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OnePlus’s earbuds have occupied a key spot in the hearts of Android fans. OnePlus has a few options across price points, and they are good value earbuds that pair well with your Android flagship. After launching the OnePlus Buds 3 earlier in the year, the company is now launching the OnePlus Buds Pro 3 as the latest product in its Pro-tier earbud lineup.

The OnePlus Buds Pro 3 has a dual-driver design, with an 11mm woofer and a 6mm tweeter in each earbud. OnePlus has also added two DACs (BES2700ZP) per earbud, focusing individually on the woofer and tweeter. The Buds Pro 3 also feature Dynaudio branding on the case and the earbud, reminding you that the earbuds are tuned by the famous music studio.

The OnePlus Buds Pro 3 also features up to 50dB of active noise cancelation alongside an Adaptive mode that automatically adjusts the noise cancelation level. The company also claims better performance in canceling out voices.

Another highlight of the OnePlus Buds Pro 3 is the new design. OnePlus had been reusing the same design on its past earbuds for some generations. The new Buds Pro 3 changes it up completely with a new case design that houses the earbuds in a vertical position, much like AirPods. However, the CMF (Color Material Finish) on the OnePlus Buds Pro 3 is superior to the AirPods Pro 2, making OnePlus’s earbuds feel more premium than their price tag.

The OnePlus Buds Pro 3’s plastic case has a great matte finish for the holding surface, a leather-like finish for the front and back surfaces, and a glossy finish on the inside.

The earbuds themselves do not change much in shape, though they also have a matte finish on the head and a glossy finish on the stem.

More importantly, the OnePlus Buds Pro 3 now let you swipe on the stem to control the volume and tap to control playback. OnePlus has also switched to Google’s Spatial Audio technology, opening up compatibility with the wider Android ecosystem.

With their case, these earbuds promise up to 43 hours of total listening time. They also support Google Fast Pair, dual device connection, Bluetooth 5.4, and wireless charging and have an IP55 rating. Interestingly, these also support new neck health features to help you not slouch for extended periods of time.

OnePlus Buds Pro 3 pricing and availability

The OnePlus Buds Pro 3 comes in Midnight Opus (black) and Lunar Radiance (cream) colors. The OnePlus Buds Pro 3 costs $179.99 / £199 / €199 / Rs. 11,999 and can be purchased through OnePlus’s website and other retail partners.

Android 14 was publicly launched with the Pixel 8 series back in October 2023. We’re well into the new year, and Google has begun testing the next version of Android, now up to the Android 15 Beta 4.2. This beta is the second platform stability release, meaning the APIs are finalized, and we are even closer to the stable Android 15 rollout.

In this article, we’ll tell you everything we know (and think we know) about Android 15 so far! Fair warning, we’ve covered a lot of features in immense detail, so this article is very long. Consequently, this article has several indexes that should make it easier to navigate.

Android 15: Name and release date

Google used to name Android versions with dessert codenames, but it strayed away from that tradition with the release of Android 10, where it decided to stick with only the version number for all future releases. So Android 15 is simply known as Android 15. However, Google still uses the dessert codenames internally. Android 15’s internal codename is Vanilla Ice Cream.

Google has begun testing Android 15 through two developer previews and four betas (and several sub-releases), though the final stable release is still some weeks away. Android 15’s release schedule includes beta releases going through August, and we’ve already reached the platform stability stages, meaning that no new features or APIs will be added so app developers can begin testing their apps against these public APIs. The next few sub-releases, if any, will be focused on ironing out bugs for the most part.

Google hasn’t mentioned when the stable Android 15 builds will be released. We presumed it would happen alongside the Pixel 9 series launch on August 13, 2024, but the new flagship line debuted with Android 14. Google also made no mention of its forthcoming OS. This means that Android 15’s launch window could be closer to its predecessors, but it will not coincide with a new Pixel launch as was initially anticipated.

If you use a recent Google Pixel device, you will be the first in line to receive the Android 15 update. OEMs will take a little longer to release their functional Android UX skins on top of the Android 15 platform. A few Android Partner OEMs are participating in the Android 15 Developer Preview program, and you can install Android 15 beta updates (without the OEM-specific customizations, for the most part) on select non-Pixel devices.

For those who don’t mind taking matters into their own hands, you can follow our guide and install Android 15 on your phone by yourself. If you are done testing, here’s how you can leave the Android 15 beta program without wiping your data.

Once Android 15 is released publicly, OEMs will run their own beta programs for their skins, followed by stable releases. You can check if your phone has received the update through our Android 15 update tracker.

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Android 15 confirmed features, UI changes, and UX improvements

Android 15 looks quite similar to previous Android versions, but there are some notable changes that Google has introduced with this update. There are also functionality updates to several important features. All of these features have either been officially announced or have been spotted in the released Android 15 build.

Partial screen sharing

With Android 15, users can share or record just an app window rather than the entire device screen. This feature was enabled first in Android 14 QPR 2 on Pixel devices but will now be available across the wider Android platform.

Satellite connectivity support

Android 15 extends platform support for satellite connectivity. The platform now has UI elements that are needed to “ensure a consistent user experience across the satellite connectivity landscape.” As part of these changes, apps can use APIs that allow them to detect when a device is connected to a satellite, which can give the app more awareness of why full network services are unavailable.

Android 15 also provides support for SMS apps and preloaded RCS apps to use satellite connectivity for sending and receiving messages. This means that satellite connectivity will not be limited to emergency uses only. Leaks had indicated that a deeper T-Mobile tie-in would be in place for satellite connectivity features, but Google has not yet revealed such details.

New in-app camera controls

Android 15 is adding new extensions for more control over the camera hardware on supported devices. New features added through these extensions include low-light enhancements that give developers control to boost the brightness of the camera preview and advanced flash strength adjustments that enable precise control of flash intensity when capturing photos.

Universal toggle for keyboard vibration control

Android 15 Developer Preview 1 added a new “keyboard vibration” toggle that lets you universally disable keyboard vibration. When turned off, the system setting will override the setting within individual keyboard apps. When turned on, you can control the setting within individual keyboard apps, too.

Sensitive Notifications

Some forms of two-factor authentication (2FA) are safer than others, but many platforms rely on the most basic form of 2FA that sends one-time passwords (OTP) via text or email. However, Android 15 will fix that by adding a sensitive notifications feature that prevents your OTPs from being read by malicious Android apps.

Bluetooth popup dialog

Android lets you toggle Bluetooth through the Quick Settings tile, but most people leave the connection on to quickly connect to their accessories throughout the day. If you have multiple accessories around, you may find better utility with a Quick Setting tile that lets you toggle the individual connections to connect and disconnect to individual devices.

Android 15 brings this functionality, letting you click on the Bluetooth Quick Settings tile to open up a popup dialog that lets you perform more functions, such as toggling Bluetooth, connecting and disconnecting to individual devices, entering their settings page, and pairing new devices.

Auracast focus: Audio sharing to nearby Bluetooth LE Audio streams

Android 13 lets users share or connect to nearby LE Audio streams, but Android 15 could make the Auracast feature easier to discover. This would allow Auracast-supported devices to broadcast audio to nearby Auracast devices using BLE without the hassle of pairing. There is a new “audio sharing” page that appears at Settings > Connected devices > Connection preferences to facilitate this audio sharing, as spotted in Android 15 Developer Preview 2, although it isn’t working.

We managed to enable the “audio sharing” feature on the Pixel 8 Pro running Android 15 Beta 1.1. Once enabled, we could start an Auracast broadcast on the Pixel 8 Pro that other devices in the vicinity (a Galaxy S24 Ultra and a Galaxy Z Fold 5, which were part of our testing) could connect to.

We can manually set the broadcast name and password under the “stream settings” header in the “audio sharing” page. There’s also a QR code that can be generated to make it easier for others to connect to the stream.

Since Auracast is a one-way broadcast, connected devices cannot control the media playback of the source device.

You can also find and connect to nearby Auracast streams in Android 15 with some tinkering, and there may even be a button in the Quick Settings dialog for this. Since the settings stubs are live, we hope to see the feature become a permanent and functional part of Android 15.

High-Quality Webcam mode

Third-party webcam apps make it easy to use your Android phone as a webcam for your PC. Android 14 QPR 1 release for Pixel smartphones integrated the feature into the system, meaning you didn’t need a third-party app anymore. However, the output quality was pretty mediocre.

Android 15 Developer Preview 2 integrates a new High-Quality Webcam mode when you start the USB webcam feature on a Pixel device.

There is a new “HQ” symbol in the webcam preview. Tapping on it disables any power optimizations that Google made that previously resulted in lowered quality. This mode significantly improves video quality, but the drawback is increased battery drain and heat buildup.

Changes for continuity features on foldables

With Android 15, you can control whether you want to continue using apps on the front display on foldables. Mishaal Rahman notes that this feature was present on Android 14 QPR betas but was removed and is now returning. You can either have the front display turn on whenever you fold your device; have it turn on for games, videos, and other apps, or never turn it on and lock the front display when you fold your device.

If these settings feel restrictive to you, Mishaal Rahman notes that Google is also testing a “swipe up to continue” option that replaces the “only games, videos, and more” option. This mode will let you continue apps on the cover screen by swiping up on the lock screen after you fold your device.

Better cover screen support

With Android 15, app developers can declare a property to allow their app to be presented on the small cover screens of supported flippable devices. These cover screens are often too small to run full-fledged apps with a good user experience, but app developers can opt-in to support these cover displays.

Persistent taskbar for large-screen devices

Google added a taskbar dock for large-screen devices with Android 12L. It took the entire width of the screen and stayed there persisently, but this meant it took up a lot of screen space rather permanently. With Android 13, the taskbar shrunk in size to a smaller pill-shaped box, but it also became transient, appearing for a few seconds only when the user swiped up on the gesture bar. While the change was good, it also made accessing the taskbar dock a two-step process, which may not work for heavy multi-taskers.

With Android 15 Developer Preview 2, Google is giving users the option to choose the transient taskbar or to make it permanent with a new “always show taskbar” toggle.

This way, users can have the best of both worlds, suiting their needs. Android 15 Beta 2 makes it an official feature.

Circle to Search support with persistent taskbar

With the taskbar enabled on the Pixel Tablet, users could not invoke Circle to Search unless they changed back to the transient taskbar. With Android 15 Beta 3, Google added the ability to invoke Circle to Search by holding down the action key (the button in the taskbar that launches the floating app drawer).

When you boot up Android 15 Beta 3 and switch to the persistent taskbar, the launcher will even inform you that this is now possible by displaying a pop-up. The pop-up tells you to “touch & hold the action key to search what’s on your screen,” as shown below.

Health Connect

Android 15 includes updates to the Health Connect by Android platform, which adds support for new data types across fitness, nutrition, and more. Beta 2 adds skin temperature and training plans as additional data types.

Virtual MIDI 2.0 Devices

Android 13 added support for connecting to MIDI 2.0 devices via USB, which communicate using Universal MIDI Packets (UMP). Android 15 extends UMP support to virtual MIDI apps. This enables composition apps to control synthesizer apps as a virtual MIDI 2.0 device, just like they would with a USB MIDI 2.0 device.

HDR headroom control

In situations where you have some HDR content on your screen but more SDR content (for example, an HDR thumbnail while the rest of the content is in SDR), the HDR content can overpower the perceived brightness of the rest of the SDR content. Android 15 allows apps to control the HDR headroom, so they can avoid such situations.

Loudness control

Android 15 has officially introduced support for the CTA-2075 loudness standard that helps app developers avoid loudness inconsistencies and ensures users don’t have to constantly adjust volume when switching between content. The Android system leverages known characteristics of the output devices (headphones, speaker) along with loudness metadata available in the AAC audio content to “intelligently adjust the audio loudness and dynamic range compression levels.”

Edge-to-edge apps by default

Android allows apps to use the entire height and width of the display to showcase their content, but many apps do not take advantage of this. Android 15 forces apps to go edge-to-edge by default, but Google also quietly added a way for developers to opt out of this change.

Predictive Back

One of Android 14’s highlight features was supposed to be the new predictive back gesture, but the feature remained gated behind Developer Options. Google is finally graduating the feature beyond Developer Options, so system animations such as back-to-home, cross-task, and cross-activity will appear for apps that have properly migrated to this feature.

Predictive back provides a smoother, more intuitive navigation experience while using gesture navigation, leveraging built-in animations to inform users where their actions will take them, to reduce unexpected outcomes.

App Pairs to quickly launch split-screen app combos

Google is allowing large-screen device users to save their favorite split-screen app combinations for quick access. The press release does not name the feature, but the attached graphic shows a “Save app pair” option. Google also mentions it explicitly for large-screen devices and not for smaller-screen devices like phones.

From what we know, when you save an app pair, an icon is added to the home screen that shows the two apps in a saved pair configuration. Clicking on this icon will launch this app pair configuration.

New collapsible volume panel

Android 15 Beta 2 features much thicker, pill-shaped sliders in the expanded volume panel, the same that we discovered in previous builds. You can slide the slider to change volume, and you can also click on the extreme left of any pill to mute that stream or on the extreme right to raise the stream to maximum volume. This expanded volume panel also collapses, and you can do that by pressing the button next to the media stream.

Helpfully, the expanded volume panel now includes a persistent media output shortcut, which remains present there irrespective of the media playback state. There are also new animations, with the stream name text moving with the slider.

Richer Widget Previews with Generated Previews

App developers can now add personalized previews for their app’s widgets with Android 15 Beta 2. This way, when a user is at the widget selector, they will see a widget that is more representative of what the actual output would be.

Bluetooth auto-on

Google is upgrading Android’s Find My Device network to leverage the wide network of Android devices. This upgrade relies on Bluetooth beacons from participating devices to locate other nearby devices. However, if participating devices have their Bluetooth switched off, the network will lose efficacy.

Android 15 Beta 2 includes a “Bluetooth auto-on” toggle. When selected, this temporarily pauses the Bluetooth radio and switches it back on the next day instead of disabling it until the next time the user toggles it.

On iPhones, toggling Bluetooth or Wi-Fi from the Control Centre (aka the quick settings panel) merely disconnects accessories until the next day. It does not disable the radios, and both Bluetooth and Wi-Fi continue to remain available for Apple ecosystem features. To disable the radios, you need to toggle Bluetooth and Wi-Fi from the Settings app. So Google could have been partly inspired from here.

Adaptive vibration

Android 15 Beta 2 on Pixel devices includes a new Adaptive Vibration setting present in Settings > Sound & vibration > Vibration & haptics.

According to its description, adaptive vibration “automatically adjusts your phone’s vibrations based on your environment.” It does this by using your phone’s “microphone and other sensors” to “determine sound levels and context.” To preserve privacy, “no data is recorded.”

Android includes a helpful animation on the adaptive vibration page that explains what the feature does. The animation shows that, when the feature is enabled, your phone’s haptics will vibrate more intensely when your phone is on a couch and less intensely when it’s on a table. This makes sense, since the cushions on a couch can dampen your phone’s vibrations, so it needs to vibrate harder to compensate. On the other hand, your phone’s vibrations can cause other objects on a table to rustle, so reducing the intensity of the haptic motor might be necessary.

New color contrast settings

Android 15 Beta 2 adds a new “color contrast” settings page to Settings > Wallpaper & style. This page lets the user adjust the contrast of text, buttons, and icons to make them stand out more in apps.

Set Google Account photo as avatar

Android 15 Beta 2 includes a new Google Pixel Avatar App, an unbundled version of the existing avatar picker that is found in Settings > System > Multiple users. However, this app adds a new feature: the ability to use your current Google Account picture as your profile picture.

When you select your Google Account picture as your Android profile picture, your current Google Account picture is shown in the top row next to the camera and gallery icons, and it’s distinguished with a “G” logo.

