Smartphone launches, wearables and consumer tech highlights from The Verge, Engadget & more
These are the Redmi Buds 8 Pro in Glacier Blue, and we’re ready to unbox them right after their global premiere. They are the latest addition to the Redmi brand’s audio portfolio and bring some impressive specs, including triple drivers, hi-res audio streaming with LDAC support and active noise cancellation (ANC) rated at up to 55dB, all while retailing for under €100/£100.
Last week, we asked our readers whether they had any interest in buying a Pixel 10a – the answer is a resounding “no”. The majority of voters think there are better mid-rangers on the market.
Xiaomi's latest Wear OS smartwatch is here, and it means serious business. Meet the Xiaomi Watch 5, a no-compromises smartwatch with a massive battery.
Has Donald Trump brought about Claudemania?
Next week will be busy with news from the MWC and upcoming Apple announcements. This week the big event was the launch of the Galaxy S26 series.
It looks like a user error with the Amazon Polly text-to-speech system is to blame.
If you've felt nostalgic for some older Marvel games lately, the 'Maximum Collection' is here to meet your retro needs.
Who would've guessed we'd get to play the original Banjo-Kazooie on a handheld with just a D-pad in 2026. HyperMegaTech!'s latest release is a collaboration with Rare Ltd.
So called "pig butchering" scams are happening on an industrial scale. Politicians have noticed.
TORRAS is launching a new anti-reflective screen protector designed specifically for the Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra. The OrigArmor Screen Protector also boasts high light transmittance, enhanced protection against damage and easy installation with a roller tray system.
Wayans gives you a little bootlegged sneak peek at what you'll laugh at (and probably feel bad about laughing at) in 'Scary Movie 6.'
At the outbreak of a new war, Altman is closer than ever to the Pentagon.
MWC 2026 officially gets underway on March 2 and will continue through March 5, but the announcements are already coming ahead of its start. We can always count on the annual tech event to bring tons of new phones, laptops and tablets, and we're expecting to see some robots and other gadgets too — plus plenty of AI news, of course.
Created in 1897, it's over two decades older than the term "robot."
Alaska's House of Representatives unanimously passed HB47 , a bill that imposes sweeping limits on when and how minors use social media apps, along with bans on generating or distributing harmful deepfakes of children. The bill's original form was focused on prohibiting the possession and distribution of sexually explicit images of children using AI, but Alaska lawmakers decided to add amendments that would impose social media restrictions.
Bloodborne fans may not be happy to hear that a remake was reportedly rejected, but that doesn't mean it's completely off the table. Bluepoint Games , Sony's closed-down studio behind many PlayStation remakes, pitched remaking the classic Gothic horror RPG in early 2025, but was blocked by the game's developer, FromSoftware, according to a Bloomberg report.
Buddy Guy and Miles Caton don't summon any spirits, but listening to them together will make your day better.
A few months after launching in China, the Xiaomi Pad 8 Pro is expanding to more markets around the world. This is one of Xiaomi’s thinnest LCD tablets as it is 0.4mm slimmer than the Pad 7 Pro.
It certainly wasn't like this in the old days.
Welcome to the weekend, friends! While the rest of our team was checking out Samsung’s forthcoming Galaxy S26 lineup and prepping for Apple’s “special experience” next week, we’ve been sifting through Woot’s “Video Games for All” sale and a truly weird slate of deals that, frankly, don’t have a throughline.
Alongside a global launch for Xiaomi's 17 Ultra (read about that right here ), the company announced a further deepening of its relationship with Leica . The CEO of Leica, Matthias Harsch, took to the stage to announce a new Leitzphone, which appears to be an even deeper collaboration than 17 Ultra by Leica, which is a different phone.
Are two 5,000mAh power banks the same size? Before you say “of course”, we need to clarify what we mean by size.
Max Landis and Danny McBride (no, really) are apparently next in line to bring 'GI Joe' back to the big screen. Yay...?
Xiaomi launched a tracking tag called simply the Xiaomi Tag. We have one in our hands and we can see a few reasons why you may want to pick one up over trackers from other brands.
Can you really tell the difference that a generation makes for mobile gaming?
Xiaomi today announced the Xiaomi 17 and Xiaomi 17 Ultra for international markets at an event in Barcelona, Spain, alongside a bunch of other products, including the Leica Leitzphone. No, it isn't one of those Japan-exclusive Leitz Phones made by Sharp, but basically the global version of the China-exclusive Xiaomi 17 Ultra Leica Edition we already reviewed, with the most notable difference being the battery capacity.
The company also brought its Leica edition Xiaomi 17 Ultra to global markets, albeit with a sky-high price tag.
One day Apple, Google, and Samsung will catch up. Won't they?
