Of all the jarring things I've witnessed on the National Mall, nothing will beat the image of the first thing I saw after I cleared security at the Army festival: a child, sitting at the controls of an M119A3 Howitzer, being instructed by a soldier on how to aim it, as his red-hatted parents took a photo with the Washington Monument in the background.
The primary stated reason for the Grand Military Parade is to celebrate the US Army's 250th birthday. The second stated reason is to use the event for recruiting purposes. Like other military branches, the Army has struggled to meet its enlistment quotas for over the past decade. And according to very defensive Army spokespeople trying to convince skeptics that the parade was not for Donald Trump's birthday, there had always been a festival planned on the National Mall that day, and it had been in the works for over two years, and the parade, tacked on just two months ago, was purely incidental. Assuming that their statement was true, I wasn't quite sure if they had anticipated so many people in blatant MAGA swag in attendance - or how eager they were to bring their children and hand them assault rifles.
Demonstrators in Los Angeles marched alongside an inflatable Donald Trump baby dressed in a diaper.
As President Donald Trump kicked off a birthday military parade on the streets of Washington, DC, what's estimated as roughly 2,000 events were held across the US and beyond - protesting Trump and Elon Musk's evisceration of government services, an unprecedented crackdown by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and countless other actions from the administration in its first five months. Held under the title "No Kings" (with, as you'll see, one conspicuous exception), they're the latest in several mass protests, following April's Hands Off events and a wave of Tesla Takedown demonstrations in March.
As The Verge's Tina Nguyen went to downtown DC, we also sent reporters to No Kings demonstrations spanning the country, plus a "No Tyrants" event in the UK. How would they unfold after promises of "very heavy force" against protesters in the capital, after the deployment of thousands of military troops in a move a judge has bluntly called illegal, and after promises to "liberate" the city of Los Angeles from its "burdensome leadership" by local elected officials? What about the overnight killing of a Minnesota Democratic state representative and her husband, and the shooting of …
Less than a month after making their debut, the WH-1000XM6 are on sale at Amazon in black, blue, and platinum with a $30 gift card for $448. It’s not a straight cash discount, sure, but if you were already debating picking up Sony’s latest pair of noise-canceling headphones, it makes the $50 price hike over the last-gen XM5 easier to stomach.
If you were to ignore the steep price hike, the new XM6 are a welcome improvement over the XM5 in every way. They’re outfitted with Sony’s latest noise-cancellation chip, which allows them to do a better job at drowning out the ambient noise you might encounter on the street, at your local coffee shop, or on your next cross-country flight. Their transparency mode is as natural-sounding as ever, too, and thanks to a new set of drivers, they deliver clearer vocals and the same dynamic, rich sound for which the XM series is known.
Design-wise, they also represent an excellent return to form, albeit with a few minor tweaks for added comfort and convenience. They sport a wider headband that’s designed to alleviate pressure during longer listening sessions, along with a redesigned power button that’s easier to distinguish from the onboard ANC button. More importantly, however, they once again collapse with the aid of a joint in each arm, allowing them to take up less room in the included carrying case. As someone who frequently travels with the XM5 — the only pair in the XM series that can’t fold down — I can say the change is greatly appreciated.
8BitDo’s Ultimate 2C Wireless Controller has fallen to its lowest price to date at Amazon, where you can grab it in green or purple for an all-time low of $25.49 (about $5 off). The 2C is a great little gamepad for Windows and Android, one you can connect via USB-C, Bluetooth, or a 2.4GHz dongle boasting a 1,000Hz polling rate. It’s also got an extra set of remappable shoulder buttons and Hall effect sticks / triggers, so you needn’t worry about the notorious “Joy-Con drift” that has plagued consoles like the Switch.
When it comes to portable batteries, Anker and EcoFlow are the two biggest names that come to mind. Jackery is a close second, though, and now through June 18th, you can save up to $3,300 on various power solutions thanks to the company’s Father’s Day sale. There’s a lot on offer, but the highlight for me is the port-heavy Explorer 1000power station, which is available for a limited time from Jackery and Amazon for just shy of $500 ($300 off).
If you’re big on Android Auto but hate having to plug your phone into your car’s infotainment system, Motorola’s MA1 wireless car adapter is on sale at Best Buy for a new low of $34.99 (50 percent off). The Chromecast-looking USB dongle pairs with smartphones running Android 11 or higher via Bluetooth, allowing you to then transmit data over 5Ghz Wi-Fi. Just ensure your car or aftermarket head unit actually supports Android Auto in the first place.
One of the biggest surprises of the Nintendo Switch 2's reveal was its proposed accessibility. For years, Nintendo has been known for accidentally stumbling on accessibility solutions while stubbornly refusing to engage with the broader subject. Yet, in the Switch 2, there appeared a more holistic approach to accessibility for which disabled players have been crying out. This was supported by a webpage dedicated to the Switch 2's hardware accessibility.
However, specifics were thin and no further information emerged ahead of the Switch 2's debut. Now, having spent the last week with the Switch 2, I've found that this limited information hid, aside from a few missteps, an impressive suite of system-level accessibility considerations and advances that somewhat offset the otherwise gradual update the Switch 2 represents. But as we finally answer lingering accessibility questions over the Switch 2, there's a nagging sense that this information should have been readily available ahead of launch.
