Google Pixel buds pro review: At long last, AirPods pro for Android fans

Google is getting serious. The search engine giant is starting to make a name for itself in the hardware department after shaking off its failed Nexus brand, and its building a Pixel ecosystem empire it hopes will be large enough to rival that of Apple and its iWhatevers.

From its series of Pixel smartphones and the Pixelbook, to the upcoming Pixel watch and Pixel tablet, Google’s line-up is rolling out at breakneck speed, and the company’s got its sights set on the AirPods pro next.

The Pixel buds pro are the newest member of the Google Pixel family, and are the company’s third pair of wireless earbuds, following the launch of the Pixel buds in 2020 and the more budget-friendly Pixel buds A-series (£85.29, Amazon.co.uk) in 2021.

The Pixel buds pro are essentially a successor to the 2020 Pixel buds, but look, sound and feel completely different. They’re Google’s first pair of wireless earbuds with active noise cancellation (ANC). Yep, while the competition has had ANC for years now, Google is a little late to the party,

So with a subtle redesign, better sound quality and new noise-cancelling features, has Google finally made its own version of the AirPods pro that will suitably impress the Android crowd? We’ve put the Pixel buds to the test to find out.

We’ve been testing Google’s new premium earbuds in a range of environments, including in our homes, on the tube and at the gym, in order to see how they stack up against other wireless earbuds. We’ve also been comparing them to Apple’s own AirPods pro, seeing as they’re an evident competitor, analysing their sound quality, comfort, battery life, ease of set up and simplicity of use.

And for the avoidance of doubt, we’ve been testing these using the new 2.12 firmware update, which added volume EQ to the settings in the Pixel buds app for the Pixel buds pro.

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From the outside, the Pixel buds pro look almost exactly like the Pixel buds A-series and the Pixel buds from 2020. They feature that same white egg-shaped case and black internal trim, with a stronger magnetic hinge, a front LED indicator and a USB-C charging slot on the bottom. The case is a little larger than the Pixel buds and A-series, but not by a lot, and it’s nice that Google’s premium pair of buds now support wireless charging.

When you open them up, you’ll notice a subtle design change. The buds are slightly longer, flatter and chunkier – more like a large raisin rather than the spherical malteser shape you get with the A-series. But they’re still plastic and shiny and emblazoned with an unobtrusive G logo.

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Google’s also ditched the ear fins, which gave the A-series and its predecessor a more interesting aesthetic and a more secure fit. This did, however, put a little too much pressure on our concha when we tested them though, and they weren’t all that comfortable. And while you might expect the fit to be a little loose now that the fins have gone, surprisingly, they fit like a glove. Sure, they’re a little bigger and fuller in the ear compared to the A-series, but they’re unbelievably comfortable.

We wore them for hours without getting ear fatigue, something we’ve only really experienced with the AirPods and AirPods pro, and they didn’t feel like they were going to fall out at any point, even when we were blown back by a gust of wind. They don’t jut out too much either, which is always a bonus, especially when you compare them to the protruding stems of their fruity rival. Comfortable and inconspicuous in the ear.

The Pixel buds pro can fast pair right out of the box when you bring the charging case next to your Android device, except it uses Bluetooth Low Energy rather than a dedicated chip, used in Apple’s headphones. For some reason though, we actually had a couple of issues fast-pairing out of the box with our Pixel 4a device. We had to hold down the reset button on the rear of the case before they’d connect via fast-paring. Only then did the Pixel buds pro notification pop up.

But when fast-pair did work, it worked like a charm. It paired quickly, instantly registered them to our Google account and sent us to the companion app, which walked us through an eartip seal test upon launch. The default medium eartips fitted perfectly, but if they didn’t, we have other silicon tips inside a tube in the box.

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With fast-pair, Google is also adding auto-switching, which – in it’s current state – isn’t quite prime time material. Auto-switching lets you connect your Pixel buds pro to several Android devices at once, automatically switching the audio route to that device when it detects sound. But, for now, it’s not quite relevant.

You can’t switch between a Windows laptop and an Android device without having to go into the Bluetooth menu when you want the sound to start playing from your Windows machine again. But when Google eventually releases the Pixel tablet and Pixel watch, we can imagine these working just as well as multipoint on Apple’s AirPods. In our limited testing of this feature with two Android devices – a Pixel 4a and a Samsung Galaxy S20 FE – auto-switching worked extremely well.

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Inside the companion app, you’ve got a “Find device” feature, which works just like “Find my AirPods”, as well as settings for adjusting the touch controls and switching between active noise cancellation, transparency modes and none. There’s also the new Volume EQ toggle, which enhances the bass and treble when listening to music at a low volume.

But that’s pretty much it. The sound settings are extremely limited, and it sometimes makes the Pixel buds pro feel slightly under-baked, as if Google rolled these out before it was truly ready.

Google says that 5-band EQ and support for spatial audio with head tracking and volume balance, which essentially synthesises surround sound in your ears when watching content on your Pixel device, is coming later this year. Still, it would have been nice to have both on launch day – especially 5-band EQ.

