The Verge

Google is quietly building key features of its Play Games app, which lets you track achievements on Android games, directly into the Play Store, Android Police reports - signaling plans that the former may be headed for the infamous Google Graveyard. Coder and self-proclaimed APK teardown specialist AssembleDebug posted on X that Google hasn't made [...]

For millions of people, any one of the many unprecedented actions in the first 100 days of the second Trump presidency was enough to show that the US is barreling toward - or has already arrived at - billionaire-helmed fascism. Sure, Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has indiscriminately fired thousands of federal employees [...]

OnePlus has reversed a big price hike for the Watch 3 and will sell the smartwatch for $349.99, OnePlus spokesperson Spencer Blank tells The Verge via email. That's $20 more than the price it was initially announced at, but a big drop from the unexplained $499.99 cost it debuted at on April 10th. Blank attributes [...]

Today, we have something special for you: A few days ago, I hosted a panel with FTC commissioners Rebecca Slaughter and Alvaro Bedoya at the IAPP Global Privacy Summit in Washington, DC. We recorded the discussion, and we're bringing it to you today. That's all pretty normal Decoder stuff, you might say - except these [...]

Nothing has announced the second phone under its colorful subbrand CMF: the Phone 2 Pro. Just like the first CMF phone, this is a modular handset with extra accessories you can screw into place. And also just like the first CMF phone, it's not getting an official US release. Buy the Phone 2 Pro by [...]

In less than 100 days the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has been converted from a media and telecom watchdog into a bizarre, rights-trampling grievance machine built for one purpose: to coddle and protect the ego of President Donald J. Trump. Gone is the agency that used to occasionally care about whether broadband maps were accurate [...]

Tudum, Netflix's annual fan event showcasing all of its upcoming projects, is almost upon us once again. Today, Netflix dropped a trailer teasing some of what's going to be at this year's Tudum, which will stream live from the Kia Forum in Los Angeles on May 31st. On the film side of things, we can [...]

Squidge, splodge, splat: Skin Deep doesn't sound like most immersive sims. It doesn't sound like most video games. Close your eyes and what it aurally resembles is a slapstick cartoon with a healthy dollop of toilet humor. These sounds, though, bookend chains of effects that are pure video game magic. Take the splodge, produced when [...]

Ever wanted a mouse that could easily stick to your laptop as you carry it around? I can't say so myself - but one's launching on Kickstarter today that seems to do the job! I've been testing the $36 ESR MagMouse for roughly a week now, and I'm genuinely surprised we haven't seen anything like [...]

Elon Musk's expansive portfolio of companies could avoid more than $2.37 billion in potential legal liability due to his unprecedented influence over the US government, a new Senate report finds. The figure comes from a report assembled by Democratic staff for the Senate Homeland Security permanent subcommittee on investigations (PSI) probing the impact of Musk's [...]

A group of people sued Nike this week over its decision to wind down its virtual show project RTFKT last year. The buyers of the digital assets accuse Nike of causing the rug to be pulled out from under them," and say they wouldn't have bought its NFTs if they'd known they were unregistered securities," [...]

The OnePlus 13R is a particular kind of midrange phone for a particular kind of person. It's a pared-down version of the OnePlus 13 - which is a full-on flagship and a good one at that. And even though it shares a lot of the flagship DNA, the 13R lacks peace-of-mind features present on the [...]

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 has flashy, thrilling battles, but the best thing about them is how you can twist the game's many systems to your advantage. The turn-based RPG combat might feel familiar, but it offers a lot of ways to customize your approach to battles so that you can do absolutely devastating amounts of [...]

Hi, friends! Welcome to Installer No. 80, your guide to the best and Verge-iest stuff in the world. (If you're new here, welcome, hope you had better luck than I did preordering a Switch 2, and also you can read all the old editions at the Installer homepage.) This week, I've been reading about The [...]

It's been a busy week for Alien: Earth's marketing team, having released three new teasers over the last few days. The longest of them - titled "Gestation Complete" - spends two whole minutes on the gestation and birth of an alien creature. Another, "Crate," gives hints that Earth could be facing more than just a [...]

One of the most frustrating realities about modern technology products is that while so many of them can get exciting new features via the internet, they can lose them just as easily. That happened to owners of Nixplay smart digital photo frames this week when they were hit with a previously announced update the company [...]

One of the Apple Intelligence features that hasn't been delayed is Visual Intelligence, which uses your iPhone's camera to identify and answer questions on whatever's around you in the world. It lets you snap a pizza restaurant storefront and find out its opening hours, for example, or point your camera at a plant and find [...]

