Amazon is set to announce new Alexa features beginning at 10AM ET this morning — and we hope a few devices accompany them. There isn’t a way to watch the event remotely, but our team is here in person to bring you all of the updates as they happen.

We’re expecting Amazon to announce its new AI-powered Alexa, which, according to earlier reports, could cost as much as $5 to $10 per month on top of a Prime membership. Reuters said in June that Amazon has considered the subscription pricing for a complete Alexa overhaul that could allow people to order dinner from services like Uber Eats or help write an email.

The Washington Post said earlier this month that Amazon won’t release the new version of Alexa for at least a month after this event because the company has reportedly encountered issues with inaccurate answers to test questions.

It seems like it would be a good time for Amazon to announce new products that use the latest version of Alexa, too, so we’re hoping to see new Echos or updates to Amazon’s glasses, Fire TV platform, and other devices and services. But who knows? Follow along below for the updates.

Apple has acknowledged a peculiar bug with the iPhone’s dictation feature that briefly displays “Trump” when someone says the word “racist.” The Verge has been unable to reproduce the issue, but it picked up attention on Tuesday after a video demonstrating the strange substitution went viral on TikTok and other social media.

The company provided a statement to The New York Times and Fox News confirming the bug. “We are aware of an issue with the speech recognition model that powers dictation, and we are rolling out a fix as soon as possible,” an unnamed spokesperson said, according to Fox News.

Apparently the issue boils down to phonetic overlap between “Trump” and “racist.” The company told Fox News that other words with an “r” consonant are also occasionally affected. But John Burkey, who formerly worked on the Siri team at Apple, told the Times that Trump’s name appearing “smells like a serious prank” that could have been purposefully carried out by someone internally.

Regardless of the technical reason behind it, the awkward glitch comes a day after Apple announced plans to invest more than $500 billion in the United States over the next four years. The company is looking to blunt the potential impact of tariffs put into place by President Donald Trump, with a 10 percent tariff already in effect on goods imported from China, and a 25 percent tariff threatened for chips.

I’m hard-pressed to find another example of a tech company announcing something and then waiting over four years to actually ship it, but that’s exactly the situation we’ve reached with Spotify and its long-delayed HiFi feature. The latest reports indicate it’s finally coming in a matter of months as part of a Music Pro package that Spotify hopes will ensure the service’s continued profitability.

But this has become quite the saga.

First introduced on February 22nd 2021, Spotify HiFi was to roll out later that year — or such was the original plan, anyway. In that story, I wrote “your turn, Apple Music,” which is funny in retrospect since Apple Music managed to successfully deliver lossless and high-resolution audio just a few months later (and at no added cost for subscribers). Amazon stopped charging extra for lossless music at around the same time.

By all accounts, this aggressive approach from both companies totally derailed Spotify HiFi, which was always going to demand an upcharge over the service’s regular Premium subscription. The company went radio silent on the feature, and Spotify spokespeople never provided any meaningful updates on its status.

T …

Read the full story at The Verge.

Apple just announced the long-rumored iPhone 16E. With a starting price of $599 (up from the $429 SE), it’s now the most affordable smartphone in the iPhone lineup and offers the company’s latest A18 processor, Apple Intelligence software features, and a much better OLED display.

But if you’re mulling an upgrade from the now-discontinued iPhone SE or another smartphone, there are a few key points to consider — and some of them aren’t obvious.

