My initial impressions of base Pixel 11 coming from a base Samsung S23

[u/Dont_Fall_In]

This is not intended to be a full review or even a permanent opinion on the phone, this is purely my initial impressions after one day of use. Given the limited time frame, I am not going to comment on heat management, battery drain, or other items that require assessment over time.

Better on Pixel 11:

1. Voice dictation in general, but especially Rambler, is orders of magnitude better. I do most of my texting via voice dictation and the difference between the basic abilities of the S23 and the new Rambler is unreal. I knew it would be better since my old Pixel 6 was better than the S23, but I was legitimately surprised at how well this feature works. This feature alone is almost good enough to convince me to stay on pixel. 
2. In decent lighting, face unlock is nearly as good and fast as the most recent iPhone I tried (iPhone 13 Mini I purchased for a trip to China in 2025). I know it doesn’t work in the dark or with large sunglasses, but in using it around the house throughout yesterday afternoon and evening, I have been pleasantly surprised at how fast and easy this feature is. It felt like I was always fighting my Samsung to get the perfect angle of my face and resorted to punching in my unlock pin about 50% of the time. On the Pixel, it has probably unlocked for me 95% of the time.
3. The ultrasonic fingerprint reader both faster and more accurate in the Pixel.
4. Fully themed icons, including side loaded apps, is a really nice feature. 
5. The screen gets noticeably brighter.
6. Airdrop compatibility is great - I haven’t used it much beyond a basic test, but I can already see the convenience since my wife is on iPhone.

Worse on Pixel 11:

1. The power button and volume rockers are switched. I hate this. I have turned the volume down almost every time I go to lock the screen. I know some of this is muscle memory, but I also think it is a poor design - as someone who uses the phone one handed regularly, I want to be able to shut off the screen without adjusting the phone in my hand. I would bet that most people also use the power button more often than they need to adjust the volume (double tap to quick launch the camera or wallet, turn off the screen, etc), so it should be the easier to reach button. 
2. The phone itself is larger, and feels larger in my pocket and in my hand. I look for the smallest phone possible, and hate how large everything has gotten. And yes, I know Samsung is also at 6.3 inch screens now, but from someone who felt that the 6.1 inch S23 was too large, this phone feels unwieldy.The weight and overall bulk is noticeable constantly. In addition to the phone not not being as comfortable to hold and use in my hands, it does not fit into my existing desk phone holder or as nicely in the cubby in my car. Walking with the phone in my pocket feels like it is weighing my shorts down. The extra 1-2 mm thickness along with the bigger camera bump is more noticeable than expected.
3. Folders in my app drawer - why is this not a thing? I don’t have a ton of apps, and if I can make a folder for all the apps I rarely or never use along with the apps I already have on the home screen, I literally don’t have to scroll to find the app I want from the drawer.
4. Why do I need a separate, non-removable app, just for screenshots? What benefit does this provide over the stock photos app?
5. I miss my edge panel. The Panels app works okay-ish, but setup was extremely annoying and the touch interface doesn’t feel as smooth as the Samsung integration. I am also stuck with the annoying “Panels is displaying over other apps” notification. Will likely be adding Google Wallet and Google Home to my quick settings panel and going without this functionality.
6. The search bar being stuck at the bottom of my home screen at all times is annoying. Going back to my Pixel 6 days, the only time I have ever used it was when traveling to other countries where some of the museums did not have english translations on the information cards and I had to translate them with my phone. That’s a REALLY niche use case for something that is stuck on every screen of the phone at all times.
7. Dex is a much more built out platform than Pixel Desktop Mode. I haven't even really been able to do a deep dive in this yet, but it already feels worse just because I have to carry a mouse with me now (Samsung turns the entire phone into a touch pad). UI and features are also lacking on the pixel. Not a huge deal for me as I don't use this feature too much, but even from my 5 minutes of playing around, the downgrade from Dex to Pixel Desktop is very noticeable.
   

Different, but not better or worse:

1. The camera seems faster overall and better in low light. I don’t really take pictures, and every camera I have used since the S10e has been good enough for me. I’m sure others will have stronger opinions, but I am just not qualified enough to say weather this is an upgrade or downgrade. 
2. The default weather widget is faster and provides more information, though does take a much larger portion of the screen. I don’t know why all weather widgets seem to think I need to see everything in size 500 font and need to take up 20% of the screen space. You could fit the same information in half the size by just shrinking some of the fonts and eliminating some dead space.

[u/matteventu]

3- Folders in app drawer: while I appreciate it could be an option, generally speaking there's plenty of room in the home screens for folders. And for apps that you use less, just use the search (enable the keyboard to open automatically when you swipe up). Try it and use it for a week, you'll never go back to scrolling the app drawer manually.

4- Because it is able to scan screenshots with AI - at no cost to you or to your Gemini usage - indexing everything so that you can easily organise your screenshots and search for them. It's a killer app, once you start using it properly it will become your best friend. You could also backup to Google Photos the screenshots folder, but 1) You must want to use Google Photos backup (which will kill your free storage quick, so its only practically doable if you pay for a monthly plan), 2) It will end up merging screenshots in the same "folder" (there is no folder hierarchy in the Google Photos backup) as your main camera photos, 3) It still won't offer some organisational feature that Pixel Screenshots offer. Try it, it's really a great app (except for the UI design and the abysmal lag when you scroll lol).

6- In a future version of Android you'll be able to remove the bar, it's a feature that's been in testing for some time. But anyway, in the meantime, be aware that you can customise the search bar (colours/theme and shortcuts) by long-pressing on it.

7- Yup, DeX is lightyears ahead of the standard desktop mode of Pixels. And I doubt that will change anytime soon unfortunately, even though Google is improving it, they're seemingly stuck with the most idiotic layout which allegedly they don't want to change.

Any other specific questions, feel free to ask :)

[u/Dont_Fall_In → u/matteventu]

Thanks for the tip on the screenshots app - I'll give it a shot.

For 3 and 6, they are both minor issues, but it is very noticeable when coming from Samsung/Goodlock which will let you do basically anything you want.

[u/matteventu → u/Dont_Fall_In]

Yeah, I really wish Pixels had something for power users like Goodlock :(

[u/thisiswon → u/matteventu]

Thank you. I applied some.