With last year’s A-Series phone, Google moved up the launch by a week, and the Pixel 9a is rumored to be getting an even earlier March unveil.
The Pixel 9a has already been rumored for mid-March, and Android Headlines now reports it will be available for pre-order on March 19. It will “ship on” and be available in stores a week later on March 26.
As such, expect a blog post announcement from Google. We know a great deal about the hardware, but it remains to be seen whether there will be any new software features that debut on the Pixel 9a, though the chances of that are not particularly high. (We got Audio Emoji last year.)
Google moving up the A-Series launch to reflect how flagships are presumably launching in August going forward is not particularly surprising. A 3-month gap between the two launches doesn’t make a great deal of sense. This expected 5-month period matches the previous May-October dynamic, though six months would probably be better.
The Pixel 8a was announced a week before I/O 2024 after usually debuting at the developer conference. Google I/O in the AI era is already pretty jam-packed. While having hardware appear alongside everything else makes for some nice thematic unity, it’s not necessary and distracts from other consumer-facing app announcements.
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