Lockdown mode prevents juice jacking

Lockdown mode was introduced with Android 9 Pie in 2018. When you enter lockdown mode, your phone’s notifications are hidden, and all forms of authentication except for the user’s primary authentication (PIN, password, or pattern) are disabled.

In Android 15, Lockdown mode helps prevent juice jacking by immediately disabling USB data access.

Home controls screensaver

Android 15 Beta 3 has added a screensaver called “Home Controls” that lets you control your Google Home devices when your device is idle and charging.

This screensaver simply shows the Google Home controls that you have favorited and the current time. The UI is even the same as the one that appears in Android 14 when you set the Google Home app as Android’s Device Controls provider and open the smart home controls dashboard via the aforementioned Quick Setting tile or lock screen shortcut.

New Device Diagnostics menu in Settings app

Google has added a dedicated Device Diagnostics menu to the Settings app on Android 15, which allows you to run manual tests and check the health of your phone’s internal components. Component health lets you “run manual tests and view battery and storage health.” Evaluation mode lets you “use one device to assess another device.”

Under the Component health page, you can run a display test that shows a series of differently colored screens, making it easy to inspect the screen for defects visually. You can also run a touch test that shows a red screen turning white as you swipe your finger over it, giving an obvious indicator of where touch input may be broken. 

The Component health screen lets you check the health of your phone’s battery and storage chip. The battery status page shows you the remaining capacity of your phone’s battery as a percentage of its original capacity, the manufacturing date of your phone’s battery, its first usage date, and its charging cycle count. It also has fields for the serial number and part status. The storage status page, meanwhile, shows you the remaining lifetime of your phone’s storage chip as well as its total capacity.

Evaluation mode requires a secondary, trusted device to assess the device under evaluation. The device being assessed needs to tap Evaluated device to generate a QR code that the other device can scan. Doing so will run a series of tests on the device being evaluated, some of which require internet access. These tests consist of the same display and touch test from before. Completing these tests generates a report that can be evaluated to see if there are any issues with the device.

While the device diagnostics page doesn’t provide a lot of information or test every component, it could save some folks a lot of hassle, especially those whose issues stem from their device’s display/touch screen, battery, or storage. This feature is available to users with Android 15 Beta 4.

Hidden space-themed screen saver

Android 15 has a hidden Landroid spaceship game as an easter egg, but there’s also a second easter egg in the form of a new Landroid screensaver (h/t Dylan Roussel). This becomes available after you access the spaceship game for the first time on Android 15. The screen saver mimics the game, with the little spacecraft visiting planets and landing on them.

Smaller changes

There are a few smaller changes as well that have been either announced by Google officially or spotted on Android 15 builds so far:

• There is haptic feedback when adjusting the display brightness through the Quick Settings slider (h/t Mishaal Rahman).
• New APIs allow smoother NFC experiences by allowing devices to listen but not respond to NFC readers. In some cases, this would allow for a one-tap transaction.
• Android has a new PDFRenderer API, which allows apps to render password-protected PDF files and annotations, as well as form editing, searching, and selection with copy.
• The Pixel Launcher has a new “apps list settings” page that contains the “swipe to start search” settings toggle (h/t Mishaal Rahman).
  • Android 15 Beta 3 houses a new “show long app names” setting that lets you display long app names on two lines in the search results and apps list.
• New accessibility settings for use with physical keyboards: You can enable Sticky keys, Slow keys, and Bounce keys when you are using a physical keyboard on a device with Android 15. This feature will be useful for users with motor disabilities and those who face difficulties typing on a physical keyboard.
  • Sticky keys make it easier to enter keyboard shortcuts in quick succession.
  • Slow keys hold down the duration that the user has to press before the system accepts a keypress.
  • Bounce keys help ignore rapid, repeated presses of the same key.
• Android 15 also shows a preview of the keyboard layout that you select in physical keyboard settings, in case your physical keyboard has a different physical layout.
• Android TalkBack is gaining support for Braille displays, which use human interface devices over USB and Bluetooth to improve accessibility.
• You can now set a wallet app as a default, allowing you to set something other than Google Wallet as your default wallet service.
• The Android system now lets you set how it addresses you in gendered languages, starting with French.
• Android 15 Beta 2 includes API-related updates from ICU 74. ICU 74 contains updates from Unicode 15.1, including new characters, emoji, security mechanisms, and corresponding APIs and implementations. It also includes updates to CLDR 44 locale data with new locales and various additions and corrections.
• The font file for Chinese, Japanese, and Korean languages, aka the NotoSansCJK, is now a variable font, allowing many weight and other variations.
• There is a new font file for old Japanese Hiragana called Japanese Hentaigana.
• Android 15 Beta 2 supports setting rich vibrations for incoming notifications by channel. This allows users to distinguish between different types of notifications without having to look at their devices.
• The USB debugging/Android System icon has been updated in Android 15 Beta 2 (h/t Mishaal Rahman). The upside-down logo has been replaced with a V shape to reflect the internal dessert name, Vanilla Ice Cream.
• In Android 15 Beta 2, under Settings > Storage, there’s no longer a “System” option. Instead, there’s a “System” header that splits into the “OS” and “temporary system files.” This may somewhat reduce confusion about how much space system files take up. Unrecognized files will still be seen as “temporary system files,” though (h/t Mishaal Rahman).
• Android 15 Beta 2 makes it easier to understand your storage, as it splits the broad “System” category into an “OS” category and a “Temporary system files” category (h/t Mishaal Rahman).
• Android 15 Beta 2 brings back the ability for Pixel devices to control the volume of Google Home speaker groups while casting.
• Killing an app by force-stopping it will now also temporarily disable its home screen widget. The widgets will also be grayed out on the home screen and won’t restart until you manually launch the app again, directly or indirectly.
• Android 15 Beta 3 adds single-step passkey support that allows app developers to easily incorporate biometric security (fingerprint or face unlock) for signing into their apps.
• Android 15 Beta 4 tweaks the battery widget’s UI on Pixel devices to integrate Material You’s Dynamic Coloring.

Android 15 performance improvements

Improvements to the Android Dynamic Performance Framework

Android 15 continues work in the Android Dynamic Performance Framework (ADPF). ADPF is a set of APIs that allow games and performance-intensive apps to interact more directly with the power and thermal systems of Android devices. With these APIs, you can monitor system behavior better and then go a step further to optimize performance to a sustainable level that doesn’t overheat devices.

ADPF consists of these main features:

• Thermal-state monitoring
• CPU performance hints
• Fixed-performance mode

On supported devices, Android 15 will add new ADPF capabilities, namely:

• A power efficiency mode for hint sessions to indicate that their associated threads should prefer power saving over performance. This is said to be good for long-running background workloads.
• Hint sessions can now report CPU and GPU work durations, allowing the system to adjust CPU and GPU frequencies together to best meet workload demands.
• New thermal headroom thresholds to interpret possible thermal throttling status based on headroom prediction.

App and game developers can use these APIs to make their apps and games work better on devices that would support these APIs.

App archiving through Settings

iOS has a handy feature that lets you “offload apps” to reclaim some storage space. You can uninstall apps you use rarely but keep the user data around. So when you reinstall the app, you can get back where you left off.

With Android 15 Developer Preview 2, Google baked in a similar app archiving feature. It then formally announced the feature with the launch of the first Android 15 beta, all but assuring us that this feature will launch.

When an app is archived on Android, most of its working files will be removed, while a stripped-down version of the app will be retained. There will be a home screen icon which, when clicked, will trigger the Google Play Store to unarchive the app.

Google already lets you opt into auto-archiving through the Google Play Store. Since the feature is run through the Play Store, you cannot archive or unarchive apps through your phone’s Settings app.

Android 15 changes this behavior by adding a new Archive and Restore button on the App Info page.

This way, even apps installed from outside of the Play Store could be archived from an easily accessible location.

Here is a good demo of how the app archive feature within the Android system works.

In this demo, an app that is 387MB in size has been archived to just 18MB in size, a staggering 95% decrease. After the archive, the app was restored to show that none of the user data was lost in the process.

Android 15 will not only let you manually archive apps but also let you choose whether to have the OS automatically archive apps that you do not use often. Further, other app stores beyond the Google Play Store will also be able to get the feature working if they support the necessary app formats.

Locking WebView into memory

Android 15 is locking into memory the trichrome library that Android System WebView uses, with the release of Developer Preview 1. Many apps use Android System WebView to display internet content, as it helps them avoid building a web browser from scratch for such a task. Since the process is locked into memory, the Android system will deprioritize killing the process during regular RAM management operations.

In theory, apps that rely on WebView could see a marginal improvement in their performance to the extent of their use of WebView, especially on devices with less RAM where processes are more frequently purged from RAM.

ANGLE: Optional layer for running OpenGL ES on top of Vulkan

OpenGL and Vulkan are the two popular graphics APIs currently in use, while OpenGL ES is the variant used on embedded systems like mobile devices. Most popular Android games now use Vulkan for its superior features and performance, but some legacy games still use OpenGL ES for some of their rendering tasks.

Vulkan is Android’s preferred interface to the GPU and will remain so. Therefore, with Android 15 Beta 2, Google includes ANGLE, a translation layer that converts OpenGL ES API calls to Vulkan.

ANGLE will also become the default driver on many 2025 devices for OpenGL ES interfacing, and beyond 2026, it will be the only way available.

Google clarifies that it plans to continue supporting OpenGL ES on all devices, but it strongly encourages the use of Vulkan for new projects.

More efficient AV1 software decoding

dav1d, the popular AV1 software decoder from VideoLAN is now available for Android devices not supporting AV1 decode in hardware. It is said to be up to 3x more performant than the legacy AV1 software decoder, enabling HD AV1 playback for more users, including some low and mid-tier devices.

For now, Google says that apps need to opt-in to using dav1d by invoking it with the name “c2.android.av1-dav1d.decoder.” Subsequent updates will make it the default AV1 software decoder. This support is standardized and backported to Android 11 devices that receive Google Play system updates, so it’s not a part of Android 15 per-se, but was announced in the Beta 2 announcement.

Better standby battery life

At Google I/O, Dave Burke, VP of Engineering for the Android Platform, mentioned in an interview that in Android 15, Google has sped up the time to doze by 50%. This means that devices running Android 15 will enter doze mode 50% faster than they do in Android 14. The result is an improvement in standby battery life, up to three hours on some devices that Google tested.

Android tries to intelligently defer and run as many background tasks at the same time during select ‘maintenance windows’ while the device is in a state where it’s been idle for a period of time and its screen is off. This state — called doze mode — has been a core feature of Android’s power management system since Android 6.0.

This change will extend to all devices that get updated to Android 15, including alternate platforms beyond smartphones.

Smaller changes

• Android 15 has new APIs that allow apps to track their app startup and stop state, display their detailed app size information, and more.
• There is a new “disable default frame rate for games” setting in Developer Options that disables limiting the maximum frame rate for games at 60Hz.
• Apps optimized for Android 15 will now be edge-to-edge by default. This means that developers won’t have to call on additional classes to show their content beyond system bars.
• Android 15 Beta 2 allows app developers to quickly toggle the visibility of irrelevant UI elements for a PiP window, ensuring a smoother and flicker-free PiP entry animation.
• Two common foreground service types now have a ~6-hour timeout, after which the service is no longer considered a foreground service. Further, Beta 2 also now requires apps to have a visible overlay if it is attempting to start a foreground service with a permission exemption for background start.
• Android 15 adds support for devices that use larger page sizes, including 16 KB pages in addition to the standard 4 KB pages. Devices with larger page sizes can have improved performance for memory-intensive workloads.

Android 15 privacy and security features

Privacy Sandbox on Android

One of the highlights of the Android 15 update is that it incorporates the latest version of the Privacy Sandbox on Android.

Privacy Sandbox on Android is a multi-year initiative from Google that introduces more private advertising solutions that limit the sharing of user data with third parties and operate without cross-app identifiers. The goal here is to develop an effective and privacy-enhancing advertising solution where user information is protected. This is needed to cultivate a healthy app ecosystem, which is needed for the overall health of the Android platform.

File integrity

Android 15 introduces a new FileIntegrityManager API that uses a feature called “fs-verity” in the Linux kernel. With fs-verity, files can be protected by custom cryptographic signatures, ensuring that they do not get tampered with or corrupted. So app developers can rest easy knowing that their app functionality and data are not compromised in any way.

Screen record detection

Android 15 will allow apps to detect when they are being screen-recorded. For apps that perform sensitive operations, developers can invoke APIs to allow the content to be hidden within such screen recordings.

End-to-end encryption of contact keys

The first beta introduced an OS-level API that provides end-to-end encryption for contact keys. This feature allows the user to manage and verify other people’s contact information securely.

As we learned in an APK teardown, the Contact Keys feature will rely heavily on the Google Contacts app for its UX. Users who want to confirm that all their E2E apps are actually encrypted can scan the QR code present on the other person’s Google Contacts app. Alternatively, you could also compare the app-specific numbers instead to reassure yourself about the encryption status.

Apple has a similar feature on iOS called Contact Key Verification, which was added in iOS 17.2. Contact Key Verification lets you receive automatic alerts that help verify that you are communicating only with the people you intend to communicate with. By verifying the encryption status, you can reassure yourself that you are not being targeted by any sophisticated cyber attack.

Private Space

We discovered Private Space a long time back as an upcoming Android 15 feature, and even showed off a hands-on of Private Space at the time. With Android 15 Beta 2, Google is officially announcing Private Space as a feature. The feature appears to be similar to Samsung’s Secure Folder, removing the need to use third-party apps to hide other apps on your Android phone.

Private space allows users to create a separate space for sensitive apps on their device, protecting these apps with an additional layer of authentication. This feature uses a separate user profile which is paused (and the apps are no longer active) when the private space is locked. The user can choose to use the device lock or a separate lock factor for private space. The feature is available at Settings > Security & privacy > Private space.

Private space apps appear in a separate container in the launcher. When the space is locked, the apps are hidden from recent view, notifications, settings, and other apps. Further, user-generated and downloaded content and accounts are separated between the private space and the main space. The system share sheet and the photo picker can be used to give apps access to content across spaces when private space is unlocked.

As we know from previous hands-on, users will be able to automatically lock their private space, change the screen lock, automatically hide private space from appearing in the app list, make sensitive notifications appear on the lock screen when private space is unlocked, or delete the private space. You can also quickly install an app in your private space through the Pixel Launcher by tapping on a button in your primary profile.

Target SDK version raised, making older Android Marshmallow apps incompatible

Google introduces new APIs and features with every Android release and banks on developers keeping their apps updated with these new APIs and best practices. However, older apps still exist, and developers may not be keen to keep them updated for various reasons. Regular users still need to be protected against the drawbacks of outdated APIs, so the Google Play Store hides older apps from users. Users could still sideload them, but Android 14 began blocking sideloading apps that were built for Android 6.0 Marshmallow, i.e. with a target SDK version 23.

With Android 15 Beta 2, Google has raised this target SDK version to 24. This means that apps targeting APIs for Android 6.0 Marshmallow will not be easy to install, and you’d need to default to apps built for Android 7.0 Nougat at least.

Smaller changes

• On Android 15, you now have to authenticate your identity using the fingerprint sensor or other lock screen security options if you want to change the USB mode on your phone when it is connected to a computer.
• If you head to Settings > Security & privacy > More security & privacy, you can toggle on two new security features: “security notifications” and “require encryption.” These will help protect you against “stingray” hacks. You can find out more about this in our deep dive into Android 15’s anti-stingray protections.
• WEP is an older security protocol for Wi-Fi that is not as secure as modern methods. Android 15 will put a toggle at Settings > Network & Internet > Internet > Network preferences that will allow you to disable connections to networks that use WEP.
• Malicious apps within the same task can launch another app’s activity and then overlay themselves on top, creating the illusion of being that app. This “task hijacking” attack bypasses current background launch restrictions because it all occurs within the same visible task. To mitigate this risk, Google has added a flag in Android 15 Beta 2 that blocks apps that don’t match the top UID on the stack from launching activities.
• With Android 15 Beta 2, apps can now highlight only the most recently selected photos and videos when partial access to media permissions is granted. This can improve the user experience for apps that frequently request access to photos and videos.