When Google launched its long-awaited Find My Device network in April 2024, it arrived to... well, what's the opposite of "fanfare"? A slow network rollout and damning reviews dampened enthusiasm for what was supposed to be a wave of Android-powered rivals to Apple's AirTag. But a year's a long time in tech, and Google has [...]

Testimony this week from Google's antitrust trial shows that Google gives Samsung an enormous sum of money" each month to preinstall the Gemini AI app on Samsung devices, reports Bloomberg. Now that Judge Amit Mehta has ruled Google's search engine is an illegal monopoly, its lawyers are sparring with the DOJ over how severe a [...]

Wandering through Bionic Bay's dark alien world is unsettling and awe-inspiring. There are massive structures with no clear purpose and autonomous factories filled with whirring saw blades and devastating lasers. It's grim and unforgiving, with little light and harsh shadows that give everything a sinister tone. But then you step on a bomb and your [...]

Solid-state batteries are the future. They're more powerful, compact, safe, and sustainable than Lithium-ion alternatives, but true all-solid state batteries can't be mass-produced cost-effectively. That's why Kuxiu has gone semi-solid state for what it calls the "world's safest" power bank, while calling dibs on it being a world first. Kuxiu's $79.99 S2 Qi2 5000mAh MagSafe [...]

Every so often, Central Computers - one of the last remaining dedicated Silicon Valley computer stores - lets subscribers know it's managed to obtain a small shipment of AMD graphics cards. Today, it informed me that I could now purchase a $600 Radeon RX 9070 XT for $850 - a $250 markup. It's not alone. [...]

Donald Trump wants to mine the depths of the ocean for critical minerals ubiquitous in rechargeable batteries, signing an executive order on Thursday to try to expedite mining within US and international waters. It's a brash move that critics say could create unknown havoc on sea life and coastal economies, and that bucks international agreements. [...]

Interim DC attorney Ed Martin has written a letter to the Wikimedia Foundation - the organization behind Wikipedia - that calls into question its status as a nonprofit entity. In the letter, which was obtained by The Free Press, Martin claims he found that Wikipedia is engaging in a series of activities that could violate [...]

President Donald Trump recently announced that he would host a private dinner for the top 220 biggest holders of $TRUMP, the meme coin he launched days prior to taking office - and several U.S. Senators would like to know exactly why he's doing this. The dinner was publicly advertised on the $TRUMP coin homepage this [...]

Google is rolling out Gmail updates for mobile users across Android and iOS, with some design updates and new access to AI features. Android tablet and foldable owners will have a more flexible Gmail app interface that lets them drag the divider to adjust the list and conversation panes to whatever size they want in [...]

After stranding former US Agency for International Development (USAID) workers with devices holding sensitive information, the Trump administration says it will no longer physically collect their government-issued phones, laptops, and tablets. An email sent by USAID to workers on Thursday and obtained by The Verge says the devices will be wiped remotely, and then marked [...]

Chrome could eventually be up for sale, if the US Department of Justice gets its way in the remedies trial for US v. Google. And there are already buyers lining up at Google's door. Any potential sale might not happen for a very long time. The remedies trial is still ongoing, a decision in that [...]

Aravind Srinivas is battling Google to get his Perplexity AI assistant preinstalled on Android phones. At the same time, the CEO is refocusing his startup on what he predicts will be the next battleground in the AI race: your web browser. Perplexity plans to release its own browser called Comet next month, Srinivas tells me. [...]

On paper, Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 doesn't seem to stand out amidst a recent wave of prestige RPGs, from the newly polished high fantasy of the Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion remake to the medieval warfare of 15th century Bohemia in Kingdom Come: Deliverance II. For one, its fantastical conquests are set in a world reminiscent [...]

Last night, a new company called Slate Auto unveiled its first product, a spartan two-seat electric truck with a mere 150 miles of range and a world of possibility. There's no paint, no distracting infotainment screen, and no stereo or even radio. It doesn't tower over your average 12-year-old, and it may sell for under [...]

Japan's YKK, the world's largest zipper manufacturer (go ahead, grab the nearest zipper, it probably says YKK on the pull), has announced a prototype self-propelled zipper with a built-in motor and gear mechanism it can use to zip itself up at the push of a button on a wired remote. The days of being embarrassed [...]

Chromebooks on Arm processors are about to get a big boost as developers prepare new versions of ChromeOS with support for Qualcomm's latest Snapdragon chips, reports Chrome Unboxed. According to a new developer commit message posted in the Chromium project Gerrit code review, the SoCID for a Qualcomm X1P42100, aka the Snapdragon X Plus, is [...]

