Pixels and weird bugs go hand-in-hand. No matter how many improvements Google rolls out with each new generation, strange and unexplained glitches still manage to slip through testing. Pixel 10 users have already reported several such weird glitches, including a snowy display and failure to make 911 calls reliably. Some Pixel 10 users also noticed an annoying gain issue in videos while zooming in and out. Turns out, this is an unintended side effect of a small change Google made for a better gaming experience.
Earlier this month, Android Police founder Artem Russakovskii posted a thread on X detailing a weird audio glitch issue with his Pixel 10 Pro XL. He noticed that while zooming in and out while recording videos, the audio would suddenly spike in volume for a second before returning to normal.
You can notice the problem in the YouTube video embedded below.
Post a debugging session with Google’s engineering team, the Android Police co-founder shared more details on the problem and why it happens. Google swapped the bottom microphone and speaker position on the Pixel 10 Pro XL vs. the Pixel 9. The company’s engineering team noted they made this change so that while gaming in landscape mode, users did not accidentally cover the speaker with their right hand. But this has created an unintended issue.
It’s the reason behind the weird audio gain bug that Artem and you might have noticed in videos shot from the Pixel 10 Pro XL while zooming in/out.
When holding the phone in your right hand and zooming with your thumb, you can accidentally block the microphone. Adjusting your grip while zooming then changes the pressure on the mic, causing sudden gain shifts and volume spikes.
Adjust your grip to avoid the audio issues
The solution is a relatively simple one. Just rotate the phone 180 degrees while recording. Yep, you’re holding your Pixel 10 the wrong way while recording videos. This will change your grip and prevent your thumb from covering the microphone, eliminating the sudden audio gain spikes.
The real issue is that most Pixel 10 owners won’t immediately realize the audio gain problem stems from the bottom microphone’s placement. And even if they do, changing their grip isn’t a practical fix. For right-handed users like me — and likely most others — this is simply the natural way to hold and shoot videos.
It’s unclear if Google only swapped the microphone and speaker position on the Pixel 10 Pro XL or on other members of the lineup as well. If it’s the latter, the same audio issue will likely crop up on the other models as well.
