Google Pixel And Pixel XL Display Freezing Joins List Of Growing Hardware Problems

In some instances, the device freezing lasts for just a few seconds, which can be a minor annoyance. However, some report that their devices are locking up for as long as several minutes. A common thread among many of the members that have posted in Google’s product support forum is that they have the Life 360 app (which keeps you in close contact with friends and family) installed. In fact, some users have reported that uninstalling the app restored their Pixel smartphones to proper working order.

However, there are still those that have uninstalled the app and are still having problems, or those that never installed Life 360 and experience frequent freezing. One user, Bula Bone, writes:

I would get freezing multiple times a day and I'm on my 3rd pixel xl from Verizon... after seeing this thread, all I did was factory reset and not re-install Life 360... now I’m on my 4th day with no freezing.... but I still use google maps everyday with navigation & weather widget which both hit the GPS.  So, if its GPS that is bad... shouldn’t it freeze no matter what GPS app I use?

VA-Jeep reports that Pixel lockups have been a frequent occurrence even without Life 360:

I've never had Life 360 on my device and it locks up constantly.  Only did it twice before the 7.1.1 update.  After the update it locks up after every restart, in poor coverage areas or at random times.  Sometimes if I turn on the Wi-Fi, there really is no specific recipe for what makes it happen.  After 3 calls to support which were extremely painful (call center is offshored it sounds like and reading from a script) I finally got a replacement device sent to me today. 

Yet another, Dave Renouf, had an interesting theory about what could be going on:

I had the freezing issue and figured out that when the display was cold, the touch screen stop working until it warmed up. The phone looks unresponsive but it's really just the screen that's dead, all other button work. If you wait for the phone to warm up it work again. My phone got replace and now it's fine.

The latest bout of device freezing joins other Google Pixel maladies including camera freezing and problems with audio popping/clicking. On that last issue, Google’s product team is working behind the scenes on the issue. Orrin, the Pixel Community Manager, posted a week ago that “the team is aware and continuing to investigate” and that he will “post an update as soon as there is some meaningful info” to distribute.