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Android 15: Leaked and upcoming features

In addition to all the features that Google has officially announced, and those that have been spotted in the Android 15 Developer Preview and Beta builds, there are plenty of changes that have been leaked and are rumored to arrive on Android 15.

Satellite Messaging with T-Mobile

Google has confirmed that satellite messaging support is coming to Android 15. However, we don’t know much about how this will actually work. Based on what we know so far, T-Mobile (in conjunction with partner Starlink) might offer a paid subscription that would allow you to send satellite messages natively in the Messages app. These messages would work anywhere as long as you have a view of the open sky. Even if there are zero cell towers around, you could still text with your friends (for a price).

This is what the Satellite Messaging page within Android 15 looks like as it went live for some Pixel users on T-Mobile:

While recent iPhones have access to free satellite messaging, they can only be used in emergencies to contact help. Android users being able to use them for whatever they want would be a major win. We’re waiting for the satellite pointing UI to go live, which is expected closer to when the Pixel 9 launches later in the year.

Revamped status bar with new icons and haptics

Google could refresh Android’s status bar icons with a new look and add haptic feedback to the Quick Settings and volume panels. The changes are not live yet.

With Android 15, some of the status bar icons may feature a segmented design. The battery icon may also finally support showing the current battery level inside the icon rather than to the right of it.

The charging chip which appears when you plug in your device is also being updated.

Users will be able to disable the battery level if they don’t like it. Here is what it will look like without the battery level.

Android 15 may also add haptic feedback to the Quick Settings panel, such as when users long-press on tiles such as the Bluetooth tile. There will also be some haptic feedback when moving the volume slider to adjust the volume stream.

Reorganized Settings app

We expect the Settings app on Android 15 to be reorganized, with several top-level menu items being placed next to each other in visually distinct sections.

For reference, here’s the order of entries of the top-level settings page in Android 14 on Pixel phones, next to how the top-level settings page might be arranged in a future Android 15 release:

Here are screenshots showing the top-level settings in Android 14 next to a mockup of what we believe the top-level settings page will look like in an upcoming Android 15 release.

This should be more logical for users to follow.

Optimized landscape layouts for lockscreen and notification panel on phones

Android phones are primarily meant for portrait orientations, and the Android UI is optimized for that purpose. When you attempt to use a phone in landscape orientation, you will notice elements like the notification panel poorly using space, while the lockscreen will refuse to rotate.

We managed to enable an optimized landscape layout for the notification panel and lockscreen in Android 15 for use on phones. The optimized notification panel on Android 15 looks like a shrunk-down version of the same on tablets, with a lot less wasted space.

Similarly, the optimized landscape mode layout for phones’ lock screens looks similar to the one for tablets.

These layouts are still buggy and unfinished, but they are quite evidently improvements over Android 14.

Notification cooldown

There’s a new function within the Notifications section called “Notification cooldown.” It lowers the volume of successive notifications from the same app. It’s designed to prevent users from being overwhelmed by too many notifications.

While we spotted this feature in the first Android 15 Developer Preview, the first beta hid the feature below the surface. It’s possible Google wants to let this feature cook a bit longer before releasing it to the public.

In newer builds, we also spotted a new toggle called “vibrate when unlocked.” According to the description, this toggle makes it so your phone will “only vibrate when [the] screen is unlocked.”

In other words, enabling this toggle should prevent your phone from vibrating in your pocket when you receive a ton of successive notifications from the same app.

Compact heads-up notification

Google introduced heads-up notifications with Android 5.0 Lollipop in 2014. These notifications appear in a floating window at the top of the screen and can be immediately seen and acted upon, regardless of the app you’re using. This notification style is meant for high-priority notifications, but they can get quite distracting when they appear over a full-screen app.

Android lets you opt out of heads-up notifications on a per-channel basis, and you can use ADB to disable them entirely on many Android versions. However, if you’re only bothered by their distracting size when using a full-screen app, then Google has another solution for you: Compact heads-up notifications.

We found clues for these in the Android 15 Beta 4 release and managed to enable the compact heads-up notification feature.

You can see the compact layout in the second set of notifications. This change is not live yet in Android 15, and since it was spotted after the platform stability phase, it is unlikely to ship with Android 15 at launch. Instead, it could come with a future Android 15 QPR release, or even get pushed to Android 16.

Lock screen widgets for tablets, At a Glance widget for phones

Android supported lock screen widgets with Android 4.2 Jelly Bean, but the feature was killed off in Android 5.0 Lollipop. Since iOS brought lock screen widgets with iOS 16, Android will bring widgets back to the lock screen with Android 15.

However, recent evidence suggests this will only apply to tablets, and possibly only the Pixel Tablet. We need more information to be certain, but that’s the way things are looking right now.

The lockscreen widget has also evolved with newer Android 15 betas, as Google fixed two major issues. The first major issue was that certain lock screen UI elements, like the clock, were overlaid on top of the widgets page, visually obstructing some of your widgets. The second issue was that the widgets couldn’t be interacted with, meaning they were only useful if they showed relevant information at a glance. Both of these were fixed with Android 15 Beta 3 release.

As you can see in the video, there’s now a long, vertical pill on the right edge that’s similar in size and color to the navigation pill. This serves as a visual indicator that you can swipe inward on the right edge. Swiping inward reveals that the lock screen and glanceable hub no longer visually overlap. By default, the only button that appears on the glanceable hub is a button to change the current profile; the button to customize the glanceable hub is only shown when you long press on an empty space.

Up to six widgets can be shown on a single page at a time, though since the glanceable hub is horizontally scrollable, you can add more widgets than that. You still can’t resize widgets, unfortunately, but you can interact with them.

For phones, it seems Google is taking some inspiration from iOS’ Live Activities and giving Android a similar implementation. There are plenty of challenges involved, but the At a Glance widget could be the widget of choice on the lockscreen of Android phones.

As you can see above, we managed to activate the At a Glance widget on the lockscreen on Android 15 with some tinkering. We also got it to appear at the bottom, which is where it looks very Live Activity-like. The lockscreen does appear very busy with the widget enabled, so there is a lot of cleanup and testing that Google needs to do to bring widgets back to phone lockscreens. Consequently, there’s a chance phones get their lockscreen widgets with Android 16.

There’s no evidence of Google considering lockscreen widgets for phones. However, we managed to activate lockscreen widgets on an Android 15 phone anyway, and this is what it looks like:

“Tiny” taskbar for phones

Android’s taskbar is largely accessible to foldables and tablets, but Google is also working on a version that could be accessible to smaller-screen devices, such as smartphones. We spotted the tiny taskbar in Android 15 Beta 4 and managed to activate it.

The tiny taskbar looks and behaves the same as the taskbar for large-screen devices. Since the feature was spotted after Android 15 reached platform stability, it may be included in a future Android 15 QPR release.

Battery health percentage

Android 14 laid the groundwork for the OS to track battery health information, while Android 15 could make battery health information accessible to users. The OS could show the estimated percentage of charge your phone’s battery can currently hold compared to when it was new. This would give users a clearer idea of how far their battery has degraded.

There are many variables involved in this feature’s release, though we cross our fingers and remain optimistic. iPhones already report their battery health in an easy-to-read manner, and that information has been valuable to users in deciding the condition of pre-owned units and whether they should get their batteries replaced.

Storage chip health

In addition to battery health information, Android 15 is also preparing a new feature that will tell users the remaining lifetime of their device’s internal storage. Under the hood, the Device Diagnostics app will utilize a new storage lifetime API in Android 15 that “returns the remaining lifetime of the internal storage device, as an integer percentage.”

However, only some devices are expected to report the remaining storage lifetime with 1% granularity. Most will report it at a less accurate 10% granularity, if at all they support the feature (as Google doesn’t require devices to support it).

Powered Off Finding API will let you find devices even when they are switched off

Android 15 will add the new Powered Off Finding API, which will enable powered-off finding across compatible Android devices, according to a report. These APIs would be contained within the Project Mainline module called “Tethering,” which can only be used on devices running Android 15. Further, this API will be utilized by the upgraded Find My Device network, which will be rolled out through Google Play Services.

What Powered Off Finding API does is that it allows a device to fire off precomputed Bluetooth beacons, even when the device is off (presuming there is some reserve power available for this action). With these Bluetooth beacons, nearby Android devices will be able to help track the switched-off device, similar to how iPhones can be tracked when they are powered off.

This feature would need hardware support to allow the Bluetooth controller to work when the rest of the device is powered off. The feature also requires the phone to support the Bluetooth Finder HAL so that Android can enable Powered Off Finding mode.

The feature is expected to debut with the Google Pixel 9, but it could also make its way to the Pixel 8 series as the devices include the necessary hardware.

Voice activation feature for digital assistants

Android allows any app to become the default assistant app on your device, but it doesn’t let them use wake words like “Hey Google” in the background. Your phone would have to constantly listen to audio through the microphone in order to pick up the designated wake word.

Android 15 could introduce a new feature called “voice activation” that could use a privacy-preserving “adaptive sensing” technology to let other digital assistant apps use wake words.

Previous versions of Android allowed wake word detection, but Google removed the feature with Android 12. This upcoming feature could bring back the functionality, letting apps like ChatGPT and Amazon Alexa become accessible with a wake word, even when your phone’s screen is off. Pre-Android 15, only Google Assistant and Bixby on Samsung phones allow for hands-free voice activation through a wake word.

Desktop mode: Enhanced windowing capabilities

With Android 15, Google could improve the windowing capabilities of Android’s desktop mode. In desktop mode, app windows could get a small handle that will show a small menu. This menu will contain the app’s name and icon, as well as three buttons to open the window in full-screen, split-screen, or freeform mode.

In freeform mode, the app will get a title bar that shows the app’s name and icon, a dropdown to open the menu to change the windowing mode, a maximize button, and a close button. The window can be freely moved around and resized. Resizing the window temporarily hides the app’s content to make it easier to see the window as it’s being resized. Windows can be dragged to the left or right edge to snap them to that half. Once an app is full-screened, you can drag instead of tap the handle at the top to quickly turn the window into a freeform or split-screen one.

Independent desktop mode for tablets

Desktop mode allows the smartphone to launch freeform windows and other extended capabilities when the phone is connected to an external display. Google is also working on an independent desktop mode for tablets that doesn’t require them to connect to an external display.

As you can see in the video, a new “desktop” button can appear when you tap the dropdown menu in the recents screen. Tapping the “desktop” button launches the app in a freeform window in Android’s desktop mode environment. Here, the window can be moved, snapped to the side, resized, minimized, maximized, or joined by other app windows.

When the desktop mode is active, and you return to the home screen, you can reenter the environment by tapping on the “desktop” card in the recents screen or by opening an app, expanding its window caption, and then tapping on the button to launch it in a freeform window.

This feature was spotted in Android 15 Beta 4.1, so it’s not coming with stable Android 15 at least. It could make its way to a future Android 15 QPR or be pushed to Android 16.

New Pixel Launcher features

Google is preparing a bunch of changes specifically for the Pixel Launcher with the Android 15 update. These are the new features coming to the Pixel Launcher with Android 15:

• New animation when swiping up on an app to return to the home screen.
• Better widget recommendations across recommendation categories: Essentials, Social, Entertainment, Health and Fitness, News and magazines, Weather, Suggested for You, and Your Chill Zone.
• A “+ Add” button in the widget selector to make it easier to add widgets to home screen.
• A new pill in the Recents menu opens shortcuts for the app, namely the app info page, entering split screen mode, and pausing an app.
• The ability to stop app names from being truncated and show long app names.
• The ability to use Circle to Search when using apps in split screen mode.

These changes have been spotted through feature flags. There is a chance that not all of them will make it to Android 15. It also remains to be seen how many of them get carried over to the AOSP Launcher as the Pixel Launcher is Pixel-specific.

Google AI features for the Pixel 9

Google is planning to launch Google AI features with the Pixel 9 and debut them with Android 15. However, these features aren’t likely to come to the Android platform at large.

Google AI will include existing AI features such as Circle to Search and Gemini, but it will also include new features such as Add Me, Studio, and Pixel Screenshots.

Easy pre-set mode to improve readability and ease of navigation

Strings within past Android builds indicate that Google has been working on a feature called “easy pre-set mode,” which could arrive with Android 15’s later releases.

Easy pre-set mode could optimize the Android experience for improved readability and ease of navigation. It would do so by enlarging icons and text, adding contrast and boldness, and adding navigation buttons to the bottom of the screen. It would also set the current wallpaper to a black color, so you can have an easier time figuring out your icons and icon labels. A feature like this would be very handy for elderly or less tech-savvy users as it would make it easier to use the phone.

Headphone loud sound alerts

This feature was intended for Android 14 but arrived with Android 14 QPR 1 (h/t Mishaal Rahman) on Pixel devices. As such, the changes it introduces are expected to be available for the wider Android platform with the Android 15 release.

This new feature monitors sound doses over time to protect users from the damaging effects of excessive or prolonged sound exposure. It complies with regulatory requirements in the EU and is also different from the safe media volume limit feature (which focuses on a fixed volume). The new feature warns when the music is playing loudly (volume measured through the audio signal) for a while.

Adaptive timeout for screen timeout

We’ve spotted code within Android 15 that indicates that Google is also working on an adaptive timeout feature for the upcoming Android release. This feature will automatically turn off your phone’s screen early if you are not using your device. With adaptive timeout, you may be able to set an extended screen timeout and still enjoy the security and battery benefits of a shorter timeout when you are not using your phone.

It is not immediately clear how the feature will be implemented. There’s a chance that this feature doesn’t make it to AOSP but gets reserved for Pixel UI.

Adaptive Touch for Pixel devices

Google could debut the Pixel 9 with Android 15 and a new Adaptive Touch setting for the display sensitivity. When Adaptive Touch is enabled, “touch sensitivity will automatically adjust to your environment, activities, and screen protector.”

It’s not quite clear yet what environmental factors or activities will cause the touch sensitivity to be automatically adjusted, but it’s possible that wet fingers (or a wet screen) will be one factor.

We don’t know if Adaptive Touch will remain a Pixel 9 exclusive or trickle down to older devices.

“Even dimmer” display brightness

Android 15 could include an “even dimmer” display brightness option. As the name suggests, this setting toggle would allow your phone’s display to go dimmer than usual. This feature could work alongside adaptive brightness, going even dimmer than usual when the ambient lighting is super low but automatically returning to normal brightness when the ambient lighting is high.

This feature is likely going to replace the Extra Dim feature that users can toggle. The key difference between the two is that Even Dimmer is meant to be toggled and forgotten as the adaptive brightness will take care of the dimming, while Extra Dim is a manual toggle for going lower in brightness.

NFC wireless charging

Android 15 could introduce support for NFC wireless charging. NFC wireless charging works with significantly smaller antennas than Qi wireless charging. It is ideal for tiny smart devices like earbuds, styluses, smartwatches, and tracker tags, though the devices will need to feature an antenna that manages both communication and charging.

Hide unused notification channels by default

Notification channels are categories of notifications that an app can deliver. App developers can create channels for the various types of notifications that their app serves, and users can be selective about the channels they allow notifications from.

However, app developers can decide how many notification channels their app needs, and there are situations where they create too many channels. To combat this, Android 15 could hide unused notification channels by default. A three-dot menu button will house a new “show unused channels” option that you can use to showcase the unused channels.

You can see how much cleaner figuring out notification channels gets when you hide the unused notification channels.

