I was limping along on a fading Nexus 5X (goes to sleep for a night, then revives) and refusing to pay the outrageous prices for the Pixels. Huawei has a phone

I was limping along on a fading Nexus 5X (goes to sleep for a night, then revives) and refusing to pay the outrageous prices for the Pixels. Huawei has a phone I was eyeing, and I would have dumped Google Fi. But the Pixel 3a came out at exactly the right time, so I am still in the Google fold for this product cycle. But this story cured me of ever buying a phone directly from Google. Just like one shouldn't buy web hosting and domain registration from the same entity, the lesson here is never buy a device directly from Google. The risk is just too great.