Upgrading to Pixel 10? Here's How to Prepare Your Old Pixel for Trade-In

CNET

4 hours ago

Google just announced the Pixel 10 family, and there are several preorder offers available right now. If you're looking for an even better deal on these new phones, you might want to consider trading in your old Pixel for maximum savings.
The Pixel 10 family consists of the base Pixel 10 base model, two Pro models, and the latest Pro Fold, all of which feature the latest Tensor G5 Processor, Qi2 wireless charging and of course, new AI tricks. We went hands-on with the new phones and they made a good impression.
If you're ready to throw money at Google for a Pixel 10 and trade in your old phone, you'll want to make sure you've prepared it properly before you send it off. In some instances, if you don't check all of the right boxes for trading in your phone, its trade-in value could be reduced or you could be sending your phone out with a ton of personal information still left on it.
Below, we'll go over the steps to ensure a seamless trade-in experience when your new Pixel 10 arrives.
For more, we've wrangled all of the best Pixel 10 cases you can buy right now.
Turn off the activation lock on your Pixel phone
Most places you'll trade in your phone will just require a factory reset to qualify for the maximum trade-in value, but some will want you to remove the activation lock from your phone first, which essentially means that you need to remove the device from your Google account before resetting it. I should know; AT&T took off over $400 of the value because I didn't do this to my Pixel 7 Pro when I upgraded to the 8 Pro a few years back. So just take the extra two minutes to do this first.
You can remove your Google account either from your phone or via your online account.
From your Pixel settings
You can easily remove the activation lock right from your Pixel phone. Here's how:
On your phone, navigate to Settings. Tap Passwords & accounts. Tap your Google account. Tap Remove account.
Repeat this process for any additional accounts you need to remove.
From the web
Alternatively, you can head to your online Google account webpage and handle the removal from there. Here's how.
From a web browser, navigate to your Google account. Select Security on the left sidebar. Locate the Your devices box, and select Manage all devices. Select the device you're trading in. Select Sign out.
Factory reset your Pixel
With the activation lock removed, you're now free to factory reset your device as you normally would.
On your Pixel, navigate to Settings. Tap System. Tap Reset options. Tap Erase all data (factory reset).
That's it. Now you're ready to send in your trade-in without any hiccups that could drop the value you get for your phone.
For more, check out a closer look at the Pixel 10 Pro XL's camera performance.