Google also relies heavily on artificial intelligence (AI) in its own smartphones, but even in the latest models there is an important differentiation. Gemini Nano, Google’s new AI model for smartphones, does not run on the Pixel 8, which is only around five months old, only on the Pixel 8 Pro. Google justifies this with “hardware limitations”. Both models are based on the same chip.
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Terence Zhang, a member of Google’s Gemini on Android team, mentioned this previously little-known limitation during a video conference following the Mobile World Congress. “[Gemini] Nano will not be available on the Pixel 8 due to some hardware limitations,” Zhang explained. “It is currently available on the Pixel 8 Pro and recently also on the Samsung S24 family. It will be available on more high-end devices in the near future.”
Just about a month ago, Google introduced the Gemini AI model as the successor to Bard and shortly afterwards presented the Gemini 1.5 and 1.5 Pro versions with drastically improved performance. The AI model should be able to understand particularly long and multimodal contexts. Gemini is basically available in three versions: Ultra as the most powerful model, Pro as a mid-range and Nano as a particularly slim model that can be integrated into smartphones.
Google’s Pixel Differences
However, Gemini Nano apparently places high demands on the cell phone hardware. Since the Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro, developed by Google, are Google’s top smartphones and both use the Tensor G3 chip, also developed by Google, the exclusion of the Pixel 8 comes as a surprise. The biggest difference is the screen size (6.7 to 6.2 inches), but the models also differ in battery capacity and camera configuration.
These differences shouldn’t matter for an AI model, but the Pixel 8 only comes with 8 GB of main memory, while the Pixel 8 Pro has 12 GB of RAM. The memory size is important in AI calculations, but Samsung’s base model of the Galaxy S24 series only offers 8 GB and this is supposed to support Gemini Nano. It seems doubtful that Samsung uses the RAM more efficiently than Google itself, writes Ars Technica.
Further differences that could have an impact on an AI model cannot be found in Google’s hardware specifications. But there is apparently a differentiation between the Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro that Google has not yet communicated. Pixel 8 users are limited to AI from the cloud, which is where the Gemini chatbot also runs. Still, it’s unfortunate that despite promising to provide the Pixel 8 with Android updates for seven years, Google is already cutting features due to hardware limitations.
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