Survey shows the Pixel speakerphone issue is more widespread than we thought

It’s never a great sign when a basic in-call control starts acting up on your flagship phone, but that’s been the reality for some Pixel owners lately. Reports have been piling up about the Pixel speakerphone button feeling slow or unresponsive during calls, and a problem with such a fundamental function is bound to be frustrating. We wanted to determine the actual extent of the issue among our readers.

We reported on the buggy feature last week, outlining what appeared to be happening and the possible reasons behind it. Pixel 9 owners first raised the alarm back in May, and Pixel 10 owners have since joined them. The behaviour often looks the same — you tap the speakerphone toggle and nothing happens, or it takes a beat or two before it lights up. Some users have found workarounds for the issue, but these shouldn’t be necessary, and Google’s response to one reader didn’t do anything to alleviate concerns. We ran a poll to get a clearer picture of how often this is happening among our readership.

Are you facing a laggy speaker button on your Pixel?

As you can see from the graph above, the problem appears to be more widespread than most of us had anticipated. Users of all Pixel generations reported that the speakerphone button lags on their device, with the split between the two categories likely representing the spread of device ownership. The damning statistic is that only 27% of all Pixel owners who responded in the poll advised that the button was in perfect working order.

Poll results like this should always be considered in context — you’re more likely to be reading an article about speaker button lag if you’re experiencing it yourself. Even so, Google may want to take note of the hundreds of respondents who are afflicted. We went through the comments section on our previous article to get a better idea about your experiences.

As the poll suggests, Pixel 9 and 10 owners in particular described having to press the button more than once, or wait a second or two before anything happens. One commenter summed up their experience by saying, “Sometimes it takes several taps to get the speakerphone to kick in.” Others on older handsets, including the Pixel 8, said the same thing has been happening to them since earlier updates.

Several people said everything works fine on their phones. A few mentioned that the most recent updates seem to have improved things for them, while others pointed out tricks we’ve heard before, like sticking with an older version of the Phone app or nudging the volume button after toggling speakerphone. Nevertheless, both the poll and the disgruntled comments confirm that this isn’t a niche issue.