How intuitive is the setup? Very, but blind players may need assistance
I tend to find setup procedures dense and unapproachable thanks to cognitive disability. Yet I was pleasantly surpris …
The first Switch was such a hit that Nintendo decided not to mess with a good thing. Instead of releasing a successor that feels like a generational leap or a pivot in a new direction, it's following up the hugely successful original with the Switch 2 - a welcome upgrade that largely sticks to the formula. It looks about the same, works about the same, and plays most of the same games. It's the Switch, just better.
Nintendo's bet is that it doesn't have to wow people all over again, and so it made a sequel that's only as good as it needs to be. After spending a week with the new console, I've realized that good enough is exactly what the Switch needed.
A refined (and bigger) Nintendo Switch
Fundamentally, the concept of the Switch hasn't changed. It's still a tablet with a split controller stuck on either side, with a dock that connects to your television.
But the idea has been refined. The Switch 2 is much bigger, for one thing. It now has a 7.9-inch LCD panel, up from the original's 6.2 inches, making it great for playing text-heavy games. It also means the entire device has become larger as a result, now weighing in at a comparatively hefty 1.18 pounds with the controllers …
AI researchers have recently been asking themselves a version of the question, "Is that really Zuck?"
As first reported by Bloomberg, the Meta CEO has been personally asking top AI talent to join his new "superintelligence" AI lab and reboot Llama. His recruiting process typically goes like this: a cold outreach via email or WhatsApp that cites the recruit's work history and requests a 15-minute chat. Dozens of researchers have gotten these kinds of messages at Google alone.
For those who do agree to hear his pitch (amazingly, not all of them do), Zuckerberg highlights the latitude they'll have to make risky bets, the scale of Meta's products, and the money he's prepared to invest in the infrastructure to support them. He makes clear that this new team will be empowered and sit with him at Meta's headquarters, where I'm told the desks have already been rearranged for the incoming team.
Most of the headlines so far have focused on the eye-popping compensation packages Zuckerberg is offering, some of which are well into the eight-figure range. As I've covered before, hiring the best AI researcher is like hiring a star basketball player: there are very few of them, and you have t …
23andMe co-founder and former CEO Anne Wojcicki is set to buy back the company after it filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection earlier this year. On Friday, 23andMe and TTAM Research Institute, a nonprofit public benefit corporation run by Wojcicki, announced in a press release that TTAM would be buying “substantially all of the Company’s assets” for $305 million.
As of last month, New York-based biotech company Regeneron Pharmaceuticals was set to buy 23andMe for $256 million. But the new purchase agreement with TTAM is “the result of a final round of bidding that occurred earlier today between TTAM and Regeneron Pharmaceuticals,” according to the release. Wojcicki made the “unsolicited offer” earlier this month, according to The Wall Street Journal.
23andMe is well-known for its at-home genome testing kits, and at one point the company was worth about $6 billion, according to CNBC. But it so far has been unable to turn a profit and dealt with a massive data breach in 2023. The company paid $30 million to settle a lawsuit over the breach last year. When 23andMe filed for bankruptcy in March, Wojcicki resigned as CEO.
TTAM will comply with 23andMe’s “privacy policies and applicable law” and has made “binding commitments to adopt additional consumer protections and privacy safeguards,” including establishing a consumer privacy advisory board within 90 days of the close of the deal. The release says the transaction is still subject to court approval but is expected to close “in the coming weeks.”
You can get a great budget device these days if you know how to pick your priorities. | Image: The Verge
Some of us take a kind of “I eat to live” rather than an “I live to eat” approach to gadgets. They’re tools that help you get things done, not something you want to invest a lot of time or money in. If that’s you — and there’s no judgment here from a certifiable gadget nerd — then you can probably think of more worthwhile ways to spend $1,000 than on a phone.
Budget phones to the rescue. These devices are roughly $500 or under, though not all of them, and they’re more capable than ever. You won’t get all the bells and whistles, but you will save a little money to spend on, I don’t know, actual bells and whistles. It’s your world.
How we test
There’s no shortcut to properly testing a phone; I put my personal SIM card (physical or otherwise) in each phone I review and live with it for a minimum of one full week. I set up each phone from scratch, load it up with my apps, and go about living my life — stress testing the battery, using GPS navigation on my bike while streaming radio, taking rapid-fire portrait mode photos of my kid — everything I can throw at it. Starting over with a new phone every week either sounds like a dream or your personal hell, depending on how Into Phones you are. For me, switching has become so routine that it’s mostly painless.
Strong software support
At least a couple of years of OS upgrades and, ideally, three years of security updates. There’s no point in buying even a cheap phone if you have to replace it after just a couple of years because it stopped getting security patches.
A good screen
Since you look at it roughly two thousand times a day, your phone’s screen is one place you shouldn’t compromise. An OLED has richer contrast and color than an LCD, and the big screens on today’s phones really need at least a 1080p resolution. Faster refresh rates like 90Hz and even 120Hz are becoming more common on budget phone screens, but for my money, a smooth-scrolling LCD doesn’t look as nice as an OLED with a standard refresh rate.