• The iPhone 16E is eSIM-only (in the United States): Unlike the iPhone SE, which supported physical SIM cards, the iPhone 16E completes Apple’s transition to eSIM-only cellular connectivity. That’s at least true of the hardware that’ll be sold in the United States; in other markets, Apple still includes a traditional nano-SIM tray. But US customers will have to set up cellular data directly on the phone. The good news is that carriers have made this process much smoother over the last few years.
• Farewell, Lightning: Apple’s proprietary connector is finally relegated to history among the iPhone lineup with today’s introduction of the iPhone 16E, which uses USB-C for wired charging and data transfer. (Note that you’ll be limited to USB 2 data speeds; only the “Pro” iPhone gets faster USB 3 performance.)
• There’s no MagSafe: In another departure from most iPhones in recent memory, Apple is not including its magnetic connection technology in the iPhone 16E. There’s no mention of MagSafe on the phone’s tech specs page, and MagSafe is also absent in the description of the iPhone 16E’s silicone case. Wireless charging is still very much supported, but at least from the looks of it, your magnetic accessories won’t effortlessly attach to the 16E. That’s a real bummer of a cost-cutting measure. The iPhone SE never had MagSafe, but Apple made a very intentional decision to leave it out of this newer design.
• But you do get the Action Button: The ring / silent switch has been replaced by the customizable Action Button that first debuted on the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max. You can still choose to have it silence your phone, but there are numerous other capabilities — including the option to launch the camera-powered Visual Intelligence feature. My personal favorite remains the ability to quickly identify songs with Shazam just by pressing the button.
• This is the first iPhone to use Apple’s own modem: The company says its C1 modem leads to the best battery life ever in an iPhone of this size. But we still don’t know how Apple’s in-house modem will compare to Qualcomm when it comes to cellular reception, peak data speeds, and more. Stay tuned for our review of the iPhone 16E for more on this.
• The camera can’t do macro photography: The 48-megapixel Fusion camera in the iPhone 16E is certain to be a significant improvement over the last iPhone SE. But one shooting capability that buyers will miss out on is macro photography. Apple’s latest handset only has a single camera and lacks the secondary ultra wide lens that other iPhones use for close-up macro images.
• 512GB will cost you: That $599 starting price is very appealing. Unfortunately, customers who need the most storage available can expect to pay quite a bit more: $300 more, to be specific. The 512GB iPhone 16E sells for $899.
• It’s got a 60Hz display: No one was expecting the new budget iPhone to surpass the regular iPhone 16 and 16 Plus in refresh rate — and the target market for this phone is unlikely to care. But it’s still worth highlighting. Thankfully, rumors suggest this year’s iPhone 17 will finally standardize Apple’s more fluid ProMotion displays across the lineup.

Preorders for Apple’s iPhone 16E begin this Friday, and the phone’s release will follow a week later on February 28th. Check out our StoryStream for even more details, and keep your eyes peeled for The Verge’s full review in the coming days.

It can be surprisingly daunting to follow up on a great pair of earbuds. The objective is to make improvements wherever possible without sacrificing anything that people loved about the previous set. That’s where Technics found itself with the $299.99 EAH-AZ100 earbuds, which it announced at CES 2025. I was rather taken with the company’s last flagship set, the AZ80, because of their rich sound and unique ability to pair with three devices at the same time. The new buds look to augment those strengths with even more dynamic audio, longer battery life, and more capable active noise cancellation.

Technics even rethought the core sound. Inside the A100s are new “magnetic fluid” drivers — and yes, there’s actually liquid in there. Technics puts an oily substance (mixed with magnetic particles) between the driver magnet and voice coil and says this approach, derived from its $1,200 in-ear monitors, helps lower distortion and increase clarity beyond what the AZ80s were capable of. The same goes for bass response, with the AZ100s able to dig down even deeper for a more impactful thump. Despite the new approach, there’s not a world of difference between the AZ80s and AZ100s …

Read the full story at The Verge.

Considering the trajectory of 2025 so far, perhaps we should’ve known that Netflix finally playing nice with the Apple TV app was too good to be true. And now the streaming giant has confirmed that’s exactly the case.

Netflix spokesperson MoMo Zhou has told The Verge that this morning’s window where Netflix appeared as a “participating” service in Apple TV — including temporary support for the watchlist and “continue watching” features — was an error and has now been rolled back. That’s a shame. The jubilation in our comments on the original story was palpable.

Netflix has never gotten on board with Apple’s attempts to aggregate content from numerous streaming services, and it has also refused to participate in similar efforts from other companies like Google. So it was a surprise when it seemed like Netflix had changed its tune out of nowhere without any press release or official announcement from either side. Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman said he’d heard it was a bug of some sort earlier on Friday.