Google has also removed three features found on the Pixel buds – bass boost, adaptive sound and attention alerts. We don’t mind that the first two are gone, seeing as the bass is a lot better on these buds and that adaptive sound (which increased and decreased the volume based on the level of external ambient sound) is less relevant now that we’ve got ANC, but we wish Google had kept attention alerts.

This was a pretty neat feature that lowered the volume when it detected certain sounds, such as a barking dog, a crying baby or a ringing doorbell. Google is known for making everything smart and snappy, and these feel a little less smart than before.

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As for the controls, well, just like the Pixel buds A-series, these are a joy to use. They’re seamless, responsive and blimey, we love sliding our finger across the earbud’s surface to increase and decrease the volume to any level of our choosing. We literally never need to get our phone out or speak to the Google Assistant if we want to increase the volume. It’s just an all-round good experience.

Out of the box, tapping and holding turns on either active noise cancellation or the transparency mode (whichever you’re using at the time) and this works even when you’re wearing just one bud in your ear. You can reprogram what a tap and hold does in the app and switch it so that it invokes the Google Assistant (or your native voice assistant if using an iPhone) rather than activate ANC, but we can’t see why anyone would want to with support for “Hey Google”.

There is one problem with tap gestures, however, and that’s the occurrence of false taps. When removing them from your ears or just readjusting them, it’s pretty easy to accidentally register a tap on the touch panel. If you’re conscious of where you grab them, ensuring it’s on the outer edge rather than the panel, you’re golden, but it’s something to think about, and may be one of the reasons why Apple opted for the classic stem squeeze.

Sound is arguably the most important element of a pair of wireless earbuds. If they look good and are nice to control, but sound like garbage, they’re not much use. Thankfully, they sound class, but maybe aren’t class-leading.

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They are, however, a significant step up from the Pixel buds A-series in terms of sound quality. They have a fairly neutral sound profile leaning to the bassier side, although they still manages to reproduce sound with a sense of pizazz.

As mentioned earlier, the bass has been massively improved, removing the need for the bass boost feature – a necessity on the previous model. Tracks with a low bass line or a fairly complex composition, such as Emancipator’s When Will it Be Cold Enough to Build Fires, come across noticeably thumpy, and sometimes overwhelm the neutrality of the rest of the track.

Highs on Grimes’ 4Æm come across crisp and clear without any distortion – perhaps a little too loud on occasion. It’s an uptempo track and the Pixel buds do a good job of juggling all the elements fairly well. While the soundstage isn’t enormous, you do feel a sense of immersion when listening to your favourite tunes, but it does feel a little compressed at times.

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If the sound profile isn’t your jam and you want something deeper or more exciting, or the tuning isn’t just right, you’ll have to wait until later in the year for the company to release the 5-band EQ feature, which should give you more control over the sound.

For now though, you’ll have to stick with how Google has engineered them, and while they sound pretty good out of the box, we can’t wait until we can tune them ourselves. And weirdly, the Pixel buds pro only support AAC and SBC Bluetooth codecs, but not AptX or AptX Adaptive, let alone high-res LDAC.

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The active noise-cancellation is shockingly good for Google’s first attempt at them – a large portion of the lows and mids were eradicated and softened to unintelligible levels, although they did struggle a little bit with the highs. It completely killed the sound of the roaring train outside the window and the noisy fan in our room. The wind from the fan didn’t disrupt the ANC either.

Not many wireless earbuds can completely dampen the sound of a freight train passing by our home, but these managed it. Some of that is down to how well they fit, and they fit and cancel external sound very well. We were also impressedwith the transparency mode, which let in a huge amount of external audio while still allowing us to hear our music.

There are three microphones in each earbud, one more than the Pixel buds A-series, and our voice sounded fine on calls – not muffled or overly boomy, though it struggled to reproduce words with softer-sounding letters, but this wasn’t all that distracting in practice.

This is one of the standout features of the Pixel buds pro. While the AirPods pro struggle to get 4.5 hours of playback on a single charge, Google says you can get 11 hours of battery life on a single charge, or up to 7 hours with ANC/transparency modes turned on – that’s a huge amount for wireless earbuds.

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In our tests, we found that to be the case. These last for ages. When we’d frequently be placing our AirPods pros back in their case several times a day, we got through an entire working day before needing to put them back into the case again. It’s really impressive.

So, Google’s finally done it. Yes, it’s about two years too late, but Android and Pixel owners finally have a worthy option when it comes to wireless earbuds. There are still a few missing features, such as 5-band EQ, spatial audio and (hopefully) the return of attention alerts, but the Pixel buds pro are unbelievably comfortable, fit snugly and securely, are wonderful to control and the active noise cancellation is one of the best we’ve seen on a pair of wireless earbuds.

While they sound good, we’d still enjoy being able to tune the sound ourselves. The audio can sometimes sound a little compressed, so it might be worth waiting for Google’s equaliser to roll out before taking the plunge.

Overall, these are cheaper than the AirPods pro, the controls are better, the battery life is longer and we really can’t overstate how good it is being able to increase the volume on the buds themselves.

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