Google has officially announced a new Pixel phone, the Pixel 5A 5G. It’s done so in the same way it has announced a lot of recent Pixel phones: by reacting to a rumor.
“Pixel 5a 5G is not cancelled. It will be available later this year in the U.S. and Japan and announced in line with when last year’s a-series phone was introduced,” a Google spokesperson said in a statement. Google announced the Pixel 4a 5G last September, so it’ll be several months before the company unveils the Pixel 5a. As such, you shouldn’t expect to hear too much about it at Google I/O next month.
The rumors about the Pixel 5A 5G point to it being somewhat similar to the Pixel 4A 5G another lower-end phone designed to broaden Google’s market reach by keeping the cost down. Code pointing to the existence of the Pixel 5A has been seen in the Android Open Source Project as early as July 2020. The Pixel 5A 5G is expected to be similar (but not identical) in size to the Pixel 4A 5G, with a 6.2-inch FHD+ display, dual rear cameras, and a headphone jack.
Google’s statement says it will be announced “in line with when last year’s a-series phone was introduced,” which was in August 2020. However, many have speculated that it would be announced at this year’s online-only Google I/O developer conference alongside a lower-cost version of the Pixel Buds.
Google is also rumored to be creating a higher-end flagship Pixel phone later this year. Assumed to be the Pixel 6, the big deal with that rumored phone is that it will begin to use more Google-designed chips, including the so-called “Whitechapel” system on a chip.
