The Verge

In September, Donald Trump claimed that "the United States is getting a tremendous fee" for brokering the TikTok deal. Now sources tell the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times that fee is expected to be in the range of $10 billion. The money is supposedly being paid by new investors, including Oracle and [...]

According to Reuters, Meta is looking to offset spending on AI and data centers with a massive round of layoffs. Sources familiar with the matter say the company could lay off as much as 20 percent of its staff, eliminating roughly 15,800 positions. That would be the largest series of layoffs at the company since [...]

Happy Saturday, all! This week, we found a number of deals that should help you unwind and relax over the next few days (and beyond). If you're planning to stream the Oscars on Sunday, there's still time to take advantage of a great deal on Hulu and Disney Plus, as well as Google's latest 4K [...]

Though it was weird to see the Golden Globes partner with Polymarket for its most recent awards show, the collaboration wasn't shocking given the way that people have begun using prediction markets to gamble on basically anything. Prediction markets are being used to bet on everything from when wars might break out to who will [...]

You may recognize Jonathan Djob Nkondo's work from animated projects like the surreal sci-fi series Scavengers Reign or the recent Gorillaz short film The Mountain, The Moon Cave and The Sad God. But before that the French artist and animator made self-published comics that depicted strange alien worlds and future societies. Now he's revisiting that [...]

The Cetra Open Wireless aren't like most other gaming earbuds. They're large, with an open-style design that rests just outside of your ears, letting game audio mix with sounds in your environment. These allow for immersion, but only if your environment is quiet enough. And turning them up might let those nearby hear what you're [...]

"Someone might be watching everything I'm doing on my screen," I tell myself in public. Even when I'm doing nothing of consequence - just making my little Wordle guesses - there's a sense of unease that stays with me. It's never bothered me too much, and I generally save the sensitive stuff like banking for [...]

I just got back from the GDC Festival of Gaming, a big industry-focused event in San Francisco that was formerly known as the Game Developers Conference. While the show is mostly about educational sessions and networking opportunities for working developers, there were also a bunch of games that I got to play. Here are some [...]

Hi, friends! Welcome to Installer No. 119, your guide to the best and Verge-iest stuff in the world. (If you're new here, welcome, hope your agents are well, and also you can read all the old editions at the Installer homepage.) This week, I've been reading about Pixar's future and flight MH370 and sports gambling [...]

Some European retailers have stopped selling certain headphones after an EU-funded study found that they contained hormone-disrupting chemicals. The study included leading brands such as Apple, Beats, Samsung, Bose, JBL, and Sennheiser. Online stores Bol.com, Coolblue, and Mediamarkt didn't respond to inquiries from The Verge about which headphones they pulled, but local news outlets report [...]

The Live Nation-Ticketmaster trial is back on. Dozens of states are expected to move forward with their claims against the company's alleged concert industry monopoly beginning on Monday, following a brief hearing on Friday. The Justice Department and a handful of states have accepted settlements with the company, but the majority of the 40 state [...]

Spotify Premium users in New Zealand will be the first to experience the service's latest personalization feature. The company is letting users view and make changes to their Taste Profile directly. If your algorithm is serving up too much Bieber, you can politely tell the algorithm to ease up. Beta testers will be able to [...]

Xbox is getting ready to launch its Gaming Copilot AI assistant on "current-generation consoles" this year, according to a report from GamesRadar. Sonali Yadav, Xbox's product manager for gaming AI, revealed the news during a panel at the Game Developers Conference (GDC), adding that the company will also add the assistant to "more services that [...]

Where's the Trump phone? We're going to keep talking about it every week. This week, I wanted to see how Trump Mobile stacks up to its conservative carrier competition. Trump Mobile isn't unique. I mean, it is in some pretty specific senses - it's not every day the president's family launches a phone company while [...]

It's only been a year since Digg founder Kevin Rose, Reddit cofounder Alexis Ohanian, and a few others announced the link-sharing site would relaunch, promising a "social discovery built by communities, not by algorithms." Now, two months after opening its Reddit-like platform to the public, Digg is announcing a "hard reset" that's shutting down operations [...]

Instagram will no longer support end-to-end encrypted messages starting May 8th. In a statement to The Verge, Meta spokesperson Dina El-Kassaby Luce says the platform is discontinuing the feature because "very few people" were using E2EE in their DMs. Instagram has begun notifying impacted users about the change inside its app, and has also posted [...]