Selectively hide sensitive content when screensharing

In addition to letting apps know about screenshots, screen recordings, and screenshares and allowing partial screen recordings, Android 15 could also prevent apps from leaking sensitive information. There is a new feature internally called “sensitive content protection.” With this, apps that display sensitive information only occasionally can selectively block those fields from appearing in screen shares and recordings rather than disabling screenshots, screen shares, and recordings entirely.

Force apps to go dark mode

Android 10 introduced an “override force-dark” toggle under Settings > System > Developer options. Android 14’s QPR builds introduced a new (but hidden) “make all apps dark” toggle under Settings > Accessibility > Color and motion. This toggle works differently from the older toggle, and it remains present in Android 15 beta builds.

The older option was a developer-oriented feature, and apps could opt out of it just like many did. The newer option is an accessibility-oriented feature and is thus intended for consumers.

Here’s a gallery that compares the UI of several apps without a built-in dark theme in their original state, with dark mode plus “override force-dark” enabled, and with dark mode plus “make all apps dark” enabled.

As you can see, “make all apps dark” isn’t perfect, as it still reduces the contrast of certain buttons, but it does handle certain apps like Fitbit and Orangetheory much better than “override force-dark.”

Color correction slider

Android offers a dedicated page for color correction settings, present at Settings > Accessibility > Color and motion. Here, color-blind users can toggle one of Android’s several color correction modes, which each compensate for various degrees of color blindness. You can choose between the various color correction profiles to alter how your phone’s display displays the color to you.

With Android 15, your phone could also show a color correction intensity slider, letting you switch between low, medium, and high intensity of correction.

This will help tune the color balance changes for the active color correction mode.

Delete your biometrics if they aren’t working well

Android phones can be found across a variety of budgets, and one of the issues that prominently crop up because of this variety of hardware is that the Android OEM may have opted for a sub-optimal biometric sensor (fingerprint scanner or facial recognition system). Software updates also sometimes mess up success rates, and one of the most common recommendations to users to fix the poor performance of their biometric authentication system is to re-enroll their fingerprints or rescan their face.

Android 15 could proactively help users who are facing poorly performing biometrics by automatically detecting when your face or fingerprint models aren’t working well, deleting them, and then prompting you to set them up again. Android 15 will show a notification saying that your face or fingerprint model “wasn’t working well and was deleted. Set it up again to unlock your phone” with your face or fingerprint. Since Android only lets you enroll a single face, the notification that’s shown for re-enrolling your face will be slightly different than the one shown for re-enrolling your fingerprint, but there’s no functional difference.

Change the definition of fast charging from 7.5W to 20W

The way Android determines whether a charger is “slow,” “normal,” or “fast” is quite simple. Android, through the health HAL, receives information from the battery and charging circuitry, such as the current and voltage.

If the power (which is determined by multiplying current times voltage) that’s being delivered to the phone is below 5W, then the charger is considered “slow,” and the message “charging slowly” is shown on the lock screen. If the power is above 7.5W, then it’s considered “fast,” and the “charging rapidly” message is shown instead. If the power is between 5 and 7.5W, then the charger is seen as “normal,” and the lock screen simply says the phone is “charging.”

OEMs can configure these values for their phones, but Google hasn’t yet changed them for Pixels. The company could do that with Android 15, as there is a new fast-charging configuration that upgrades the charging rapidly status from 7.5W to 20W.

Changes to the Setup Wizard

As we spotted in an APK teardown, the Google Setup Wizard could soon present activation screens for Quick Share. Pixel users will also be able to set up Satellite messaging, car crash detection, and Moment.

Use Wear OS device to change the media output device

Starting with Android 15, companion apps for Wear OS devices can be granted a new platform permission called MEDIA_ROUTING_CONTROL. This permission allows “watches (via companion apps) to control the routing of applications running on the phone.”

In simpler terms, this permission allows the watch companion app on your phone to change which device to output audio to, even if that audio is coming from another app. Your Wear OS smartwatch may also need an update to add a screen that interfaces with the watch companion app on your phone, so some things are still in the air.

New Camera2 Extensions API: Eyes Free videography

All Android camera apps are built on top of Android’s Camera2 API, while the Camera2 Extensions API provides a way for camera apps to access extensions that OEMs have implemented on their devices.

As of Android 14, the Camera2 Extensions API supports the following five types of extensions:

1. Auto: “adjusts the extension mode according to the current scene background”
2. Bokeh: “sharpens the foreground subject and blurs the background”
3. Face retouch: “touches up skin texture, under-eye tone, and more”
4. HDR: “widens exposure range, resulting in more vivid photos”
5. Night: “brightens photos in low-light situations”

The availability of these extensions varies by device and brand. All five extensions can only be used during image captures and previews, but not during video recordings.

Android 15 could introduce a new Eyes Free videography extension that can be used during video capture. According to its description in AOSP, this sixth Camera2 extension “aims to lock and stabilize a given region or object of interest.” This extension could let third-party apps that use the Camera2 API (like Snapchat) utilize this video stabilization algorithm.

The availability of the extension on your device will depend on the OEM, though. Even if OEMs don’t implement Android 15’s new Eyes Free videography extension, the operating system might deploy a software implementation that third-party camera apps can utilize.

Under Settings > Security & privacy > More security & privacy, there is a new “allow camera software extensions” toggle that “enables the default software implementation of advanced camera features, such as Eyes Free videography.” While the Android default implementation of Eyes Free videography might not be as good as the OEM’s for a given device, it’ll still ensure this feature is made available to third-party camera apps that look for it.

Cloud search support for Android’s Photo Picker

During the second day of Google I/O 2024, Google confirmed that Android’s Photo Picker will support both local and cloud search. This is coming “later this year,” apparently, but we don’t know exactly when.

When search support rolls out, it’ll hopefully be available on all OS versions where the Photo Picker is available. The Photo Picker is available natively on all devices running Android 11 and newer through a Project Mainline module, but it’s also available on devices running Android 4.4 and newer thanks to Google Play Services.

Enhanced Confirmation Mode

Enhanced Confirmation Mode in Android 15 builds upon Android 13’s Restricted Settings feature. Enhanced Confirmation Mode checks an allowlist that’s preloaded in the factory image, exempting packages and installers mentioned therein as “trusted packages.” Trusted packages can, in turn, install apps that are eligible to be exempt from any restrictions on being granted Android’s Accessibility or Notification Listener services (which Android 13 marked as Restricted Settings).

This feature essentially closes a loophole that Android 13’s Restricted Settings brought about.

New screen magnification gesture

Android has a screen magnification feature that zooms in on the screen to make elements easier to see. It’s found under Settings > Accessibility > Magnification (at least on Pixel devices) and can be set up to magnify either the entire screen or a specific area of interest. You can activate it through three methods found under the “magnification shortcut” submenu: an on-screen accessibility button, a gesture that involves pressing and holding down both volume keys, and a gesture that involves quickly tapping the screen three times.

The first method is the most convenient but takes up part of the screen and always magnifies the center. The second method doesn’t take up space on-screen but has the longest activation time. The third method is really convenient and also lets you zoom in on the exact part of the screen you want to magnify, but it also slows down your device since Android has to add a delay to every screen tap.

Android 15 will introduce a fourth method to enable screen magnification. Users will be able to quickly tap the screen two times with two fingers to zoom in.

This toggle is shown above the collapsed-by-default “advanced” dropdown, which currently contains the “triple-tap screen” shortcut.

Google likely hid the triple-tap screen shortcut under a dropdown because it slows down other tap inputs, as mentioned before. Its description even warns that “this shortcut may slow down your device.” Interestingly, this text is missing from the description for the two-finger double-tap screen shortcut, suggesting it won’t slow down your device. However, in our brief testing, we noticed that there’s still a slight delay in screen taps when it’s enabled.

Thread network stack to connect to smart devices over Matter

If you own a smart home, chances are that you already know about Matter and Thread. Smart devices that can control other smart home devices need a Thread radio to communicate over Matter, but these Thread radios aren’t built into many devices yet, as opposed to Bluetooth and Wi-Fi.

Devices like the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max became the first smartphones to ship with an included Thread radio. Android devices will soon be joining the bandwagon with Android 15’s Thread network stack for Thread radio-included devices.

Phones running Android 15 that have a Thread radio, ship Android’s Thread network stack, and declare the feature flag indicating the device supports Thread will have a “Use Thread” toggle under Settings > Connected devices > Connection preferences > Thread.

Enabling Thread network support on a phone running Android 15 will allow that device to directly communicate with other Thread network devices, without the need for a separate Thread border router (like a Google TV device) to facilitate the communication. This could speed up certain smart home actions or even enable them to be run locally.

Opening up Bedtime Mode-related APIs to third-party apps

Google’s Digital Wellbeing app has a dedicated bedtime mode that silences your phones and changes various screen options to encourage you to stop using your phone based on a time-based trigger. Google is giving third-party apps access to the bedtime mode APIs with Android 15, giving them the ability to change distracting screen options and opening up an avenue for developers to let users create an even more custom bedtime mode routine.

With the release of Android 15 Developer Preview 2, Google introduced a new publicly available API called ZenDeviceEffects API that lets apps dim the wallpaper, minimize the display’s color saturation (i.e., go grayscale), suppress the ambient display, and toggle night mode (i.e., dark theme) when the app-created Do Not Disturb mode schedule goes into effect.

The benefit of Google making this API public is that users won’t be limited to using the company’s Digital Wellbeing app to manage these screen options at night. Users could, for example, create an even more custom bedtime mode routine through a third-party app, one that potentially triggers based on scanning an NFC tag instead of time, for example.

There’s a low chance that Google will scrap the API from Android 15 since it has been officially announced. However, since the APIs are not finalized, the company could tweak them before the stable release, as various features like changing dark mode aren’t working in the build.

Upcoming Health Connect changes

During the “What’s new in Android Health” session at Google I/O, Google revealed that Health Connect will soon add support for history reads. Apps can currently only read the past 30 days of data that other apps have contributed to Health Connect. Limiting apps to the past 30 days of data made it difficult to migrate your entire health data history from one app to another, so it’s good to see Google remove this limitation.

Another improvement to Health Connect is the ability for apps to do background reads. This enables apps to read data from Health Connect while they’re in the background. Currently, apps need to either run a foreground service (which requires showing a persistent notification) or wait for the user to open them before they can sync with Health Connect.

Google says that both the background reads and history reads capabilities are locked behind new permissions. The Health Connect app has added two new runtime permissions, one for background reads, and one for history reads, that the user needs to explicitly grant to apps. After granting approval, users can revoke access at any time through Health Connect’s settings.

These Health Connect updates are coming later this year. Google didn’t say exactly when, but we’ve already spotted evidence of these new permissions in the Health Connect app shipped in the Android 15 beta. It’s possible this update will roll out with the Android 15 release before being backported to Android 14 through a Google Play System Update and to earlier releases through an update to the Health Connect app on Google Play.

New Project Mainline module: WebViewBootstrap

Project Mainline is referred to as the biggest change to Android since Project Treble. The purpose of Project Mainline is for Google to wrest control of framework components and system applications that are critical to security and maintaining development consistency away from OEMs, thereby reducing the overall fragmentation in the OS. Project Mainline was introduced with Android 10, and we’ve seen Google add new modules with every Android release.

With Android 15, we could get a new Project Mainline module called WebViewBootstrap. According to a report, this module will handle the core framework APIs that Android uses to integrate WebView into apps. Google already handles the distribution of the core browser component of WebView through the Play Store but pushes the core framework APIs to AOSP for OEMs to pick up from. Switching from AOSP to a Project Mainline module will give Google the ability to update the core framework APIs without OEM intervention.

This new module could launch with Android 15 but could possibly be optional for OEMs to include in their builds. It could be made mandatory to include with Android 16 instead.

New Location Privacy HAL

Android 15 could include a new radio HAL API that allows for location privacy settings. This API will give the user some more control over how their carrier can request a network-initiated location request for non-emergency use cases.

Proactive alerts when using an insecure connection

Android 15 could warn you when a cellular network collects your device’s IMSI or IMEI, as well as when the network attempts to change the ciphering algorithm to create an insecure connection. Your device does need to support newer hardware APIs for this feature to function. The cellular transparency feature will present a notification that informs the user that their device’s IMSI or IMEI has been accessed, and users will be able to access it at Settings > Security & Privacy > More security & privacy. The page will also likely include a toggle to “require encryption,” which will disable null-ciphered connections at the modem level on supported devices.

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That’s everything we know (and think we know) about Android 15 so far! Be sure to bookmark this page, as it will be updated often with new leaks and announcements.

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Update, August 19, 2024 (12:10 AM ET): According to a new leak from Majin Bu on X (the platform formerly known as Twitter), this gold/bronze-like color is likely to be called Desert Titanium. The color is said to be dark gold, similar to the older purple color on the iPhone 14 Pro, offering a deep and relatively discreet color to the iPhone 16 Pro lineup.

Desert Titanium will be joined by White Titanium, Black Titanium, and Natural Titanium.

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Original article, August 16, 2024 (07:21 AM ET): With the Pixel 9 launch done and dusted, all our attention is now towards what Apple will do for the iPhone 16. The company hasn’t made any announcements or even teased the iPhone 16’s existence, but a launch is widely expected in September 2024. We’ve started seeing dummy unit leaks of the device, and today, we’re getting our first look at the gold-like bronze color of the iPhone 16 Pro.

Leaker Sonny Dickson has shared dummy units for the iPhone 16 Pro (likely looking like the bigger Max lineup instead of the smaller Pro). These dummy units align with what we have seen in his previous leaks, but this set has a new color variant.

We had already seen the white, black, and Natural Titanium colors for the iPhone 16 Pro Max, so the bronze-gold color is the only surprise here. The bronze/gold here is a bit too dark and ventures into a mix of dark yellow-orange, almost sandy brown, similar to the saddle tan color we associate with leather (but this would be glass here).

These are dummy units, as you can see from the identical camera openings and the lack of a rectangular opening for the tetra prism periscope camera. Still, the shape, dimensions, and colors should be close to what we could potentially see in the final retail units that ship to customers.

Apple has been rumored to replace the Blue Titanium color of the iPhone 15 Pro with a “rose” or “rose gold” color for the titanium build of the iPhone 16 Pro. This new color is said to have a bronze hue, and we can see the dummy unit aligning closer to the rumored shade. There’s a chance that the color shifts depending on how light reflects off the back of the device, so you could get different hues depending on the angle of light.

For a refresher, here’s what the regular iPhone 16 could look like, according to Sonny’s previous dummy unit leak.

What are your thoughts on the new bronze gold color for the iPhone 16 Pro, as leaked above? Would you buy a bronze-gold iPhone? Let us know in the comments below!

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The Google Pixel 9 series is launching just a few days from now, but information about the devices just can’t stop leaking. Google itself has confirmed a few details about the Pixel 9 series and Pixel 9 Pro Fold, but leaks have practically given us everything we need to know about the devices. The latest leak shows off the European version of Google’s previously leaked 45W USB-C charger, and we can’t help but balk at the atrocious port placement.

We’ve seen this Google-branded charging brick with the model number GW8L7 before when it went through NCC certification. The latest leak from Arsène Lupin on X (formerly known as Twitter) shows off the charger in marketing materials destined for the European market.

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Update, August 4, 2024 (11:55 PM ET): This feature from Google Lens that lets you add context to searches with your voice is now rolling out to the stable branch. Have you received the feature on your phone? Let us know in the comments below!

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Original article, June 4, 2024 (10:02 AM ET): Google Lens is a nifty tool that makes it trivial to image search objects around you. It’s great for reading barcodes and QR codes and for looking up web results by just pointing your camera at something. While Google Lens is pretty good and gets the job done, sometimes an image search query could use some added context. Google is working on improving Google Lens’ ability to accept additional context with some key changes.

