The St James' Park side showed plenty of industry against the attacking verve of the Premier League champions, but they were ultimately undone as a first-half strike from David Silva and substitute Sergio Aguero's injury-time finish gave Manuel Pellegrini's men the points.
Newcastle had their chances too, and they could have gained more from the game had substitute Ayoze Perez not seen a late effort deflected wide, while Yoan Gouffran fired straight at Joe Hart in the Manchester City goal when he perhaps should have done better just after the restart.
However, despite failing to come away with anything, Pardew was satisfied enough with his side's efforts.
"It was frustrating for us," he told Sky Sports.
"In the second half we pushed on and brought some younger players on. It was a shame we couldn't get the equaliser [before Aguero's late second for City]. I felt that if we got that we could even have gone on to win it.
"We were brave and went for it, but we pushed and you know with their [City's] quality they can get that second goal.
"We have goals in the squad. We were a bit unfortunate today not to get something from the game but it was a real solid performance from the team against real quality. In the end, the quality just won."
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