The $1800 Google Pixel 9 Pro Fold. Supposedly the thinnest fold available here in the USA. Internationally they do get a bit thinner than this, but all allow the asterisk. Hopefully this thinness doesn't come back to haunt Google, cuz I'd hate to have a repeat of last year's catastrophe with the Pixel Fold 1. Google is calling this phone super durable though, so I'm sure we'll be fine. Out of the box I'm already a huge fan of how it looks. It feels amazing and folds completely shut and appears like the hardware has finally caught up to the folding form factor. To where it looks just natural. Let's hope it can stay that way. Fully closed the 9 Pro Fold is still thinner than my S24 Ultra in a case. Which is a huge accomplishment and unlike last year the 9 Pro Fold opens completely flat. Along with having both halves of the phone meet together in the center above the stainless steel spine of the phone. The two slabs meeting in the center should give us more structure when it comes to the bend test. Fingers crossed. Google's installed a 6.3 inch Actua display on the outside and an 8 inch Actua display on the inside. But we still have yet to learn what Actua actually means. I do know however, that it scratches at a level six with deeper groves at a level seven. Off to a normal start. The front camera is a 10 megapixel little guy protected by glass. With the razor thin earpiece slit near the edge of the frame. Moving to the inner display I start to get the vibe that when Google says super durable they mean regular durable. Since the inner display is made from the same soft flexible plastic that we've seen on every folding phone so far. Which scratches a level two even fingernails can leave very permanent marks on the center screen. This is absolutely normal for a folding phone though and really not too big of a deal if you take care of it. Making sure there are no bits of dust or dirt in the screen when you close it will go a long way to keeping things pristine. Since there's not a whole lot of room between the two halves, and to be fair, even my own S24 Ultra that's been in my pocket unprotected for about 6 months now has micro scratches and actual scratches that just randomly happen with normal use. Accidents happen. I've been hearing that the reason people avoid screen protectors is because applying protection properly is harder than it looks. And that's where my channel sponsor dbrand comes in. They're calling their new prism 2.0 the idiot proof screen protector and having tested a few of my own I got to say it lives up to the tagline. Just pop it on pull the tab peel it off and just like that a perfectly installed glass protector. And since it is indeed real glass it feels the same as the original screen. Every order comes with two installer trays so you can keep the second one for later. And the installers are indeed recyclable nice work dbrand. I'll drop a link down in the description so you can pick up one for your own device. The inner display of the Pixel 9 Pro Fold is still unprotectable, but at least those of us with normal regular smartphones can have some peace of mind. Now one cool thing that Google has done is that they've made every single part of this metal frame from recycled aluminum. The volume rocker is aluminum along with the power button. Which doubles as a fingerprint scanner; right where it should be. And up at the top of the phone we have a small microphone hole, speaker grill, and 5G antenna. The cover over the hinge is also aluminum. It's the internals of the hinge that are apparently made with stainless steel. The bottom of the phone has our 45 watt USBC port, another loudspeaker Gill, some microphones, and an IPX8 water resistant SIM card tray. That has a black rubber ring. Now the X in IPX8 means that there's no dust protection, but on Google's website it shows the IPX8 on the main pages but IP68 in the footnotes. Which would mean that it does have an official dust rating if that's true. Personally I think the 68 is a typo left over from a copy paste, but we'll find out for ourselves if there's any dust protection here in a minute. Moving over to the camera units we have a 48 megapixel main camera in the top right, laser autofocus in the top left, 10.5 megapixel ultra wide in the bottom left, and a 10.8 megapixel 5x telephoto in the bottom right. With the directional microphone hole inside the metal camera lens housing. Now maybe like some of you I to sometimes venture out into what they call the outside where exists this stuff called dirt and sand. I don't like sand it's coarse rough and irritating and it gets everywhere but, to find out if the pixel 9 Pro Fold as any dust protection at all this is a necessary rite of passage. And unfortunately for Google, and anyone who bought this phone, there appears