Gizmodo

Now you don’t have to rely on Siri to open your HomeKit-compatible smart lock. Schlage’s Encode Plus just launched with support for Apple’s Home Key feature in iOS 15, which means you can tap your iPhone or Apple Watch to your lock to open it.

Many gamers experienced the blood and gore of Mortal Kombat on an arcade machine long before the infamous title was ported to home consoles, but Arcade1Up is bringing the best of both worlds to an updated version of its miniature Mortal Kombat cabinet. The new machine is introducing online multiplayer so players can …Read more...

You probably know TCL for its value-friendly TVs and smartphones, but now you might come across the company the next time you’re searching for a new laptop.

There are countless factors that can affect the performance of a home’s wifi network, from building materials to running appliances to the location of the devices trying to connect to it. TP-Link’s solution to that last problem is a new Wi-Fi 6E router with four motorized antennas that independently move and rotate to…Read more...

You can be as diligent as possible about scrubbing your hardware floors, but if you don’t regularly clean your mop, you’re really just spreading dirt and germs all over your home. And if you don’t clean your mop, you’re probably even less likely to clean your robot vacuum. Now one robot vacuum company, Roborock, has…Read more...

You might not think of TP-Link when it comes to the smart home—after all, other brands are splashier and offer more exciting gadgets. But the company known best for its routers also has a Kasa lineup of connected home accessories, which is a good deal and well-reviewed, too. I’m a big fan of TP-Link’s Kasa Spot Cam,…Read more...

Although many companies offer wireless headphones specifically designed for gamers, Bluetooth is still a problem. It’s not a perfect way to stream audio to begin with, but adds even more issues while gaming because it introduces a subtle delay between what’s happening on screen and what’s being heard. JBL’s new…Read more...

Chinese state media outlet Xinhua released an English-language parody video on Tuesday taking aim at U.S. and British fears about tech giant Huawei. And it’s one of those things that’s both extremely awkward and incredibly fascinating.Read more...

Anti-vaccine activists have spent the past few days spreading lies about Betty White, the beloved actress who passed away at 99 years old on Dec. 31. But contrary to internet rumors, Betty White didn’t die after getting a covid-19 booster shot.

Samsung was so focused on its latest foldable phones last fall it seems there wasn’t room (or more likely the resources) for a refresh of its flagship Galaxy S phone line. But it’s a new year and now Samsung is kicking things off with the launch of the Galaxy S21 FE.

LG is updating its fleet of OLED TVs at CES, and while the underlying technology remains mostly the same, the company’s 2022 lineup has gained some enticing enhancements.

Elizabeth Holmes, the founder of blood testing startup Theranos, will go down in history as the female entrepreneur who took Silicon Valley by storm, talked a smooth game, and left financial disaster in her wake. On Monday, a California jury added another line to biography: a company executive guilty of so many…Read more...

Jabra’s Active wireless earbud lineup has always been one of my favorites for workouts. They’re actually impervious to sweat, they fit perfectly, and the smartphone app allows for plenty of customization, which is great for people like me who love a bass-forward EQ for running outside. Now Jabra has a new addition to…Read more...

We were impressed with Netgear’s WiFi 6E Nighthawk RAXE500 router, but it’s also $600 and is meant for larger houses. Now Netgear has a cheaper option, the $400 Nighthawk RAXE300, which is designed for smaller homes that still need ultra-fast (and futureproofed) wifi.

OnePlus usually debuts its new flagship phone in the spring. But this year, the company is switching it up: OnePlus is revealing the new One Plus 10 Pro in Las Vegas this week prior to the flagship’s official launch in China on Jan. 11.Read more...

Whatever the post-covid world looks like, most of us are going to be a little more conscious about germs, which makes Moen’s new smart faucets a perfectly timed upgrade. The latest version allows the faucets to be operated using just hand gestures, eliminating the need for a handle altogether.Read more...

Video game consoles have evolved into multi-purpose entertainment hubs, letting gamers stream movies, chat with friends, and do far more than just play games. The 32-year-old Nintendo Game Boy, by comparison, was strictly a game machine—at least until Sebastian Staacks found a way to expand its capabilities, including…Read more...