Serviceable storage space
If you plan to hang onto your phone for a while, you’ll want enough storage space to accommodate all the system files, photos, and videos you’ll accumulate over the years. Ideally you’ll get at least 128GB built in.
One good rear camera, not four mediocre ones
Upgrades like telephoto cameras and optical image stabilization are rare in the under-$500 class, but you can still expect good, basic performance in good lighting from any modern smartphone. Low light is trickier. Phones in this class should offer a night mode to help with non-moving subjects in very dim light. And there are no bonus points awarded for adding extra macro and depth cameras to pad out the rear camera array — those 2- and 5-megapixel sensors are pretty much useless.
What compromises can you expect from a budget phone? Some combination of the following: slower processors, less storage, and worse cameras than flagship phones, almost across the board. Many have lower-resolution screens and water resistance is often less robust than on a pricier phone.
If I was making this recommendation to you face-to-face, you’d hear a heavy sigh. Yes, this is the cheapest new iPhone Apple makes. Yes, it comes with most of the things that make an iPhone an iPhone. But it comes with some significant tradeoffs — some of which make more sense than others — and it’s not exactly cheap. If you’re amenable to last year’s model or a refurbished iPhone 14, one of those might actually be a better option. But for an unfussy person who just wants a new iPhone for the least amount of money, the 16E will do the trick.
There’s a single 48-megapixel rear camera on the back, meaning there’s no ultrawide like on the regular 16. That’s an understandable tradeoff — so is the use of the older “notch” design rather than the Dynamic Island. But it’s harder to understand why Apple left out MagSafe here — that’s the ring of magnets built into the back of virtually every other iPhone since 2020. The 16E still supports wireless charging, but it can’t take advantage of the ecosystem of magnetic chargers and accessories on its own; you’ll need to add a magnetic case. This is a silly omission, and Apple should feel bad about it.
Another heavy sigh: the 16E supports Apple Intelligence, which you won’t get if you opt for an iPhone 15 or 14. Should you care? It’s really hard to say. What exists of Apple Intelligence so far is underwhelming and the most interesting bits won’t arrive anytime soon. If you want to future-proof your purchase as much as possible, the 16E will be ready for Apple’s AI. But don’t buy one expecting a life-changing experience now. It’s just an iPhone after all, for better and worse, and right now it’s the best price you’ll find on a brand-new one.
Google’s Pixel A-series phones have been my go-to recommendation for a cheap Android phone for years, but there was still room for improvement. With the 9A, Google made some modest tweaks that make it even easier to recommend — and at $499, the price is right.
The phone uses a Tensor G4 chipset that doesn’t run as hot as some of its predecessors, and performance is reliable. The 6.3-inch OLED screen is a little bigger and a bit brighter than last year’s, which makes a difference when you use the phone outside. Durability also got a small boost up to IP68, which means it can survive a drop in deeper water than the IP67-rated Pixel 8A.
The 9A’s camera is fine, though it comes up short against the rest of the Pixel 9 series in low light. Portrait mode could be better, too, and if you care a lot about image quality, then that might be a good reason to consider stepping up to a Pixel 9. But it does the trick for everyday snaps, and for the price, the 9A’s better qualities outweigh its shortcomings by a wide margin.
The OnePlus 13R isn’t quite as well-rounded as my pick for the best overall budget Android phone, the Pixel 9A. It’s also a little pricier at $599 — though we’ve seen it at $499 for extended periods of time — but for some people the 13R’s upgrades will make it a better choice. It comes with one of the best big screens in its class, and lots of people love a big screen. The 13R also offers very strong battery performance; unless you’re a power user, you can probably manage two full days on a single charge.
There’s also very fast charging with the included charger, though you won’t find wireless charging at any speed. The 13R also lacks full water resistance; it should hold up fine against spray and rain showers, but it isn’t rated to withstand full immersion. Plenty of people won’t find those omissions bothersome, but they make it harder to recommend to a general audience — especially at a higher price than the Pixel 9A.
The Samsung Galaxy A35 5G comes with surprisingly strong specs for its $399 price. They’re the kind of features you won’t really spot from the outside, but they’re important, particularly its IP67 rating for dust and water resistance. Unlike virtually every other phone at this price, the A35 5G is built to withstand water immersion, so you don’t need to sweat it if your phone lands in a toilet bowl or puddle.
Here’s another unexciting spec: four years of OS updates and five years of security updates. That’s not the very best in the budget category — the Pixel 9A takes that honor with seven years of updates — but it’s much better than the two or three years we typically see in phones well under $500.
The camera is lackluster; it’s fine in bright light but struggles in dim and mixed indoor lighting. It doesn’t have the strongest processing performance you can find under $500, either, and the Samsung-made Exynos processor occasionally stutters when quickly bouncing between tasks. I was horrified — horrified! — when I accidentally texted my husband one of the automatically generated replies because it popped up at the last moment as I was trying to tap on something else. These things don’t happen when everything loads quickly.
