Bad News: Pixel 4's Motion Sensing Feature May Not Come To India, And It's Disappointing
As the days keep passing by, we're getting closer to Google's next flagship phones -- the Pixel 4 and the Pixel 4XL. Moreover, Google has been teasing many things about its upcoming smartphone, including the Soli radar enabled gesture navigation.
However, recent report hints that this feature may not come to India.
XDA Developers discovered on Best Buy's Pixel 4 Landing page that Motion Sense might not be a global feature. The page stated, "Wave hello to Motion Sense* - You no longer have to touch your phone to make things happen. Motion Sense is a new technology in Pixel 4 that can detect your gestures without you having to touch the screen."
XDA Developers
If you closely noticed the text, you would have seen an asterisk ( * ) at the end of Motion Sense. According to that asterisk, Best Buy states- "Not functional in Japan. Motion Sense functional in the US, Canada, Singapore, Australia, Taiwan, and most European countries. Not all phone features are controlled by Motion Sense. For more information see g.co/pixel/motionsense," shedding light on the list of countries that will be getting Motion Sense on the Pixel 4 and Pixel 4XL. India is not one of the countries on that list
Why Isn't Motion Sense Coming To All The Countries?
Motion Sense or Project Soli uses radar technology to register inputs through hand gestures as opposed to conventional light-based or camera-based technologies that we've commonly seen. The Pixel 4 is equipped with a plethora of sensors on the top, including the Soli Radar Chip, along with IR cameras, Face unlock cameras etc. A recent report also revealed that a phone was spotted getting clearance for the use of 60GHz (58-63.5GHz) transmitter from the FCC-- the kind that works with Soli.
Every country has its own regulatory bodies that set rules pertaining to mobile devices and the frequencies they emit or communicate with. Motion Sense hardware could not be in accordance with these norms, so it is likely that the feature won't be coming to those countries.
India faced something similar when Apple launched its Series 4 Watch with the ECG function, which is still not permitted for use in India. Let's see if India ends up getting clearance for using Motion Sense.
