Those of you that remember the Pixel 8 launch event last October will remember Google announcing a number of AI-powered camera features — including Zoom Enhance for the Pixel 8 Pro. Now, 10 months later, that feature is finally ready to be rolled out. Which means it’s coming to both Pixel 9 Pro series phones and the Pixel 8 Pro.
Google announced this news in a blog post detailing some of the new camera features on the Pixel 9 series. This feature will be coming to Pixel 9 Pro, Pixel 9 Pro X and Pixel 9 Pro Fold, with no apparent love for the standard Pixel 9. However, Pixel 8 Pro owners will be happy to hear that Zoom Enhance has already started rolling out to their phones.
For those that don’t know, or forgot on account of the 10-month delay in launching Zoom Enhance, this feature is named pretty literally. The idea is that you can keep zooming into your photos, beyond the capability of the camera it was taken with, while AI “intelligently fills in the gaps between pixels and predicts fine details for high-quality, post-capture zoom results."
Originally, Google said that Zoom Enhance would be added to the Pixel 8 Pro as part of a future Pixel Feature Drop — rather than being available at launch. However, it’s unclear why it’s taken so long for the feature to actually start rolling out, and Google hasn’t volunteered that information.
Still, it’s good to see the company keep its promises and add Zoom Enhance to Pixel 8 Pro, even if it took until the Pixel 9 launch event to make it happen. Plus, the feature will be coming to Pixel 9 Pro phones as well, and hopefully that means Zoom Enhance will be available on release day.
Zoom Enhance isn’t the only camera feature coming to Pixel 9 phones. Google has also announced features like Add Me, Auto Frame and Reimagine for Magic Editor, the first of which allows you to add the photographer to a group photo using a mix of generative AI and augmented reality. Auto Frame uses generative AI to expand or crop an image to reframe it, while Reimagine lets you submit prompts to change the original background to something totally different.
Standalone AI apps are also available in the form of Pixel Screenshots, which automatically collects and organizes your screenshots, and Pixel Studio can generate AI images from scratch.
The Pixel 9 series is available to pre-order now, and you can check out our early impressions in our Pixel 9 hands-on review, Pixel 9 Pro & 9 Pro XL hands-on review and our Pixel 9 Pro Fold hands-on review. All 4 phones are available to pre-order now, with the Pixel 9 and Pixel 9 Pro XL releasing on August 22. The Pixel 9 Pro Fold will hit shelves September 4, and the Pixel 9 Pro won’t arrive until September 26.