to be no dust protection whatsoever. Immediately the hinge starts grinding and that IP68 textual appearance on the website is most definitely a mistake. This Fold has more creaks and groans than a millennial walking upstairs. The 8 inch inner screen does have a whole punch 10 megapixel camera scrunched over in the corner. Which I didn't even notice till now so that's not too big of a deal. And all 120 Hertz of it lasts for an impressive 25 seconds before going black and not recovering. Normally we see some melting of the plastic, but this time around there doesn't appear to be any melting damage. The exterior screen being that same actua OLED technology. Lasts for the same amount of time but with the glass layer absorbing most of the heat it just goes white and mostly recovers. It's also interesting that some of the dust I gathered from the outdoors has metal fragments in it that are collecting on the interior magnets. I think the splotch on the inside is from the earpiece speaker, and the ferris rocks near the edge are collecting at the magnets that hold the phone closed. No magnet paper needed. I've delayed as much as possible but I think the time has come. With the Pixel 9 Pro folded it's just as thick as a regular phone and behaves like a regular phone. It's got some subtle creaks, but it might just be that leftover dust that's filled up the internals. And I don't see anything to worry about when the phone is closed. When the Pixel Fold is unfolded however, and bent from the back even though the back panels meet at the spine there doesn't appear to be a whole lot of resistance. And that 9 Pro's folding screen immediately succumbs to the backward motion and dies. Notice this antenna line up at the top which is mirrored by an identical antenna line at the bottom. It's this exact spot at the antenna lines where the Pixel 9 Pro Fold snaps in half. Not sure why Google thought it was a good idea to put an antenna line right here at the weakest point in an already thin frame but here we are. It snaps so easily that all the white foam balls busted out of the upper loudspeaker. There's quite the mess in here and absolutely wild that the only thing holding Google's folding phone together is the interior flexible screen. Now to be fair Google did say they have a durable hinge. Which is true the hinge is still 100% intact. It's just the two antenna lines right next to the hinge that kick the bucket. Like putting an exhaust port in the Death Star the Pixel 9 Pro Fold has four fatal flaws. It is cool however to see the ultra thin glass cracking on the folding screen itself. You can see the shatter lines underneath that top protective plastic layer. This display is most likely made by Samsung. Also interesting that the left half of the phone is now getting extremely hot. I will have to deal with that in a second. And the right half of the fold, now that we can analyze them separately, has the upper loudspeaker with the busted balls. The exterior 10 megapixel front-facing camera and the larger of the two batteries. The left side of the phone which is still getting warmer is hiding under the rear matte glass panel. Which can be removed with some persuasion from my Jerry rig razor knife. Under that glass we see the smaller of the dual internal batteries bringing our total capacity to 4,650 milliamp hours. In this half of the phone the lower intact stereo loudspeaker has red stickers over its ball holes to keep the foam inside. The red stickers, of course not to be confused with the white rectangular water damage indicator, near the 45 watt USBC port. Which turns red if liquid ever does get inside. I'll remove about 15 or so screws and unplug the remaining battery just like a little Lego, so it stops overheating. It was getting abnormally hot there for a second. With a few more connectors removed the main motherboard can come free from the phone. Revealing that most of the thermal heat dissipation happens from the backside or internal side of the device when the screen is closed. Flowing from the processor to the large vapor chamber, and then into the center of the fold. Which is an interesting move since the center of the phone has that plastic folding screen. Which I don't think would be super great for letting heat out, but I guess time will tell. To get the battery out Google is still trying to use a non-functional plastic battery adhesive slicer. Which is like trying to cut down a Redwood with dental floss, and I think next year they should come up with a better method to remove the battery. Among you know other minor structural adjustments. Grab a prism screen protector from dbrand down in the description. Hit that subscribe button if you want to see if Google fixes this thing next year, and thanks a ton for watching. I'll see you around.