Composer and lyricist Marc Shaiman is unquestionably talented. Over his long career, he helped create John Waters’ long-running musical Hairspray, scored films like Sleepless in Seattle and Mary Poppins Returns, and has won a Grammy, an Emmy, and a Tony for his work (meaning he only needs an Oscar to complete his…Read more...

Apple has debuted a pretty intense commercial to pump up the new Apple Watch Series 7 with LTE. I must admit, when I first saw it, I was left almost speechless, my mouth slightly agape. The first thing I managed to think of a few seconds afterwards was, “Well, that was mighty unsettling.”

This year, you’re going to hear a ton about the new Matter smart home standard. It’s not technically live yet, and the first compatible devices are just starting to roll in this week for CES 2022. But in preparation for the onslaught of marketing and movement around the new connect-it-all smart home platform, Comcast…Read more...

A lot of people complain about how dark and gritty the Star Trek franchise has become nowadays, having moved away from the idealistic future presented by the original series and The Next Generation. But the first time Star Trek revealed the shadows hiding in the cracks of that future, the result was one of its most…Read more...

The set-up for Claude Cloutier’s animated short Bad Seeds is very simple: two hungry carnivorous plants wage a turf war over the flies that enter their shared airspace. But the execution—a surreal series of gorgeous drawings that change as the battle heats up—is simply brilliant (and often hilarious). Check it out!Read more...

Acer’s place in the laptop industry is a strange one. For a long time, the brand was associated with budget laptops and often shared design elements with its Taiwanese rival, Asus. Recently, though, the company seems to have found its niche, and in an unlikely place.

The last season of Doctor Who, subtitled Flux, had more downs than it did ups—a mess of plot threads, unconvincing resolutions, and nebulously high stakes that never really lived up to the series’ attempt to return to a serialized story format. Thankfully, its return on New Years Day was pretty much the exact opposite.

If you’ve ever attempted to color your hair using a home kit, you get why salons charge an arm and a leg for good color. In an attempt to take the mess out of the process and make the results a little more salon-quality, L’Oréal has created a handheld device that sounds as easy to use as simply combing your hair.Read more...

It’s no secret that we here on io9 love Hasbro’s Black Series of Star Wars toys. We write about them every chance we can, often in serious news breaking fashion, other times with heartfelt yearning, and even sometimes with silly adoration. Basically, if we can cover these 6-inch beauties, we will.Read more...

Of all the iPhone features Apple has upgraded over the years—from the camera to the screen to the software—the built-in speaker remains disappointing at best. A good pair of headphones solves that problem, but so does Scosche’s new BoomCanMS Portable Speaker, a tiny Bluetooth boombox that secures itself to modern…Read more...

Cobra Kai season four is now out in the world and it’s another exciting, surprise-filled ride through the world of The Karate Kid. Daniel LaRusso (Ralph Macchio) and Johnny Lawrence (William Zabka) have teamed up to take down Cobra Kai and its sensei, John Kreese (Martin Kove). Kreese has recruited his best friend…Read more...

Until batteries are capable of keeping our most power-hungry devices running for days on end, it’s a good idea to travel with a charger close at hand. And if your travels are primarily road trips, Scosche’s new AC-DC travel charger looks like a near-perfect option, allowing tablets and laptops to be charged from a…Read more...

When you think of the smart home, you think of obvious gadgets like lightbulbs, thermostats, and robotic appliances like vacuums. But there are decidedly less cool ways to smarten up your home that could actually help you save money and do some good for the environment.

Some time ago I came to feel, in a very literal way, the speed of semi-recent technological progress. My roommate—a gamer—had gotten it into his head, possibly via some other gamer, that ‘90s video games look best when played on ‘90s televisions. This led him to secure one on Craigslist, which led in turn to my…Read more...

It’s a gamer’s nightmare scenario, and one that happens all too often. You get back from work ready to unwind, and a roommate, spouse, or sibling is hogging your gaming desktop or laptop. Or, in an equally stressful scenario, someone is binging the entirety of Squid Game on the monitor or TV you use to gun down…Read more...

