The Verge

Cheater, I'd grumble between huffs as yet another e-bike rider casually skittered past me on a steep ascent. It's this purist attitude that, for years, has left me blind to one simple fact: electric mountain bikes are fun! My attitude adjustment came a few weeks ago, the very first time I rode an Amflow PX [...]

Food producer Taylor Farms released a statement on the Cyclospora outbreak Friday, confirming that it's "voluntarily removing all iceberg lettuce sourced from central Mexico from the US market." Reuters reports that, according to a source, Taylor Farms told customers like Yum Brands owner Taco Bell and the food distributor Sysco on Thursday to pull shredded [...]

Portable fans are one of the easiest ways to stay cool during the summer, and you don't have to spend much to find a decent one. If you're looking for something more versatile, though, Shark's ChillPill Personal Fan and Cooling System combines a rechargeable fan with a dry-touch evaporative mister in a design that can [...]

TikTok is starting to test an opt-in tool that scans for AI likenesses and lets creators report them to the company, as spotted by social media consultant Matt Navarra. The tool is initially being tested with "some" US creators, TikTok US spokesperson Zachary Kizer tells The Verge. YouTube has been working on a similar tool [...]

Pebble founder Eric Migicovsky says buyers of its new e-paper smartwatches should know what they're signing up for and trust Pebble to make things right if they run into issues, despite the short warranty. "I think the most important thing is trust," Migicovsky told me in an interview this week. "Do people trust the product [...]

Apple Music is more expensive now. In the US, an individual plan now costs $11.99 per month, a $1 bump up from the previous $10.99 price. A family plan now costs $19.99 per month, up from $16.99, and a student plan costs $6.99 per month, up from $5.99. Apple, in a statement to Music Business [...]

Apple is suing OpenAI. The complaint is readable and intense, as these things often are, though many experts seem to think many of the allegations are just the ways things are done. So what does Apple really want here, and why is it picking such a public fight with OpenAI? On this episode of The [...]

The Asus ROG Swift 32-inch 4K QD-OLED gaming monitor has almost everything I want in a high-end gaming monitor, most notably a QD-OLED panel for inky black levels and vivid colors that go beyond what's possible on an LCD screen. Amazon, Best Buy, and B&H Photo have this model on sale for $899.99 (usually $1,299.99). [...]

Leaker Evan Blass shared images of Samsung's redesigned Galaxy Z Fold 8 just days before the July 22nd launch event where Samsung is expected to officially announce the phone. The leaked images show a shorter, wider foldable matching earlier leaks of the Z Fold 8. They also reveal some of its specs, including a Qualcomm [...]

Are we living through a small car renaissance? There's the Slate Truck, Amble's dune buggy, and the Fiat Topolino, as well as a whole galaxy of kei cars and trucks from Japan that have their own built-in fan base. While microcar sales in the US are still as tiny as the vehicles themselves, there are [...]

Federal authorities have arrested a Florida man suspected of stealing at least $220,000 in crypto through malware-infected Steam games, as reported earlier by local news outlet Local10. In the complaint, officials accuse 21-year-old Zyaire Wilkins and co-conspirators of launching eight malware-embedded games from around May 2024 to February 2026, allowing them to infect about 8,000 [...]

Greenworks Tools has issued a recall for around 554,780 Kobalt-branded power tools designed for yard work because of a battery issue "posing a risk of serious injury from fire hazard." There have been 34 reports of the tool's batteries "producing smoke, sparking or catching fire while the batteries are inserted in the tool and charging [...]

Xbox is currently in a "reset" period that includes laying off around 3,200 employees over the next year, involving deep cuts at beloved studios like id Software and Obsidian Entertainment. Now, in an attempt to show that things are still running fine, the company has announced a slate of upcoming projects at Bethesda Game Studios [...]

This is Optimizer, a weekly newsletter sent from Verge senior reviewer Victoria Song that dissects and discusses the latest gizmos and potions that swear they're going to change your life. Opt in for Optimizer here. I was in the middle of writing a different Optimizer column this week when I learned that Pete Hegseth is [...]

Last year, Microsoft's 13-inch Surface Laptop quickly became one of my favorite thin-and-light Windows notebooks. At $900, it was easy to recommend to anyone wanting MacBook Air-like build quality and battery life on Windows - I even convinced my sister to buy one on sale. But that was last year. This year, thanks to RAMageddon, [...]

Trump Media, the company behind Truth Social, is selling Wall Street faster access to the "most market-moving" posts on the US President's social media platform. On Thursday, Trump Media announced plans to launch "Truth API," a licensed real time data feed for businesses that provides "the fastest access to Truth Social's most influential accounts." It [...]

