The Google Pixel 6a has received laurels as the most effective price range telephones accessible if you happen to stay within the U.S. market. For $450, it presents a standout design, a pair of dependable cameras, clear software program, some neat unique methods, and a complete lot of Tensor firepower.

Google’s Tensor chip is loads highly effective to deal with even probably the most demanding workflow. In my very own expertise, it hasn’t left me hanging with any aggressive background job administration, and I haven’t come throughout any regarding lags both. However, gaming is one thing that the Pixel 6a falters at, and in moderately odd methods.

A succesful chip on paper and in apply

On paper, Tensor is nothing in need of a behemoth, and technically, it ought to outperform one of the best processors on the market. The Tensor chip packs two high-end Cortex X1 cores for heavy lifting, a pair of mid-range Cortex-A76 cores, and 4 Cortex-A55 cores for much less demanding duties.

If you examine it with the Snapdragon 888, the Qualcomm chip presents a single Cortex-X1 core, a trio of Cortex-A78 cores, and 4 Cortex-A55 cores. The core structure of Samsung’s Exynos 2100 isn’t totally different both. Yet, the Galaxy S21 — which got here out in 2021 — races forward of the Pixel 6a on AnTuTu, GFXBench Manhattan 3.1 (on-screen), and Geekbench 5.

When in comparison with newer telephones just like the Galaxy S22 that depend on the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1, the Tensor chip inside Pixel 6a is left far behind. Comparing it with the A15 Bionic at artificial benchmarks yields an analogous story.

But we are sometimes instructed that benchmarks usually are not the actual story of how a telephone performs. That’s particularly becoming for the Pixel 6a. Over the previous few weeks, I’ve used the telephone closely as my each day driver and haven’t come throughout a single performance-related crimson flag. The telephone managed to run anyplace between 15 to twenty apps within the background with ease.

It’s a flagship chip by design however doesn’t actually sustain with the flagship friends from Apple or Qualcomm. Of course, quite a bit additionally relies on the thermal {hardware} and the show tech allowance, if one plans to check the gaming efficiency of the Pixel 6a with another flagship telephone. That’s precisely the place the Pixel 6a falters.

What it’s like gaming on the Pixel 6a

However, issues change as you turn to extra demanding video games. From the get-go, I couldn’t assist however discover that issues felt sluggish. Games take longer to load, and the extra belongings additionally take extra time to put in, even in comparison with Android mid-rangers just like the Nothing Phone 1 powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 778G+.

You may also run right into a bizarre scaling problem in some video games. Take a have a look at the clean bars on both aspect of the display screen (picture above) whereas taking part in Injustice 2. Mortal Kombat was no exception. But earlier than we delve right into a title-by-title expertise of difficult video games, right here’s what gamers want to remember.

You should compromise on both graphics high quality or uncooked body fee numbers. If you need one of the best visible expertise, you higher persist with reasonable to excessive fps preset as an alternative of Ultra or Extreme choices for graphics high quality.

Even in a room with the temperature set at a cool 60-degree Fahrenheit, the CPU temperature went up by 11 levels F after simply quarter-hour of taking part in PUBG spin-off New State. As for graphics settings, taking part in the sport with graphics settings set to Ultra (most permissible is Extreme) and body fee set to Max (most potential is 90 fps), the gameplay expertise was acceptable.

However, body drops are nonetheless seen every so often. During intense fight scenes, I observed stutters, too. Another vexing facet is that nearly each UI factor appears to load slower than anticipated, particularly if you happen to’ve performed the identical recreation on one other Android flagship or iPhone.

That turns into particularly annoying if a recreation like Genshin Impact throws a large 16GB set up bundle your method. Unpacking and putting in even the heavy replace packages take extra time than it ought to for a processor that’s as succesful because the Tensor.

In a room with the temperature set at 73 levels Fahrenheit, even unpacking the primary obtain bundle for Diablo Immortal triggered a number of heating inside a couple of minutes. Then there are system restrictions. For instance, you may’t set the picture decision to Ultra, and picture sharpening doesn’t actually make a tangible distinction.

As for the core expertise, I maxed out anti-aliasing, visible results, shadows, environmental particulars, and monster particulars within the recreation, and got here out with a largely optimistic expertise. There had been a number of jitters, once more in the course of the intense fight scenes, and the CPU temperature shot all the way in which as much as 112-degree Fahrenheit.

A rudimentary model of Gamebench check revealed that the body stability is a paltry 60% to 65% for taxing video games like Call of Duty: Mobile and Shadowgun Legends. Any title past that class, equivalent to Genshin Impact, Fortnite, and Apex Legends, delivers worse outcomes.