Who needs a mirrorless camera when you can buy Xiaomi's Ultra.
The global Xiaomi Watch 5 is a feature-heavy upgrade focused on hands-free control and AI.
China’s biggest phone makers continue to relentlessly forge ahead with high-spec phones that you may never see in the US. With the Xiaomi 17 Ultra this year, the company has continued its pattern from previous iterations by focusing on powerful camera sensors, huge batteries and… being selective about global availability.
The Xiaomi 17 and 17 Ultra launched in China at the end of Q3 last year – so if you wrote them off as China-only phones that you can’t buy, it’s time to have a second look since they are now launching to new markets. There are no surprises on their spec sheets, other than the predictable decrease in battery capacity for the global models.
The Xiaomi 17 might be a low point for original design, but do the upgrades make it worth buying?
Xiaomi has announced its first Bluetooth tracker, and while the Xiaomi Tag has a more elongated design than the Apple AirTag, that lets you use it in more places right out of the box. On one end of the tracker you'll find an integrated metal loop that can be attached to a keyring or clipped […]
Xiaomi and Leica's long-running phone partnership just got a little closer. Alongside the new international release of its 17 Ultra flagship, Xiaomi has been entrusted with manufacturing a separate version that is the first Leica Leitzphone to release outside of Japan, following three Sharp-made models exclusive to the country.
Xiaomi has just given a global launch to two of its latest flagship phones, the Xiaomi 17 and 17 Ultra, along with a Leica-branded Leitzphone edition of the Ultra. There's no sign, however, of the 17 Pro, which launched in China with an additional display mounted next to the rear cameras.
Shokz OpenFit Pro envision a world where open-style earbuds have their own version of noise cancellation—and it actually feels possible.
Hi, friends! Welcome to Installer No.
Sure, Valve delayed the Steam Machine, but Samsung, Nintendo, Sony, and more had surprises in store.
But it comes with a pricing hurdle.
Welcome to our latest roundup of what's going on in the indie game space. It's Steam Next Fest week, with literally thousands of demos for upcoming games for us to dive into.
Better in every way, but still requires some patience to get going.
$900 for the Galaxy S26? I don't think so.
I couldn't imagine using Android without these Google apps.
They make use of that big screen and the S Pen.
A bunch of useful Android Recovery menu tools have apparently been gutted in Samsung's latest update.
OpenAI has reached an agreement with the Defense Department to deploy its models in the agency’s network, company chief Sam Altman has revealed on X. In his post, he said two of OpenAI’s most important safety principles are “prohibitions on domestic mass surveillance and human responsibility for the use of force, including for autonomous weapon systems.” Altman claimed the company put those principles in its agreement with the agency, which he called by the government’s preferred name of Department of War (DoW), and that it had agreed to honor them.
President Donald Trump has ordered all US government agencies to stop using Claude and other Anthropic services, escalating an already volatile feud between the Department of Defense and company over AI safeguards. Taking to Truth Social on Friday afternoon, the president said there would be a six-month phase out period for federal agencies, including the Defense Department, to migrate off of Anthropic's products.
Even with the ability to take excellent photos with our phones and instantly share them across the world, there’s something magical about the old-school instant camera. With just a click of a button, you can capture a moment in a photo that you can see and touch almost immediately.
The Federal Communications Commission has given the go ahead for two of the US' biggest cable providers, Charter Communications and Cox Communications, to merge. Charter announced its intention to acquire Cox for $34.5 billion in May 2025, with specific plans to inherit Cox's managed IT, commercial fiber and cloud businesses, while folding the company's residential cable service into a subsidiary.
Paramount Skydance and Warner Bros. Discovery are officially merging .
After suggesting a version of AMD's FSR 4 could be ported to the PS5 Pro last year, it looks like Sony is finally rolling out an update with the upscaling tech in March. Mark Cerny, the lead architect of the PS4, PS5 and PS5 Pro, shared via a blog post that the PS5 Pro will be updated with a new version of the company's PSSR (PlayStation Spectral Super Resolution) upscaling tech next month, and Resident Evil Requiem is one of the first games to use it.
Where's the Trump phone? We're going to keep talking about it every week.
When Amazon first showed off its redesigned Fire TV OS at CES, we were impressed. It’s faster, better organized, and feels similar to Google’s top-notch TV interface.
There’s a sale happening at Woot that’s delivering Black Friday-esque deals on video games through March 5th. The “Video Games for All” sale includes discounts on physical games for most modern consoles, making it a great time to treat yourself (or a pal) to some titles that you’ve been waiting to see big price drops […]
Since I saw the TCL X11L SQD-Mini LED TV at a pre-CES event in December, I've been eager to get a close look at it in my living room. At first glance, the TV impressed me enough that I named it the best TV of CES 2026.
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