Some Pixel 3 owners report flickering display issues, possibly connected to Ambient Display

Ben Schoon | Nov 13 2018 - 7:27 am PT

While the Pixel 3 is a much better phone compared to what came before it, it’s still had its fair share of issues. This week, we’re hearing new reports regarding a Pixel 3 display flickering issue seemingly connected to the ambient display.

A Reddit thread on r/GooglePixel has collected a handful of users who are experiencing a flickering issue with the Pixel 3 devices. This issue causes the display to brightly light up a portion of the display while the rest is turned off, and it appears to be loosely connected to the Ambient Display.

One user who provided a video of the problem has their display turned off with Ambient Display enabled. As they move the device around, the Pixel 3 display flickering issue kicks in and lights up the bottom portion of the display in a bright white before going back to normal. In this user’s case, the issue started about three weeks after receiving the phone.

Other users on the same thread say that the same issue has happened to their Pixel 3 units, and there are some threads of Google’s forums as well. One user claims that the issue started after installing the November security update. Some also say that turning off the Ambient Display feature remedies this problem, hinting that a flaw in that feature could be causing the problem.

Notably, similar issues popped up with the Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL last year. Those issues were fixed with a later software update, but so far, it seems Google’s support team is recommending a replacement device for users affected by this issue.