Apex Legends turned out to be an exception, although. Frame drops had been far and few, and I didn’t discover any critical stuttering even with the Frame fee set to Ultra and Dynamic Shadows enabled. As for the body fee rely, it remained at a steady 60 vary all through the check rounds.

The battery temperature additionally touched the 107-degree Fahrenheit mark inside simply 10 minutes of taking part in Diablo Immortal. Needless to say, heating is a significant issue, and it’s exhausting to disregard even when the gameplay expertise is rewarding, barring a number of stutters. The battery drain scenario can be regarding, because the telephone burned by means of 13%  of ionic gas in nearly 10 minutes.

Tensor hassle

The Pixel 6a can deal with ‘almost’ any demanding recreation you throw at it with ease, and also you received’t discover the expertise sub-par until you examine the expertise with a current-gen flagship just like the Galaxy S22 Ultra or the iPhone 13 Pro.

Aiming for excessive body charges with HDR visuals? Lower your expectations. If you’re after a clean gaming expertise with minimal stuttering, body drops, and crisp visuals, the Pixel 6a will serve you properly. Just just be sure you’re not sitting within the solar whereas taking part in a recreation like Genshin Impact, in any other case, issues get toasty moderately rapidly.

Another problem is throttling. With 20 CPU threads lively for quarter-hour straight, Tensor throttled to as little as 54% of its peak efficiency. In comparability, the Poco F4 – which technically contains a two-year-old Qualcomm chip – by no means dipped under the 90% mark. Check out the CPU throttling graph of the Google Pixel 6a within the picture above.

Running the CPU throttling check for separate check durations of 15, 30, and 45 minutes additionally yielded a efficiency graph that constantly declined from begin to end with none important spell of stability. Now, examine the Pixel 6a’s sloping (learn: unhealthy throttling) graph with the comparatively steady output from the Poco F4 within the picture under:

Even the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1, which has courted a nasty rep for poor efficiency optimization and temperature administration, carried out much better than the Tensor. When operating the identical throttling check on the Galaxy S22 Ultra, the CPU frequency by no means dipped under the 80% mark, and there have been no crimson bars for alarming temperature spikes both.

There are additionally optimization points. Gamebench, which presents probably the most complete set of recreation efficiency testing instruments, was incompatible with the Android 13 (64-bit, ARMv8 structure) construct operating on the Pixel 6a. Likewise, attempting to run a number of the demanding 3DMark exams returned an error for unexplained causes.

Annoyingly, the native Game Dashboard that’s unique to Pixel telephones has additionally vanished from the Pixel telephones. The function allows you to control metrics like FPS rely and set efficiency profiles. After being unique to the Pixel 6 and its Pro sibling, it started rolling out for Pixel 6a in August, however it’s not accessible.

I attempted to allow it whereas operating the steady construct of Android 13 (with August safety patch) and in addition after registering with Google’s Android 13 beta program, however couldn’t discover the function. On the opposite hand, the third-party FPS counter and efficiency monitoring apps are both grossly inaccurate, or not optimized for chips apart from these made by Qualcomm or MediaTek.

You can push the Pixel 6a, however you shouldn’t

The Pixel 6a is a really odd telephone for gaming. It comes armed with a reasonably highly effective processor, and that ideally shouldn’t allow you to down regardless of the sport you throw at it. But alas, that’s not likely the case, as a result of there are caveats you have to be conscious of.

The dominant downside with gaming on the Pixel 6a isn’t the dearth of uncooked firepower, however poor optimization for the Tensor chip. It explains why some benchmark exams received’t run, there are stability points with video games, throttling is commonplace, and the warmth administration is fairly unhealthy.

I examined telephones such because the Poco F4 5G and the Nothing Phone 1, each of which function a much less highly effective processor than the Tensor, however a considerably higher expertise at gameplay smoothness and warmth administration. Then comes the throttling problem.

Technically, you may max out the graphics settings in a majority of demanding video games, and nonetheless get a clean expertise, however the heating within the higher half could be exhausting to disregard. However, if you happen to mood your expectations just a bit bit by way of graphics high quality, and maintain issues only a notch under the Ultra or Extreme settings, you should have a pleasant time taking part in video games on the Pixel 6a.

The solely different telephone within the U.S. market which might match the gaming prowess of the Pixel 6a is the iPhone SE (2022). The remainder of the midrange rivals from Motorola, TCL, and Samsung can’t meet up with the Tensor chip’s capabilities contained in the Pixel 6a. That means the Pixel 6a nonetheless has a leg to face on for a gaming handset on this value vary, however assuming we get a Pixel 7a in 2023 with Tensor 2, there’s nonetheless ample room for enchancment.

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