Unfortunately, at least for now, Netflix’s stance on all this remains the same. The company still very much wants everyone to browse and consume its content from within the Netflix app. Maybe there’s still hope for Netflix to change its mind, but that day is not today. At least we now know how easily it could be done, I suppose.

Apple is preparing a new 27-inch display with Mini LED backlighting for release later in 2025 or early next year, according to analyst Ross Young (and highlighted by MacRumors).

The purported follow-up to 2022’s Studio Display would leave the monitor’s size unchanged but offer meaningful gains in contrast, black levels, and (potentially) overall brightness. Even at the time of its release, the original Studio Display trailed modern TVs and many displays with its traditional LED technology, which lights up the entire panel at all times.

Mini LED allows for a punchier, more contrasty image across the display since there are many dimming zones behind the screen that can individually light up and turn off based on the content being shown. Apple’s Studio Display already delivers excellent color accuracy and a very sharp 5K resolution, but it can also be susceptible to minor backlight bleed and other irregularities that sometimes come with conventional LED panels.

Switching to Mini LED would further improve the monitor’s uniformity while making blacks look darker when watching videos. These are things I’d hope for from a display that starts at $1,599.

Apple could also take another swing at improving the built-in camera with this rumored Studio Display sequel. The camera quality was underwhelming when the product first came to market, which led Apple to issue a firmware update designed to boost its clarity. I’m still more than satisfied with the Studio Display’s integrated speakers, however, which have been good enough to negate the need for standalone speakers on my desk.

The company’s higher-end monitor, the Pro Display XDR, already uses Mini LED technology but hasn’t been updated since 2020. Apple has refined its approach to the backlighting system in subsequent products like the 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pros and previous versions of the iPad Pro.

Beats just announced the $249 Powerbeats Pro 2, the long-awaited sequel to a pair of fitness earbuds released way back in 2019. The new model retains the ear hook design that’s synonymous with the Powerbeats line, but the buds are significantly smaller and 20 percent lighter than their predecessors. The charging case has also been scaled down by 33 percent and now supports Qi wireless charging along with USB-C. But the biggest new feature of the Powerbeats Pro 2 is heart-rate monitoring for workouts. It’s been rumored that Apple eventually wants to bring similar functionality to the AirPods, so this could be a preview of that.

Both earbuds contain LED optical sensors that pulse “over 100 times per second to measure blood flow,” according to Beats’ press release. An algorithm takes in the data from both earbuds and parses it for the most accurate reading, which then gets relayed to compatible fitness apps including Nike Run Club, Peloton, Open, and more. Heart rate data can also be reviewed later in the Apple Health app. (For those who wear an Apple Watch, its heart-rate readings will always be prioritized over those from the Powerbeats Pro 2.)

If you’re using a supported app on iOS, heart-rate monitoring starts and stops automatically. But Android users will have to manually activate it through the Beats app or by double-pressing and holding the button on either bud. Since a good seal is important for the heart-rate functionality, Beats now includes five sets of ear tips in the box, including extra small and extra large sizes.

The original Powerbeats Pro lacked any kind of noise cancellation, but the Powerbeats Pro 2 now feature proper ANC (and a transparency mode) thanks to Apple’s H2 chip. Integrating the H2 means you get a host of other Apple ecosystem features like audio sharing, hands-free “Hey Siri” commands, personalized spatial audio, Find My support, and more. Android users can rely on the Beats app for some features, but unlike the Studio Buds Plus, these earbuds aren’t designed to take advantage of Google’s native OS capabilities like Fast Pair or Find My Device.

Battery life has improved substantially: Beats says the Powerbeats Pro 2 can achieve up to 8 hours of continuous playback with ANC enabled (or 10 with it off) and a total of 36 hours (or 45 with ANC off) when you factor in additional juice from the case. One thing that hasn’t changed is the sweat / water resistance rating, which is still the same IPX4 as last time. Some competitors, like Jabra’s Elite 8 Active and Sennheiser’s Momentum Sport earbuds, go beyond that. But Beats is confident that the Powerbeats Pro 2 are very durable — the company redesigned the earbuds’ venting system to better guard against water ingress — and claims the ear hook is its most robust yet in regards to wear and tear.

