old design, cube big bezels, to make room for the home button and to maintain symmetry. There are large areas above and below this 4.7 inch retina display. Now it's not a bad display coming in at 1334 by 750 resolution, and it still pumps out good colors that are on par for the apple course, but there's a significant amount less of the screen when compared to other devices like the Pixel 4a, which keep to the current trend of having as much screen as possible, even if it means punching a hole in it and that's exactly what the 5.81 inch OLED display does now being OLED. The Pixel 4a can do things like have an always on display, something that no iPhone has, and overall, the display is just larger and thus a bit more enjoyable. Google still kept the footprint as small as possible, despite the size of the screen, so the pixel has perfect handling as well, but it's also made of a matted plastic shell all around and only comes in this dark color.

It doesn't look bad by any means, but that just means that there's less choice when it comes to style now. One thing that the pixel 4 does boast over the iPhone is a headphone jack. So if you're unable to get a pair of let's say, Pixel Buds or some sort of Bluetooth set, you can always go for a wired solution or just let the stereo speakers do their thing. The fingerprint reader remains on the back readily accessible. However, both of these phones happen to lack face, unlock, so you're reaching for either sensor anytime.

You want to get into the phones. The best part about smaller phones is that slapping a case on them doesn't even make them that much bigger, consider checking one out from our channel sponsor subcase with their award-winning up pro it's one of my favorites, because it really puts this glass on glass phone in a very protective shell cases for the Pixel 4a are coming as well, which might be a good prospect, because the Pixel 4a does not sport an IP rating. Okay, so both of these phones are small yet mighty. The power within is definitely the interesting story. Here, I'm going to go out on a limb here in apple's case, it made perfect sense that, because they're making their own bionic chips, eventually a powerful one would appear in a more affordable device.

Contrast that to like the android world, where a great performance out of low-priced smartphones has usually been a game of trade-offs, not anymore, though, as the Pixel 4a and multiple mid-range phones this year have proved, but what's so interesting about the Pixel 4a, is that it's not even sporting the processor that some of us might expect instead of the 765g it's the 730g, it does sound like a lower tier processor, despite having that g at the end. So maybe expectations were a bit low, but I'm happy to report that the pixel 4 is as smooth as it should be for pretty much any user. Now I kind of fancy myself a power user. I definitely play a bunch of games that I have installed on here, but most of the jumping in and out of applications that I do involves the camera and in the Pixel 3a. There were just times when the stutters and the wait times for things to load were just unappreciated.

Thankfully, all of that is practically gone in the Pixel 4a. Honestly, it's a great bump up from the previous generation, but it's also a wonderful example of how you can get good, reliable, everyday performance without breaking the bank, which is obviously what the iPhone was focusing on when it included the bionic a13. Despite some speculation that this top tier processor is actually under clocked for the iPhone SE, it doesn't change the fact that iOS is still snappy as ever on this little device, iOS does have its own combination of carefully crafted animations and software optimizations. So of course, that is why iPhones tend to feel high performing no matter what, but again it speaks to where we are in smartphones today that good performance, specs and hardware are readily available. It just takes the manufacturers to choose current processors, and then they can figure out what things they want to prioritize around that heart, which is where things start to look quite a bit different.

On the hardware front, the Pixel 4a keeps things pretty simple, yet effective, there's only one configuration that gets six gigabytes of ram and a welcome bump up from before in 128 gigabytes of storage. Now in the previous generation, the Pixel 3a would just get 64 gigabytes to start, meaning that Google photos would be a must-have app for those who were massive, shutter bugs, and we already mentioned the headphone jack and then there's the 3 140 William hour battery, which has been good enough so far. I personally haven't had any issues getting to the end of each day with somewhat heavy usage, but even then 18 watt fast charging is a speedy way of topping back up now fast charging is included in the iPhone SE, but then they got a little extra by including wireless charging. This is one of those nice to have features that actually separates the iPhone SE from many other competitors. That simply don't have it I'll admit being at a work desk and just having the phone on a charger is something I just appreciate in pretty much any phone in 2020 and so far this is the cheapest phone to have it.