Infinity Nikki's next update will add some major new features. Bubble Season starts April 29th and will include a new area, new activities, and, of course, new (and returning) outfits. But the biggest addition is one that fans have been asking for since launch: co-op. Check out the trailer above. In the new season you'll [...]

If you're like me and you have a bit of an uncontrollable potty mouth, Microsoft has got you covered with its latest Windows 11 feature. The software maker is changing the way its profanity filter for voice typing works on Windows 11 soon, so you can disable the filter and let all your nasty swear [...]

Trump administration senior officials are facing harsh criticism after it was revealed that they had used the personal messaging app Signal todiscuss highly classified military intelligence in a group chat. The chat, in which Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth laid out plans for an upcoming military strike in Yemen, inadvertently added Jeffrey Goldberg, the editor-in-chief ofThe [...]

Donald Trump's staggering tariffs on Chinese imports have hit nearly every category of consumer goods, from electronics and automobiles to clothing and footwear. One of the most vulnerable industries is the ultracheap e-commerce sites like Shein, Temu, and AliExpress that American shoppers have become accustomed to. It is already showing signs of a bloodbath. Last [...]

Maybe, like me, you bought the Xbox Series S with 512GB of storage and realized, after installing Call of Duty: Black Ops 6, that you don't have much (or any) space left for any other games. And maybe, like me, you had to hunt for another drive so you could install other games to play. [...]

Google has just announced that it's ending software updates for the first-generation Nest Learning Thermostat, released in 2011, and the second-gen model that came a year later. This decision also affects the European Nest Learning Thermostat from 2014. You will no longer be able to control them remotely from your phone or withGoogle Assistant, but [...]

Federal agents arrested a Milwaukee judge Friday on obstruction charges for allegedly interfering with an immigration arrest. Judge Hannah Dugan of the Milwaukee County Circuit Court was arrested in the county courthouse and remains in federal custody, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports. Kash Patel, the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), posted about [...]

Waymo may sell autonomous vehicles for personal ownership at some point in the future, Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai said during an earnings call last night. Pichai was asked about the long-term business model for Waymo, and he responded that it includes expanding partnerships like it has with Moove in Miami and Uber in Austin and, [...]

For months, a popular Australian radio station has used an AI-generated DJ to host one of its segments - and no one seemed to notice, as reported by the Australian Financial Review and The Sydney Morning Herald. The show, called Workdays with Thy, offers a four-hour mix of hip hop, R&B, and pop, with no [...]

On the first day of filming, a small crew set up in my parents' house in Long Beach, California. We were shooting a short documentary about my parents' experiences as Vietnam War refugees who were used as background extras in Apocalypse Now nearly 50 years ago. Though my parents played a variety of characters - [...]

Boox is expanding its Go Series with two new E Ink devices that are the first from the company to bring stylus support and note-taking capabilities to its smaller seven-inch e-reader models. It's functionality that Kobo already offers on its seven-inch Libra Colour, but the new Boox Go 7 and Go Color 7 Gen II [...]

For sale: one browser, very popular. As the remedies phase of the Google Search trial heats up, two things have become very clear. The US government would really like to force Google to sell Chrome, and there are a lot of companies interested in buying it. What do you really get when you buy the [...]

OpenAI is introducing a new version of its ChatGPT deep research tool that it says is cheaper to operate. The lightweight" model is available now to free users, as well as those on several of the company's paid tiers. Deep research (lightweight) is powered by a version of OpenAI's o4-mini model, and the company says [...]

Microsoft has revealed that it's created a minute-long advert for its Surface Pro and Surface Laptop hardware using generative AI. But there's a twist: it released the ad almost three months ago, and no-one seemed to notice the AI elements. The ad, which went live on YouTube on January 30th, isn't entirely made up of [...]

Ask just about anybody, and they'll tell you that new cars are too expensive. In the wake of tariffs shaking the auto industry and with the Trump administration pledging to kill the federal EV incentive, that situation isn't looking to get better soon, especially for anyone wanting something battery-powered. Changing that overly spendy status quo [...]

A group of tabletop game makers and other American small businesses are filed a lawsuit on Thursday against President Donald Trump and his administration to attempt to stop his tariffs. The lawsuit alleges the tariffs are unlawful and unconstitutional" and details how they are creating challenges for the plaintiffs' businesses. The tabletop companies that are [...]

Bluesky experienced a major outage on Thursday evening that lasted around an hour. On my desktop browser, my Bluesky feed wouldn't load at all, just showing a spinning loading circle. I saw something similar with the mobile app; I could log in, but when I did, the feed didn't show. Other Verge colleagues were also [...]