The Pixel 2 XL’s display is made by LG Display — a newcomer to the smartphone OLED (organic light-emitting diode) display business, which to date has been monopolized by Samsung. (Note that the smaller Pixel 2’s OLED display is made by Samsung, like the 1st-gen Pixel XL.) Apple is using Samsung OLED displays for the X’s Super Retina HD display.

OLED primer: colors are displayed differently than LCDs: No matter what OLED phone you use, you’re going to see color reproduced in subtly (or not so subtly) different ways compared to LCDs. At least to the naked eye. So, get used to it. See the example at bottom that compares the iPhone 8’s LCD to the iPhone X’s OLED. I also noticed that — at least to my eye — the way the color is tuned on the iPhone 8’s LCD (based on the photo reproduced on the display) is closer to the Pixel 2 XL than it is to the iPhone X.

iPhone X vs. Pixel 2 XL:

OK, so color reproduction to the naked eye is definitely not the same for the two phones (see images at bottom*). Usually, the Pixel 2 XL shows less color saturation than the iPhone X  — though the X doesn’t pull out all of the saturation stops like Samsung’s phones.

I say “usually” because in some cases the Pixel 2 XL colors do pop more than the X. But it’s not an over-saturated pop, it’s a case of seeing deeper hues.

Color accuracy/Pixel 2 XL blue bias: I would say reality (what I see with my own eyes when I look at the actual subject being photographed) usually falls somewhere between the Pixel 2 XL and iPhone X. That said, you will see the blue bias (hue) in the Pixel 2 XL, which is probably the most consistent, stark difference between the two phones.

For example, if you look at the image of the respective Pixel 2 XL and iPhone X boxes (below) you see the definite blue bias on the Google phone. However, looking at the boxes themselves, the iPhone X display reproduction is not necessarily more accurate. In fact, the Pixel 2 XL gets closer to reality (with my eyes at least) than the iPhone X.

What makes the iPhone X the Best Smartphone Display is the impressive Precision Display Calibration Apple developed, which transforms the OLED hardware into a superbly accurate, high performance, and gorgeous display, with close to Text Book Perfect Calibration and Performance!!

Raymond Soneira, president DisplayMate Technologies, iPhone X OLED Display Technology Shoot-Out

Color gamut: Apple touts a “wide color display”, aka the industry-benchmark P3 color gamut, and reports show a brightness of around 625 nits. Google also boasts “100% of DCI-P3 coverage” but reports point to lower brightness in terms of nits for the Pixel. I don’t really see a difference in day to day use but that lower nit number could influence color reproduction to the naked eye.

Winner: I favor realism, even at the expense of punchier colors. Google** is striving to achieve realism with the LG OLED display. That said, Google probably went too far in pursuit of the most realistic color reproduction. Another way to say it is: the sRGB color default profile is too muted (in addition to the blue bias showing up in every image). Despite all of that, I still like the realism in many of the images on the XL. When I took a good, long look at both displays and ignore the blue bias on the Google phone, the actual subject (excluding background) of the image was sometimes (not usually but sometimes) closer to reality than the iPhone X.

However, I’ll declare the iPhone X the winner because it strikes the best balance between realism and saturated colors — not to mention the glowing review the iPhone X’s display got from DisplayMate Technologies.

*Photos are archived images not captured by either the iPhone X or Pixel 2 XL.

**Google is in the process of delivering a patchfor the Pixel 2 XL (though it hasn’t shown up on my XL yet) in addition to the “vivid colors” switch that is already included. The new patch will add “boosted, natural, and saturated” switches.