💾

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The Made by Google 2024 event is right around the corner, and we’re expecting to see Google unveil the Pixel 9 series, including the Pixel 9 Pro Fold (previously presumed to be called the Pixel Fold 2). While Google has confirmed the name and design of the phones, and the event has been confirmed for August 13, 2024, it seems that customers will have to wait a while before they can get their hands on the phone, especially with the new foldable.

A leak by Android Headlines claims that the Pixel 9, Pixel 9 Pro, and Pixel 9 Pro XL will be available for pre-order right after the launch keynote ends, so about 2 pm ET on August 13. Companies usually have about a week or so between pre-orders and open sales, and similarly, Google is expected to begin open sales on August 22.

The shipping dates for the other devices get a bit interesting. The Pixel 9 Pro Fold is said to go on sale on September 4, giving us more than half a month between the official launch and device availability. And if you were looking to get your hands on the Pixel Buds Pro 2, those are expected to go on sale on September 26, about a month and a half after the announcement. The leak does not cover shipping dates for the Pixel Watch 3.

Google is holding its Made by Google event earlier this year, which will likely put pressure on many different launch timelines. A wild leak also suggested that the Pixel 9 series could launch with Android 14 instead of Android 15, so it appears that Google is hurrying up quite a bit to get its products out. Google usually launches new Pixels and the new Android version in October, so an August launch is two months too early. We expect these timelines to smoothen out in the coming years as the rest of Google grows accustomed to an August launch.

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The Made by Google 2024 event is right around the corner, and we’re expecting to see Google unveil the Pixel 9 series, including the Pixel 9 Pro Fold (previously presumed to be called the Pixel Fold 2). While Google has confirmed the name and design of the phones, and the event has been confirmed for August 13, 2024, it seems that customers will have to wait a while before they can get their hands on the phone, especially with the new foldable.

A leak by Android Headlines claims that the Pixel 9, Pixel 9 Pro, and Pixel 9 Pro XL will be available for pre-order right after the launch keynote ends, so about 2 pm ET on August 13. Companies usually have about a week or so between pre-orders and open sales, and similarly, Google is expected to begin open sales on August 22.

The shipping dates for the other devices get a bit interesting. The Pixel 9 Pro Fold is said to go on sale on September 4, giving us more than half a month between the official launch and device availability. And if you were looking to get your hands on the Pixel Buds Pro 2, those are expected to go on sale on September 26, about a month and a half after the announcement. The leak does not cover shipping dates for the Pixel Watch 3.

Google is holding its Made by Google event earlier this year, which will likely put pressure on many different launch timelines. A wild leak also suggested that the Pixel 9 series could launch with Android 14 instead of Android 15, so it appears that Google is hurrying up quite a bit to get its products out. Google usually launches new Pixels and the new Android version in October, so an August launch is two months too early. We expect these timelines to smoothen out in the coming years as the rest of Google grows accustomed to an August launch.

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OnePlus launched a powerful Android tablet in the form of the OnePlus Pad 2. Features like the famous Open Canvas multitasking system make it a smart choice for anyone looking for a versatile tablet for entertainment, productivity, and even gaming. The device has recently gone on sale, and if you have picked one up or are planning to, you’d be glad to know that OnePlus is now rolling out the first update for the device, fixing a bunch of annoying bugs.

Changelog for Oxygen OS 14.1.0.229 for the OnePlus Pad 2

Here is the official changelog for this new update:

• Camera
  • Improves camera performance for a better user experience.
• System
  • Improves the experience of using some apps in landscape mode.
  • Fixes an audio noise issue to improve the audio experience.
  • Fixed an issue where some apps cannot be opened in Split View.
  • Fixes some issues with the keyboard to improve the typing experience.
  • Fixes an issue where the Adaptive Sleep feature might not work in some scenarios.
  • Fixes a connection issue with Multi-Screen Connect.
  • Fixes some known issues and improves system stability.

A bunch of these fixes sound crucial to the tablet experience. Users claim that the tablet is still missing HDR and Dolby Vision functionality for Netflix, and you can expect these to arrive in a future update.

Download Oxygen OS 14.1.0.229 for the OnePlus Pad 2

Given how important this update is to the tablet experience, if you’d like to sideload the update on your OnePlus Pad 2, you can download the official update file below:

• For Europe
• For Global
• For India

Thanks to 1NormalUsername for the tip and download links!

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The iPhone 16 launch has us excited, and leaks have revealed plenty of upgrades that make it meaningful for people to upgrade. Yesterday, we got our first look at the possible iPhone 16 colors, and we are all in for the more saturated look of the lineup. Today, we get our first look at the possible colors for the iPhone 16 Pro Max, and we finally have a black color that actually looks black so far!

Leaker Sonny Dickson has now shared dummy units for the iPhone 16 Pro Max. These dummy units align with what we have seen in his previous dummy unit leaks, but this set of dummy units seems more polished and ready for release, indicating that this could be the final design that Apple settles on. And yes, stating the obvious to get it out of the way: the iPhone 16 Pro Max in these renders looks like an iPhone.

In the above image, we can see three colors for the presumably Titanium-built iPhone 16 Pro Max. The white color looks as gorgeous as ever, and I am surprised to see that there is an actual deep black color for the iPhone 16 Pro Max. Apple frequently lands on the gray spectrum for Pro iPhones instead of a deep black, so I am pretty excited about a deep black color this time. There’s also the Natural Titanium color for fans who prefer a more neutral tone but don’t want to be too boring.

Curiously, the leaked image from Sonny only shows three colors for the iPhone 16 Pro Max. Apple usually releases four colors at launch, so we are missing one. There are rumors of a “Rose” color for the iPhone 16 Pro and Pro Max, but we don’t see it in this leak.

Also, since these are dummy units, you can ignore the apparent size of the camera module within the camera lenses — we’re likely going to see the tetraprism periscope zoom lens on the actual phone, but that won’t be present and visible in dummy units. Dummy units are shared with case and accessory manufacturers to help them with the dimensions of the actual phone.

It’s not apparent immediately, but past leaks (including one from Sonny, seen below) have suggested that the iPhone 16 Pro Max could aim for an enormous 6.9-inch display. This would easily make it one of the biggest iPhones available so far.

Keep in mind that these are still leaks, so you should take them with a pinch of salt. We’ll have to wait for Apple to release the iPhone 16 Pro lineup to see what it actually looks like, and that’s still more than a month away. Stay tuned!

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OnePlus is known for its impressive flagships and foldables, but it also makes some pretty good budget Android phones. The company is refreshing its budget phone lineup with the launch of the OnePlus Nord CE 4 Lite 5G, packing in an even bigger battery and faster charging than before. Previous devices, like the OnePlus Nord CE 3 Lite, have entered the US market as the OnePlus Nord N30. While we don’t know of such rebranding plans for the Nord CE 4 Lite, it’s still a device worth looking at.

The processor on the OnePlus Nord CE 4 Lite is the Qualcomm Snapdragon 695, which was also used on the CE 3 Lite and even the CE 2 Lite. Qualcomm itself has rebranded the Snapdragon 695 into the Snapdragon 6s Gen 3, so there is nothing fundamentally flawed here by OnePlus. A newer SoC (one that is not merely a rebrand) would have been better, but that would have messed around with the pricing and value proposition. Customers looking for more performance can climb higher up OnePlus’s product lineup to devices like the Nord CE 4 and even the main Nord series.

Update: June 22, 2024 (4:00 AM ET): We’ve updated our Galaxy Watch 7 rumor hub with apparently leaked pricing, confirmation of the Galaxy Watch Ultra name, and more.

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Original article: The Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 is easily one of the best smartwatches you can buy, though it’s not a dramatic improvement from its predecessor. We’re eagerly awaiting the release of the next iteration of Samsung’s smartwatches in the form of the Galaxy Watch 7 series, and we hope to see a lot more dramatic changes that catch it up to the competition, like the OnePlus Watch 2 and even the Apple Watch Series 9. But how is the Galaxy Watch 7 shaping up so far? Here’s what we know about the Galaxy Watch 7, what we can expect, and what we want it to be!

Will there be a Samsung Galaxy Watch 7?

The Samsung Galaxy Watch series is one of the premier smartwatch lineups for Android devices. While competitors like the OnePlus Watch 2 and the Pixel Watch 2 exist in the Android space, the Galaxy Watch series (like the Galaxy Watch 6 and Galaxy Watch 6 Classic) dominates the charts thanks to Samsung’s popularity and marketing and distribution channels.

Samsung has also been very invested in smartwatches, with a lot of notable smartwatches over the years, like those on Tizen OS. Samsung has immense goodwill in this space, and it is unlikely that the company will give up this advantage any time soon, at least not without a good fight.

So even though Samsung has not officially announced anything yet, we’re very confident that the company will release a Galaxy Watch 7. Based on past trends and current leaks, this could take the form of the Galaxy Watch 7 series with multiple products.

A leak from Kro on X suggests that Samsung is planning three smartwatches: a Classic, a Pro, and a “new one.” SamMobile followed up on this by revealing that the Galaxy Watch 7 series will have the following model numbers:

• SM-L300 and SM-L305
• SM-L310 and SM-L315
• SM-L700 and SM-L705

Here, the xx0 models could represent the Wi-Fi-only variants, while the xx5 models could represent the Wi-Fi plus eSIM variants. These variants were also spotted in an official FCC listing, further confirming the existence of the Galaxy Watch 7 lineup.

To sum it all up, Samsung seems to be well underway in the Galaxy Watch 7 development cycle.

We also know that an Ultra watch is in the works. Samsung itself accidentally confirmed the “Galaxy Watch Ultra” name on its own regional websites in June 2024. This comes after regulatory filings mentioned the “Galaxy Watch Ultra” too.

What is the most likely Galaxy Watch 7 release date?

• Samsung Galaxy Watch 4 series — Announced August 11, 2021; released August 27, 2021
• Samsung Galaxy Watch 5 series — Announced August 10, 2022; released August 26, 2022
• Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 series — Announced July 26, 2023; released August 11, 2023

Samsung has maintained a fairly predictable release cycle for its smartwatches in recent years, choosing to launch them alongside its foldables around August. So you can expect the Galaxy Watch 7 series to be released at the same Galaxy Unpacked event where Samsung will launch the Galaxy Z series fold and flip phones.

According to SamMobile, Samsung could launch the Galaxy foldables in early July 2024, possibly in the second week. Since Samsung usually launches its devices on a Wednesday, that would give us a date of July 10, 2024, as the possible launch date for the Galaxy Z foldables. This is supported by a leak from tipster Evan Blass who shared a GIF of an official countdown clock with the event scheduled for July 10 at 10 PM Korean Standard Time (KST). By extension, this could also be the day and event where Samsung launches the Galaxy Watch 7 series.

Chosun corroborates an early release rumor, suggesting that Samsung wants to take advantage of marketing around the 2024 Summer Olympics, which are scheduled to be held in Paris, France, on July 26, 2024. Consequently, the launch could be held in Paris, France.

What will the Galaxy Watch 7 look like?

So far we had very little to go on about what the Galaxy Watch 7 would look like, but we do have a new leak courtesy of Onleaks that gives us our first look at what’s supposedly Samsung’s first “Ultra” smartwatch.

Based on the leaked render, the Galaxy Watch Ultra is set to feature a distinctive squircle design, combining a circular display with a square frame. This peculiar choice creates a visually jarring appearance, as the circular display seems awkwardly placed atop the square base. Despite the unconventional shape, the round 1.5-inch display means the watch would retain the familiar user interface seen in previous models.

A standout feature visible here is the third button (or Quick Button, per Android Headlines), which may function similarly to the Apple Watch Ultra’s Action Button. With dimensions slightly larger than the Galaxy Watch 6 Classic, the Galaxy Watch Ultra also seems to sport a redesigned watch band mechanism and larger speaker grilles. Its rumored colorways include Titanium Gray, Titanium Silver, and Titanium Beige.

While Samsung is clearly venturing into new and somewhat questionable design territory with its first “Ultra” smartwatch, we can expect the rest of the lineup to not stray too far away from last year’s Galaxy Watch 6 in terms of design. We don’t have officially confirmed information from Samsung yet, nor do we have any leaked renders that give us any idea of what the standard Galaxy Watch 7 would look like.

Speculatively from our end, some of the variants in the Galaxy Watch 7 (most likely the base variant) could continue on with the looks of the Galaxy Watch 6, which has also largely carried forward the look of its predecessor. Further, the middle Galaxy Watch 7 variant could look like a Galaxy Watch 6 Classic successor with a rotating bezel, as this feature has been loved by fans, and we don’t imagine Samsung would like to remove it again.

What rumored specs and features could the Galaxy Watch 7 series have?

A new Samsung wearable with the model number SM-L305U was recently spotted on the Bluetooth SIG database. When analyzed alongside earlier leaks, it appears that this device could be the LTE-enabled 40mm version of the upcoming Galaxy Watch 7, geared towards the US market. The Bluetooth certification confirms the Galaxy Watch 7 will retain the same Bluetooth 5.3 with LE technology as the Galaxy Watch 6, but the exciting upgrades likely lie beyond connectivity.

According to TheGalox on X, the upcoming Samsung Galaxy Watch series could feature a new Exynos SoC that promises 50% better efficiency and 30% faster performance. While initial reports hinted at this chip being called the Exynos W940, a recent report from SamInsider points towards the W1000 designation instead. This aligns with Samsung’s recent trend of simplifying the naming schemes for its flagship mobile CPUs as well.

A report from the Korean website New Daily suggests that Samsung could be using Samsung Foundry’s 3nm process for its SoC on the Galaxy Watch 7 series. Connecting the dots, it could mean that the Exynos W940/W1000 could be a 3nm SoC powering the Galaxy Watch 7 series. If correct, this would be a decent upgrade over the 5nm Exynos W930 that is present on the Galaxy Watch 6 series. The switchover to a 3nm process would also explain the claimed efficiency improvements.

A report from SamMobile suggests that Samsung could also increase the internal storage of the watch. The Galaxy Watch 6 series has 16GB internal storage, while the Galaxy Watch 7 series could double it to 32GB.

Galaxy Club reported in early April that one of the watches (model number SM-L70x) has a battery with a rated capacity of 578mAh. The outlet suggested that this would translate into a typical capacity of 590mAh, which would be in line with the Galaxy Watch 5 Pro.

The FCC listing of the Galaxy Watch 7 series suggests Samsung might increase wireless charging speeds by 50% this year. The listing mentions 15W wireless charging on the smartwatch, up from 10W on the Galaxy Watch 6. As far as the new Galaxy Watch Ultra model is concerned, we don’t have any specific information about its features.

Leaked specs from Android Headlines corroborated the info above but offered additional details surrounding the watches’ displays and materials. The Galaxy Watch Ultra may offer a panel capable of 3,000 nits, with the Galaxy Watch 7 peaking at 2,000 nits. Both may come slathered in sapphire crystal. Other details included the use of titanium for the Ultra’s shell and aluminum for the Galaxy Watch 7. Both watches reportedly pack IP68 water and dust resistance with a MIL-STD-810H durability rating, while the Ultra offers a 10ATM rating, too.

Galaxy AI on Galaxy Watches

In terms of software features, Samsung has now confirmed that Galaxy AI (as part of One UI 6 Watch) is coming to “the next Galaxy Watch line-up,” which obviously means the Galaxy Watch 7 and Watch Ultra should be launching with Galaxy AI. The AI features confirmed as of now include an “Energy Score” providing daily insights into your overall condition, personalized “Workout Routines” for seamless exercise transitions, and a “Race” feature allowing runners and cyclists to compare performance on the same routes.