But overall, it’s a compelling package — especially with a big, crowd-pleasing OLED display and strong battery performance. If you’re a light user and not fussy about camera quality, the A35 5G offers some upgrades that make a real difference in the long term.
Other budget phones we tested
The 2024 Motorola Moto G Power has all the makings of a good budget phone, including a lovely vegan leather exterior and wireless charging. But it’s loaded with bloatware of the worst kind, and that alone disqualifies it from our recommendations. Read our impressions.
The Samsung Galaxy S24 FE is another perfectly capable phone that doesn’t quite earn a recommendation here. It’s a little outside the scope of this guide at $649 anyway, but you do get a telephoto lens and a nice, big screen for that price. Still, you’re better off saving a bunch and picking up the Pixel 8A or trying to score a trade-in promo for the newer Galaxy S25. Read our review.
Update, June 13th: Updated prices and availability. Samsung’s Galaxy A35 5G is currently out of stock at Amazon and Samsung, while Best Buy has it marked down on clearance.
Spaceballs, which was first released nearly 40 years ago, is getting a sequel in 2027 from Amazon MGM Studios.
A Spaceballs 2 announcement trailer posted Thursday doesn’t have any solid details besides the date, though it does poke fun at the entertainment industry’s obsession with franchises and spinoffs by listing many of them out. (I particularly liked “DCU attempt Number 1” and “DCU attempt Number 2.”)
Mel Brooks, who played Yogurt (a Yoda parody) in the original film, also makes an appearance. “After 40 years, we asked, ‘what do the fans want?’” he says. “But instead, we’re making this movie.” The film’s logline, according to Variety, is “A Non-Prequel Non-Reboot Sequel Part Two but with Reboot Elements Franchise Expansion Film.”
Brooks will be reprising the role of Yogurt, and Bill Pullman and Rick Moranis will be back as Lone Starr and Dark Helmet, Deadline reports. Lewis Pullman (Bill Pullman’s son), Josh Gad, and Keke Palmer are also set to star in the film.
Whether you’re buying your first pair of AirPods or replacing a well-used older pair, it’s easy to understand why so many iPhone owners prefer Apple’s earbuds and headphones over other options. Apple has spent years gradually adding new features that work best — and sometimes only work at all — within the company’s walled garden. These convenient tricks include audio sharing, automatic switching between Apple’s various devices, Apple TV integration, and more.
There are four AirPods models to choose from, each with a distinct appeal and upside. You likely already know whether you’re more interested in earbuds or over-ear headphones, so that’s the first divide. In the case of headphones, your only choice is the AirPods Max. But in the earbuds category, Apple has three options: the AirPods Pro, AirPods 4 with Active Noise Cancellation, and the plain old AirPods 4.
If you want the earbuds that guarantee you’ll get the latest and greatest software features from Apple, the second-generation AirPods Pro should be at the top of your list. They offer the whole gamut of ecosystem exclusives. And if you’re the type of person to misplace things, you’ll be thankful that the earbuds’ case has a U1 chip for pinpoint location finding. So whenever they go missing, you can track right where they are in the room using Apple’s Find My app.
The AirPods Pro deliver noise cancellation that’s effective at tamping down the volume of your surroundings in all but the most hectic environments. Their sound quality is on another level compared to the regular AirPods — helped in no small part by the in-ear seal you get from their silicone ear tips.
In 2024, Apple introduced three major hearing health features, including a hearing test, automatic hearing protection, and the option to use the AirPods Pro as clinical-grade hearing aids if you have mild or moderate hearing loss. No other AirPods (including the AirPods Max) offer this functionality, so it definitely sets the Pros apart. And the same can be said of their volume controls; you just swipe on the stems to raise or lower the loudness of your music, which is a handy advantage that the similar-looking AirPods 4 lack.
But not everyone likes the way ear tips feel. Even with venting and the other measures Apple has taken to improve comfort and reduce that clogged-up sensation, some people just prefer the regular, one-size-fits-most AirPods. Their open design means you’re never cut off from the outside world. The AirPods Pro have an impressive transparency mode, but the AirPods 4 don’t need to pipe in your surroundings; you can always hear what’s happening around you.
Apple sells two versions of the AirPods 4. No matter which you choose, you’ll get the same sound quality, microphone performance on voice calls, and IP54 water resistance. (The latter also applies to the AirPods Pro.) The more expensive pair features active noise cancellation and a more advanced charging case. You might be surprised by how well the noise cancellation works even with an unsealed design; it reduces office ambience and annoying hums, but louder sounds and voices still cut through the ANC. As for the case, the pricier AirPods 4 include wireless charging and Find My integration.
If you’re really interested in noise-canceling earbuds, you should consider saving a bit more and stepping up to the AirPods Pro 2. They offer much better audio quality, stronger ANC, and a better experience. I’d only steer you to the noise-canceling AirPods 4 if you’re really opposed to ear tips.
I’ve gone back and forth recommending Apple’s $549 AirPods Max over the last few years. They have a standout design, but the good looks and premium feel come at the cost of weight. These headphones are considerably heavier than most competitors and can get fatiguing over extended use. But Apple has also made smart choices: the fabric ear cups on the AirPods Max are much more pleasant in warm weather than the pleather you’ll find on Bose and Sony products, and won’t get your ears sweaty.