The Trump administration is waging a culture war on science, and the latest salvo is in the form of a dry, bureaucratic proposal from the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) that could threaten the future of US science as we know it. The proposal would give political appointees unprecedented control over grant funding, the [...]

Amazon's upcoming God Of War show has hit a major snag - it's now on the hunt for a new Kratos, after an on-set injury put its current lead actor out of commission. Sons of Anarchy star Ryan Hurst was originally cast for the role in January, with Deadline reporting that four episodes of the [...]

Get ready for more AI characters in Fortnite. Developer Epic Games is going to let Fortnite creators publish experiences featuring characters with AI-powered voices starting on July 30th, and ahead of that launch, it's created 36 characters with "consistent voices and personas" that creators can use as NPCs. The characters include Fortnite staples like Agent [...]

Samsung's Frame is different from your average 4K TV. Its biggest selling point involves what it does when you aren't actively using it. It can display art, turning your living room into a gallery. The Frame has bezels that make it look like - you guessed it - framed art, and its matte finish can [...]

Netflix says roughly 300 titles on its platform used generative AI, most of which occurred in post-production. The streaming service revealed the news in its second-quarter earnings report released on Thursday, saying it's "increasingly leveraging these tools to deliver higher quality output more quickly and at a lower cost." It also provided some examples of [...]

CD sales are apparently going up, reportedly thanks to fans realizing they're an affordable way to support their favorite artists. According to a new report from research firm Luminate, 16.3 million CDs were sold in the first half of 2026 in the US, a 16 percent increase year-over-year. The growth in CD sales was driven [...]

Kalshi users betting on what President Donald Trump would say during his speeches were reportedly up against tough competition: the president's teleprompter operator. ABC News reports that federal investigators believe Gabriel Perez - Trump's teleprompter operator since 2016 - used inside information to make bets on Kalshi, a major prediction market platform that allows users [...]

New York Governor Kathy Hochul might have just signed a moratorium on new AI data centers in the state, but she's not against using the technology herself. During an interview with Bloomberg's Odd Lots podcast, Hochul said that her team is using "AI to analyze every single rule, regulation, [and] policy" to check for outdated [...]

Sometimes it feels like keeping your floors clean is one of those never-ending chores, which is why it's nice to have a versatile robot vacuum take it off your hands. The Ecovacs Deebot X11 robovac / mop hybrid is designed to do just that, and it's now $699 ($400 off) at Amazon and directly from [...]

Today, the European Union ordered Google to give its AI rivals greater access to Android, the open-source operating system that powers billions of devices worldwide. The demand is hardly surprising. It may look like a defeat on paper for Google, which has spent years resisting exactly this kind of access, but it is a regulatory [...]

Roblox is about to let people make games with AI right inside its mobile app, which could make a platform that's already filled with content of questionable quality feel even more overloaded. The company has embraced AI with open arms, including a preview of an ambitious take on AI world models similar to Google's Project [...]

Google is giving its AI note-taking app a new name. The company announced on Thursday that NotebookLM is becoming Gemini Notebook, but will remain a standalone app even as it integrates more deeply across Gemini and Google Search. Google first revealed Gemini Notebook - then called Project Tailwind - in May 2023 before widely releasing [...]

Splatoon Raiders' July 23rd launch day is almost here, so your window to preorder the physical version at a $10 discount is about to close. The digital version is $49.99, and so is the game on cartridge if you preorder at Walmart. Amazon previously honored the preorder discount, but it's selling the game at full [...]

The Tesla driver who fatally struck a woman after crashing into her home "manually overrode" the vehicle's Full Self-Driving (FSD) technology by pressing the gas pedal to 100 percent, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) confirmed in a preliminary report on Wednesday. After examining the car's electronic data, investigators found that the Tesla Model 3 [...]

The iPad Mini could get an OLED display upgrade as soon as October, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. It would be the most significant refresh for the Mini since its 2021 redesign. An OLED iPad Mini has been rumored for months now, with Gurman previously reporting last year that it will also come with a [...]

Google must give rival AI assistants and search engines greater access to key parts of Android and Google Search after the European Union ordered the company to comply with the bloc's digital antitrust rules. The two decisions, handed down Thursday, could weaken Google's control over two of the tech industry's most important platforms and have [...]

I stood before a hulking glass and brick structure in the heart of Fort Worth, Texas. Thousands gathered inside to see what had been billed as "the future of policing in the digital age." As press, I was prohibited from entering, but from a number of nearby locations, I met with attendees who told me [...]

OnePlus has confirmed what industry observers have long expected: it's quitting the US and European markets, and will no longer launch new products in either region. Parent company Oppo promises that it will honor existing support and warranty agreements, with devices transitioning to its ColorOS for future updates. "Software updates and after-sale support will be [...]

