The Verge

Disney is launching its direct-to-consumer ESPN streaming service this fall.The service, which will simply be called ESPN," will cost $29.99 per month for the unlimited" plan, which will include all of ESPN's linear channels. Disney will also offer ESPN's unlimited plan annually for $299.99, which saves you about $60 compared to paying monthly. For those [...]

Google did something a bit different this year. Instead of talking about Android during the I/O developer conference, which kicks off on May 20, it's hosting a show dedicated to its mobile software. The Android Show begins at 10 AM PT/1PM ET today, and we expect to hear more about Material 3 Expressive, the new [...]

At its virtual Unpacked event on Tuesday, Samsung officially announced the launch date for its new ultra-slim Galaxy S25 Edge. The latest S25 series phone launches on May 30th to the tune of $1,099, with preorders starting today at Amazon, Best Buy, and Samsung's online storefront. At just 5.8mm thick, the Galaxy S25 Edge is [...]

Ahead of the release of the Lenovo Legion Go S running SteamOS later this month, Valve has announced a new compatibility rating system for SteamOS devices. As the name implies, the new SteamOS Compatibility system will rate how compatible games are with third-party devices, similar to how Valve already rates the compatibility of games for [...]

The Nintendo Switch 2 isn't even out yet (it's coming June 5th), and one of its launch window games already has a preorder discount at Costco. With a membership, you can get Donkey Kong Bananza - the first 3D platformer for this character since Donkey Kong 64 - for $62.99. A $7 discount may not [...]

Apple is getting into Lofi Girl's turf. The company has teamed up with Universal Music Group (UMG) to make the Sound Therapy collection of tracks for Apple Music that are designed to help listeners attain clearer focus, deeper relaxation, and better sleep," according to a press release. There are three categories of Sound Therapy tracks [...]

Google has announced that it's now added a Quick Edits" feature that lets you edit an image as you're sharing it without necessarily saving those changes to your library. We're not talking deep edits here: you'll be able to crop or auto-enhance the image, then compare it to the unedited version before you let the [...]

Microsoft announced on Tuesday that it's laying off more than 6,000 employees, around three percent of the company's entire workforce. These are the biggest job cuts at Microsoft since it laid off 10,000 employees in 2023, and will impact employees across Microsoft's businesses. We continue to implement organizational changes necessary to best position the company [...]

Mark Zuckerberg wants you to be understood by the machine. The Meta CEO has recently been pitching a future where his AI tools give people something that "knows them well," not just as pals, but as professional help. "For people who don't have a person who's a therapist," he told Stratechery's Ben Thompson, "I think [...]

Console modding enthusiasts beware, Nintendo might take away your system. According to a recently updated account services user agreement and privacy policy, Nintendo reserves the right to, render the Nintendo Account Services and / or the applicable Nintendo device permanently unusable in whole or in part." The change, first reported by Game File, came with [...]

It would seem that the money-making days for CryptoPunks, one of the oldest and most valuable NFT brands, are well and truly over. After acquiring the non-fungible token collection from Larva Labs in 2022, Bored Ape Yacht Club creator Yuga Labs is now selling CryptoPunks to Infinite Node Foundation - a non-profit focused on preserving [...]

General Motors is teaming up with LG to develop lithium manganese-rich (LMR) batteries for its electric trucks and SUVs. The automaker says that the new chemistry is safer, more energy dense, and less costly than the current technology. GM aims to become the first automaker to deploy LMR batteries in EVs, with plans to start [...]

If the question, "Who is Meta's biggest rival?" were on a Family Feud survey, TikTok would likely be the winning answer. In the Federal Trade Commission's antitrust case against the Facebook and Instagram owner, the government's response probably wouldn't even make the top 10: a small blockchain-based platform called MeWe. MeWe looks a fair amount [...]

Apple previewed new Vision Pro accessibility features today that could turn the headset into a proxy for eyesight when they launch in visionOS later this year. The update uses the headset's main camera to magnify what a user sees or to enable live, machine-learning-powered descriptions of surroundings. The new magnification feature works on virtual objects [...]

The Square Handheld is available today for $399 with support for traditional card transactions and tap-to-pay, scanning products, and managing inventory, all from a single device. That should bring tap-to-pay acceptance without an iPhone to more places in the businesses and restaurants where you're already used to seeing the Square Stand and other similar setups. [...]

Apple has revealed a new reading mode designed to make text easier to read for users with a wide range of disabilities, such as dyslexia or low vision," the company announced on Tuesday. The feature, called Accessibility Reader, is coming later this year and will allow users to customize a text's font, color, and spacing [...]