The Powerbeats Pro 2 are available starting today for the same $249 price as before in four colors: orange, purple, gray, and black. My colleague (and Verge fitness guru) Victoria Song has been testing out the Powerbeats Pro 2 for several days now. So if you want the full rundown on how comfortable the new design is, heart-rate monitoring accuracy, and whether the sound quality is good enough to fuel the hardest moments of your workout, check out her full review.

In a continued shuffling of the top ranks at Sonos, chief marketing officer Jordan Saxemard has exited the company. His departure is effective immediately. The news was announced during an internal call on Monday. Lindsay Whitworth, who has been at Sonos for over 20 years, will lead the brand’s marketing on an interim basis.

Internally, employees are happy about Whitworth taking over. She’s a longtime Sonos veteran who understands the company’s culture and customer base, and giving her the marketing reins is another move by interim CEO Tom Conrad to show rank-and-file employees that he’s serious about getting Sonos back on track in 2025.

Saxemard joined Sonos in May 2024 after nearly three years at Dyson and was hired by former CEO Patrick Spence. From what I’m told, he never quite gelled with the audio brand’s mission. He also had the unfortunate luck of immediately facing a challenging ordeal when Sonos prematurely rolled out an overhauled mobile app that was buggy and missing features.

“Sonos head of marketing Jordan Saxemard has departed Sonos effective immediately,” Sonos said in a statement provided by spokesperson Erin Pategas. “We thank him for his contributions to the company. Lindsay Whitworth, Vice President of Global Consumer Direct will lead the marketing team in the interim. A search for a new marketing leader is underway.”

During last week’s earnings call, Sonos declined to offer any specifics on sales of its Ace headphones, though CFO Saori Casey admitted that the company’s first-ever headphones were derailed by the software controversy. Hoping to overcome that, Sonos spent big on marketing the Ace — including a hard-to-miss New York City subway campaign — but those ads rarely highlighted the unique features of the product like TV Audio Swap. Sonos also dumped millions of dollars into its holiday marketing even as the app continued to frustrate customers.

Conrad has stressed that improving the core Sonos user experience remains his top priority. “Honestly, there remains a lot of work to do to meet my bar. And so, we’re focusing on three areas: performance and reliability, usability, and design, and new experiences,” he said on the earnings call.

Getting ready for the Big Game? Once you’ve invited your friends over and picked what food to order, the most important thing is deciding how and where to watch Super Bowl LIX. But thankfully, it’s going to be very, very easy to catch the Eagles and Chiefs facing off in New Orleans.

If history’s anything to go by, betting against Patrick Mahomes seems ill-advised. Repeating the outcome of this matchup two years ago is his goal. Denying Kansas City a history-making three-peat would be quite the triumph for Philadelphia, however. So if you’re looking for the best way to experience Sunday night’s spectacle (and Kendrick Lamar’s halftime show), I’m here to help.

When is Super Bowl LIX?

The Philadelphia Eagles and Kansas City chiefs will collide on February 9th at Caesars Superdome in New Orleans. Official coverage begins at 6:00PM ET with kickoff scheduled for 6:30PM.

Where can I watch Super Bowl LIX?

Fox will be airing the game on cable, and you can also watch it through various internet TV services like YouTube TV, Hulu with Live TV, and Fubo. Comcast will presenting it in Dolby Vision and Atmos.

But the simplest option for many will be to tune into Tubi’s free live stream of Super Bowl LIX. You won’t need a cable login to watch any of the action live, and the Fox-owned app will be serving the game in upscaled 4K and HDR. And don’t worry: you’ll get all the same, big-money ads during commercial breaks as everyone else.

Which devices support the 4K stream of Super Bowl LIX on Tubi?

