I loved the idea of the Pixel Tablet, but these 2 mistakes doomed it from the start

After a three-year run, it looks like the Pixel Tablet has reached the end of the line. The tablet is still set to receive software updates through 2028, but last week we spotted that Google is no longer selling it. Today, there’s no sign of the Pixel Tablet on the Google Store, and links that used to point to the tablet-smart display combo device now redirect to the store landing page.

Google ending sales of its only currently supported tablet before introducing a replacement might seem a little strange, but I’m almost surprised the Pixel Tablet lasted as long as it did. I love the idea of the Pixel Tablet, but the device we got had some fundamental flaws that ultimately made it an unappealing buy.

Here’s where I think Google went wrong with the Pixel Tablet.

It was a middle-of-the-road tablet

The concept behind the Pixel Tablet resonates with me. For a lot of people, tablets are tertiary devices; we might reach for them once in a while when we want to do something too big for a phone, but not big enough to grab a laptop or sit down at a desktop computer. As such, they can sit unused for days or even weeks at a time, and when I finally have a reason to pick up a tablet, its battery is often drained. The Pixel Tablet’s bundled dock theoretically solves both parts of the problem by keeping the tablet charged and enabling it to function as a smart display, giving it something to do when it otherwise would’ve sat idle.

But to me, the overall experience never felt worth the $500 Google was charging for it. Even in 2023, the tablet itself seemed dated, with a design that looked and felt more in line with the Pixel 5 than the same year’s Pixel 8. Teardowns revealed that the inside of the tablet wasn’t any more considered than the outside; there’s a bunch of empty space in the Pixel Tablet’s body, implying Google had initially intended the device to be more compact than what we ended up with.

Performance out of the Pixel Tablet’s Tensor G2 and 8GB of RAM is fine enough for watching videos and tooling around the internet, but anyone who wanted a device for productivity or 3D gaming would’ve been better served by a similarly priced tablet from Apple or Samsung. The tablet’s display is also unremarkable for its price segment: a 1600p, 60Hz, LCD panel.

So, as a tablet, the Pixel Tablet is pretty pedestrian, featuring a dated aesthetic, middling build quality, just-okay performance, an adequate display, and unused internal space that could’ve been used for any number of user experience improvements, like expandable storage or a larger battery. That doesn’t sound like a great deal at $500, but the tablet’s two-in-one functionality potentially could’ve saved it. Unfortunately, Google dropped the ball there, too.

And not a great smart display, either

The Pixel Tablet came bundled with what Google called the Charging Speaker Dock, a stationary platform that the Pixel Tablet magnetically attaches to, charging the tablet’s battery and routing audio output through the Dock’s built-in speaker. It’s a great concept on paper.

But the dock’s speaker just isn’t very good. Compared to the $229 Nest Hub Max, the Charging Speaker Dock sounds quiet and hollow, with far too little low-end response for me. There’s such a gulf in audio quality that the Pixel Tablet can’t replace the Nest Hub Max that’s lived in my kitchen since 2019: I use the smart display primarily as a photo frame, a timer, and a connected speaker, and while the Pixel Tablet can handle the first two just as well, it can’t keep up when it comes to music playback.

The dock is also surprisingly limited in functionality. Without the tablet attached, the Charging Speaker Dock can’t do anything at all; there’s no built-in microphone to hear voice commands, and no Wi-Fi or Bluetooth connectivity to stream music. It doesn’t feel like it’s worth whatever portion of the $500 package price it makes up, let alone the $129 Google was charging for additional docks, more than the cost of the internet-connected Google Home Speaker or the previous Nest Audio.

The Pixel Tablet could have been so much more

The Pixel Tablet has kind of the same issue as folding phones do: it’s hard to quantify how much value there is in replacing two discrete devices with a single one. It’s novel, sure, but would you be better off spending $500 on a Pixel Tablet bundle, or buying any given midrange Android tablet along with an affordable smart speaker or display? For most customers, I think the answer is probably the latter.

The two-in-one device is still irreplaceable for some users, and I’d love to see a second-generation Pixel Tablet with more considered hardware and better performance, along with a more capable speaker dock — ideally with Qi2 built in so it can charge more types of devices. Given the Pixel Tablet is the nth time Google’s tried and failed to gain traction in the tablet space, though, we might never get a sequel.