The AirPods Max provide impressive noise cancellation, and the transparency mode is clearer and more natural-sounding than any other set of headphones on the market. As for sound, Apple’s headphones have a pleasant sound signature that works well across a wide range of genres. They’re easy to listen to with an impressive soundstage for closed-back headphones.
You lose some features — like conversation awareness and adaptive audio — that are included on the AirPods Pro; this is a side effect of the AirPods Max using Apple’s older H1 chip. But the company recently added lossless audio over USB-C, meaning these headphones offer the richest audio fidelity of the whole lineup.
We spend dozens of hours using AirPods products for our initial reviews, and that testing extends for weeks and months afterward. That’s where we assess sound quality, mic performance, and overall reliability. Where applicable, we try the active noise cancellation in a wide range of different environments and have put the hearing protection of the AirPods Pro through the paces at concerts. We also closely examine ecosystem benefits and how the AirPods and Apple’s other products work together.
Update, June 13th: Adjusted prices and availability.
In March, Apple delayed its upgraded Siri, saying that “it’s going to take us longer than we thought to deliver” the promised features. At WWDC this week, Apple’s SVP of software Craig Federighi and SVP of worldwide marketing Greg Joswiak shared more details about the decision to delay in an interview with The Wall Street Journal’s Joanna Stern.
As part of its initial Apple Intelligence announcements at WWDC 2024, Apple said that the improved Siri would have awareness of your personal context and the ability to take actions for you in apps. While Apple was showing real software at that show, Siri “didn’t converge in the way, quality-wise, that we needed it to,” Federighi said. Apple wanted it to be “really, really reliable. And we weren’t able to achieve the reliability in the time we thought.”
“Look, we don’t want to disappoint customers,” Joswiak said. “We never do. But it would’ve been more disappointing to ship something that didn’t hit our quality standard, that had an error rate that we felt was unacceptable. So we made what we thought was the best decision. I’d make it again.”
Stern asked why Apple, with all of its resources, couldn’t make it work. “When it comes to automating capabilities on devices in a reliable way, no one’s doing it really well right now,” Federighi said. “We wanted to be the first. We wanted to do it best.” While the company had “very promising early results and working initial versions,” the team came to feel that “this just doesn’t work reliably enough to be an Apple product,” he said.
At WWDC, Federighi also spoke to YouTuber iJustine, and both Federighi and Joswiak were interviewed by Tom’s Guide’s Mark Spoonauer and TechRadar’s Lance Ulanoff. In Apple’s March statement, it said that anticipated rolling out the Siri upgrades “in the coming year,” which, to Spoonauer, Joswiak clarified to mean 2026.
OpenAI’s ChatGPT service was down all day for many users after the platform started experiencing performance issues on Tuesday morning. The chatbot responded with a “Hmm…something seems to have gone wrong” error message to my colleague after failing to load, and users across X and Reddit are reporting platform outages.
Downdetector showed that issues started at around 3AM ET, with multiple regions impacted globally. OpenAI’s own status page said that some users started experiencing “elevated error rates and latency” at that time, noting that the issues were affecting ChatGPT, its Sora text-to-video AI tool, and OpenAI APIs. OpenAI added a separate line for “elevated error rates on Sora” at 5:23AM ET, and later updated the status for both to “partial outage.”
As of 6:32PM ET, OpenAI’s tracker reported a “full recovery in the API,” and that “Nearly all ChatGPT components are now working properly for all users.” The one spot of trouble, however, is voice mode, which still has elevated error rates.
Some users were able to access ChatGPT, but found that the service was sluggish and taking much longer than usual to respond. Others, like myself, were able to use the chatbot without any issues, so the outages and errors didn’t seem to impact everyone.
So, you’re thinking of buying a smart ring. Well, some good news. Picking the best of the lot is incredibly easy right now. The “bad” news is that, as far as trustworthiness and reliability, your choices are somewhat limited, as this is still a niche and emerging gadget category.
Smart rings are in the middle of a resurgence. That means a lot of experimental ideas and newcomer tech brands you’ve probably never heard of. Enough competitors have cropped up that I spent the better part of last summer rocking six rings like a high-tech mafia don. While these aren’t necessarily bad products (some are pretty good), many aren’t as polished as what you’d see in more mature categories like smartwatches, headphones, and smartphones.
Speaking of which, there are a few things to know about the category. Currently, these devices are primarily health trackers. Their benefit is they’re more discreet and are better suited to sleep tracking than a smartwatch. However, the vast majority don’t include smart alarms or push notifications. This makes them best suited to casual athletes or more wellness-minded people. Hardcore athletes would be better served in most cases by a smartwatch or fitness tracker, with a smart ring as a supplementary source of data. (But that’s quite an expensive endeavor.) Smart rings are also ill-suited for weightlifters, as they can easily scratch against equipment.
With that in mind, here’s the best smart ring for most people in 2025 — and a handful of runners-up worth highlighting for the more tech-adventurous.
