Google Copies Samsung’s Awesome Instant Trade-in Discount for Pixel Phones

There’s a chance you aren’t that interested in the Pixel 10a because you don’t see it as much of an upgrade over the Pixel 9a or maybe you just aren’t into A-Series phones. Whatever the case is, you should at least get excited about one thing that Google is introducing as a part of this launch. Google has started applying trade-in credit instantly in the same way that Samsung does.

For those not sure what I’m referring to, let’s back up a bit. For years now, we’ve talked about how Samsung has the best trade-in program in the business. Whenever they launch a new phone, they offer big trade-in values that are applied as credits/discounts at the time of purchase. So rather than telling them you have a phone to trade, Samsung charging you the full price today, and then only sending you money back later on after your trade-in has been accepted, they give you the value upfront as an instant discount. It’s awesome and makes buying phones at full retail so much easier on the wallet.

Samsung was really the only one doing this for many years, but OnePlus (and maybe Motorola) have at least dabbled in the idea at times. Google, up until today, has always done trade-ins the old fashioned way where they send you credit for you trade-in later, after inspection.

Google Store starts doing instant trade-in credit

As a part of the Pixel 10a launch, Google is introducing its version of an instant trade-in credit. If you head to the Pixel 10a page (or any other phone page) on the Google Store, you’ll see new wording around trade-ins. In pricing areas, there are references to “after instant trade-in” or “trade-in credit applied instantly.” And should you take a phone all of the way to checkout, you will indeed see a final price that reflects your trade-in value as a discount applied today.

This is huge. This might be bigger news in the long-run than the launch of the Pixel 10a itself.

Below, you can see a checkout page where I told Google I had a Pixel 8a to trade and they want to give me a $215 discount for it. With that applied, I would pay just $284 today for a Pixel 10a with 128GB storage.

So how does this all work? Why would Google pay you upfront before they have had a chance to inspect your device? Well, they are trusting you on some level, but they will also verify that your device is in the condition you said it was. If they verify that, you’ll get a confirmation and continue enjoying your new phone.

If you weren’t accurate about the condition, there are a couple of things that could happen. For one, they actually mention raising the estimate and giving you additional money back. I can’t imagine that is a likely scenario for most. However, if they determine your device is in worse condition, they could charge you a difference in the value they gave from the value they deem to be correct. So again, there is some trust here, but you really want to give an accurate description for the condition of the phone you are trading in.

Here’s their wording on this new instant trade-in credit program:

Your final trade-in value might be higher or lower than the estimate if your device’s condition is different than what was described in the trade-in flow. If the trade-in value is above the original estimate, you’ll get the excess amount back to your original form of payment, or in the form of store credit if the total trade-in value exceeds the cost of your new device (excluding taxes). But if the trade-in value is lower than the original estimate, you’ll be charged the difference.

If you do not send in your trade-in device within 30 days, you’ll be charged the trade-in credit amount on the form of payment used for your original purchase. Once charged, you can still get a trade-in refund by sending back your old device later. The refunded amount may be different from the original estimate due to the expiration of the original trade-in quote.

At first, I wasn’t seeing this also apply to other Pixel phones, but it looks now like they are included. If you want a Pixel 10 Pro, for example, you can enter your trade-in information and Google will apply an “instant trade-in credit.” You can see it happening below.

But look, how awesome would it be if we get this new instant credit program with the Pixel 11 launch? Let’s hope this isn’t just a test and they continue with it going forward.

Shop Pixel 10a at Google Store