Buy Note 8 on Amazon
Buy Pixel 3a on Amazon
I recently switched from a Note 8 to a Pixel 3a. In a previous post, I described my experience using an older original Pixel XL for a week instead of my Note 8. Well, I decided I liked it enough to buy the Pixel 3a. Through a special deal I was able to do this and basically break even by selling the Note 8. It was a very smooth transition to the Pixel 3a and I haven't found I've missed the Note 8 much at all. There are a few things that are better on each phone. Read on to find out what those are.
Battery charging and wireless charging
Although I haven't done actual time comparison, it seems the fast charging on the Pixel 3a is a bit faster than the fast charging on the Note 8 when using a regular wired charger.
I haven't particularly missed the wireless charging on the Note 8 but it would have been a nice feature to have on the Pixel 3a.
Weight and size of the phone
Note 8 in hand 
Pixel 3a in hand
The clear winner here (for me) is the Pixel 3a. The Pixel 3a is lighter and smaller which really makes a difference if you're holding the phone for longer periods of time for instance when watching a video or reading a long article or even just regular navigation around the phone. It also makes a difference that the Pixel 3 is less wide and fits in your hand generally better which makes reaching buttons and navigating around the screen with your thumb much more convenient. It's very noticeable in my opinion and it's a big plus for the Pixel 3a.
As far as fitting in more information on the screen, the Note 8 obviously wins and I'll be honest in saying that I sometimes miss all that screen real estate. But, in my opinion, the extra weight and overall cumbersome size of the Note 8 doesn't make it worth it. If I really get desperate for more screen real estate, I simply move to a computer or a tablet.
The S Pen
I have come across a few situations where I did miss the S Pen on the Note 8. This is mainly when I want to mark a part of the screen or mark up a picture in some way. I also miss being able to highlight and copy only part of a text message. That is really convenient on the Note 8.
Brightness of screen
The Pixel 3a appears to be just slightly brighter at full brightness. That was a little surprising. Brightness is one of my key criteria for selecting a phone.
Battery
Battery life actually seems similar between the two phones. This might be a little surprising as the battery on the Note 8 is a bit bigger (3300mAh on the Note 8 versus 3000 mAh on the Pixel 3a). I haven't done extensive testing or much of any testing but the time at which I need to charge the phone again seems about the same on both phones, i.e. they both easily get me through the day with moderate use.
The Note 8 does have a maximum power saving mode which is really nice when the phone has very low battery and you won't be able to get to a charger for a while. The Pixel 3a has a battery saving mode but it’s probably more equivalent to the medium power saving mode on the Note 8, not the maximum power saving mode on the Note 8.
Navigation buttons
One thing I haven't liked on the Pixel 3a is the location of the soft navigation bar back button on the left side. This is easily fixed by an app called Custom Navigation Bar which contains a few other nice features. You can find it here. Just be warned that it does require some extra work (using your Pixel 3a connected to your PC and ADB) to get it to work.
Fingerprint sensor placement
I certainly don't need to say a whole lot about this as everyone knows that the fingerprint sensor placement on the Note 8 is not good at all. I simply can't unlock the phone with my fingerprint on the Note 8 on the first try using my finger very often at all. On the Pixel 3a, it unlocks on the first try every time.
Speed of fingerprint sensor
It was difficult to compare the speed because it's difficult to make sure my finger is in the right place on the Note 8 every time. When I was able to make a fairly decent comparison, the speed for the unlock seems very similar. I really didn't notice any difference.
Active Edge (Pixel 3a only)
Active Edge on the Pixel 3a is a pretty useful feature although certainly not deal-breaking if deciding between these two phones. For those who are not familiar with that feature, Active Edge allows you to squeeze towards the bottom sides of the Pixel 3a to start Google Assistant. This is nice, especially when you'd rather not say ‘OK Google’ into your phone.
Overall speed
There's no doubt that the Note 8 is going to win in this category with a flagship processor versus a mid-range processor on the Pixel 3a but it's really not by that much. The consistency of speed is extremely good on the Pixel 3a. That is, there are hardly any hesitations in normal operations on the phone. But I do wish the Pixel 3a was as fast as the Note 8.
Micro SD card expansion
This is one thing I've missed on the Pixel 3a. The Note 8 has a micro SD card slot that I used for extra storage (usually another 64GB at least). The Pixel 3a has 64 GB of internal storage and no option for a micro SD card. I've filled up the 64 GB pretty quickly. My music files are taking up a lot of that space. What's worse is that I thought I'd be able to use a USB on-the-go (OTG) flash drive to store movies from Amazon Prime or Netflix. But those apps don't recognize a USB OTG storage device. There's a 3rd party app that I believe allows this for $3.99 but I'm not sure I want to try it.
The missing micro SD card slot wasn't a deal breaker when switching to the Pixel 3a, but it was something I knew I was going to miss. I have already found myself having to manage storage space on the Pixel 3a using the built-in Files app.