Skullcandy announced a new version of its Crusher wireless headphones today featuring a few of Bose's audio technologies including its QuietControl ANC and head-tracking spatial audio. The Crusher headphone line differentiates itself from the competition through the use of both full-range and dedicated bass drivers in each ear cup to boost deeper frequencies. Skullcandy admits [...]

With storage and memory prices still at an all-time high, we're happy to tell you about a solid deal on a good laptop when we find one, rare as they are. Best Buy is selling the HP OmniBook X Flip 2 in 1 for $999.99 (usually $1,649.99) with an Intel Core 7 Ultra CPU, 16GB [...]

An AppleCare Plus subscription for a Mac or iPad will cost more soon, with prices going up by $0.50 per month or $5 per year for new sign-ups while remaining the same for existing subscribers, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. Gurman says that under the new AppleCare Plus pricing, "a plan for a new 13-inch [...]

Valve has been incredibly friendly to customers who need repairs - which is why it was so surprising to hear that Valve was already discontinuing the battery for the Steam Deck LCD handheld. It would have meant you could no longer just buy a battery from iFixit and install it yourself. Why would Valve stop [...]

The Elon Musk-owned xAI is suing a South Carolina man who allegedly used the company's Grok AI chatbot to generate child sexual abuse material (CSAM). In a lawsuit reported earlier by Reuters, xAI claims Terry Wayne Harwood "knowingly and intentionally used Grok to circumvent safeguards, alter nonconsensual images, and generate and distribute CSAM," breaching the [...]

The Federal Communications Commission will vote next month on whether a single company can own broadcast stations that reach more than 39 percent of US TV households. In a Breitbart op-ed on Wednesday, Republican Chair Brendan Carr announced an August 6th vote to end the national ownership cap rule, which was intended to prevent one [...]

Roblox will be shutting down Roblox Connect, its video calling service introduced in 2023. Roblox Connect let you video chat with other people using your Roblox avatar, which would be able to mimic the movements you were making in real life. You could also run around with people on the call in a shared virtual [...]

This weekend, cinephiles across the world will march to their local theaters to feast their eyes on Christopher Nolan's new adaptation of The Odyssey. It's on track to rake in anywhere between $80-$100 million in just a few days. People are clearly excited to see how Nolan uses cutting-edge filmmaking tech to make the Homeric [...]

Bryan, a food broker from Michigan, wasn't sure if he'd be able to make it to urgent care in time. He started feeling off on Thursday, and by Saturday, he was having to use the bathroom every 15 to 30 minutes. "It's no joke about the explosive diarrhea," Bryan, who asked that his last name [...]

A new teaser for Google's upcoming Pixel 11 lineup reveals that the phones will feature some kind of glowing orb on the camera bar, as reported by 9to5Google. Google's store page for the Pixel 11 has a short video that shows the glowing, color-shifting orb to the one side of the camera bar. The store [...]

Suno data obtained in a hacking incident has exposed that the AI music generator was trained by scraping millions of songs and lyrics from online audio platforms, including YouTube Music, Deezer, and Genius, 404 Media reports. Given that Suno has avoided revealing what's in its training datasets and how they were acquired, this a rare [...]

Lucid Motors found itself in a tough bind this week, fending off bankruptcy rumors and watching its stock price plunge as a result. The company quickly denied the report, calling it "completely false" and pointing to its available free cash flow as evidence that it has enough runway to operate into next year. But despite [...]

Netflix just can't let Stranger Things go. Since the final episode aired on New Year's Eve there's been a behind-the-scenes documentary, an animated series that expands the story, and now, on the 10th anniversary of the show's original release, Netflix has released a new version of the show's first season. The episodes have all been [...]

Samsung gave a sneak peek of the "brand new shape" for its upcoming Galaxy Z Fold 8 in a new teaser for Spider-Man: Brand New Day. The video includes a few shots of Spidey taking a foldable phone off a 3D printer and opening it book-style, but each shot is heavily obscured by lens flares. [...]

OpenAI is finally releasing some hardware. No, it isn't the mysterious AI-powered device the company is developing with former Apple designer Jony Ive, a project already tangled up in a messy lawsuit. Instead, it's a product designed to be used with its coding platform, Codex. The device, a square-shaped block of buttons called Codex Micro, [...]

The US is getting closer to observing daylight saving time year-round. On Tuesday, the House advanced the Sunshine Protection Act on a 308 to 117 vote, which would turn clocks one hour ahead permanently, as reported by CBS News. President Donald Trump wrote on Truth Social in May that the bill would save the "hundreds [...]