I'm not entirely sure why the Pixel 10A exists. Google hasn't upgraded the chipset, cameras, or battery in the new phone, and the tweaks it's made elsewhere are minimal at best. The flatter camera island is good, I guess! In one sense this isn't a big problem: The Pixel 9A is an excellent device, and [...]

Mobile gaming has come a long way over the course of the last decade or so, but we all know that smartphones simply can't match the visceral, tactile feel you get while playing with a dedicated controller. Luckily, Backbone makes some excellent mobile options - including last year's Backbone Pro, which is on sale at [...]

Adobe says it will pay $75 million to resolve a lawsuit filed by the US government alleging that the creative software giant harmed consumers by making its subscriptions intentionally hard to cancel and concealing termination fees. The payment aims to resolve the complaint raised in June 2024, in which the US Justice Department accused Adobe [...]

If you've ever wanted more control over what goes into your ice cream, the Ninja Creami 5in1 Ice Cream Maker makes it easy. The ice cream maker lets you whip up dessert exactly as you want it from the comfort of your home, and right now it's on sale for $169 ($30 off) at Walmart. [...]

Starting April 10th, Amazon's ad-free Prime Video subscription will be rebranded as Ultra as its price increases to $4.99 per month from the current $2.99. Once it launches, it will also be the "exclusive" way to access 4K/UHD streaming, removing 4K streaming access from Prime subscribers who don't pay extra. Paying the extra five bucks [...]

They may be great for fan engagement and selling ads, but the Big 12 has decided to replace the innovative glass-covered LED floors at Kansas City's T-Mobile Center with a traditional hardwood finish. It will be used for the remainder of the tournament during semifinal matches and the championship game. The LED floors, which were [...]

On Thursday, Rivian revealed its most important vehicle to date: the R2, a midsize SUV that eventually will start at under $50,000. As a distinctive EV with an attractive sticker price, the R2 is designed to take Rivian to the next level. In fact, the company is banking on it. If they succeed, then Rivian [...]

I upgraded from the Pixel A-series buds released in 2021 to the Pixel Buds Pro 2, and two things were immediately apparent: the A-series buds have no business sounding so good for their sub-$100 price, and the Pixel Buds Pro 2 were everything I wanted in a successor. They're even smaller and have a silicone [...]

Epic Games announced this week that Fortnite's in-game V-bucks currency would be getting more expensive with a somewhat glib statement: "The cost of running Fortnite has gone up a lot and we're raising prices to help pay the bills," the company wrote. The price hike will go into effect on March 19th, the same day [...]

When you open your Peacock mobile app this summer, you might see a portal leading to the AI likeness of TV host Andy Cohen on your homepage. In an announcement on Friday, NBCUniversal said Cohen's avatar will serve as a guide through Peacock's "infinitely swipeable" feed of clips from Bravo shows, like Love Island, The [...]

Peacock is rolling out a native vertical video format for live sports, allowing you to watch games without turning your phone sideways. The feature will roll out to NBA games first this spring and will use an algorithm to track players and zoom in on the action. The launch of this feature comes just months [...]

It was a little surprising to see Apple decide to leap fully into the affordable laptop market, to try and compete with devices the company typically prefers to just look down its nose at. It was also a little surprising to see Apple basically nail it on the first try. On this episode of The [...]

I had to buy Samsung's Galaxy Z TriFold from eBay for $4,399 and I'm pretty sure that's because Samsung doesn't want anyone to actually have this phone. I'm also afraid to turn it on. Not that turning it on does much good. Whenever I tap "start" to set it up, a prompt to supply a [...]

The MacBook Neo is here, and it took no time at all for an executive from a major PC manufacturer to put their foot in their mouth trying to discuss this new competition from Apple's $600 laptop. On Asus' latest earnings call, CFO Nick Wu said that the Neo and its aggressive entry-level pricing were [...]

Apple is cutting App Store developer fees in China from March 15th, dropping its typical commission on purchases from 30 percent down to 25 percent. The decision was made following "discussions with the Chinese regulator," according to Apple's announcement, suggesting that the reduction aims to avoid regulatory intervention after China reportedly considered opening a formal [...]

Some people rarely lose things. Wallets are always exactly where they're supposed to be, keys never go missing, and remotes never slip between the couch cushions. And then there's the rest of us - the folks who can't ever seem to find the thing that was right there a few seconds ago. For us, there [...]

