Google’s Pixel 11 Pro teaser shows a notification light, first reported by The Verge. The feature gives longtime Pixel fans a hardware detail to scrutinize even as Google’s celebrity-led event begins at 6PM ET, eight hours after its preorder countdown is scheduled to end, presumably after the phones have been revealed in full.
Google is widening the launch spectacle even as the hardware teaser speaks to longtime Pixel users. Last year’s Made by Google event for Pixel 10 aired an hour after the phones were revealed and featured Jimmy Fallon; the stream drew 8.4 million YouTube viewers, compared with 1.4 million for the launch the year before.
This year’s livestream replaces Fallon with Trevor Noah and adds Stephen Curry, Alex Cooper and Peggy Gou. The format is aimed beyond Pixel power users, most of whom already know much of what is coming.
The notification light sits in the Pixel 11 Pro’s camera island, where the flash normally is. The regular Pixel 11 may not have it, and its placement suggests the component could also serve as the flash and flashlight. Google has not said what it can do; leaks suggest it may light up when users talk to the chatbot or receive calls from certain contacts.
That would revive a distinctive part of Google’s phone history. Most Nexus phones included hardware notification LEDs, and the Pixel 2 briefly brought the feature back in 2017 before Google dropped it again. Those lights could show charging status, flash for notifications and use different colors; open-source Android skins and apps added controls for colors and blink rates.
Dedicated LEDs went out of fashion around the same time that always-on displays arrived. Nothing’s recent phones have instead made them more elaborate with complex light arrays and dot-matrix displays that can vary by app or contact. The new phones may also bring the usual chipset bumps, camera upgrades and design-language tweaks, but Google has not said what the Pixel 11 Pro’s light can do.