Problems Persist in the Pixel Ecosystem (Premium)

I love Pixel and everything it stands for, but Google still has a ways to go before it can match the quality of the Apple ecosystem. This makes me a bit nervous because we've been down this road before, and Google now faces the same challenges that have dogged other would-be ecosystem providers like Microsoft and Samsung. And given Google's flighty reputation, I'm further worried they'll just pull the plug at some point and give up.

I started writing this ahead of publishing my Pixel 8 Pro review, but I've held off publishing it for a few weeks, in part because I don't want this to come off as overly negative. I hope it's clear that I want Pixel to succeed. And that I've invested a lot in Pixel recently: In addition to buying my Pixel 8 Pro---after having purchased almost every Pixel phone that Google's made---I leaned heavily into the Pixel ecosystem in recent months.

More specifically, I've been using the Pixel 8 Pro alongside a Pixel Watch 2, a Pixel Tablet, and Pixel Buds Pro earbuds, and I've amped up my Chromebook usage. (Google no longer makes its own Chromebook, so I alternated between an HP Dragonfly Pro Chromebook Plus and an IdeaPad Flex 5i I reviewed and then shipped back to Lenovo before leaving for Mexico.) I've also somewhat coincidentally escalated my use of Google services, most notably by moving from OneDrive to Google Drive---via a 2 TB Google One subscription---for my day-to-day work. (I was already using many Google services, like Gmail, Maps, and Google Photos, heavily.)

My Pixel experiences aren't entirely negative. But I also wish I had better news. The relative success and quality of these products and services vary quite a bit, and the resulting mishmash undermines the value of the broader ecosystem.

As noted in my review, the Pixel 8 Pro is a terrific smartphone and perhaps the first Pixel with no real downsides or issues. And that reality has been driven home in dramatic fashion by my experiences with the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra I've been using here in Mexico for a coming review. Samsung is so irritating. It counters every useful change it makes to Android with 4 to 5 frustrations, and I am pining to return to the Pixel, which is much lighter in my hand and offers a cleaner and more coherent user experience. I miss it every day.

If only the other Pixel devices were this good.

But they aren't. Instead, each falls short in key ways, much like earlier Pixel phones often did, and I can't imagine that Google or its fans will give these products 8 or 10 years to catch up, as the phones required. The collective disappointment of using these devices runs contrary to the "better together" promise of any ecosystem, where good experiences with one product can lead customers further into the fold with complementary hardware devices and services. Even something as simple as two devices with matching color schemes can be desirable, but the real value is when using two or more devices/services together feels...