Google Pixel 5 front

Credit: Robert Triggs / Android Authority

  • The Google Pixel 5 reportedly has unfixable volume issues.
  • Some users say the volume randomly drops while watching videos.
  • Others report that the phone has a tendency to get too loud and that the volume sliders don’t work.

Several Google Pixel 5 users are experiencing problems with the phone’s volume. They’ve taken to Reddit and Google’s official support forums saying that the Pixel 5’s volume controls are messed up.

There seem to be two distinct issues with the phone. Some users have noticed the volume keeps dropping randomly while playing videos, while others report that it gets too loud for things like notifications, screenshots, the camera shutter button, and other system sounds. The latter seems to be a more common issue and adjusting the volume sliders doesn’t help fix the problem.

“I first noticed this when I went to record a voice message in WhatsApp; touching the mic and releasing it both resulted in very loud sounds. I tried the same in the native messages app that came with the phone; while the sound is not nearly as obnoxious, it’s still inordinately loud, ignoring my volume settings. Perhaps the most obvious instance is the sound of the screenshot. These things are loud and do not care what I do with my volume sliders,” writes a disgruntled Pixel 5 user.

Apparently, the only way to turn down the phone’s volume is to set it on silent or vibrate. Factory resetting the device, as tried by some, also doesn’t help.

What does Google have to say?

The complaints about the Pixel 5’s volume issues have shot up in the last month or so. Users say they haven’t had any success with Google Support. However, a Google community specialist had this to say on the official forum thread:

With each new Pixel phone we work to improve volumes to make sure customers don’t miss important phone calls and notifications. On Pixel the settings for ringtones and notifications are tied together so these volume changes affect both of these settings. Thank you for your feedback about these settings and we will work to make improvements in future updates on Pixel 5.

The response is clearly lacking in that it does not really address the problems users are facing. We hope Google reaches out to affected Pixel 5 users just like it did for the phone’s screen gap issue.