Speakers
The Pixel 3a actually seems to have much louder speakers than the Note 8. It also has stereo speakers even though one of the speakers faces down instead of front facing. In general, I really like the Pixel 3a speakers more than the speakers on the Note 8.
No duplicate apps!
I definitely like simplifying my experience on my phone so that I don't spend as much time on my phone. Having no duplicate apps on the Pixel 3a is definitely a plus. I don't have to decide on which calendar app or contacts app or mail app or text messaging app to use. And although there are some nice features in the Samsung versions of these apps, I simply don't see enough added value to be missing them at all.
Camera
There have been a lot of reviews of the Pixel cameras and how good they are, so I won't go into a detailed review. My usage of the cameras is certainly not in a professional sense but I do like a good camera on my phone. The Samsung camera is very good but I do like the pictures taken with the Pixel 3a better. The one thing I wouldn't mind having on the Pixel 3a that the Note 8 has is the 2x zoom on the rear camera. Surprisingly, though, the Pixel 3a does better with digital zoom than most phones I've had in the past.
Night Sight (Pixel 3a camera)
Same photo on Note 8 
Pixel 3a night sight photo
I thought I would use the night sight feature on the Pixel more but haven't actually used it that much (yet!). I like that it's there when I finally do need to use it and the pictures taken with the night sight feature are really quite impressive. Above is a picture that was taken in almost complete darkness in a closet with the Pixel 3a (right) and Note 8 (left). The difference is night and day (pun intended). With my naked eye, I really couldn't see anything at all.
Camera settings
One thing I like more on the Pixel 3a is simply that the camera settings are simple. They seem to have selected the most useful features and kept them while the Samsung camera has many features I never use.
Camera playground feature (Pixel 3a only)
Playground Pixel feature
I have a small video showing the playground feature which is surprisingly fun even for someone like me that doesn’t get into extra features like these very much. The video is here.
Notification LED on the Note 8
My girlfriend has the Pixel 3a also and one thing we both miss is the notification LED that Samsung puts on their phones. This allows us to see if we have some notifications that we missed when we weren't looking at our phones. I have to say, though, that sometimes it's nice not having a notification LED constantly blinking at me when I have missed notifications seeing as I almost always have some missed notifications.
Samsung Pay
I have missed Samsung Pay only a little. There very few stores where Samsung Pay works and Google Pay doesn’t and let’s face it, it’s not that hard to pull out the credit card when it doesn’t work. I was actually a little surprised at how many places Google Pay works.
Face unlock and Iris unlock on Note 8
I simply don't miss these two unlock features on the Pixel 3a. There's not much else I can say about it. It worked fine on the Note 8 but I simply don’t need it. I might even say that the face unlock on the Note 8 was annoying sometimes when I wanted to see the lock screen and the phone unlocked too quick to see it.
Size of bezels and curved screen
I'm one of those people that actually like some bezels so that I have a place to put my fingers without entering something on the screen. And I definitely am a fan of flat screens instead of curved screens. So the Pixel 3a wins out over the Note 8 on both these things for me.
Also, one thing I've never seen anyone else mention is that when you are pulling down the notification shade with your right thumb on the Note 8, you are putting fingerprints over the front-facing camera and iris sensor, not to mention that you have to reach pretty high up with your thumb in order to even do it. On the Pixel 3a, there is a proximity and ambient light sensor that you might put fingerprints on when you pull down the notification shade, but it actually isn't likely because of its placement.
Now Playing feature (Pixel 3a only)
A new feature for Pixel phones is the now playing feature that constantly listens for music and shows you what music is playing around you on the lock screen. I really like this feature and use it more than I thought I would. It even saves a history of songs that have been identified in case you want to go back a few songs to find out what you might have heard earlier. I just wish that it would wrap information on the lock screen. More often than not, you can't see the entire name of the artist. This is a definite plus over the Note 8.
Bixby and Google Assistant
Don't get me started on Bixby. I can appreciate what Samsung is trying to do, but they've missed the boat on this functionality. All I need and want is Google's assistant. Having the extra button for Bixby is distracting at the least. And the Bixby feature in the camera is not needed (although you can't have the Google Lens in the Samsung camera I don't think). Google Lens in the camera works great on the Pixel 3a. And, of course, Google Assistant does everything I need also on the Pixel 3a.
Conclusion
I definitely think I made the right decision to switch to the Pixel 3a from the Note 8. Of course, a lot of these things are personal preferences. And really my most ideal phone would probably be the faster Pixel 3 128 GB (or 64GB with micro SD card slot) with a headphone jack. But since the Pixel 3 doesn't have a headphone jack, I'm pretty happy with the Pixel 3a.
Buy Note 8 on Amazon
Buy Pixel 3a on Amazon