Exclusive: Google chooses MediaTek modem for Pixel 10 series

Over the past month, we’ve seen a lot of information about future, completely in-house designed Google Tensor chips leaked, including Full Specifications of Tensor G5 and Tensor G6, a list of Features they can enableand more. We went from knowing basically nothing to having a pretty good idea about future Tensor chips and the Pixel handsets they’ll power.

However, an important unanswered question is what modem will be used in future Pixels. All devices using Tensor chips designed in collaboration with Samsung used Exynos modems, presumably because they were the easiest to integrate, but with Google becoming completely independent, there was no reason to continue that practice. There is no reason.

We finally got the answer to that question and it’s not what anyone expected. Thanks to a source inside Google, Android Authority has learned about Google’s plans regarding the modem it intends to use in the future pixel 10 series.

There are currently only three companies with modern, 5G-capable modems: Samsung (S.LSI), Qualcomm, and MediaTek. Google didn’t have much of a choice there unless it wanted to build its own solution, which would be riskier and much more expensive even with a prebuilt 5G IP block like Ceva’s PentaG2.

Before making its decision, Google evaluated all available options, including Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X75 modem, which is also used in Apple’s modems. iPhone 16 seriesTalking about Apple, it is planning to move away from Qualcomm towards its own in-house modem in the coming years. Ultimately, however, for some reason or another, Google decided to go with MediaTek’s (not yet released) T900 modem.

Unfortunately, we know basically nothing about this new modem, except that it is based on MediaTek’s “M85” generation modem IP. For reference, the “M70” supported the 3GPP Release 15 5G specification, the “M80” upgraded to Release 16, so it’s safe to assume the “M85” will support Release 17 or even newer.

Unfortunately, we don’t really know that much about MediaTek’s previous generation T800 modem Making assumptions. Although we have a specs sheet, it doesn’t tell us much (for example, if it’s manufactured on Samsung or TSMC’s process node). As far as I can tell no device has actually used it.

We can’t really know how good the T900 will be, but I would cautiously assume it will be at least okay. After all, Google is well aware of this Thermal and battery life are some of the biggest issues With the tensor-based Pixel, largely due to their modem, and I doubt they’ll let a disaster like the Pixel 6 happen again.

The MediaTek modem is definitely not what most expected – or wanted. Many of you will probably also criticize this move after reading this article and declare Pixel 10 a dead-on-arrival product, but I think it is too early to say anything like that. We basically don’t know anything special about this modem nor do we know much about the performance of Qualcomm’s external modems, since the only devices that use them are iPhones. Needless to mention, despite being heavily criticized by many, Samsung managed to release a relatively good modem – the Exynos Modem 5400 – and as a result, the Pixel 9 series has quite solid battery life.

Ultimately, we’ll have to wait and see how things look when Google releases the Pixel 10 series, but I doubt it’ll be anywhere near as bad. Google makes choices for a reason, even if sometimes it doesn’t seem like it, and this is certainly no exception.