Tubi’s website says “you’ll be able to stream in 4K on supported devices like Roku, Fire TV, Android TV, and Apple TV” as long as your streaming player and TV are both 4K-compatible.

Not long before last year’s software quagmire thrust the company into controversy, Sonos tinkered with an idea that some employees believed might resonate with Gen Z customers. Engineers at Sonos prototyped a miniature speaker that could magnetically connect to the back of Apple’s recent iPhones. 

At least conceptually, the since-abandoned product sounds rather similar to JBL’s Soundboost speaker. Released back in 2016, that MotoMod accessory was designed to attach to Motorola’s Moto Z lineup of smartphones. Any time you placed it on the phone, music and other audio would automatically play through the Soundboost, which offered louder and more powerful sound than a phone’s very small speakers.

But the MotoMod system used pogo pins for routing audio and other data to accessories. MagSafe does not offer audio passthrough capabilities, so the Sonos speaker would’ve relied on a Bluetooth connection (Trying to integrate Wi-Fi like the Roam would’ve been too much of a battery drain.) This idea isn’t without precedent in the iOS world; Scosche’s BoomCan is a circular speaker that can latch onto iPhones with MagSafe. You can also find similar gadgets on Amazon or Temu.

Read the full story at The Verge.

Things at Sonos are getting worse before they get better — if they’re going to get better. Today the company laid off approximately 200 employees, The Verge has learned. The news was announced at around 4PM ET, and a letter to employees from interim CEO Tom Conrad was posted on Sonos’ website shortly thereafter. “One thing I’ve observed first hand is that we’ve become mired in too many layers that have made collaboration and decision-making harder than it needs to be,” Conrad wrote. “So across the company today we are reorganizing into flatter, smaller, and more focused teams.”

Conrad clearly sees a need to rethink the way Sonos operates as part of the company’s turnaround effort. Sonos is scheduled to report its latest quarterly earnings on Thursday afternoon. And if this is the precursor to that, the near-term outlook probably isn’t very good.

It’s an even more substantial wave of job cuts than Sonos made back in August, when it let 100 people go. The company remains in an unenviable position, facing cooling demand for its products and a reputation that has been badly tarnished by last year’s app controversy. The situation eventually became so damaging to Sonos’ business that it led to the ouster of former CEO Patrick Spence last month.

Conrad has pledged to continue improving the mobile app after the company carelessly released a major overhaul of the software back in May — well before it was actually ready for Sonos customers. The new app was buggy out of the gate and missing many features. Sonos has spent the months since trying to make up for its colossal misstep. But another round of layoffs at the company could further harm morale among employees who are still doing their best to rectify the mistakes of previous leadership.

Sonos will now divide its product organization into groups for hardware, software, design, quality and operations “and away from dedicated business units devoted to individual product categories,” Conrad wrote. “Being smaller and more focused will require us to do a much better job of prioritizing our work — lately we’ve let too many projects run under a cloud of half-commitment. We’re going to fix this too,” he added.

After releasing the well-received Arc Ultra soundbar late last year, Sonos’ next planned hardware release is a high-end streaming player that doubles as an HDMI switch, among other capabilities.

From a presentation standpoint, Super Bowl LIX will largely be sticking to the status quo on Sunday. Fox Sports is capturing the game in 1080p HDR and upscaling that to 4K for its own networks and the free Tubi live stream. Comcast just announced that it’ll be airing the game in Dolby Vision, which it has done before, but now with Dolby Atmos for the first time. The latter is certain to be a virtualized surround signal, but it could still lend some extra atmosphere to the game if you’ve got a nice home theater setup.

Comcast says the Dolby Vision / Atmos broadcast of Super Bowl LIX will be available to Xfinity TV customers as part of its Enhanced 4K offerings, which “provides customers with an unmatched viewing experience with the best picture and audio quality, delivered to the home in the fastest way possible so the action customers see in their living room is only seconds behind the game unfolding in New Orleans.” If you’re an Xfinity Stream subscriber, you can also watch it there as well.