Additionally, users can anticipate tailored “Wellness tips,” more comprehensive sleep analytics with detailed “Sleep Score” metrics, and advanced running metrics like “Aerobic Threshold (AT) / Anaerobic Threshold (AnT) Heart Rate Zone.” While these are the currently confirmed features, Samsung may introduce additional AI capabilities when One UI 6 Watch is officially released.

What might the Galaxy Watch 7 price be?

• Samsung Galaxy Watch 6, 40mm: Wi-Fi-only: $299.99 / 4G: $349.99
• Samsung Galaxy Watch 6, 44mm: Wi-Fi-only: $329.99 / 4G: $379.99
• Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 Classic, 43mm: Wi-Fi-only: $399.99 / 4G: $449.99
• Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 Classic, 47mm: Wi-Fi-only: $429.99 / 4G: $479.99

We can draw some reasonable conclusions about the Galaxy Watch 7 series pricing by looking at the predecessor, the Galaxy Watch 6 series.

The Galaxy Watch 6 series started at $300 in the US for its smallest 40mm and Wi-Fi-only variant (though it is often discounted below this these days). One can presume that Samsung would like to stick close to this price tag for the entry-level Galaxy Watch 7. Upgrading to the 4G LTE eSIM variant adds a $50 bump to the price, and we presume this will continue with the Galaxy Watch 7 series.

The Galaxy Watch 6 Classic starts at $400 in the US for its smallest 43mm Wi-Fi-only variant. You can expect one of the other two Galaxy Watch 7 variants to target this price band.

It looks like the Galaxy Watch 7 could share the same price as the Galaxy Watch 6. But what about the Watch Ultra model?

91mobiles reported in June 2024 that the Galaxy Watch 7 will apparently cost $299 to $310. That would put it on par with the Watch 6 in the US.

A European retailer leak from June 2024 also gives us purported price details. It mentions a €314.49 (~$336) price for the 40mm Galaxy Watch 7 Bluetooth model. Meanwhile, the 44mm model is said to cost €344.99 (~$369). This is apparently a slightly discounted price by the retailer compared to the recommended price. European prices tend to be more expensive than US prices though, so it’s worth keeping this fact in mind.

Now that it’s likely that Samsung is also releasing a brand-new Galaxy Watch Ultra, it’s highly likely that the company will also follow Apple’s strategy and price the Galaxy Watch Ultra much higher than the rest of its smartwatch series. We are expecting a starting price well above $500, to say the very least.

The aforementioned 91mobiles leak revealed that the Galaxy Watch Ultra could actually retail for $699 to $710. Meanwhile, that European retailer leak pegs the price at €688.99 (~$737). That’s way above our $500+ expectation but cheaper than the Apple Watch Ultra.

Should you wait for the Samsung Galaxy Watch 7?

If you’re looking for a great smartwatch right now, the Galaxy Watch 6 still remains a solid choice. However, if you can hold out for a couple of months, the Galaxy Watch 7 might offer significant upgrades that make the wait worthwhile. Plus, even if you decide the Watch 6 is perfect for you, the Watch 7’s release will likely bring tempting price drops on the older model.

Alternatively, if you’re open to exploring beyond the Galaxy ecosystem, there are several impressive smartwatches to consider, such as the Google Pixel Watch 2 ( ), the OnePlus Watch 2 ( ), or the Garmin Venu 3 ( ). While the latest Apple Watch ( ) is a top recommendation, it’s worth noting that it’s only a feasible option if you’re contemplating a switch to an iPhone, as Apple’s smartwatch does not support Android.

Samsung Galaxy Watch 7 wishlist

While there’s still more than a month before we get newer watch hardware, we’d love to see Samsung make a few bolder moves in 2024 with the next Galaxy Watch. There are certainly more than a few things on our Samsung Galaxy Watch 7 wishlist, so let’s jump right in.

The sensor data needs big improvement

The Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 is a good smartwatch, but its health and fitness features could use some work. Specifically, we’re focused on the accuracy of its sensors. As noted in our Galaxy Watch 6 review, the heart rate data on the Watch 6 is extremely inconsistent. The same applies to GPS accuracy in runs and other activities. While it can be reasonably accurate in many neighborhoods, it sometimes produces wonky and unexpected results.

Samsung needs to focus on improving its sensor accuracy. A bigger Health feature push could attract fans who are interested in Samsung’s watch but find its health features lacking compared to Garmin watches, Fitbit, or the Apple Watch. Hopefully, the newly confirmed Galaxy AI features will help bridge the gap for health enthusiasts.

Improve support for Android phones that aren’t made by Samsung

Samsung prioritizes its Galaxy phones over other Android devices, which isn’t too surprising, but it’s something we’d like to see change. The Galaxy Watch is easily one of the best, if not the very best, Android watches for generalist users, so Samsung shouldn’t limit its appeal.

What kind of features are currently unavailable to non-Samsung phone owners? There are three main features that are only for Samsung phone owners: on-demand ECG readings, blood pressure detection, and irregular heart rate notifications. To use these advanced features, you need the Samsung Health Monitor app, which isn’t available outside of the Galaxy Store on Samsung phones and tablets.

Samsung should embrace more styling options

The Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 and Pixel Watch 2 are basically the gold standard products for Wear OS, largely thanks to their decent features and mainstream appeal. While the Galaxy Watch 6 comes in a few fun colorways, there’s always scope to add more colors or band options. We’d like to see that change with the Galaxy Watch 7 series. This is especially needed for the new Pro model, which is the Galaxy Watch 7 Ultra. Instead of just offering black or silver, give us a splash of color in the watch body itself. Or at least throw in a few new funky watch band options for the entire series.

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Update, June 21, 2024 (01:50 AM ET): Yesterday, we told you of reports that people’s YouTube Premium subscriptions were being terminated if that user had used a VPN workaround to get the service at a cheaper rate. Now, we have a statement from Google confirming that it is clamping down on this practice:

To provide the most accurate plans and offers available, we have systems in place to determine the country of our users. In instances where the signup country does not match where the user is accessing YouTube, we’re asking members to update their billing information to their current country of residence.

Interestingly, YouTube did not confirm or deny that it has canceled YouTube Premium subscriptions for this practice.

A customer service rep did tell PCMag, though, that the company “initiated the cancellation of premium memberships for accounts identified as having falsified signup country information.” While this isn’t an official statement from Google, it does heavily suggest that that’s what the company is doing.

The original, unedited article continues after the break.

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Original article, June 19, 2024 (08:58 AM ET): A YouTube Premium subscription can be one of the best subscriptions you can purchase, especially if you are an avid user of the video streaming platform. The platform has made it clear that it doesn’t like ad blockers, and the amount of ads on it has also made it rather annoying to use. The only real solutions are to stop using YouTube or plop some money down for a Premium subscription. Some users have used VPNs to buy YouTube Premium at cheaper rates, but it appears that Google is cracking down on such subscriptions and canceling them.

Reddit user Alopez1024 pointed out that YouTube seemingly canceled their YouTube Premium membership out of nowhere.

Other Redditors chimed in, claiming that their subscriptions were canceled too. However, the common thread appears to be that the users used a VPN to subscribe to YouTube Premium at a cheaper rate than what is available for their home market.

YouTube presents different Premium rates to specific markets, possibly to better accommodate the purchasing power of the local currency and align with local consumer expectations. Many people have used a VPN connection to mask their country of origin and take undue advantage of YouTube Premium’s regional pricing.

For instance, one of the common countries for such workaround subscriptions is Ukraine, where the subscription costs 99 UAH per month (~$2.44) compared to $13.99 per month in the US, and an international credit card would work. Premium would work normally after subscription, even without a VPN, making it a lucrative workaround. But not anymore, though.

If you have subscribed to YouTube Premium through a VPN, there is a good chance that your membership has been canceled. If you were scratching your head on the reason, this is probably it.

Redditors who have contacted customer service mention that the cancelation is because the user “moved” to a different location than the one they signed up from. They have been advised to sign up with a local card and address, which would inevitably bring them the normalized regional prices.

So far, we have not yet come across reports of people who have moved countries being caught in this clampdown on VPNs. But there is a possibility that even they could be affected.

We’ve reached out to Google for a statement and will update this article if and when we hear back.

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Google and Yale announced the Nest x Yale smart door lock back in 2017, with the smart features of the lock controlled through the Nest app. However, the company sunset the Nest app in favor of the Google Home app in 2021. Despite “transitioning” to the Google Home app, Google never really managed to get full feature parity with the Nest app. An upcoming Google Home app update could help bridge some of the gaps, finally giving Nest x Yale smart door lock users the ability to use passcodes through it.

In the latest Google Home app v3.19.1.3 update, we found the following strings that reference passcode functionality:

<string name="choose_a_lock_header_description">A guest passcode will be created for this lock</string>
<string name="create_label_header_description">Labels help you identify and organize passcodes</string>
<string name="choose_a_lock_header_title">Choose lock</string>
<string name="create_passcode_label_hint">Passcode label</string>
<string name="edit_label_header_description">Tap label to change. Labels help you identify and organize passcodes.</string>
<string name="create_label_header_text">Create label</string>

The strings reveal that the Google Home app will get passcode-related features. These features will extend to labeling and creating guest passcodes, though there is always room for adding more features in the future.

Now, the strings do not directly reference the Nest x Yale locks. So, there is a chance that Google is building functionality for some future hardware products. However, there’s also a chance that this feature is finally an attempt at bringing feature parity to Nest x Yale lock users, and we believe that to be more likely the case.

Google’s support documentation on Nest x Yale Lock passcodes continues to reference the Nest app for creating and changing the passcodes used to lock and unlock the Google Nest x Yale Lock. We’ve also spotted exasperated Nest x Yale lock users on Reddit trying to figure out how to manage passcodes for their lock in the confused mishmash between the Nest app and the Google Home app. The Nest app redirects them to the Google Home app, but the Google Home app seems to lack functionality around passcodes. So it’s likely that Google could be looking to finally bridge the gap here for existing users. However, this remains speculation on our end.

We’ve reached out to Google for a statement on this finding. We’ll update this article when we hear back from them.

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Samsung’s Fan Edition smartphones have their own fan base. The “FE” branding has become popular as an Android flagship alternative, offering a different combination of specifications at a lower price tag. We’re waiting on the launch of the Samsung Galaxy S24 FE, which will hopefully come later in the year, and now the first set of details are leaking out for the device.

Galaxyclub suggests that the Galaxy S24 FE could come with the 50MP ISOCELL GN3 1/1.57-inch sensor for the primary camera, sporting 1.0μm pixels. If the sensor sounds familiar, it is the same one you can spot in the Galaxy S23, Galaxy S23 FE, and Galaxy S24.

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The Google Pixel Watch was Google’s first smartwatch under the Pixel branding, and the company followed it up with the Pixel Watch 2. If you place both of these good smartwatches side-by-side, you’d be hard-pressed to find the difference. Google seems to have settled on this design language, as the latest Pixel Watch 3 leak suggests that we will see more twinning.

91Mobiles has shared renders of the upcoming Google Pixel Watch 3, and no matter how you cut it, it looks pretty much like both of its predecessors.

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YouTube is testing a redesign with desktop users, and opinion on it is divided, to put it mildly. The platform is experimenting with putting the title, description, and comments to the right of the video player rather than under it and placing video recommendations at the bottom. If you want to try this redesign out, you can pay to become a YouTube Premium subscriber and get a chance to try the experimental redesign before it goes live for all (if at all it does).

As spotted by 9to5Google, YouTube Premium’s experimental features page now lists the new “Redesigned Watch Page” as one of the features that subscribers can opt into. This redesign on desktop seemingly makes it easier to find related content but also “enhances your ability to engage with comments.”

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Despite the recent price rises and the lack of lossless audio music, Spotify still remains the primary music streaming app for many users. Spotify’s excellent cross-device functionality is one of the reasons why many people, including myself, prefer it over YouTube Music. But if you recently opened Spotify and found all of your playlists have vanished, don’t panic, as that’s definitely a bug and not a feature.

We’re seeing multiple reports from users complaining that their playlists have vanished. These reports are generally from desktop and web browser users.

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Qualcomm made the leap to a “simplified” naming scheme with the launch of the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 in 2021, promising an SoC lineup that would be easier for consumers to understand. We’re now deep in 2024, and Qualcomm’s naming scheme is in a really bad spot. Qualcomm has released plenty of confusing SoC versions following no discernible hierarchy, making it challenging to rank phones at a glance. The company has quietly launched the new Qualcomm Snapdragon 6s Gen 3, which appears to be a slightly better version of the Snapdragon 695 from 2021 but seemingly much worse than the Snapdragon 6 Gen 1 from 2022.

The Snapdragon 6s Gen 3 has the model number SM6375-AC, which puts it closer to the Snapdragon 695 (SM6375) than to the Snapdragon 6 Gen 1 (SM6450). When you go through the specifications of the 6s Gen 3, you’d be hard-pressed to find any real differences between it and the Snapdragon 695 other than a tiny increase in clock speeds.

Update: May 31, 2024 (07:30 PM ET): We’ve updated our Galaxy Watch 7 rumor hub with a new leak about the Galaxy Watch FE and confirmed information about Galaxy AI features coming to the Galaxy Watch 7.

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Original article: The Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 is easily one of the best smartwatches you can buy, though it’s not a dramatic improvement from its predecessor. We’re eagerly awaiting the release of the next iteration of Samsung’s smartwatches in the form of the Galaxy Watch 7 series, and we hope to see a lot more dramatic changes that catch it up to the competition, like the OnePlus Watch 2 and even the Apple Watch Series 9. But how is the Galaxy Watch 7 shaping up so far? Here’s what we know about the Galaxy Watch 7, what we can expect, and what we want it to be!

Samsung Galaxy Watch 7 series: At a glance

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Update, May 31, 2024 (12:50 PM ET): It looks like Google has fixed the issue described in the original article below. Here is a statement from the company:

There was an issue that was briefly affecting some results on Google News, Discover and other products. We’ve fixed the issue and things should be working normally now.

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Samsung is one of the biggest pioneers of smartwatches and one of the few manufacturers that has been around since the start and is still going strong. Samsung’s entry into the smartwatch space started a long time ago, and the Galaxy Watch lineup started with the original Galaxy Watch back in 2018. It ran Tizen, which many would strongly argue provided a better user experience than Wear OS at that time. Samsung jumped to Wear OS with the Galaxy Watch 4 (to help save Google’s wearable OS), but this jump came at the cost of Tizen. Samsung has now put Tizen on life support, and in the coming months, your Tizen watch’s functionality will become increasingly limited until its eventual demise.

Reddit user Seaweed_Maximum (via Techissuestoday) brought to light Samsung’s termination schedule for Galaxy Store access for Tizen smartwatches. According to screenshots of the notice posted purportedly by a member of the Galaxy Store Operations team, here is the timeline for various termination dates for Tizen watches:

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Google Calendar is a rather underrated Google app that does most things right. Since it is part of GMS, most Android phones come with it out of the box, and users generally don’t need to install an alternative calendar app. Many people add birthdays to Google Calendar to get reminded of such important dates every year without manually creating a new event for every year. Google seemingly recognizes this use case, as an upcoming Google Calendar update would make it even easier to add birthdays.

In the latest Google Calendar v2024.21.0-637471596 app update, we managed to activate a dedicated “Birthday” chip that makes it super convenient to add recurring birthday events.

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We’re hearing reports on social media that Verizon had a noticeable outage in many parts of the US. Many users have been spotted complaining on X (formerly known as Twitter) and Reddit that their Verizon phones did not have service, while some who did had fallen down to LTE with no 5G.

From what I can see on DownDetector, there was a large spike in Verizon outage reports a few hours ago, though that spike has now died down. Verizon’s support handle has confirmed the outage in replies to customers, but has not put out a standalone post informing the public at large about the outage.