How we test smart rings
Smart rings are meant to be a stylish and discreet alternative to traditional fitness trackers. That requires a combination of experiential testing and benchmarks. We wear them daily for weeks to see how well they accommodate bloated fingers and temperature changes. We don’t take them off in the shower or to wash dishes to test waterproofing. And we compare them to a smartwatch, the Oura Ring, and a smart bed to gauge sleep and health tracking accuracy. Other factors we consider are size ranges, sizing kits, app design, syncing times, and, of course, battery life.
Sizing
Your fingers will bloat. How accommodating is the design? What’s the size range offered? (Some of us have tiny fingers!) How easy is it to return?
Design
Many people want a smart ring to double as a piece of jewelry. Is it comfortable to wear 24 / 7? Is the design versatile for all sorts of events? Will you get compliments for wearing it?
Durability
Does the finish scuff? Will you see visible scratches if you wear other rings alongside it?
Charging and battery
Rings are easy to lose. Does it have a charging case or does it use a charging dock that a cat can easily knock off your nightstand? Sleep tracking is one of the most popular use cases for a smart ring, and for that you need good battery life. How much do you get on a single charge?
App
Many smart ring companies are newcomers. The hardware can be nice, but it means nothing if the app is a nightmare. How easy is the ring to update and sync? Does it sync with larger platforms like Apple Health or Google Health Connect?
Best smart ring for most people
Surprising no one, it’s the Oura Ring 4.
I can already hear some of you shouting, “But what about the subscription!” And I agree. Even Oura’s relatively affordable $6 monthly fee can feel more like $100 when you consider the sheer number of apps, gadgets, and services asking for a chunk of your monthly paycheck. However, Oura is still the best in terms of hardware, size range, features offered, app, dedication to research, and experience in the field. Many of the smart rings available today follow the example Oura set this past decade.
The upgrades from the Oura Ring Gen 3 to the Oura Ring 4 were mostly software-based, with minor hardware refinements. You can read more in my review, but the gist is a more accurate heart rate and blood oxygen algorithm, improved automatic activity detection, and an expanded range that spans size 4 to 15. The app has been redesigned to be less cluttered, and in the last few weeks, Oura added AI-powered meal logging and glucose tracking, the latter of which requires Oura users to purchase a Dexcom Stelo CGM ($99). It also recently launched an AI chatbot. (Of the AI chatbots in health trackers I’ve tested, this one is among the more polished implementations — though it often feels like Captain Obvious-level insights.)
I’ve been long-term testing three iterations of the Oura Ring since 2018. Accuracy, design, and comfort have improved with each generation. The company continues to frequently and clearly communicate research and scientific developments. Third-party retail options have expanded, and I’ve seen investment pour into Oura. In an emerging category, these things matter. A lot. While I believe some of Oura’s newer competitors do some things better or have more creative ideas, Oura is the one I continually recommend for its combination of reliability, accuracy, and experience.
If subscriptions are an absolute dealbreaker, you’ll find zero protest here. In that case, here are the best alternatives to the Oura Ring.
The $400 Samsung Galaxy Ringnails the hardware. Its charging case is more elegant than the Oura Ring’s, and I prefer the slightly concave design for comfort. It also has the second widest size range. If you’re already all-in on a Samsung Galaxy Watch 7 or Ultra, you get the added benefit of extended battery life. If you have the latest Galaxy Z Flip 6 or Z Fold 6, Samsung also has gesture controls for the ring so you can control the camera.
There are a lot of interesting ecosystem-centric ideas that Samsung has for its Galaxy Ring, but while there’s no subscription, it’ll cost you a pretty penny to unlock the ring’s full potential. Without discounts, we’re talking about $1,800 to nearly $3,000 for the phone, watch, and ring. The Galaxy Ring is also a first-gen device with some first-gen quirks, too. Samsung is still catching up with sleep tracking accuracy, and its Galaxy AI-powered health features are rather hit or miss.
I’m also keen on the $350 Ultrahuman Ring Air. It gave the Oura Ring an honest run for its money when I tested six smart rings at once last year. It’s not quite as good with accuracy, but it’s on par with comfort and design. The app has much more of a fitness focus than wellness. Instead of a subscription, it has “Power Plugs.” You can think of them as add-on features. Some are free, like smart alarms and cycle tracking. Others will come with an additional fee, like a planned atrial fibrillation detection Power Plug and a cardio adaptability metric, which costs $2.90 a month.
Lastly, I’ve been testing the RingConn Gen 2 Air, a slimmer, entry-level version of its Gen 2 ring. At $200, it’s the most affordable smart ring I’ve tested but looks and feels a lot nicer than the original RingConn I tested last summer. I had issues with the RingConn’s squarish shape, but it’s much less noticeable this time around and more comfortable. It’s broadly accurate, and the app goes heavy on AI, to middling effect. It has great battery life. I’ve gotten around eight to nine days on a single charge — far better than any other smart ring I’ve tested.
Update, June 10th: Updated to reflect current pricing / availability and add several related links.