The game’s picture quality will be similar to what we’ve seen in recent years, but you might notice some unique shots as the Eagles and Chiefs face off. Fox Sports says it’s using a Super Slowmo / 4K SkyCam, which is a first for the Super Bowl, so I’ll be curious to see when and how that’s used.

I’ve got friends who still insist on the OTA antenna method of watching the Big Game for the “purest” feed, but I definitely prefer the HDR experience over that — wherever you can find it. The wider color gamut makes a real difference, and the upscaled 4K image apparently meets the “good enough” bar for the enormous audience that will be watching on Sunday if we’re still doing it this way. For reference, last year’s game tallied 123.4 million average viewers across all platforms, according to the NFL.

(Disclosure: Comcast is an investor in Vox Media, The Verge’s parent company.)

After the most tumultuous nine months in Sonos’ history, the brand is trying to find its footing again. Even as work continues to rehabilitate the company’s beleaguered mobile app, Sonos is planning to take a big swing in a new product category: it’s getting into video for the first time. In the coming months, Sonos will release a streaming player that sources tell me could cost between $200 and $400 — a truly staggering price for its category.

I’ve seen images of the upcoming product, which is deep into development, and it’s about as nondescript as streaming hardware gets. Viewed from the top, the device is a flattened black square and slightly thicker than a deck of trading cards.

But the Android TV-powered streamer, codenamed Pinewood, is designed to be more than just another competitor to the Apple TV 4K, Nvidia Shield, or Roku Ultra. Don’t get me wrong: streaming is a huge focus for the product. Sources familiar with Pinewood tell me it has a “beautiful” interface, despite the software being developed in partnership with a digital ads firm.

Sonos plans to combine content from numerous platforms including Netflix, Max, and Disney Plus under a single, unifi …

Read the full story at The Verge.

Netflix and WWE nearly made it a whole month streaming Raw without any major technical hiccups, but that streak was broken on Monday night. Throughout the February 3rd episode, some viewers were annoyed by the feed intermittently cutting out to a black screen. Audio would also drop whenever these glitches occurred. The problems never caused the live feed to drop entirely — this wasn’t anything like the messy Jake Paul / Mike Tyson stream — but they were still a source of frustration for fans eager to see the fallout from Saturday’s Royal Rumble event.

WWE Raw debuted on Netflix in early January after spending decades as a staple of linear cable TV. The streamer has committed $5 billion over 10 years to secure WWE’s flagship weekly show. Outside the US, Netflix is now home to an even bigger WWE content portfolio that includes SmackDown, NXT, and the company’s monthly premium live events. So if these streams don’t go smoothly, fans are certain to notice.

Monday’s technical issues were most obvious during the main event, which pitted CM Punk against Sami Zayn. The Netflix logo remained visible during Raw’s blackouts, which led to speculation that the problems were coming directly from WWE’s live production feed in Cleveland. They remained present in immediate replays of the episode.

The Verge has reached out to WWE for comment on what caused the brief interruptions. Netflix raised the price of its monthly subscriptions last month, bringing its ad-supported tier up to $7.99 per month, the standard ad-free plan to $17.99, and the premium tier to $24.99 per month.

As has become an annual tradition, Apple just reported blockbuster earnings for the company’s most recent holiday quarter. “Today Apple is reporting our best quarter ever, with revenue of $124.3 billion, up four percent from a year ago,” CEO Tim Cook said in a press release. Revenue was up nearly across the board for the company’s Mac, iPad, and services divisions.

But the numbers show a slight dip in year-over-year iPhone revenue, seemingly confirming that Apple Intelligence isn’t doing much to drive iPhone sales. The same goes for that new Camera Control button, I suppose. Cook tried to dismiss the notion that Apple Intelligence isn’t compelling people to upgrade in an interview with CNBC. “During the December quarter, we saw that in markets where we had rolled out Apple intelligence, that the year-over-year performance on the iPhone 16 family was stronger than those markets where we had not rolled out Apple intelligence,” he said.

The standard iPhone 16 models are a particularly excellent value this year, which isn’t always the case. So that could also factor into the slightly lower revenue if fewer people are opting for the Pro variants.

