Google Quietly Removes Astrophotography Ultra Wide Mode From New Pixel Phones – Latest News

After enabling the astrophotography ultra-wide mode in the Google Pixel 4a 5G and Pixel 5 camera app, Google has removed it from the Google Camera app. Google’s camera app was recently updated to version 8.1 and according to a report from
9to5Google, after the update, the function is no longer available. However, there is still hope. Google mentioned that on the Pixel 4a (5G) and Pixel 5, astrophotography only works at zoom settings equal to or greater than 1x.

Google has not provided any official explanation as to why it is removing astrophotography from wide-angle cameras.

With its Pixel 4 lineup, Google introduced Astrophotography mode that can be used to accurately capture images of stars. The mode allows exposures of up to four minutes on the Pixel 4 series and up to one minute on the Pixel 3 and Pixel 3a series, allowing you to take sharp images without artificial light.

Google Pixel phones are known for their excellent cameras. To show off and differentiate itself, Google recently introduced a new nomenclature for clickable images on Pixel phones using the Google Camera app.

If you notice, clicked photos on any smartphone or DSLR usually start with ‘IMG’ as the default filename. So photos are usually named (IMG_file number_time stamp) by default. Now Google wants to reserve ‘PXL’ instead of ‘IMG’ for clickable photos on Pixel phones. With version 7.5 of the Google Camera app, which is now available in Android 11 beta, you will see file names appear as PXL_time stamp_file number.