Letterboxd - a film tracker app and the only good social network - announced a Letterboxd Video Store at the Festival de Cannes on Tuesday. Unlike a traditional video-on-demand service, Letterboxd Video Store will offer limited festival-style windows" when you can stream festival favorites, underseen gems, global cinema, and emerging voices" in cinema. The service [...]

Spotify is giving users more control over which songs are spat out by its AI DJ feature. Starting today, Spotify Premium subscribers can now use English voice commands to personalize what music they want DJ to play instead of relying on the ever-changing playlist that it curates based on their listening habits. Users can access [...]

Product design requires considering lots of different things. How things look; how they work; how people will understand how to use them. Here's one probably not on a lot of designers' lists, though: the insect enticement factor. Maybe that needs to change, because as The Verge's Will Poor discovered, the way your gadgets are designed [...]

Today, DJI is officially announcing the Mavic 4 Pro, which could be the most versatile drone it's ever made. It's the first with a 360-degree rotating gimbal for footage that tilts, rolls, and offers true vertical filming. It's the first Mavic to offer 51 minutes of battery life, tied with the old Mini 3 and [...]

There's still a week to go until Google I/O 2025 starts in earnest, but some of the developer conference's biggest announcements are likely to arrive today in a one-off livestream called The Android Show: I/O Edition. When the Android Show will happen and where to watch it The Android Show takes place today, Tuesday, May [...]

Microsoft revealed earlier this year that it was planning to stop supporting Office apps (Microsoft 365) on Windows 10 after the October 14th end of support cutoff. Now, Microsoft is performing a U-turn and has pledged to continue providing security updates for Office apps on Windows 10 for an additional three years. To help maintain [...]

Toyota's flagship electric vehicle with the clunky name, the bZ4x, is getting a makeover for the 2026 model year - including a much shorter moniker. Now styled as just bZ, the compact SUV is also getting more range, thanks to expanded battery capacity, and an improved design. The front-wheel drive bZ with 74.7 kWh battery [...]

Microsoft is redesigning the Start menu in Windows 11 this month with a new, wider design that finally lets you disable the recommended feed of files and apps. While the new Start menu looks different to what exists in Windows 11 today, this design refresh could have looked a lot different as Microsoft has now [...]

Some Google Search users are starting to see the platform's AI Mode search engine chatbot in the wild. Several user reports across X and Threads show that Google is testing different locations to display the AI Mode tab - while some examples show it in the search bar itself, besides the search by image" button, [...]

Hours after announcing a 90-day mutual reduction in tariff rates with China, the White House has followed up by confirming a similar reduction on duties for cheap imports from the country. From May 14th, packages from Hong Kong and China valued below $800 will be subject to either a 54 percent tariff - down from [...]

Sony has announced its latest flagship smartphone, the Xperia 1 VII, and it fits right into the company's wheelhouse: a familiar design, tech cobbled together from across Sony's other hardware brands, and a price tag that'll sting. Sony's last few flagships have been technological powerhouses that eschewed tech industry trends in favor of enthusiast features [...]

Samsung's thin phone is here. The Galaxy S25 Edge - first teased back in January - is essentially a slimmed-down S25 Plus, with the same 6.7-inch OLED display, Snapdragon 8 Elite for Galaxy chipset, and AI features. The compact design comes at a price though, and you'll have to do without the telephoto lens or [...]

Get ready for more Fallout. The second season of the hit Prime Video show will premiere in December, and the show has already been renewed for a third, Variety reports. The second season will pick up in the aftermath of Season One's epic finale and take audiences along for a journey through the wasteland of [...]

Any ebook reader will let you cram a Beauty and the Beast-sized library's worth of books in your pocket, but so will your phone. An ebook reader offers a more book-like reading experience, with fewer distractions and less eye strain, and many include extra features, like adjustable frontlighting. Some really are pocketable. Others are waterproof [...]

Duolingo is making a big change: it's moving on from hearts in favor of a new energy" mechanic. The idea is to switch from a system that punishes mistakes to one that's intended to feel more motivating - and a bit more gamified. Under the old system, you'd lose a heart if you made a [...]

Apple's iOS 19 update could include an AI-powered feature designed to conserve battery, according to a report from Bloomberg. The battery management tool will reportedly optimize your iPhone's power consumption based on how you use your device. The new feature will use battery data it has collected from users' devices to understand trends and make [...]