Spotlight and themes are in the limelight. | Screenshot: Antonio G. Di Benedetto / The Verge
At WWDC, Apple announced its new Liquid Glass design language, which is coming to all of its devices, including Macs. I've been tinkering with the macOS Tahoe 26 developer beta on the M4 MacBook Air for about a day. So far, the aesthetic changes range from slick to slightly overwrought, but the new Spotlight search features are nifty and useful.
There are new touches of glassy transparency all over macOS 26, including the Dock, Finder, widgets, and built-in apps. It's more subtle than on the iPhone, mostly because the Mac's much larger screen real estate makes the Liquid Glass elements more like accents than whatever this mess is supposed to be. I'm not very fond of it just yet, but maybe it will grow on me, like UI changes tend to.
The Dock now has a frosted background that's more translucent than Sequoia's flatter design. The hazy, frozen glass aesthetic also extends to widgets, like the calendar and weather, and drop-down menus - though the latter have much higher opacity. The pop-ups for volume and brightness now use this distorted glass look as well, though they've moved to the top-right corner of the screen instead of being centered above the dock. Frankly, they're ugly, …
Apple's WWDC 2025 had new software, Formula 1 references, and a piano man crooning the text of different app reviews. But one key feature got the short end of the stick: Siri.
Although the company continuously referenced Apple Intelligence and pushed new features like live translation for Messages, FaceTime, and phone calls, Apple's AI assistant was barely mentioned. In fact, the most attention Siri got was when Apple explained that some of its previously promised features were running behind schedule.
To address what many saw as the elephant in the room, Apple's keynote briefly mentioned that it had updated Siri to be "more natural and more helpful," but that personalization features were still on the horizon. Those features were first mentioned at last year's WWDC, with a rollout timeline "over the course of the next year."
"We're continuing our work to deliver the features that make Siri even more personal," Craig Federighi, Apple's SVP of software engineering, said during Monday's keynote. "This work needed more time to reach our high quality bar, and we look forward to sharing more about it in the coming year."
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, in a blog post published Tuesday, says an average ChatGPT query uses about 0.000085 gallons of water, or “roughly one fifteenth of a teaspoon.” He made the claim as part of a broader post on his predictions about how AI will change the world.
“People are often curious about how much energy a ChatGPT query uses; the average query uses about 0.34 watt-hours, about what an oven would use in a little over one second, or a high-efficiency lightbulb would use in a couple of minutes,” he says. He also argues that “the cost of intelligence should eventually converge to near the cost of electricity.” OpenAI didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on how Altman came to those figures.
AI companies have come under scrutiny for energy costs of their technology. This year, for example, researchers forecast that AI could consume more power than Bitcoin mining by the end of the year. In an article last year, The Washington Post worked with researchers to determine that a 100-word email “generated by an AI chatbot using GPT-4” required “a little more than 1 bottle.” The publication also found that water usage can depend on where a datacenter is located.
Google rolled out a bunch of new features with Android 16 on Tuesday, but the company appears to be saving its big Material 3 Expressive redesign for a future update. The update doesn’t feature the design language’s revamped elements, and a source tells Android Authority’s Mishaal Rahman that Google is planning to launch the new look on September 3rd, 2025, instead.
With Android 16, Google is starting to roll out support for Live Updates with progress-centric notifications and enhanced settings for users with hearing aids. The updates are coming to Pixel devices first, but according to Google, Android users will have to wait for another update to see Live Updates “fully realized.”
Google officially took the wraps off Material 3 Expressive following a leak last month, which features updates to icon shapes, type styles, and color palettes with “more natural, springy animations” across the Android interface. You can still check out some Material 3 Expressive updates in the Android 16 QPR1 beta that’s available now, but Rahman notes that Google plans on launching more design updates in the next Android 16 QPR1 Beta 2.
Google is expected to include Android’s desktop mode in a September launch as well. The new mode, which builds on Samsung’s DeX platform, optimizes apps and content for large-screen devices. It will allow you to resize multiple app windows across your screens, as well as connect phones and tablets to external displays for a desktop-like experience. Users with a Pixel 8 and up can try out these features in the Android 16 beta, but the rest of us will likely have to wait a few more months.
Google is starting to offer buyouts to US-based employees in its sprawling Search organization, along with other divisions like marketing, research, and core engineering, according to multiple employees familiar with the matter.
The buyouts, which Google is referring to as a "voluntary exit program," are currently not being offered to employees in DeepMind, Google Cloud, YouTube, or Google's central ad sales organization. Employees in Google's platforms and services group, which includes Android and the Pixel line of devices, were offered buyouts earlier this year before the company enacted layoffs. It's unclear if more layoffs will follow this week's buyout announcement. Employees in some orgs are being offered a minimum of 14 weeks' pay with a July 1st enrollment deadline.
Other parts of Google, including YouTube, are also requiring US employees within a 50-mile radius of an office to return to work at least three days a week by September, or be laid off with severance.
In an internal memo I obtained, Nick Fox, the head of Google's wider "Knowledge and Information" group that includes Search, called the buyout program a "supportive exit path for those of you who don't feel a …
According to Sveum, Alexa Plus is now being rolled out to customers with Echo smart speakers and displays “at an increasing pace” following its late March launch, and the company will “make it even more broadly available over the summer,” he says.