Apple has taken a cautious approach in rolling out its AI-powered features, having only just turned them on by default with this week’s release of iOS 18.3. Cook again confirmed that Apple Intelligence will become available in more languages in April. So far, the tools are convenient and helpful, but not game changing. And those promised improvements to Siri can’t come soon enough.

This tends to be Apple’s most crucial quarter of the year for two reasons. It includes the all-important holiday shopping season, and since the iPhone 16 lineup was on sale for the entire three-month duration, this is our best indication yet of demand for Apple’s latest phones. The company also released several new Macs near the end of last year including a redesigned, much smaller Mac Mini and refreshed MacBook Pros. Revenue for Apple’s wearables business, which includes the Apple Watch and AirPods, was also slightly down compared to the year-ago quarter.

A year ago, Google started off 2024 with some layoffs. It hasn’t taken similar steps (yet) in 2025, but employees are fearing the worst. And if the Platforms and Devices team is anything to go by, there’s ample reason for concern. Google has distributed a memo to all US employees working on Android, Pixel hardware, and other projects that offers a “voluntary exit program” guaranteeing severance for anyone willing to step away from their role at the company. The memo went out from platforms and devices SVP Rick Osterloh, according to 9to5Google.

“This comes after we brought two large organizations together last year,” Osterloh wrote. “There’s tremendous momentum on this team and with so much important work ahead, we want everyone to be deeply committed to our mission and focused on building great products, with speed and efficiency.” Voluntary buyouts can often be a precursor to layoffs if not enough employees take Google up on its offer and choose to leave.

Google combined its Android and hardware teams under Osterloh in April. Executives said the streamlined approach would help it integrate AI features across products and services more quickly.

A few months later in October, Alphabet’s chief finance officer Anat Ashkenazi said she would prioritize “cost efficiencies” throughout the company. “There’s really good work that was done, started by Ruth, Sundar and the rest of the lead team to re-engineer the cost base,” she said during her first earnings call as CFO. “But I think any organization can always push a little further and I’ll be looking at additional opportunities.” The cost-cutting measures are partly designed to offset Google pouring so much money into AI.

Google’s Pixel phones have never come anywhere close to the sales numbers enjoyed by Apple and Samsung, but the company is at least trending in the right direction; Counterpoint Research reported that Google recorded its highest-ever quarterly sales volume for smartphones in Q3 2024.

Some employees at Google have recently been circulating a petition that calls for CEO Sundar Pichai to offer exactly this type of optional buyout before resorting to involuntary layoffs. “Ongoing rounds of layoffs make us feel insecure about our jobs,” the petition said, according to CNBC. “The company is clearly in a strong financial position, making the loss of so many valuable colleagues without explanation hurt even more.”

At least for the time being, it appears the voluntary exit program hasn’t been extended to other divisions within Google like search or the DeepMind AI team.

CVS is releasing a significant new update for its mobile app today, and many of the changes are detailed in this report from The Wall Street Journal. Aside from trying to simplify and speed up the process of picking up your prescriptions, the latest version also includes a feature that should make dealing with locked cabinets a bit less maddening. A trial that’s currently underway in three stores allows customers access the items on those shelves using their phone — without having to summon an overworked employee to open it first.

According to the Journal, “app users need to be logged in, on the local store Wi-Fi, and with their device’s Bluetooth enabled to activate the feature.” You’ve also got to be a member of the CVS loyalty program if you want the convenience of grabbing secured merchandise without calling for help. Signing up for that gives CVS plenty of insight into your shopping habits, so keep that in mind as you weigh the convenience of not waiting around.

“People really, really dislike locked cabinets,” Tilak Mandadi, executive vice president of ventures at CVS Health, told the Journal. Walmart has apparently come to the same realization, as the massive US retailer conducted a similar test last year. CVS aims to expand the program to around 15 stores soon and eventually reach national availability if all goes well.