Admittedly, it's kind of needed too, though, because this little smartphone has a battery matching its size.1821 William hours talk about a throwback. The iPhone SE has gotten me searching for a cable, quite a bit before bedtime, just like many of us did back in the days of the iPhone 6 and 7. And to round out the hardware. We have the cameras, the single cameras on both phones, so both put their emphasis on doing one sensor really. Well, okay, you get 12 megapixels on the iPhone SE and then 12.2 megapixels on the Pixel 4a, both of which sport is and are capable of 4k video recording and then the front cameras are 7 megapixels for the iPhone SE and 8 megapixels for the Pixel 4a. Both stick to 1080p for recording video, though, and the front cameras on both are expectedly decent in most respects with one recent quirk.

Both phones were actually able to recognize my face despite having a mask on so in a nutshell. Simplicity is key here. You've got yourself an affordable and enjoyable smartphone experience with cameras that just won't. Let you down it's like okay, you don't have ultra-wide zooms or even a crap ton of features, but we've made sure you won't be disappointed with what we could provide you and in shooting, with both of these phones. It's clear to me that google is still hard to beat because it's putting the power of the algorithm data to work.

It's still a blast, getting what you think is a good picture via the viewfinder. Only to see it get further enhanced in the Google photos. App stills photography clearly remains the focus for Google. Now, let's be fair apple, isn't far behind with the iPhone SC photos, there's just a little more elbow grease required. One quirk to the iPhone camera.

I've always noticed is that it starts out overexposed to get the contrast and colors closer to what I was seeing in the pixel. I had to dial down the exposure compensation most of the time. It's as if Apple really wants the HDR to be used as much as possible, making for brighter shadows and basically foregoing contrast, and you would think that google would go hard in the HDR as well, but the pixel's photos retain a pleasing level of contrast that also maintain detail. You know where the HDR games really show, though, in video apple brought a lot of their video prowess to the iPhone SE, making it a good motion shooter that can keep videos nice and bright. In most scenarios, 4k at 30 frames from either phone came out, looking pretty good in my eyes, but it's the iPhone that can take it a step further with 4k at 60 frames.

Now I think that, while the iPhone only somewhat lags behind the pixel in stills photography, the opposite happens to be true. When it comes to video. There is just one big omission from the iPhone camera that the pixel proudly boasts night mode, despite the processor in the iPhone SC allowing for 4k60 and the portrait modes, there's no night mode to be found, and it just gets dominated by the night sight. Long exposures of the Pixel 4a in even the darkest of situations the pixel is able to make something out of nothing and create a photo that is even halfway decent. That's an overachieving feature to put in a 350 phone for sure, but that's the whole point of these phones right making it so that these smartphones are the lowest barriers of entry into either the android world or the iOS wild garden.

You'll find yourself with good support in either camp. Getting software updates straight from the source and the features to boot. Google puts features in like automatic screen, calling that will talk for you when suspected spam calls come through and, of course, there's everything else that Google Assistant provides. Even if you can't squeeze the phone to hail it anymore, iOS on the iPhone SE has all the features and power that you're, probably accustomed to if you've used any of Apple's smartphones up until now, only the home button and touch ID or back. If you have been missing that level of tactility- and you know what iOS 14 is right around the corner- looking to bring some much-needed refreshes to the core experience and with the cameras in both phones bringing pretty high quality in their own ways, there's very little not to like for phones that come in under 400.

But it's when you look a little closer, and you see that things like a night sight mode, a bigger screen and a bigger battery can be had for fifty dollars less than the 399 dollar iPhone SE. As always, if you're already standing in one of these grass fields, you probably won't think that it's all that greener on the other side, but on the topic of green, the 350 Pixel 4a, is cheaper, provides a bit more in the fundamentals and continues to have a fantastic stills camera for the memories that you might end up. Reliving later in google photos sure enough. The iPhone SC did put the rest of the smartphone world on notice, and now we're seeing and honestly benefiting from all the responses that have come after it. Ultimately, though, if you're really strapped for cash, the Pixel 4a is easy to recommend, and then you're just going to be surprised how much phone and camera you can get for so little money.

Let me know what you think about this comparison and which one you might end up. Picking. Are you already in one of the two camps and does the other offering actually make you want to jump ship? Let us know in the comments for now, though, I'm going to go ahead and call it on this one. Thank you so much for watching keep up with everything that pocket now is doing by hitting that subscribe button, because videos are coming out pretty much every day at the very least, hit that, like button and, like I said, have some discussions in the comments down below. I will go ahead and call it on this one.

Thank you very much for watching take care of yourselves and each other, and we will see you in our next video.

Source : Pocketnow