Google Pixel phones have always had excellent software, but the elephant in the room was that Google hardware has been below par for the majority of its life cycle. In fact, I’d go as far as saying Google only finally got the hardware right last year with the Pixel 8 phones. Before that, there was always a glaring, significant hardware flaw of some kind, from the second Pixel’s display problems to the third Pixel’s hideous notch to the Pixel 6’s dim display and Pixel 7’s bad thermals. And even last year, the Pixel 8 hardware was nowhere near the best, it just wasn’t bad.