The slow rollout is down to Panos Panay’s insistence that all Alexa Plus problems be ironed out before the full release, according to a recent profile of the new head of Amazon devices and services in The Wall Street Journal. It reported that “he knows that getting Alexa+ right is critical because it will be released to millions of people who depend on the technology across multiple devices. It’s a very public rollout.”
First announced in September 2023, the supercharged Alexa faced more than a year of delays, reportedly in part due to the challenges of imposing the new technology on top of the existing Alexa assistant.
It was finally relaunched under Panay last February as an entirely new assistant, and was slated to roll out to US users in the Early Access program in March. When it eventually gets its full release, the new assistant will cost $19.99 a month and be free for Prime members.
However, it sounds like it’s not fully ready for primetime. Several features announced at the launch event aren’t yet in Early Access. According to Sveum these include asking Alexa to “jump to your favorite scene on Fire TV; order groceries hands-free; order delivery through Grubhub; schedule your next spa visit; brainstorm the perfect gift idea; set personalized reminders and Routines for your family; create personalized music — on the fly” and “Access Alexa+ on browser.” That last one feels big, as personal computers are a place that Alexa has long struggled to gain traction and is somewhere it will need to be to compete with ChatGPT, Gemini, etc.
Sveum says that these missing features “will ship over the coming weeks and months” and that nearly 90 percent of announced features are live in Early Access. These include the big one, a more conversational voice assistant, which I tested briefly at the launch event. Plus, the ability to ask Alexa to remember important details you tell it and recall things from documents you’ve sent to it (Alexa now has its own email address).
Several features announced at the launch event are still not part of the Early Access program.
Alexa Plus can also manage your calendar and move music from room to room, says Sveum. It can book you an Uber, find tickets for an upcoming event, and source someone to come fix something via Thumbtack. For smart home control, you can create Alexa Routines by voice, control multiple devices at once, and customize your own smart home widget on Echo Show devices. Smart cooking timers are also live, says Sveum.
“A lot of customers are telling us they love having natural, free-flowing conversations with Alexa. It enables them to complete more complex requests like controlling multiple smart home devices at once, deep dive on music or trending topics,” Sveum says. “We’re also getting lots of positive feedback about how easy and helpful it is to get things done — like coordinating calendars, making reservations, and taking care of weekly meal planning.”
There haven’t been any formal reviews of Alexa Plus yet (Amazon PR seems to be keeping a tight lid on this one), but one USA Today columnist got in through the Early Access program. He was largely complimentary about the experience, writing he’s “been very pleased – and occasionally quite impressed.”
This is also the general vibe on Facebook and Reddit user groups from those with access, but there are clearly some bugs to work out. “It’s early days, but it feels a tiny bit closer to what I have with ChatGPT,” said one Reddit user.
Another user agreed, noting they liked how it remembered things they mentioned to it and could recall them. But they did say they weren’t happy that Alexa couldn’t access some smart temperature sensors that the previous Alexa could. One user said controlling multiple smart home devices at once was impressive, but another said they reverted to regular Alexa as the Plus version couldn’t control their smart air fryer.
Control of smart home devices is clearly going to be a huge hurdle here. Existing smart voice assistants with their command and control structure can generally be relied upon to do the correct thing (assuming they heard/understood you). However, the transition to these more conversational, intuitive assistants is potentially fraught with danger, especially when it comes to controlling things in your home. Still, I’m very much looking forward to putting it to the test.
Warner Bros. Discovery has announced plans to split itself into two companies, separating its streaming and studios divisions from its linear television businesses. The split is expected to be completed by mid-2026 and is supposed to help “maximize the potential” of its portfolio of brands, according to the company.
Warner Bros. Television, Warner Bros. Motion Picture Group, DC Studios, HBO, and HBO Max, alongside their respective film and television libraries, will fall under a new “Streaming and Studios” company. Another company, described as “Global Networks,” will run entertainment, sports, and news television brands, including CNN, Bleacher Report, the Discovery Plus streaming service, TNT Sports in the US, and Discovery TV channels across Europe.
“The cultural significance of this great company and the impactful stories it has brought to life for more than a century have touched countless people all over the world. It’s a treasured legacy we will proudly continue in this next chapter of our celebrated history,” said WBD CEO David Zaslav. “By operating as two distinct and optimized companies in the future, we are empowering these iconic brands with the sharper focus and strategic flexibility they need to compete most effectively in today’s evolving media landscape.”
Final names for the two companies weren’t given, so it’s not clear which will get the Warner Bros. brand. Zaslav will serve as President and CEO of Streaming and Studios, while WBD CFO Gunnar Wiedenfels will be President and CEO of the Global Networks company. Both will continue in their current roles at WBD until the separation. Global Networks will receive a 20 percent stake in the Streaming and Studios spinoff.
The Financial Times reported in July 2024 that Zaslav was considering creating a new company to separate WBD’s streaming business from the growing debts of its suffering legacy TV networks. As today’s announcement doesn’t mention leadership plans for WBD following the separation, the future of the WBD brand is uncertain.
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