The best Pixel 10 colorway is a cheeky nod to Google hardware history

Google’s 2025 hardware comes in some excellent colorways. From green-and-gold Jade (a 10 Pro exclusive) to the cool gray Moonstone (available on much of Google’s new kit), the latest lineup from Google sports some of the best finishes we’ve seen from Google to date.

Particularly eye-catching is Indigo, a deep blue that’s only available on the standard Pixel 10. It’s a callback to a classic Pixel colorway that set a precedent for Google’s more lively finishes, and it’s neat to see it make a comeback nearly a decade later.

A visual trip down memory lane

The very first Pixel phone, released in 2016, came in three colors: Quite Black, Very Silver, and Really Blue. They were all about as they sound, though Quite Black was more of a charcoal-gray color than it was actually black.

The Pixel 10’s Indigo is a clear nod to Really Blue, with a new label more suited to Google’s modern naming conventions.

All of Google’s present-day hardware colorways are named after things found in nature. Obsidian, for example, is a black volcanic glass; moonstone is a type of gemstone that comes in a number of grayish hues.

The Pixel 10’s Indigo actually isn’t a reference to indigo plants, which have purple or pink flowers, but rather to the natural dye made from those plants. That dye is, well, really blue.

Indigo dye is used mainly to add blue color to the fiber that makes up denim used to produce jeans. However, most industrial indigo dyes today are synthetic rather than extracted from plants.

The name is an interesting pick for Really Blue’s 2025 rebrand. Something like Sapphire might have fit in more neatly with colorways like Jade, Obsidian, and Moonstone.

It could be Google didn’t want to imply the color had anything to do with sapphire crystal glass (which the Pixel 10 doesn’t use — it’s Gorilla Glass Victus 2).

Comparing this new Indigo to 2016’s Really Blue side by side, the tones on the two phones’ glass and metal segments really are nearly identical. It’s a nice nod to Pixel series history — and just a great colorway, generally.

Thankfully, the blue Pixel 10 doesn’t share the first-gen blue Pixel’s white display bezels (it was a different time).

Hey Google: Can we get more of these?

Really Blue isn’t my favorite-ever Pixel color. The Pixel 4’s Oh So Orange was killer, and the Pixel 2 had two top-tier options in Kinda Blue and the two-tone Black & White colorway, affectionately referred to by fans as the phone’s panda variant.

Google’s hardware colorways are chosen with an eye to current trends, so it’s up in the air whether we’ll see the company dust off more fan favorites in future generations. I’d be happy to see a Pixel 11 in the Pixel 3a’s Purple-ish, or the Pixel 5’s Sorta Sage.

Regardless, 10 generations into the Pixel project, it’s cool to see Google pay homage to the very first Pixel phone with a new Really Blue Indigo finish. It’s a shame you can’t get a Pro Indigo phone, but higher-end models always come in more subdued colors.

The Pixel 10 may not look much different from the Pixel 9, with more new software features than meaningful hardware upgrades, but Google did its best to spruce things up with a great selection of new colors.

Hopefully, snappy colors help the new phones get some positive attention — that awkward Made by Google presentation certainly didn’t do them any favors.