The CVS Health app, which the company describes as “a successor to the CVS Pharmacy app,” also contains a healthy dose of AI features. Its search is now “enhanced and AI-powered,” and later this year, customers can expect a “new conversational AI chat experience that enables patients to check medication refills, status of their orders, and more.”

As for streamlining the in-store prescription process, the new app will show a personalized barcode that pharmacists can scan for a faster checkout. And if your health insurance is provided by the CVS-owned Aetna, you’ll be able to see the out-of-pocket cost upfront to avoid any surprises. The company is apparently working with other insurers to provide similar pricing transparency in the coming months.

The CVS app has 14.1 million monthly active users, which Mandadi told the Journal is an increase of around 22 percent compared to last year.

The “Ultra” model in Samsung’s Galaxy S lineup is typically the phone crammed full of every feature the company could think of. But this year, the Galaxy S25 Ultra is actually taking a step backward with the S Pen. The motion gestures and useful remote camera shutter function have been removed, and the stylus is back to being just a stylus. You can still wave it around like a magic wand, but the phone won’t do anything.

During a media briefing on the new S25 series last week, Samsung explained that customers rarely ever used the “Air action” gestures. So the company decided to try and cut costs by ditching them entirely. And no, the starting price of the S25 Ultra hasn’t come down as a result. Samsung believes other hardware upgrades are more than enough to maintain the same $1,299.99 price.

I never bothered with the gimmicky gestures more than once or twice. But having a convenient (and subtle) way of taking a photo when the phone was positioned somewhere out of reach was very convenient.

Samsung apparently thinks that the palm gesture — where the phone recognizes someone holding up their hand and automatically triggers the shutter — is a decent substitute. You can also control the S25 Ultra’s camera with a paired Galaxy Watch. But I’d argue neither of those is as simple as pressing a button on the stylus. They’re certainly not as inconspicuous if you’re trying to capture a candid shot. (The S Pen’s button still exists, but it’s mostly there to bring up the Air command shortcuts menu.)

This less capable S Pen marks a surprising regression for Samsung’s do-everything smartphone. However, the company seems hopeful that its Galaxy AI software capabilities will receive greater customer adoption. At least the handy screen-off memo feature isn’t going anywhere.

Photography by Chris Welch / The Verge

Elon Musk doesn’t miss an opportunity to take a dig at OpenAI — even when the news item in question is supposed to be favorable to President Trump. Just a few hours after yesterday’s White House presser on The Stargate Project wrapped up, Musk posted on X that “they don’t actually have the money.”

Softbank, OpenAI, Oracle, and MGX have committed to “deploy” $100 billion now and $500 billion toward the AI data center company over the next four years.

But Musk, who now has wide-ranging clearances and reportedly even his own office inside the Trump White House, seems doubtful. “SoftBank has well under $10B secured. I have that on good authority,” he added. The Japanese CEO and billionaire investor is the former owner of WeWork and Sprint and the current owner of Arm, and there have been reports for the last year that, along with Altman, he’s been chasing funding to invest in an AI chip venture.

Musk and OpenAI are embroiled in a legal battle that often veers into public view, with Musk accusing the ChatGPT maker of steering AI in dangerous directions — and OpenAI saying his criticisms are disingenuous and in bad faith. Sam Altman replied to Musk’s allegation on Wednesday morning. At first, he chose to focus on the man himself rather than anything having to do with Stargate. “I genuinely respect your accomplishments and think you are the most inspiring entrepreneur of our time,” Altman posted.

But he got more pointed in a later response, telling Musk that “I realize what is great for the country isn’t always what’s optimal for your companies.”

The Stargate Project has a buildout “currently underway” in Texas, and the companies involved say they’re evaluating other sites across the US. Arm, Microsoft, Nvidia, Oracle, and OpenAI have been named as the project’s initial tech partners. “The scale of this investment, obviously, is huge. And what I think that says about the likely progress of the technology, at least what all of us believe, is correspondingly huge,” Altman said in a Fox News interview last night.

Update, January 22nd 12:40PM ET: The article has been updated to reflect a follow-up reply towards Musk from Sam Altman.