Google's Pixel 3XL is for people who want the best smartphone, not the best design (GOOG)

Hollis Johnson/Business Insider

I've tested and played with an impressive crop of high-end Android devices this Fall. But after spending a week with Google's new Pixel 3XL I was quickly reminded why, when it comes to choosing my day-to-day device, my SIM cards tend to stay in Pixel phones. 

My appreciation for Pixel phones has never been about the design, but that's changed a little bit with the Pixel 3XL. Still, if I was basing my buying decision on purely design, I probably wouldn't land on the Pixel 3XL, despite the improvements.

The real beauty of Pixel phones has always been a mixture of getting an unadulterated Android experience, which would have been great on its own, as well as knowing that every photo I take is better on the Pixel 3XL than it is on any other phone.

Check out the Pixel 3XL, which goes on sale October 18:

The Pixel 3XL has everything that other top Android phones have:

• An excellent, sharp display
• Fast and responsive performance
• Good battery life
• Water resistance
• Wireless charging
• A fast and responsive fingerprint sensor
• A great camera (more on this later)

These are more-or-less standard expectations form a high-end Android phone these days, and the Pixel 3XL ticks every box. 

There's just something about using a device where everything is made "in-house": The Pixel 3XL is a marriage of Google's hardware and Google's software. It's the Google experience rather than the "Samsung and Google experience" or the "LG and Googl experience." While some other Android devices can suffer from conflicts with performance and updates, the Pixel runs like a tight, well-oiled machine. 

Android 9.0 "Pie" on the Pixel 3XL feels up to date, optimized, clean, responsive, fluid, and reliable. Other Android smartphones that aren't made by Google check some of those boxes, but not all of them.

Some exceptions are OnePlus phones and the Essential Phone, both of which run the cleanest versions of Android outside of Google's own Pixel devices. To note the Essential Phone has been getting Android updates at the same time as Pixel phones, and it's the only non-Google phone to do so.

What do I mean by clean and why is it so important? It means no bloatware and a "less is more" approach to features that makes it easier to use than a phone with lots of features. 

After using the Pixel 3XL for a week, I've come to completely ignore its massive notch. It doesn't detract from the experience of using the phone at all.

If you write off the Pixel 3XL because of its notch, you'll be doing yourself a disservice for the sake of looks. You'll be missing out on everything that's great about the Pixel 3XL, including the great software and the absurdly good camera, which I'm coming to next. 

I've taken photos with many of the top Android phones, but none please me as much as those taken with Google's Pixel phones.

There's a depth to the Pixel 3XL's photos that other phones can't quite seem to muster. It's from the perfectly balanced contrast between light and dark areas, where light areas aren't too bright, and dark areas aren't too dark. Photos seem more natural than those taken with other phones, which can have an overly processed look.

Now, whenever I take photos with other high-end phones — even Apple iPhones — there's a little voice inside my head that tells me "The Pixels take better photos; this one's not going to look as good as if you took it with the Pixel."

The Pixel 3XL's camera is just astoundingly good.

The portrait mode on the Pixel 3XL is pretty amazing, and I can adjust the amount of background blur after taking the shot, too. I could even make my cat Wally blurry and make the background crisp after taking the photo if I wanted to. But no one in their right mind would blur that face. 

See Also:

• Here's how Google's new $800 Pixel 3 compares to the $750 iPhone XR
• Android phones everywhere are adopting the iPhone X design — and it's caused them to miss a golden opportunity
• Here's how Google's new $800 Pixel 3 compares to the iPhone XS

SEE ALSO: Samsung's latest smartphone has more cameras than any premium phone from Apple, Google, or LG — but that doesn't mean it's better