Google excludes Pixel 8, Pixel 7, & Pixel 6 from idle battery drain fix

For months, Pixel owners have been hoping Google would squash a frustrating idle battery drain bug that appeared after the March 2026 update. While the company now says it has fixed the issue for several recent Pixel models, its latest update also reveals who isn’t getting the fix.

In a new comment on the public Issue Tracker, Google says the fix has been included in the July software release for the Pixel 9, Pixel 9 Pro, Pixel 9 Pro XL, Pixel 10, Pixel 10 Pro, Pixel 10 Pro XL, and Pixel 10a. Pixel 8a and Pixel 9a owners aren’t being left out entirely, but they’ll have to wait until the September Quarterly Platform Release (QPR).

Conspicuously absent, however, are the Pixel 8, Pixel 8 Pro, Pixel 7, Pixel 7 Pro, Pixel 7a, Pixel 6, Pixel 6 Pro, and Pixel 6a.

That’s notable because the issue was never limited to Google’s latest phones. Although it was originally reported by a Pixel 9 Pro XL owner, hundreds of comments on Google’s Issue Tracker eventually pointed to a much broader problem. Users across the older Pixel 6, Pixel 7, and Pixel 8 families described unusually high battery drain while their devices sat idle, with some sharing logs that suggested repeated GNSS and hardware interrupt activity was preventing affected phones from entering Deep Doze.

Google hasn’t explained why only certain devices are receiving the fix. The company’s comment simply lists the supported models, with no mention of older Pixels or whether they’re unaffected, require a different fix, or are still under investigation.

That uncertainty is already frustrating users, because it doesn’t explain why Google’s official fix appears to exclude several affected Pixel generations. To make matters more confusing, Google’s July Pixel update changelog doesn’t mention any idle battery drain fix, leaving the Issue Tracker comment as the only indication that one has been deployed.

Whether Google intends to expand the fix to older Pixels remains unclear. Given the number of reports involving the Pixel 6, Pixel 7, and Pixel 8 series, users of those devices will likely be watching future updates closely for any sign that they’re next in line.