It’s the chipset – the brains of a phone, essentially – that’s being discussed once again, but nobody is smiling.
Google will allegedly equip the budget-friendly Pixel 10a with the year-old Tensor G4 chipset, instead of the brand-new Tensor G5.
The Tensor G4 was the silicon inside all the Pixel 9 models, including the cheapest one of them all, the Pixel 9a.
So, if Google is packing a 2024 chipset in a 2026 phone (the Pixel 10a is expected in March-April next year), there should be a ton of other upgrades and improvements as a compensation… right?
Hate to be the one to bring it to you, but it could be the case that the Pixel 10a is almost a carbon copy of its predecessor, as no substantial changes in design or camera are expected.
What could the Pixel 10a offer over the Pixel 9a, actually? Surely there’ll be some upgrades present, but minimal at best.What made recent A-series Pixel phones so alluring was the fact that they offered so much bang for the buck – and they shared many of their sibling’s flagship properties. Like the chipset, and more.
For example, the Pixel 9a delivers nearly the same overall experience as the Pixel 9 but at a far lower price. Both phones share the same 6.3-inch OLED display, Tensor G4 chip, and long-term software support, so the core performance and user experience are very similar.
Funnily enough, the Pixel 9a has the advantage of a larger 5,100mAh battery, which translates into significantly better endurance compared to the Pixel 9‘s 4,700mAh cell. While the Pixel 9 holds a small edge in camera quality and build materials, these differences are not enough to justify its $300 higher price tag.
The evolution has begun
Pixel 9a for reference. | Image by PhoneArena
Now, Google is in the process of drawing thicker, more distinctive lines between its different models. And it’s only natural: any company wants people to buy its most expensive stuff (the Pixel Pro models, in this case, if we’re excluding foldables). How to make it happen? By equipping the most advanced hardware and features in the Pro models?That’s just a part of the solution. More importantly – lower-end devices should not offer a similar experience. That’s the secret ingredient and Apple, for example, has been cooking iPhones according to this recipe for many years now.Google is slowly learning, too. That’s why the Pixel 10 offers a dedicated telephoto for the first time in a non-Pro model. Although at a cost. To make things even more “funny” (yeah, the quotation marks are intentional), the Pixel 10 offers a slightly degraded main and ultra-wide cameras compared to the ones on the Pixel 9.
The reason? Well, people should go and buy the Pixel 10 Pro, of course: it has a really advanced camera setup. Hey, Google is a business, you can’t blame them for what everyone else is doing.
So the Pixel 10a camera will surely not be a mighty-advanced one – Google will simply refuse to cannibalize its Pixel 10 and Pixel 10 Pro sales.
The Tensor paradox
Image by Google
Yet the situation is more complicated than it looks, because the Tensor G5 – the expected flagship chip for the Pixel 10 and 10 Pro – is not the raw performance leap many might assume.
The Tensor G5 is Google’s first fully in-house designed processor, manufactured by TSMC. It marks an important milestone since the first four Tensor generations were co-developed with Samsung. But while the G5 brings efficiency gains and a stronger focus on AI, it still lags behind the latest Snapdragon processors in terms of sheer speed and graphics performance.
In other words, the Pixel 10a’s Tensor G4 may be older, but the leap to G5 does not deliver the kind of mind-blowing power difference that would instantly make the cheaper phone obsolete.
Pixel 10a: yay or nay?
Pixel 9a for reference. | Image by PhoneArena
In practice, the Pixel 10a with Tensor G4 will remain a capable little phone. It’ll be able to handle everyday tasks, run (many of) Google’s AI features, and stay supported for years thanks to the company’s seven-year OS update policy.
The bigger question, however, is value. Why pay for the Pixel 10a when the Pixel 9a will be even cheaper by the time the new phone arrives, yet still guaranteed to receive updates into the 2030s? For many, the older model may end up being the smarter purchase.
And that’s where the danger lies. If Google limits its most advanced AI features exclusively to the Tensor G5, then the Pixel 10a risks becoming unattractive.
Without major changes in design, chipset, or cameras compared to the Pixel 9a, AI capabilities could be the only area where the 10a differentiates itself. Should the Tensor G4 struggle to keep up, the Pixel 10a might end up feeling like a recycled phone – and we have a ton of those already.
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