Controversy surrounds Google’s US trade-in prices. How about Europe?

But are Google’s trade-in prices in Europe really as low as mentioned by PhoneArena? We decided to investigate this, particularly in the Netherlands, our reference country. Interestingly, Google never sold the Pixel Fold in the Netherlands, so it is impossible to trade in this specific device. For context, Google’s trade-in program in Europe is operated by PCS Wireless, which handles the process of sending out trade-in kits Google’s behalf., validating returned devices, and reselling them.

To further explore, we compared Google’s trade-in values with those offered by the Dutch operator KPN, whose trade-in scheme is run by French company Recommerce. Both Google and KPN offer additional bonuses—funded by Google—when a customer trades in a device and purchases a new Google Pixel. In our case, we simulated buying a new Google Pixel 9 (256GB) and offered three devices for trade-in: a used Apple iPhone 13 (128GB), a Samsung Galaxy S23 (128GB), and a Google Pixel 8 (128GB).

Conclusion

In our sample, Google’s trade-in prices were lower than KPN’s in two out of three cases. However, the difference is not as significant as in PhoneArena’s findings in the US. Notably, Google is quite generous when it comes to the Apple iPhone, offering a 10% higher trade-in value compared to KPN. For the other two devices, KPN offers an average of 6.5% higher trade-in value.