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As part of the May 2024 Android Feature Drop, Google is officially rolling out some much-awaited features for Google Home users. Those who have built their smart home centered around Google Home will now have more ways to control their favorite or most accessed smart home devices.

Android users can now add a Google Home widget to their home screen, featuring their favorite smart home device controls. This is incredibly useful, especially if you have devices that you constantly toggle or access throughout the day. The widget is also surprisingly flexible, letting you resize to your desired configuration to suit your home screen.

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Update: May 30, 2024 (07:55 AM ET): We’ve updated our Galaxy Z Fold 6 rumor hub with a report about the Fold 6 Slim/Ultra and the hands-on image of the Galaxy Z Fold 6 next to an image of the Galaxy Z Fold 5.

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Original article: We’re deep into 2024, and it’s about time we learn more about Samsung’s next wave of foldables. The Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6 and the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 6 are expected to be the highlights of Samsung’s foldable ambitions, refreshing its lineup a bit past the middle of the year. Leaks and rumors have begun flowing in, and we now have a fair idea of how the book-style foldable, the Galaxy Z Fold 6, will shape up. Read on to learn more about this upcoming device!

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We’re gearing up for the launch of the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6, which is rumored to launch at a Samsung Unpacked event on July 10, 2024. Samsung has yet to confirm or even tease anything about the upcoming top foldable, but we have plenty of leaks to paint us a fair picture of what to expect. We have seen renders of the Galaxy Z Fold 6 already, but now we have a really clean look at the front of what appears to be a live model of the Fold 6, positioned next to a Fold 5.

Leaker Ice Universe has posted a hands-on image of the Galaxy Z Fold 6 (right), positioned next to an image of the Galaxy Z Fold 5 (left).

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Amazon Prime is a great subscription plan if you frequently order from the e-commerce giant, as you get plenty of delivery-related perks that make it worth it. If your shopping use isn’t that high, you also get streaming benefits with Prime Video, gaming benefits with Prime Gaming, and even cloud storage benefits with Amazon Photos. Amazon is sweetening the deal further, offering a Grubhub Plus subscription with Prime and even letting you order food without leaving the Amazon website.

Amazon has announced that Amazon customers in the US can now order from Grubhub’s directory of restaurants in all 50 states straight from the Amazon website. You won’t need to navigate to the Grubhub app for your food delivery needs now. The ordering experience is the same on Amazon as it is on Grubhub.com and the Grubhub app, and customers will also see the same restaurant prices that they do on Grubhub.

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Update: May 30, 2024 (12:22 AM ET): In a statement shared with The Verge, Google has confirmed in a roundabout way that the leaked documents are real, albeit they could be outdated or incomplete.

We would caution against making inaccurate assumptions about Search based on out-of-context, outdated, or incomplete information. We’ve shared extensive information about how Search works and the types of factors that our systems weigh, while also working to protect the integrity of our results from manipulation.

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Original article: May 29, 2024 (04:12 AM ET): Before Google jumped in deep with AI Overviews and Search Generative Experience, it banked extremely heavily on serving users search queries through the conventional Google Search results we know. However, a lot goes on behind the scenes in answering such consumer search queries. Google has kept its search engine ranking secret sauce close to its heart and has always instead presented best practices to guide websites. Now, a leak claims to have unraveled the truth behind Google’s highly coveted Search algorithm, and in a lot of ways, it showcases how the company’s guidance doesn’t match what it seemingly checks for.

The news: Google’s Search algorithm has purportedly leaked

SparkToro claims to have accessed more than 2,500 pages of API documentation that originate from Google’s internal “Content API Warehouse.”

The report mentions that the documentation was inadvertently leaked on GitHub in March 2024 but then removed. However, you can spot copies of v0.4.0 and v0.5.0 of google_api_content_warehouse on Hexdocs (we at Android Authority are unable to verify the authenticity of these leaked documents, so reader discretion is advised).

The documentation appears to be part of Google Search’s secret sauce, aka the algorithm. It doesn’t directly show the weight that Search’s ranking system assigns to different characteristics of a website or its content, but it does show the details that Google collects from websites and web pages. The initial report then collaborates with iPullRank to analyze the purported APIs.

This leak is practically the most significant insight ever into how Google Search actually works. Surprisingly, it also contradicts much of what Google has publicly stated. To appreciate what’s wrong, we’ll have to look at Google Search’s behind-the-scenes workings.

The background: What happens behind the scenes when you Google Search?

A Google Search query may seem like an innocent and inconsequential action to a consumer like you, but it is oiling the wheels of a multi-million dollar industry. So, to understand the gravity of the leak, it is crucial to understand what happens when you do a Google Search.

The basics: Search engines, web crawling, web indexing, and ranking search results

When users have questions that they want answered on the internet, they approach a website called a “search engine.” They input a query for the search engine to look up, and the search engine presents them with an answer that hopefully answers their question. Simple, right?

On the back of it, the search engine does a lot of work, but it can be broken down into three main tasks:

• Crawling: A search engine needs to know the entirety of the internet’s data to find out who is answering what and what is answered where. For this, a search engine “crawls” the entire internet, i.e., it visits every single website and webpage.
• Indexing: The pages the crawler has visited are analyzed for their data and content, and this information is stored in an easy-to-retrieve manner.
• Ranking: Since hundreds and thousands of websites are trying to answer the same query, there needs to be a system that showcases who is presented first to the user. This is commonly referred to as a ranking system. The most visible form of it is the position on which a website appears on a search engine result page (SERP).

The ranking system decides who is placed in the first spot, who is placed on the first page, which combinations of search terms their specific articles land, and so on.

Why does ranking matter on Google Search or any search engine?

Google Search (or simply Google) is the largest search engine in the world, controlling the vast majority of the search traffic that routes through the internet. Just go ahead and count the number of search queries you run in an ordinary day or week and multiply that by billions of people worldwide. Suddenly, you can see why search engines are often called the traffic signals of the internet, as they have the power to route massive internet traffic down your internet road if you do things right.

There’s insane potential to make money for your business if and when you sit at the first position of a popular SERP. Most users only click on the first result, and traffic inflow dries down further down the list by many magnitudes.

Do you recall the last time you scrolled on Google Search and clicked on the second, third, fourth, or fifth result? You only do that when the first result doesn’t satisfy you, and more often than not, you’d be changing and refining your search query before you even go through all the results on the first page of Google Search.

Do you recall the last time you went to page two of a Google Search result? You actually won’t, as Google has removed pagination and opted for a continuous scroll for Search. But the truth is that most users don’t go beyond the first handful of answers. They are either satisfied or have changed their query.

Google’s secret sauce: The Google Search algorithm

So, there’s a lot of pressure to do things right. But how do you do things right?

It would be nice to have a look at Google’s ranking system, aka the Google Search algorithm. That way, websites can do exactly what Google is looking for. They can then consistently rank at the top of search queries, get billions of views, and make millions of dollars.

But the problem is also the same: everyone would know what Google is looking for, and because millions of dollars of ad and affiliate revenue would be at stake, they would have a very strong incentive to game the results to the detriment of end-user experience.

Until recently, most of us would agree that as users, Google Search has been our primary means of finding new information online. Whatever Google has been doing with its secret sauce has been working.

Google’s public recipe: E-E-A-T guidelines for people-first content

Instead of directly publishing its secret sauce, Google publishes a public recipe in the form of content guidelines for websites like ours to follow when we publish our content.

There is a lot of depth to them built up over the years, but Google has always strongly advised creating “people-first content,” aka content for end users, instead of content for a search engine. Google wants you to leave the heavy lifting of ranking to the Search algorithm and just focus on creating content that demonstrates aspects of experience, expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness, or E-E-A-T.

Google preaches creating content for people and not for search engines. The industry operates otherwise for obvious reasons.

The idea is that if you follow EEAT, Google Search will have an easier time identifying your content as good content and ranking it accordingly. It’s not the actual, direct secret sauce, but it’s your best shot at it.

The problem: What Google says does not correctly match with what Google seemingly does

Over the years, website owners have complained that their traffic remains eroded despite following all the best practices for creating people-first content, as outlined in the Google EEAT content guidelines. People officially involved with Google Search have then made on-the-record comments on what they do and what website owners should or shouldn’t do.

The problem is that the purported leak of Google’s secret sauce Search algorithm does not accurately align with the guidelines and what Google itself has said over the years.

iPullRank says the following:

“Lied” is harsh, but it’s the only accurate word to use here. While I don’t necessarily fault Google’s public representatives for protecting their proprietary information, I do take issue with their efforts to actively discredit people in the marketing, tech, and journalism worlds who have presented reproducible discoveries.

As the initial analysis from iPullRank and SparkToro highlights, this purported algorithm leak contradicts Google’s own words:

• Domain authority: Google has maintained that it does not use the concept of sitewide “overall domain authority” for ranking SERPs, but the leaked docs suggest that Google computes a characteristic called “siteAuthority.”
• Using Chrome data for ranking: Google has said that it does not use Google Chrome data as part of organic search. The leaked docs include a few Chrome-related measurement attributes.
• Clicks: Google Search officials have denied using clicks directly in SERP rankings, but there is plenty of evidence, even beyond the leak, that it does use them as a measure of success. The docs reveal more of the same: Google does have a “click and impression signal” system, which further includes factors like “date of last good click,” and measures results that had the “longest click during the session,” and more.
• New website sandbox: Google has maintained that there is no sandbox in which websites are segregated based on age or lack of trust signals. The leaked docs include an attribute called “hostAge” that is used specifically to “sandbox fresh spam in serving time.”
• Authors: Google has maintained that author bylines should be available for reader benefit, not for Google, as they do not impact SERP rankings. The leaked documents indicate that Google at least collected author data on pages, though they stopped short of confirming if it was a ranking metric.

There’s good reason for Google to keep its sauce secret. The problem comes from Google’s willingness to misdirect instead of simply refusing to comment.

Other significant findings from the leaked docs include:

• Freshness matters: Google looks at dates in bylines, URLs, etc.
• Links matter: Google looks at link anchors, relevance, and diversity.
• Branding matters: Branding beyond Google’s ecosystem matters.
• Change history matters: Google keeps a copy of every version of every page it has ever indexed. However, only the last 20 changes are used.
• Demotion: Content can be demoted for factors such as links not matching the target site, porn, and more.

The leaked documents are enormous, and we’ll likely see the SEO and content industry pore over all of them in the coming weeks. Numerous theses will be written on how Google Search exactly works and how websites should evolve to succeed in SERP rankings. It’s great to learn more about the inner workings of Google Search, but I am fully aware that incomplete knowledge here will be a double-edged sword.

However, if these leaked documents reinforce one thing, it is that Google keeps its Search secret sauce close to heart, and one should remain skeptical of what company officials say about it on the record. Google has yet to deny the veracity of these leaked documents.

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Google’s Gemini Nano is an AI model that works on-device to execute AI tasks. It’s the smallest AI model in the Gemini family, but it is very important for all the internet-free, on-device AI capabilities it brings to a smartphone. Google’s Pixel 8 Pro is the only Pixel that can use Gemini Nano for Pixel AI capabilities, but the company caved in after an uproar to bring Gemini Nano to the Pixel 8 and Pixel 8a, too. Just yesterday, we spotted the toggle for enabling on-device generative AI features within the Android AICore app, and now we can confirm that the Android AICore app update is rolling to the Pixel 8 at least.

My colleague Adamya Sharma received the Android AICore app update on her Pixel 8, which includes the toggle. Curiously, the Pixel 8 Pro app was also updated, but there is no toggle in it. We couldn’t locate the Android AICore app for the Pixel 8a, though.

As you can see, the Android AICore app versions for the Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro are different. The Pixel 8 Pro already has Gemini Nano features, and a toggle like this would allow users to disable AI features, which isn’t possible currently. On the Pixel 8 and the Pixel 8a, this toggle will allow users to enable AI features, as the phones lack them out of the box. The toggle isn’t enabled by default on these two phones.

Google will likely bring Gemini Nano support to the Pixel 8 and Pixel 8a in a future Feature Drop, so toggling this setting right now on the Pixel 8 doesn’t immediately begin downloading the Gemini Nano module. When the feature is rolled out, users will need to activate Developer Options and then toggle this new “Enabled on-device GenAI features” setting, which is present at Settings > System > Developer options > AICore Settings.

Did you receive the Android AICore app update on your Pixel smartphone? Did the toggle begin downloading Gemini Nano on your Pixel 8 or Pixel 8a? Let us know in the comments below!

Update: May 29, 2024 (3:00 PM ET): We’ve updated our Galaxy Z Flip 6 rumor hub with the latest leaked details about the device’s battery capacity, processor and more.

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Original article: The Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 5 has been a very popular smartphone amongst consumers, more so than the larger, book-style foldable, the Galaxy Z Fold 5. The lower price and the accessible size are some of the reasons why users prefer this clamshell foldable. With 2024 now underway, we can look forward to Samsung refreshing this lineup with the launch of the Galaxy Z Flip 6. Here’s what we know about the Flip 6, what we can expect, and what we want it to be!

Will there be a Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 6?

The Galaxy Flip lineup has been well appreciated by consumers. While glass slab smartphones are still more popular than foldables, clamshell foldables like the Galaxy Flip 5 have been instrumental in changing public perception. Samsung has an immense lead in this market despite the presence of good competition, thanks to its marketing, distribution, and headstart on foldables. It is unlikely that Samsung will give up this advantage in this space with such immense potential. So even though the company has not announced anything officially yet, we’re confident that it will release a Galaxy Z Flip 6, even if it is a minor refresh.

Tipster Max Jambor has spotted references to the codename “B6” that Samsung is using internally for the device. For reference, the codename for the Galaxy Z Flip 5 was B5.

Will there be a cheaper Galaxy Z Flip 6?

Leaks and rumors indicate that Samsung wants to reduce the entry point for its foldables. The Galaxy Flip lineup is the cheaper foldable compared to the Galaxy Fold lineup, so it would make sense to release an even cheaper version of the clamshell foldable.

However, most leaks suggest that Samsung could be launching a cheaper version of the Galaxy Z Fold 6 instead. Reports have not yet refuted the possibility of a cheaper Galaxy Z Flip 6, but most of them so far are inclined towards a cheaper Fold 6 launching this year.

What is the most likely Galaxy Z Flip 6 release date?

• Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 3 — August 27, 2021
• Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 4 — August 26, 2022
• Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 5 — August 11, 2023

Samsung has a fairly predictable release cycle for its foldables, but the company could be aiming for an earlier launch for the Galaxy Z Flip 6. According to Sammobile, Samsung could launch the Galaxy Z Flip 6 in early July 2024, possibly in the second week. Since Samsung usually launches its devices on a Wednesday, that would give us a date of July 10, 2024 as the possible launch date for the Galaxy Z Flip 6.

The Bell corroborates an early release rumor, suggesting that Samsung wants to take advantage of marketing around the 2024 Summer Olympics that are scheduled to be held in Paris, France from July 26, 2024. Consequently, the launch could be held in Paris, France.

ETNews suggests that the foldable will be launched alongside the Galaxy Ring in the second half of July 2024.

Samsung has consistently unveiled its next generation of foldables every year in early August, with the new phones typically becoming available for shipping in mid-to-late August. However, these rumors indicate that Samsung has a change in plans for 2024.

What will the Galaxy Z Flip 6 look like?

We don’t have officially confirmed information from Samsung yet, but early leaked renders paint a good picture of what we can expect from the Galaxy Z Flip 6.

According to leaked renders from OnLeaks and Smartprix, the Galaxy Z Flip 6 could look very similar to its predecessor, the Galaxy Z Flip 5. It could have a similar clamshell shape and boxy design, and the overall aesthetics also could be very similar.

If you observe these leaked renders very closely, you will notice that the Galaxy Z Flip 6 has a shape that is boxier than the Galaxy Z Flip 5. The edges of the device end more sharply, while the Galaxy Z Flip 5 has a slight bevel along its edge.

