Google Pixel 6 Pro allegedly overheats, causing burn marks on the heat sink after a 10-minute call

HIGHLIGHTS

• Google Pixel 6 Pro reportedly overheated after a 10-minute phone call.
• The overheating caused burn marks in the phone’s heat sink.
• Pixel 6 Pro is powered by the first Tensor G3 chipset.

The Google Pixel 6 Pro has reportedly overheated to the extent that it caused damage to the device’s internals. This incident occurred to a Pixel 6 Pro user who shared pictures of the burnt device on Reddit. The device is said to have overheated after a 10-minute phone call. It’s worth noting that the Google Pixel 6 Pro and Google Pixel 6 Pro  were the first phones to feature Google’s in-house Tensor chipset.

 Google Pixel 6 Pro overheating causes burns inside

• The burn marks appeared on the heat sink area of the Pixel 6 Pro, per the images shared by the source. We couldn’t find the original post but it was first reportedby IT Home.
• Since it’s the heat sink area, it’s speculated that the Tensor chip is generating too much heat, and at a level that it cannot tolerate. This happened to a two-year-old Google Pixel 6 Pro powered by the original Tensor chipset.
• The interesting here though is that the reason behind the device overheating was a 10-minute phone call. This means that the phone isn’t capable of even handling something as basic as a phone call. If it was running a game or anything else heavy-duty, the result could be something even worse.

After the overheating incident, the Google Pixel 6 Pro is said to be not functioning properly. This makes sense since the device gave up after a phone call. This incident isn’t surprising though as Google Pixel 6 Pro users have been reporting overheating issues with the device for years now. Even up until this year, there were complaints of the Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro overheating even during normal usage like web browsing or watching videos. According to some user complaints, not just the Pixel 6, but the Pixel 7 series was also found to have overheating issues.

This issue seems to have continued even with the Pixel 8 series as some overheating issues have been reported. The Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro run the third-gen Tensor G3 chipset but it looks like Google still has a lot of work to do when it comes to heating issues.

Key Specs

Google Pixel 6 Pro

Google Tensor | 12 GBProcessor

6.7 inches (17.02 cm)Display

50 MP + 12 MP + 48 MPRear camera

11.1 MPSelfie camera

5003 mAhBattery

• Google Pixel 8 is updating the ARM Mali’s kernel driver to a more recent build.
• The kernel driver is updated to r44p1, which was released on October 11th 2023 from r38p1, released on August 18, 2022.
• Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro customers report improved gaming and general performance of the phones.

Google Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro launched in October, and ship with the in-house Tensor G3 chipset. However, the performance of the phones faced a lot of heat from consumers to experts alike. The phones struggled to keep up during gaming, especially with titles like Genshin Impact. The performance was hardly any different from its predecessors.

However, the Mountain View giant is trying to fix the issues to a large extent with the December 2023 Pixel Feature drop. The new update is said to boost the CPU performance significantly.

Pixel 8 performance reportedly improved

• Courtesy of the latest update, Google is updating the ARM Mali’s kernel driver to a more recent build.
• The kernel driver is updated to r44p1 (which was released on October 11th 2023) from r38p1, released on August 18, 2022.
• As per the early feedback, it appears the update brings a huge jump in gaming performance.

• One of the Pixel 8 users reports that the phone’s frame rate in Genshin Impact’s Fontaine city jumped from ~20-25fps to 45+fps, all without any excessive heating.
• YouTuber TechDroider notes a similar jump in the gaming performance as Pixel 8 is now able to run Fortnite at a stable 60fps on the highest graphics settings.
• Google is bundling the new ARM Driver with Android 14 QPR2 Beta 1.1 as well.
• While the GPU performance may not be as good as the Adreno GPU inside the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 (which powers phones like the Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra and OnePlus 11), this is still a decent performance boost.

• Google is rolling out the new Mali GPU driver to all Tensor-based Pixels. While this might not result in the same level of performance boost as the Pixel 8, there should be reasonable improvements.
• We believe the GPU driver update might also help with lags and jitters troubling the Pixel 8 series owners since launch. Either way, if you are into serious smartphone gaming, the Pixel 8 series might not be suitable for you compared to the competition but thanks to the December update, the regular performance should see noticeable improvements.