You can download Chrome for Linux, and you can download Chrome for Arm devices - but if you've got a computer running Linux on Arm, not so much! Now, Google says it's finally bringing Chrome to ARM64 Linux machines in Q2 2026, following Chrome for Arm Macs in 2020 and Chrome for Windows on Arm [...]

Around a dozen parents huddled in the dim hallway outside the courtroom in February, nervously gripping paper tickets. They were glaring at a gray tote bag held by a member of the court staff - the one who'd determine, by lottery, if they made it inside. Pinned on bags and coats, butterfly clips honored children [...]

Despite the fact Apple released a new AirTag in January, the first-generation AirTag is still a top-notch tracker if you're embedded in Apple's ecosystem. And right now, it's on sale for $13.91 ($15.09 off) at Walmart, which marks a new low price. If you're an iPhone owner, the original AirTag still delivers a level of [...]

Facebook Marketplace is adding a bunch of new AI-powered tools that are supposed to make selling items on the platform a little more efficient. One feature will use Meta AI to automatically respond to those annoying "Is this still available?" messages. You can toggle on the auto-reply option when creating a listing, and Meta AI [...]

A couple of weeks ago, Google and Samsung announced a big Gemini development coming to their newest devices: task automation. Starting with food delivery and rideshare apps, Gemini would be able to use certain apps on your behalf in a virtual window to take care of things like ordering dinner or getting a car to [...]

Between March Madness and the Oscars, now might be a good time to improve your TV setup. Google's TV Streamer 4K is currently on sale for $79.99 ($20 off) at Amazon, Target, and Walmart, which is its second-best price to date and only $5 more than its all-time low. As a streaming device, it's terrific. [...]

Anthropic's latest update to Claude will allow the AI chatbot to generate custom charts, diagrams, and other visualizations during your conversation. If Claude determines a visual is useful based on the context of your chat, it will insert the image in-line, rather than in its side panel. As an example, Anthropic says a conversation about [...]

This is Lowpass by Janko Roettgers, a newsletter on the ever-evolving intersection of tech and entertainment, syndicated just for The Verge subscribers once a week. "It is a pretty rough time for the game industry." Meta Reality Labs director of games Chris Pruett did not mince words when he returned to GDC for his annual [...]

Rajesh Jha, executive vice president of Microsoft's experiences and devices group, is retiring after more than 35 years at the software giant. Jha was a big part of the team that helped move Microsoft's Office suite to the cloud, and has recently been overseeing Microsoft 365 Copilot, Windows, Office, and more. "After 35+ years at [...]

The Pan-European Game Information (PEGI) body previously assigned its age ratings based on the presence of sex, drugs, violence, bad language, and fear. Now it's adding four new options that tie age suitability to interactive features, like rating games that contain loot boxes as unsuitable for children under 16. Games like EA's FC series - [...]

WordPress.org is launching a new tool that lets you create a private website directly in your browser, according to an announcement on Wednesday. You can access the tool by heading to my.WordPress.net, which opens up a workspace where you can start building a website without signing up to WordPress, choosing a hosting plan, or selecting [...]

When Rivian first revealed the R2 in 2024, a lot of the excitement was centered on the starting price of $45,000 - placing it slightly below the current average selling price for a new internal combustion vehicle. Finally, here was a decently sized electric SUV with great design and impressive software that wouldn't require taking [...]

Dyson's latest autonomous robot vacuum cleaner first debuted during IFA 2025 in Berlin last September. The Spot+Scrub Ai Robot is the company's follow-up to its 360 Vis Nav robovac launched in 2023 with upgrades that include a new self-cleaning roller mop, a multifunction dock, and lasers that can identify stains. It's available now through Dyson's [...]

Farewell, Honda Zero. We never knew thee. Honda is cancelling its Zero Series SUV and Saloon, as well as the Acura RSX EVs, citing an "extremely challenging earnings situation." The Japanese automaker, which unsuccessfully tried to merge with Nissan last year, said it expected to make a net loss of 360 billion (~$2.5 billion) to [...]

It's pretty easy to get an affordable phone case that looks good, no matter the device you have. Yet, that doesn't stop some companies from selling theirs for about the same cost as a dinner for two. Well, thanks to Woot, we now have a wider selection of affordable phone cases to choose from, with [...]

Microsoft announced on Thursday that it's launching Copilot Health, a "separate, secure space" in Copilot for asking questions about lab results and medical records, searching for providers, analyzing data from wearables, and other health-related chats. The feature will have a phased rollout, so it won't be available to everyone immediately, but users can join a [...]