The Pixel 9a just did something phone cameras haven’t done in over a decade

Smartphone cameras have gotten a lot better over the last 10-plus years, but that has also led to the lenses getting significantly bigger. Combine that with the emphasis on creating thinner phones, and you can end up with some pretty gargantuan camera bumps.

But Google seems to have reversed that trend with the Google Pixel 9a. Rather than having a camera bar that protrudes out of the back of the device, as is the case with Pixel 9 and Pixel 8a, the dual rear cameras are almost flush with the back of the phone.

It’s not completely seamless, as there is a little lip around the edge of the cameras. But it’s arguably the smallest camera bump I’ve seen since the release of the iPhone 6 more than 11 years ago.

Google’s pulled off something I thought impossible

It’s actually pretty miraculous that Google has managed to pull this off with the Pixel 9a, and I’m not entirely sure how that’s happened.

The most obvious answer would be that the Pixel 9a is actually much thicker than you’d expect. That extra thickness would help hide the camera bump, and reduce how much the lenses protrude out of the back of the phone. But the official specs paint a very different picture.

There’s a little bit of confusion here, since Google told us that the U.S. version of the Pixel 9a was 0.4-inches thick. Meanwhile the model available elsewhere is listed as 8.9mm thick (that’s 0.35 inches), which is quite the discrepancy. I figured there must have been a mistake or rounding error, but then I realized it doesn’t actually matter.

The international Pixel 9a has the exact same general design as the U.S. model. So regardless of whether one is thinner than the other, the camera bump has still been eliminated.

On top of that the Pixel 8a is also 0.4-inches thick, and that has a pretty noticeable camera bump. It’s not as large as the one on the Pixel 9, but it still sticks out by a fraction of an inch more than the Pixel 9a seems to. It certainly doesn’t help that Google stuck with the full-width camera bar.

Since the Pixel 9a is no thicker than its predecessor, the only explanation is that Google has figured out a way to squeeze all the camera hardware inside the Pixel 9a, either with smaller components, or by finding a way to Tetris-everything together.

The problem with giant camera bumps

As much as modern camera bumps are a necessary evil, they’re also pretty irritating things to deal with, particularly on the phones with gargantuan-looking camera bumps such as the Xiaomi 15 Ultra. They take up so much space that it makes the phones look and feel top-heavy.

At least the symmetry of the Xiaomi 15 Ultra’s bump means that you can place your phone down on a flat surface without the risk of it wobbling around. Some phones, like iPhone 16 Pro Max, might have relatively average-sized camera bumps. But since they’re stuck on one side of the phone, they’re never going to be completely stable when you place them with the screen facing up.

Camera bars are no better. I have to avoid using my Razer Kishi mobile controller with my main phone, a Pixel 9 Pro, because the camera bar gets in the way and makes it impossible to use.

And no matter what happens, you have to contend with the fact that modern smartphone cameras are usually covered in a big sheet of glass. That’s glass which could, quite easily, get damaged and break — especially if you’re clumsy. Even a case can only offer limited protection for your camera without completely blocking it.

The bigger the camera bump, the more likely it is to suffer some kind of damage, be it as simple as a scratch or something more serious like a crack or shattered glass.

Bottom line

Honestly, I never thought I’d see the day where camera bumps got smaller again. Not without seriously affecting the quality of the hardware inside. But with a 48MP main lens and 13MP ultrawide camera, it seems as though Google might have just avoided that particular pitfall with the Pixel 9a.

The camera may not be flush to the back of the phone, but it’s the closest I’ve seen for a very long time. Hopefully Google can keep that trend going, especially if it means bringing smaller cameras to the main Pixel series too.

Let’s just hope that whatever Google did to squeeze the cameras into the Pixel 9a hasn’t affected the camera quality in the process. Thankfully, though, Google isn’t quite as reliant on high-end camera hardware as some of its rivals, thanks to extensive experience in AI and computational photography.

We’ll find out for certain once we actually test the Pixel 9a’s cameras for ourselves. But right now, the Pixel 9a’s camera setup feels like a great step forward.

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