Slowly but steadily, Google has been working on integrating Gemini into all its popular services. The company was spotted developing Gmail's free Gemini integration in May this year. A month later, Gemini-powered summarizations rolled out in Gmail, making it easy to go through huge email chains quickly. Now, it appears Google has started rolling out even deeper Gemini integration in Gmail, allowing you to use the AI chatbot to help draft emails, change its tone, and more.

Like clockwork, Google has been rolling out monthly security patches for its Pixel Watch lineup. Initially, the watch's update used to go live a few days after the Pixel phones. But for the second consecutive month, Google has made the Pixel Watch's monthly security patch live ahead of its phones. Similar to the July 2024 patch, the August patch for the Pixel Watch only contains patches for known security vulnerabilities, but there's a twist.

Cloud backup services are amazing, especially because they are extremely convenient, but also offer a lot of storage for a fair price. But if you're looking to get your stuff backed up to physical media, then an SSD is the way to go. Not only are you getting a light and portable solution, SSD drives are also pretty durable as well. Now, there are a lot of different options when it comes to SSDs, but we think Samsung offers some of the best you can buy in 2024.

If you use any type of smartphone, tablet or computer, you'll know that there's this complicated love-hate relationship when it comes to notifications. While it's great to get those instant notifications about something important, sometimes, those same notifications can really just wait. Now, every ecosystem handles notifications differently, and while things have come a long way and are pretty good on Android, there's always going to be room for improvement.

A VPN, or virtual private network, can help you take control of your online privacy and ensure your data doesn't fall into the wrong hands. A good VPN service can keep you protected from trackers, those scary-good personalized advertisements, and even hackers.

Our power needs have changed a lot over the years. When I got Motorola's Turbo Charge on my Nexus 6, it felt like I'd unlocked a superpower with how fast it charged. But that was only 15W, the same wattage my S24 Ultra can wirelessly charge. Meanwhile, phones like the OnePlus 12 can charge as fast as 80W. Throw in laptops that suck back more than 100W, and it's plain to see that we demand a lot more from power banks than we used to. Sharge has recently launched the Shargeek 170, a fun and stylish power bank that can output up to 170W. Is this the ultimate power bank?

Google is finally giving us another Nest Learning Thermostat. It's a long-overdue update, with the current generation now nine years old. Rumors say the 4th version of Google's smart thermostat will cost nearly $300, a price that, only a few years ago, I'd only dream of paying for a thermostat if it crooned me lullabies at night or offered a J.A.R.V.I.S-level administrative assistance.

We know that Google shelled out billions to be the default search engine on Safari. The tech giant is clearly proud of its search engine market dominance, and plans to keep it that way. For reference, as of July 2024, Google boasted a 91.02 percent search engine market share worldwide, with Bing coming in at a distant second with a 3.88 percent market share, and Moscow-based Yandex coming in at third with 1.36 percent.

Google Chrome is among the first few things we install on a new computer, and although a few features of the desktop version haven't been ported to the app, it is among the best browsers on Android too. However, a massive change has been breathing down extension developers' necks now a shift to the Manifest V3 framework, which would make Manifest V2 and all the extensions built around it redundant and incompatible. Google has set the ball rolling and it might spell the end of many ad-blocking extensions such as uBlock Origin.

With the Google Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro having established themselves as some of the best Android phones you can buy today, it's time to look forward to what's on the horizon. You could pick up last year's Google flagships, but imagining what's around the corner is more fun. This year, that's extra exciting, as we're looking at three different phones coming to a carrier near you as soon as this summer. And yes, you read that right: summer. The new Pixels are coming earlier than usual this year, and Google's already releasing promo videos. Here's everything we know about the Pixel 9 series.

Android has always given users a lot of freedom, letting them manage their devices pretty much how they want, including grabbing apps from third-party sources. While Google did require people to enable a certain setting to install apps from outside the Play Store, it was a simple process. But now, Googles new policy is about to make sideloading apps a bit more of a hassle. With the latest guidelines, users will have to go through an extra step when downloading apps from third-party sources.