Google Pixel 8a review

A familiar dual-camera setup, yet different

The Pixels and their cameras have become somewhat of a standard on the market and just saying the word Pixel, people usually think of excellent camera quality. That is why many readers probably arrived straight to this page, so welcome! The Pixel 8a has a similar dual-camera to the Pixel 8's excluding the macro capabilities.

• Wide (main): 64MP Sony IMX 787 (1/1.73", 0.8µm - 1.6µm), f/1.9, 26mm, dual pixel PDAF, OIS; 4K@60/30fps
• Ultrawide: 13MP (1.12µm), f/2.2, 16mm, fixed focus; 4K@30fps
• Front camera: 13MP (1.12µm), f/2.2, 20mm, fixed focus; 4K@30fps

The Pixel 8a features a 64MP OIS primary camera accompanied by a 13MP ultrawide-angle camera with a focus fixed at infinity. The selfie eye is now 13MP and still uses a wide-angle lens.

The main camera now utilizes a 64MP 1/1.73" sensor with 0.8µm pixels and a Quad-Bayer color filter. It sits behind a 25mm f/1.9 stabilized lens (OIS). 2x lossless zoom is available on this camera.

The ultrawide camera has a 13MP sensor with 1.12µm pixels and focus fixed at infinity. This means there is no macro option as on the Pixel 8.

The front camera has a 13MP sensor with 1.12µm pixels and fixed focus. The lens appear to be the same as on the Pixel 8 - a 20mm f/2.2 lens for wide-angle shots. 1.4x shortcut crop is available on the viewfinder.

The camera app on the Pixel 8a is similar to that on the Pixel 8. You now have a greater range of options available compared to older Pixel devices at launch, including being able to brightness, shadows, and white balance. You can also shoot in RAW and there is an option to enable saving colors in the Display P3 color space.

Unfortunately, like with the Pixel 8, you don't get additional options such as manual focus, ISO adjustment, shutter speed, being able to force a lens without automatic switching, and capture in native high resolution of the sensor as these options are only offered on the Pixel 8 Pro. As with the Pixel 8, this feels like needless gatekeeping as these are just software settings but we suppose Google has to find some way to justify the Pro moniker on the most expensive model.

Photo quality

The 16MP images from the main are excellent - the resolved detail is abundant, the sharpness is just right, there is no noise, and the dynamic range is plenty wide. The white balance is almost always spot-on and the color rendition - lively and true to life.

Google's processing has always aimed for a natural look and it once again delivers.

Main camera, 16MP

The 2x zoomed photos are good - while the foliage is a tremendous task for the algorithm to process and upscale, everything else looks very well. Yes, you can tell that these photos are not coming from a real telephoto camera, but they are very much usable for being of high quality zoom - they are as solid as the regular ones, excluding the detail, which is average but far from poor.

2x zoom, 16MP

Portrait mode on the Pixel 8 comes in two zoom levels - 1.7x and 2x, both captured on the main camera. The subject is always well exposed, with very good (1.7x) down to good (2x) resolved detail, natural skin tones and accurate colors. The noise is kept low across the photos. The blur is pretty convicing, too.

But we have two issues with the portrait mode. First - the edge detection and the subject separation are far from ideal, poor at times and the imperfections can and will be boosted by the HDR processing.

And second - there is no preview of the simulated bokeh on the viewfinder.

Portraits

Portraits, 2x zoom

The 13MP ultrawide camera saves 16MP photos for some unknow reason, which means all images have been slightly upscaled. Still, the photos are among the best ones you can want from such type of camera and lens. They are detailed and sharp, with well processed extreme corners, very natural look, wide dynamic range and realistic color rendition.

Ultrawide camera, 16MP

You get two magnification levels for selfies - 1x and 1.4x. Both modes output 12MP photos (instead of 13MP). The selfies we took are great - they present enough detail, low noise, accurate colors and wide dynamic range. The rendition remains natural and while we have seen better selfies, they are certainly not that much better.

Selfies, 13MP

And here are a couple of 1.4x zoomed ones, which were basically cropped and upscaled.

Selfies, 1.4x zoom

Google has been known for its great night mode and it is available on the Pixel 8a, too. It doesn't always kick in if the scene's brightness is above a certain threshold, though we can imagine that it's doing at least some of its magic unless you specifically turn it off.

The default night photos from the main camera are slightly brighter than reality, excluding the sunset ones, of course. That is because the night mode usually locked a 2s simulated exposure. Still, we would not call those over-exposed.

The photos offer a good amount of detail, the noise is low up to tolerable, and the colors are nicely saturated and realistic. The dynamic range is good or even wide at times.

Main camera, low-light

The high-res zoom is still at play at low-light (unlike on many other competitors) and the 2x zoomed photos are very good - almost as good as the regular ones, but let's say with 30% less detail.

2x zoom, low-light

The ultrawide camera saves good photos at night on most occasions, but some of them did come a bit over-exposed here. And sometimes the noise reduction did smear some fine detail. Even with these issues, the ultrawide photos are very much usable, there is enough detail, the colors are kept realistic, and they are good for sharing them over the social networks.

Ultrawide camera, low-light

Video quality

The main camera on the Pixel 8a supports up to 4K60 video capturing, while the ultrawide and the selfie max out at 4K30. FHD60 is available across all three cameras. EIS can be turned on or off and also works across all cameras and resolutions. The default codec is h.264, but h.265 is also available in settings.

The audio is captured stereo with 190Kbps and sounds very good.

The 4K videos from the main and ultrawide cameras are superb - they offer rich detail, adequate dynamic range and accurate colors. The rendition is wonderful with balanced sharpness and no noise, making everything look natural.

The 2x zoomed videos on the other hand are a simple digital zoom - meaning their detail is halved and looks poor and artificial.

The selfie footage is almost as good as the main camera, but the detail here is average.

The EIS works great across all cameras and we have no complaints.

Finally, the main camera saves good low-light videos with enough detail, realistic exposure, natural colors, though the footage looks a bit underexposed and with low dynamic range. The ultrawide footage is okay, with good colors, but a bit noisy and low poor dynamic range.

Video sample playlist

You can check out the playlist below, which includes multiple video samples.