Google teased the Pixel 7 series at this year's I/O event, much to the surprise of practically everyone. That hasn't been enough to stem the flow of leaks though, as we've already seen a handful of prototypes enter the hands of consumers, and we've already heard that the display will basically be the same as the Pixel 6 series. Now a developer has been able to use the Pixel 7 Pro's display driver on the Pixel 6 Pro and using it surfaces the ability to change the display resolution.

The meaning of this is two-fold and points to some of what we can expect from the Pixel 7 Pro. The first is that if the driver is interoperable, it suggests that the earlier report of the displays being similar is correct. Furthermore, it means that the Pixel 7 Pro has a 1440p display and that it will be possible to change the resolution to 1080p. This is currently not possible on the Pixel 6 Pro. Given that it also works, it's possible that this resolution switcher may be back-ported to the Google Pixel 6 Pro with the Android 13 update.

The developer has also affirmed that this is an actual resolution change and not just a scaled resolution set via adb or through other means.

As to why you'd want to change the resolution, it depends. The most impact dropping the resolution will have is in the likes of gaming, where a game will become much easier to run on a lower resolution. You may find that you can achieve much more consistent frame rates when dropping it down to 1080p. We don't know anything about Google Tensor 2 yet, so it's unclear how beneficial dropping the resolution may be to the successor.

We'll be keeping an eye out for any more developments in the future that may benefit Pixel 6 series users and future Pixel 7 series users!