They are among the most open of secrets in personal technology, but now they’re official: Google will launch the Pixel 6 and 6 Pro this fall.

“We set out to make our own System on a Chip (SoC) to power Pixel 6,” Google vice president Rick Osterloh writes. “And now, years later, it’s almost here. Tensor is our first custom-built SoC specifically for Pixel phones, and it will power the Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro later this fall.”

Why Google has chosen now to go public with the Pixel 6 family and Tensor is unclear: The firm is, after all, set to launch a Pixel 5a any day now. And Osterloh says that Google will “share all the details [it]  normally release at launch like new features, technical specs, and pricing and availability.” Today’s announcement is just a preview.

In keeping with the leaked images we’ve seen so far, Pixel 6/6 Pro will feature an all-new design that is, for perhaps the first time for Pixel, both attractive and unique. The smartphones will have new materials and finishes, with a matte aluminum finish on the Pixel 6 and a light polished aluminum frame on the Pixel 6 Pro.

Both phones will include an upgraded rear camera system with three lenses (at least on the Pro), as rumored, a first for Pixel, and they will be arrayed horizontally across the upper back in a “camera bar,” and not clustered in a corner as is more usually the case.

Most of that is not new information. But Google’s description of the Tensor SoC is interesting.

“With Tensor, we thought about every piece of the chip and customized it to run Google’s computational photography models,” Osterloh says. “Tensor enables us to make the Google phones we’ve always envisioned, phones that keep getting better, while tapping the most powerful parts of Google, all in a highly personalized experience. And with Tensor’s new security core and Titan M2, Pixel 6 will have the most layers of hardware security in any phone. You’ll see this in everything from the completely revamped camera system to speech recognition and much more.”

I can’t wait. But for now, you can learn more about Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro from the Google Store website.

Tagged with Google Pixel, Pixel 6