Philips has announced a new initiative that will let consumers 3D print their own replacements for small but essential parts included with many of its personal health products. Philips Fixables is launching in the Czech Republic, where Prusa Research, the company's partner for the initiative, is based. But the actual files that can be downloaded [...]

One of the most convenient USB-C cables around is back down to its lowest price ever, which we last saw in early March. Anker's 2-in-1, braided USB-C cable that can charge two devices from one power source is down to $17.99 for the four-foot version at Amazon (it normally sells between $23 and $25.99). The [...]

Ticketmaster will now show how much you'll pay for tickets - fees included - before checkout. The company announced the All In Prices" initiative on Monday as part of its efforts to comply with the Federal Trade Commission's ban on junk fees, which goes into effect on May 12th. Now, when you're shopping for tickets, [...]

Apple has released iOS 18.5, and one of the most notable features is that it allows the iPhone 13 lineup to access satellite messaging features provided by carriers. With the change, T-Mobile users who have an iPhone 13, iPhone 13 Mini, iPhone 13 Pro, or iPhone 13 Pro Max will be able to use its [...]

The Office cinematic universe is expanding this fall. Peacock has given the previously announced spinoff of the mockumentary series a streaming date and name, while also revealing a first image. It's called The Paper, and it will premiere in September. The image, meanwhile, sure looks like an office. Of a newspaper. The show will feature [...]

The Sega Dreamcast wasn't the first home console to store game saves on a portable memory card, but its virtual memory unit (VMU) stood out with a built-in screen, controls, and playable mini games. 8BitMod's upcoming VMU Pro offers the same functionality as Sega's original, but it's rebuilt from the ground up with upgrades that [...]

Nintendo will give Switch 2 owners the option to sacrifice a little per-session playtime in the interest of battery health longevity. The company announced, via its Nintendo Today news app, that the console will have a setting to slow the console's charge as it approaches 90 percent capacity, then maintain it around that amount. Such [...]

The Nintendo Switch 2 will have an option to set a PIN to unlock your console when you turn it on. You can see the new System Lock" option in a new video in the Nintendo Today app that's actually about a battery-preservation feature. The lock setting locks your system with a PIN to protect [...]

Google has updated its colorful G" logo for the first time in almost a decade. An update to the Google app on iOS and Pixel phones shows a new logo that blends the logo's red, yellow, green, and blue colors into a gradient, as reported by 9to5Google. Google last made a major change to its [...]

The NBA is headed to Peacock this October, and with it a range of new features making the viewing experience distinct from watching basketball on cable and a flood of other sports-focused packages. For starters, Peacock is adding an optional performance view" overlay that will show you player names and a live shot chart that [...]

If you've been wary after getting an email with the subject line Lopez Voice Assistant Class Action Settlement," that's understandable - but it's likely a notification that you're owed part of a $95 million payout over allegations of Siri-enabled spying on private conversations. The settlement is related to Lopez v. Apple Inc, a 2019 class [...]

Fox expects to launch its upcoming streaming service before this year's NFL season, the company announced on Monday. The new service, which it will call Fox One, will allow viewers to access livestreams and on-demand content from several channels, including Fox News, Fox Sports, FS1, FS2, Fox Business, and local stations. During an earnings call [...]

We're doing something a little different on today's episode of Decoder. I asked my friend John Gruber, of the website Daring Fireball, to come on the show and talk about the future of Apple - and, importantly, the App Store. Gruber and I have been friends for over a decade now. Daring Fireball was one [...]

The team of nearly 200 Activision Blizzard developers behind the Overwatch franchise has unionized. Formed under the Communications Workers of America (CWA), the Overwatch Gamemakers Guild is the latest wall-to-wall Blizzard union to be recognized by parent company Microsoft since the World of Warcraft development team announced its own union last July. The CWA announced [...]

I did not expect a TV show called Murderbot to be quite so relatable. On the surface, the Apple TV Plus sci-fi comedy is a somewhat generic futuristic story about a group of humans exploring a dangerous planet with the help of a security bot that's designed to protect them. The key is the perspective: [...]

Every month, a group of Indigenous scientists from around the world gathers on Zoom. They never have an agenda. They meet as colleagues to catch up and commiserate about the challenges of being Indigenous in Western academia. Their February meeting, however, quickly struck a different tone. "There was this cascade that started happening," recalled Max [...]

Google Keep has finally expanded the text formatting options to its web app, almost two years after making them available for Android users. The update for Google's web-based note-taking service is now rolling out to Google Workspace, Workspace Individual, and personal Google account users and provides new options for customizing text and heading styles. It [...]