Pixel 3's Night Sight brightens tough low-light scenes

The camera on the Pixel 3 and 3 XL is already fantastic, but with Google's latest over-the-air update available today, it gets even better.

Known as Night Sight, Google first touted the feature during the Pixel 3's original launch in October. The update lets you take better low-light pictures without a harsh, unnatural flash. To see just how well the feature works, check out the following pictures.

Each pair of photos will start with a picture taken with the camera's default settings (pictured here, for example), and is then followed by the same image with Night Sight on.  

Here, the Salesforce building is brightened up with Night Sight.

Here, taking a regular photo of Stella the cat in near darkness yields a black image. (Trust us, she's there.)

With Night Sight on, Stella appears!

In this dimly lit room, you can hardly make out the book titles.

With Night Sight on, you can view the book spines much easier.    

Click through for more photos of Night Sight. 

A photo taken at dusk with Night Sight off.

A photo taken at dusk with Night Sight on.  

The same photo at dusk taken on the iPhone XS for comparison.

A photo taken at the park with Night Sight off.

A photo taken at the park with Night Sight on.  

The same photo taken at the park with the iPhone XS.

A dark street corner taken without Night Sight.

A dark street corner taken with Night Sight.  

A dark street corner taken with the iPhone XS.

The next few photos are taken with a Pixel 3 loaded with a version of Night Sight available through a modified APK, before Google officially rolled out the update. (BTW, CNET doesn't recommend downloading APKs if it's not from the original developer, in this case, Google.)