I didn’t think one of the coolest things at CES 2022 would be a remote. And yet, here we are. Thanks, Samsung. Seriously though, Samsung’s new remote is pretty damn neat.

Samsung is debuting new TVs at CES 2022, and some of them will let you play games from the cloud, no console required, with platforms you might have heard before: Google Stadia and Nvidia GeForce Now.

Apparently eager to shepherd us into a world where people proudly display their non-fungible tokens, or NFTs, on their smart TV screens, Samsung has announced that its 2022 TV lineup will include built-in support for browsing, purchasing, and showing off NFT art.Read more...

Last month, we looked back at 2021 somewhat fondly, recalling things we liked (or didn’t like), and things that surprised us. Now that 2022 has started, it’s time to look forward and think about what potentially exciting things are on the horizon for us to experience.

By all accounts, Netflix’s Cobra Kai sounds like a pretty awesome, if also utterly bonkers show. The follow up to the Karate Kid franchise dropped its fourth season on New Years Eve, continuing the adventures of Daniel LaRusso (Ralph Maccio), Johnny Lawrence (William Zabka), and their martial arts proteges. After the…Read more...

In the many prolonged months leading up to its release, No Time to Die was touted as the final outing for Daniel Craig’s tenure as James Bond. Since he first took the role in 2007's Casino Royale, Craig’s time with the character has been a fascinating one, and it was interesting to see how it would end for real this…Read more...

Airbnb is taking steps to tackle discrimination from hosts on its platform with a new update for guests who are residents of Oregon. Unfortunately, it seems like people in other states, and around the world, will just have to keep on fighting to be treated fairly on the platform.Read more...

Tens of thousands of people in the United Kingdom probably thought they had been especially good this past year when they saw their bank accounts on Christmas Day, all of which had more money than they expected. Alas, Santa Claus doesn’t have enough cash in his reserves to justify the roughly $176 million in payments,…Read more...

2021's been a not terribly great year and taken several talented folks from us, but it threw one final gut punch with the news of Betty White’s death on New Year’s Eve. Just a few weeks ahead of her much publicized 100th birthday, the vaunted actor passed away, leaving behind a pretty lengthy career spanning several…Read more...

It’s only a few weeks before Switch players can get their hands on Pokémon Legends: Arceus. The next big entry in the series is winding back the clock to the Hisui Region before it came to be known as Sinnoh, and tasks players with exploring the area to research the pocket monsters in their natural habitats.

For fans of the old superhero Miracleman, the last several years have been tumultuous. Created in 1954 by Mick Anglo and originally named Marvelman, the character’s been lost to time, even after his rights were eventually sold to Marvel back in 2009. It wasn’t clear if or when he’d return to the comics space, but this…Read more...

What better way to celebrate the start of 2022 than with some violence and a bald eagle? As the clock hit midnight for east coasters, James Gunn dropped a new trailer for Peacemaker, the spinoff of The Suicide Squad starring John Cena’s patriotic antihero. Rather than focusing on the titular character’s conflicted soulRead more...

No one really knows how to cure a hangover, a new roundup of scientific studies has found. The review found little good evidence for any one particular hangover cure, with existing studies generally being of low quality.

Amid a wave of in-person cancellations in recent weeks from big names ranging from Microsoft to Google and a surge of covid-19 cases caused by the omicron variant, CES 2022, the world’s biggest tech show, is cutting one day from its schedule.Read more...

Welcome back to Toy Aisle, io9's regular round up of all the cool toys we’ve found on the internet lately. This week we’re looking forward to 2022, mostly because there’s only a few more hours of 2021 left, making it very hard to release new toys this year. Check out what’s to come!

Scrutinizing Apple’s in-app payment system on the App Store is all the rage among government officials nowadays, with multiple countries taking cards in the matter. A new report claims that India’s competition authority has jumped on the Apple regulation bandwagon, too, a move that’ll no doubt bring more attention to…Read more...