Which Pixel phones are still worth buying in 2026? 4 good options and one bad

If, like me, you are a Pixel fan looking to buy a new phone in 2026, you might think you’re a bit out of luck. This year is looking to be really problematic for new phones. The RAM shortage is starting to cause price hikes across the board, and companies are opting to skip spec upgrades to mitigate it. There’s even talk of a potential spec regression for cheaper phones. The good news, though, is that there are still plenty of interesting Pixel phones from last year or the years prior that are worth investing in and that won’t break the bank or suffer the consequences of this price hike.

Besides saving a bit of money on an older Pixel versus a new one, there are many reasons why older Pixel phones are still as interesting and desirable as the newer ones.

For starters, the longevity of seven years of updates means that any two- or three-year-old Pixel still has a few good years to live. Google is also one of the best companies at rolling out new features to its older phones. You might not get the latest and hottest feature as fast as a Pixel 10 Pro owner, but you’ll definitely get it in the next Pixel Drop or the one after that. For example, the March Pixel Drop just expanded notification summaries and scam detection to Pixel 9 owners, while bringing several of the Journal app’s previously Pixel 10-exclusive AI prompts and features. The Pixel 9 also recently got AirDrop-Quick Share support, making it one of the few phones that can share directly to an iPhone, iPad, or Mac. If you’re an Android enthusiast, you can also beta test Android 17 to see what Google has in the works for the platform. It’s a perk few other brands allow.

And for all of the talk about longevity and hardware issues, I think Pixels tend to be quite sturdy nowadays. My Pixel 2 XL still works, and so does my Pixel 5. Plus, I just switched my entire family to older Pixels — my mom got my Pixel 7a, my dad the 7 Pro, and my aunt the 6 Pro. I’m not saying you should go this far back, but I did put my money where my mouth was with this advice and did it for my own family, so you know it’s a serious recommendation.

And finally, Pixels still do the job several years down the line. They were never supposed to be the fastest or most performant phones, but they have better-than-average cameras, no bloat to speak of, and a smooth operation. Even one or two years down the line, they retain these. However, my only concern when considering an older Pixel is battery life. Try to grab a new model, not a refurbished one, so you can have the benefit of a full battery.

The Pixel 9 Pro XL is the quintessential phone to buy if you’re looking at an older Pixel phone. It packs almost all of the features of the newer Pixel 10 Pro XL without the prohibitive price tag. Right now, you can get it for $699 on Amazon — essentially the price of a new regular Pixel 10.

Besides the questionable long-term utility 100x Pro Res Zoom the 256GB base storage, and the built-in Qi2 magnets, there’s not much you’ll be missing out on compared to the more recent model. You still get a large and very bright 6.8-inch LTPO display, 16 GB of RAM, 37W wired charging, a 5,060 mAh battery, and the same camera setup with an excellent main lens, an excellent wide angle lense, and a powerful 5x telephoto. The difference between the two phones’ Tensor G4 and G5 processors isn’t dramatic enough to scream “old phone bad!”

You can copy and paste everything I said about the Pixel 9 Pro above here. The display is smaller, and so is the battery. The charging is a little slower, too. But the rest of the features are the same, and the differences between the older Pixel 9 Pro and the newer Pixel 10 Pro are still the same.

What differs is how good of a deal you can find the Pixel 9 Pro at. The best I can find it at now is $699 on Amazon, i.e., the same price as the larger Pixel 9 Pro XL. That doesn’t seem like a fair price, and sure enough, I can see it’s already dipped to $649 and $599 before. So, if you really want the smaller version of the Pixel 9 Pro, I’d suggest you wait for another similar price drop. Otherwise, maybe going for the larger XL would be a smarter choice, considering you’re getting a bigger screen, faster charging, and a larger battery for the same $699 price.

If there’s one older Pixel phone that makes sense to still buy today compared to its successor, it’s the Pixel 9 Pro Fold. Google’s 2024 foldable looks, feels, and behaves almost identically to its 2025 foldable, to a point where it’s almost tough to tell the two apart by just looking at them. And if you were to put the experience of owning and using a foldable on a scale, both devices will provide it equally. You’ll get to try a foldable with a large display, decent camera, and all of Android’s new large screen-friendly features. Plus, the foldable form factor is so fun!

Today, the Pixel 9 Pro Fold is down to $1,199 on Amazon, though it’s seen price drops as low as $1,099. The Pixel 10 Pro Fold, even at a discount, has never dropped below $1,399 and is now higher, at $1,499. Is there enough to justify paying $300 more? Of course not. Don’t go for the newer model, especially when there’s such a significant price difference.

And I say this as someone who uses a Pixel 10 Pro Fold as a secondary device and appreciates its newer, smoother hinge, IP68 rating, and built-in Qi2 magnets. But no amount of hinge smoothness is worth $300 more. Save your money, get the older Fold, and upgrade to another model in a couple of years.

Another evidence in the “skip the new, go with the old” argument is the Pixel 9a. Despite the Pixel 10a having just launched and being an excellent phone for $499, there’s no reason to grab it if you can find the 9a at a discounted price. That’s because Google this year skipped a lot of upgrades between the two phones. The 10a still has a Tensor G4 processor like the 9a, plus the same camera setup and the same battery. It’s nearly an identical phone, save for the flatter back. And look, if you want to oay $100 or more extra just to avoid the camera bump and keep your phone perfectly flat on a desk, that’s your prerogative. But most people will want to save those dollars and get the slightly-bumpy Pixel 9a instead.

Right now is not the perfect time to do it, though, since the Pixel 9a is only down to $449 on Amazon. But when it drops to $399 or even $349 like we’ve seen in the past, it becomes an absolute steal of a deal. So yes, get the Pixel 9a, but wait for it to be at a more reasonable price. Realistically, you won’t miss anything from the Pixel 10a except the very slightly faster charging and the very slightly brighter display — i.e., not much.

The one older Pixel I wouldn’t recommend buying today is the regular Pixel 9. It’s still a perfectly fine phone, but I think the upgrade from a dual-lens system to a triple-lens telephoto setup on the Pixel 10 makes it a much more interesting buy. Everyone wants a zoom camera; people just don’t realize that until they have it. Even a basic 10.8MP 5x telephoto like the one on the Pixel 10 is great help for taking pics of pets, kids, portraits, sports, concerts, events, as well as landscape and street photography. Unless you know with absolute certainty that you won’t use the telephoto camera, you shouldn’t get the Pixel 9.

This is notably true since the two phones have a relatively minor price difference — $499 for the Pixel 9 today versus $599 for the Pixel 10. $100 isn’t big enough of a savings to justify losing the telephoto camera on top of everything else (built-in Qi2, brighter display, larger battery, newer Tensor G5 processor). If you have your eyes on the Pixel 9 already, I’d advise to put in an extra hundred and get the Pixel 10. You won’t regret that.

Unless you find an excellent deal on a brand-new phone or one that’s minimally used, I don’t think it’s worth buying the Pixel 8 series or earlier today, in 2026. The reality of Google’s battery shenanigans is so hard to dismiss, and even though affected phones were mostly in the A series, all Pixels now use Battery Health Optimization to throttle the battery’s charging speed and capacity after it crosses a certain number of charging cycles, and you don’t want to be caught with a phone going through that.

On top of this, these phones are starting to show their age now with their rounded corners, curved dim displays, slower charging, and limited RAM. Plus, you’ll have to make do with a Tensor G3 (or earlier) processor.

And that concludes the list of older Pixel phones still worth buying — or not — today in 2026. Do you have your eye on one of these? If so, which one and why?