Another point to notice is that there are two microphone holes on the top of the device in these renders, albeit this is another minor change.

The Galaxy Z Flip 6 is said to have a 3.4-inch cover display, while the inner folding display is said to be 6.7-inch in size, though a different report from display analyst Ross Young suggests that the Flip 6’s cover display could be approaching 3.9-inch.

The render leak from OnLeaks suggests that the Galaxy Z Flip 6 will measure about 165.0 x 71.7 x 7.4mm, compared to the 165.1 x 71.9 x 6.9 mm measurements on the Galaxy Z Flip 5. The only noteworthy change is a very slightly thicker body, indicating that we could see a marginal increase in battery.

Young also claimed on March 7 that the Galaxy Z Flip 6 colors are Light Blue, Light Green, Silver, and Yellow. He later clarified that the Light Green option will be known as “Mint,” while the silver variant will likely be called “Silver Shadow.”

What rumored specs and features could the Galaxy Z Flip 6 have?

As for other changes, GalaxyClub has reported that Samsung is testing early versions of the Galaxy Z Flip 6, with prototypes sporting a 50MP main camera. This could be a major photography upgrade for the Flip series if it’s indeed confirmed. Samsung has stuck with a 12MP primary camera since the first Galaxy Z Flip model launched in 2020, though the Galaxy Z Flip 4 did sport a larger sensor.

According to Ross Young, the Flip 6 will offer 256GB and 512GB storage options.

The Elec reported on May 17 that the Galaxy Z Flip 6 could gain thicker ultra-thin glass (UTG) on the folding screen. This would enable improved surface hardness and a reduced display crease. The Korean outlet also asserted that the Z Flip 6 will use the Z Flip 5’s hinge.

The Elec also claimed on May 22 that the Flip 6 will be exclusively powered by a Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chipset. This report comes after some sources asserted that Samsung’s new foldables could be powered by a Snapdragon chip or Exynos processor, depending on the region.

What might the Galaxy Z Flip 6 price be?

• Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 5 8GB/256GB: $999.99
• Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 5 8GB/512GB: $1.119.99

We don’t have price leaks for the Galaxy Z Flip 6 yet. However, we can draw reasonable conclusions based on the predecessor, the Galaxy Z Flip 5’s price.

The Galaxy Z Flip 5 started at just about $1,000 in the US. Many consider $999 a magic number that consumers look upon favorably, and Samsung has aimed to price its clamshell foldable under $1,000 (ignoring the rounding up). Considering that the Galaxy Z Flip 6 does not appear to have too many changes over its predecessor, it remains to be seen if Samsung could keep the pricing of the Flip 6 competitive.

Should you wait for the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 6?

If you have a Z Flip 3 or 4, you might be better off waiting and picking up the Galaxy Z Flip 6 when it launches. These older phones are still plenty fast, and the only major upgrade will be the Flex Window. What about those who have an even older Flip or are thinking about getting a foldable for the first time? Honestly, the Z Flip 5 is a great phone already, and I don’t see any reason to wait, especially if your non-folding phone is still doing the job well enough.

If you’re not impressed by the Z Flip 5 but want a smart flip phone you have other options aside from waiting to see what Samsung does with the Flip 6. The best alternative to the Flip will be the Motorola Razr Plus ( ), though there’s also a cheaper Razr ( ) if you’re on a tighter budget but still want a foldable device. For even more options check out our guide to the best foldable phones.

Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 6 wishlist

Right when the Galaxy Z Flip 5 launched, we had a fair idea of what we would want from a successor. For the Galaxy Z Flip 6, we want Samsung to fix all shortcomings and then some. Here is our wishlist for the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 6.

Better use of the cover screen

I love the Flex Window’s size, and it’s a big improvement over the display on my Galaxy Z Flip 4, but Samsung hasn’t done enough with it yet. While devices like the Motorola Razr Plus allow you to run full apps right on the smaller display, Samsung sticks mostly to widgets out of the box.

If you want to run actual apps on the smaller display, you’ll either have to pick from a limited selection of experimental apps via Samsung labs, or you’ll have to install the Good Lock launcher and the MultiStar plugin. Even if you find enough apps that work well, you’ll run into a few other limitations, such as there being no easy way to toggle between apps on the Cover Screen without jumping through hoops.

An upgrade to its camera package

Although the Galaxy Z Flip 5 has a decent camera experience, it’s largely identical to the Z Flip 4’s hardware and nowhere near as good as the Galaxy S23. The Z Flip is very much a flagship device, so I don’t see why we have to settle for hardware that’s anything less than the base Galaxy S model. The good news is that one early rumor points to the Galaxy Z Flip 6 getting a new 50MP main camera, which hopefully will offer a similar experience to the Galaxy S24.

Beyond this, I’d love to see a telephoto camera as well. Even if it’s not quite as good as the one in the Galaxy S24, it would better suit the more premium nature of the Z Flip series and get it closer to the very best camera phones.

Better battery life and faster charging

The Galaxy Z Flip series has never had great battery life, and while it’s gotten a bit better, you’ll still find it hard to make it much more than just a day with moderate use. In my experience, heavy use will drain it even faster. There have been times when I’ve seen my Z Flip 4 drop down to as little as 10% hours before bedtime, requiring me to plug it in early for the night. It’s time for this to change with the Z Flip 6.

To be fair, there’s a reason the Z Flip 5 only has a 3,700mAh battery: space is a premium here. Thankfully, it looks like Samsung is indeed going to squeeze a bigger battery into the Z Flip 6, even if marginally so.

On a related note, I’d like to see quicker charging. The Z Flip 5 currently has 25W charging, which isn’t horrible but not nearly as good as the Galaxy S23 Ultra’s 45W charging speed. Unfortunately, evidence suggests Samsung might stick with 25W yet again.

Dust protection

The Galaxy Z Flip 5 finally folds flat, which helps protect it a little, but there’s still no dust resistance. My brother-in-law is a farmer, and his Flip 3 died after only a year or so. This is a guy who takes great care of everything, which makes me wonder if the dusty conditions of farmwork might have played a role.

The good news is that Samsung has previously indicated it wants to eventually bring dust resistance to its foldable phones. The Motorola Razr Plus beat them to the job in 2023, which may further motivate Samsung to catch up here.

A bigger design shakeup

I have to say it, I think the Razr Plus is a more attractive phone, even if I prefer Samsung’s take overall. Although Samsung has refined its design and increased its coverscreen each generation, it’s also gotten more and more boxy.

I would like to see a design that’s a bit more rounded next time around. A slightly bigger display wouldn’t be bad either. I’d love to see anything that sets it apart beyond just increasing the screen and narrowing the hinge gap.

Yesterday, T-Mobile announced its plans to acquire most of US Cellular’s wireless operations and select spectrum assets for $4.4 billion. T-Mobile’s move is the latest business transaction that further consolidates the US market, leaving consumers with no option but to majorly bank on the big three carriers for their telephony needs. This consolidation may be good for the carrier and will also be marketed as good for the consumer. However, as consumers, we will get the short end of the stick sooner or later.

Consumers in the US have largely stuck to four carriers: AT&T, Verizon, Sprint, and T-Mobile. Some outliers have flocked to smaller carriers like Dish Wireless and US Cellular, and a few consumers also prefer MVNOs based on the top carriers.

However, with T-Mobile’s acquisition of Sprint in 2018, the top four carriers consolidated into the top three. With T-Mobile’s acquisition of US Cellular, the original top six carriers in the US are down to just the top four. The carriers are also on a spree to acquire MVNOs, like T-Mobile’s acquisition of Mint Mobile in 2023 and Verizon’s acquisition of TracFone Wireless in 2020, which have shrunk the available options to American consumers.

If you are in the market for a new phone line right now, chances are that your choices are limited to AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile only or on MVNOs based on them.

The carriers are aware of this oligopoly and have also begun resorting to price increases, even on legacy plans. We’re also seeing changes to price lock promises, watering them down from an actual price lock to a less effective walk-out clause with waivers. If you have a grandfathered plan, you should be mentally prepared to be no longer honored for it.

Needless to say, this is terrible news for consumers. A competitive telecom market is necessary for spurring innovation and keeping prices affordable and realistic. The recent wave of consolidation is moving the telecom market in the opposite direction.

An oligopoly, where only a couple of providers exist to serve millions of customers, is detrimental to consumer interest, especially if the carriers reach an unwritten understanding of keeping prices high for the perpetual benefit of their bottom line. When more consolidation goes through, the dominant carriers can make absurd promises and not follow through, and they wouldn’t have competitors left in the market that would react to such absurdity. Carriers in an oligopoly can raise prices of plans citing higher operational costs, and then two weeks later, announce another acquisition (yes, that does sound familiar).

So, are you happy with the state of the US telecom market right now? Are you pleased with the current choices of AT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon? What do you like, or what do you dislike the most? Are you satisfied with your carrier’s coverage, speed, and plans? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below!

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The upcoming Samsung Galaxy Ring has the potential to be a solid fitness tracker. It could be a practical option for users who prefer something more discreet than a big smartwatch. But smartwatches come with an adjustable strap that allows a wider range of wrist sizes to live with a particular-sized smartwatch. You are significantly more constrained for smart rings as you need to get a perfect fit for your fingers. As it turns out, if you have bigger hands and thicker fingers, you could get more battery life with the Galaxy Ring.

The Galaxy Ring has been spotted on its way to FCC certification, by MySmartPrice. As per the FCC listing, the Galaxy Ring will debut with the model number SM-Q503 (though I presume we could see a model number for each size). The listing reveals that Samsung will equip the Galaxy Ring with a 17mAh battery for sizes 5, 6, and 7. Sizes 8, 9, 10, and 11 will get a bigger 18.5mAh battery, while the size 12 Galaxy Ring will have a 22.5mAh battery. Information for size 13 is missing, but we can expect it to share the 22.5mAh battery from the size 12 ring.

Since the Galaxy Ring has no display, and the rest of the base hardware is expected to remain the same across sizes, it is easy and fair to conclude that your Galaxy Ring’s battery life will depend on its size. The biggest ring will have the most battery life thanks to the bigger battery.

The FCC listing also mentions that the Galaxy Ring will come with support for Bluetooth 5.4 and Bluetooth LE.

Competitors like the Oura Ring also follow a similar approach. The smaller-sized rings have a smaller battery, as the ring has less physical space to pack a bigger battery. Consequently, the total battery life on the larger rings will be better than that of the smaller rings, simply by virtue of more battery capacity. But you needn’t fret that much, as even the smallest-sized ring offers multi-day battery life, which is difficult to say for the smallest-sized smartwatches. So, you should still aim to get the best fit for your smart ring and not worry that much about battery size.

Update: May 20, 2024 (1 AM ET): We’ve updated our Galaxy Watch 7 rumor hub with a new report about its possible wireless charging speeds as detailed in an official FCC listing.

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Original article: The Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 is easily one of the best smartwatches you can buy, though it’s not a dramatic improvement from its predecessor. We’re eagerly awaiting the release of the next iteration of Samsung’s smartwatches in the form of the Galaxy Watch 7 series, and we hope to see a lot more dramatic changes that catch it up to the competition, like the OnePlus Watch 2 and even the Apple Watch Series 9. But how is the Galaxy Watch 7 shaping up so far? Here’s what we know about the Galaxy Watch 7, what we can expect, and what we want it to be!

Samsung Galaxy Watch 7 series: At a glance

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Google renamed Android’s Nearby Share to Quick Share to harmonize the branding with Samsung’s Quick Share. Irrespective of what it is called, Quick Share is an incredibly convenient way to transfer files across devices. It’s the closest AirDrop alternative on Android, and the feature could soon make it even easier to share files, thanks to QR codes.

Android Authority contributor Assemble Debug spotted an upcoming feature to Quick Share in the latest Google Play Services beta v24.20.13. In addition to locating phones in proximity, Quick Share could soon offer a QR code that the receiver can scan to speed up the connection process and begin sharing files.

Update: May 17, 2024 (8:00 AM ET): We’ve updated our Galaxy Z Flip 6 rumor hub with apparent details about the foldable screen and charging speed.

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Original article: The Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 5 has been a very popular smartphone amongst consumers, more so than the larger, book-style foldable, the Galaxy Z Fold 5. The lower price and the accessible size are some of the reasons why users prefer this clamshell foldable. With 2024 now underway, we can look forward to Samsung refreshing this lineup with the launch of the Galaxy Z Flip 6. Here’s what we know about the Flip 6, what we can expect, and what we want it to be!

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Google Wallet is a mobile payment app that also serves as a digital wallet where you can store your cards, IDs, passes, and other information. Google is working on adding support for e-Passports in Google Wallet, and it could do so in a way that reduces your need to pull it out often, though you’ll still need it around.

Android Authority contributor Assemble Debug spotted a new in-development feature in Google Wallet v24.18.633340707 and Google Play Services v24.20.13 beta. This feature would allow users to add their e-Passports to Google Wallet as an ID pass.

Android 14 was publicly launched with the Pixel 8 series back in October 2023. We’re well into the new year, and Google has begun testing the next version of Android, now up to the Android 15 Beta 2. This is still only intended for early adopters and app developers, but things are coming along.

In this article, we’re going to tell you everything we know (and think we know) about Android 15 so far! Fair warning, we’ve covered a lot of features in immense detail, so this article is very long. Consequently, this article has several indexes that should make it easier to navigate.

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We’re eagerly awaiting the release of the Oura Ring 4, but Oura is working hard to make its existing Oura Ring models even more useful. The company has now announced new women-centric features that will likely be well-received by many.

Cycle Insights 3.0

Oura says Ring users will soon receive information about their cycle’s regularity, typical cycle length, and typical period length so they can learn patterns and seek care if/when needed, especially those with irregular cycles and women in perimenopause.

Cycle Aware Readiness Scores

The Readiness Score that Oura presents will soon consider biometric changes that occur throughout the menstrual cycle, including rising heart rate, respiratory rate, and temperature and decreasing HRV during the luteal phase.

With this upcoming update to the companion app, members enrolled in Cycle Insights will not see decreases in their Readiness Scores as a result of their normal, cyclical biometric changes, making it a more accurate measurement of wellness.

Cycle Insights Report

The new Cycle Insights Report is designed in partnership with members of Oura’s Medical Advisory Board. This report will include cycle length, period length, temperature variation charts, cycle variability, and more.

Oura says these new features will roll out in the next few weeks. Device support has not been clarified, so we presume the features will come to currently supported models, namely the Oura Ring 3 in the Heritage and Horizon variants.

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Android 15 just received its newest release, Beta 2. App developers and enthusiasts can install Android 15 Beta 2 on their Pixel devices to test their apps. If you can live with an older build, you can install Android 15 beta on other OEM devices, too. On the Pixels, the latest Beta 2 brings a revamped, collapsible volume panel, marking a big UI change.

We’ve reported on Android 15’s revamped volume panel before. The code for the feature was present in Android 15 Developer Preview 2, but we had to activate it manually. As Mishaal Rahman notes, the revamped panel is standard on the Beta 2, and you can access it with your phone’s volume buttons.

As you can see, the basic volume slider remains the same. However, the expanded volume panel that is accessed after pressing the three-dot button is different. Older builds had an expanded volume panel that looked rather disjointed, while the newer builds have thicker, pill-shaped sliders. Of course, you can slide the slider to change volume, but you can also click on the extreme left of any pill to mute that stream or on the extreme right to raise the stream to maximum volume. This expanded volume panel also collapses, and you can do that by pressing the button next to the media stream.

Helpfully, the expanded volume panel now includes a persistent media output shortcut, which remains present there irrespective of the media playback state. There are also new animations, with the stream name text moving with the slider.

How do you like the new volume panels on Android 15 Beta 2? Let us know in the comments below!

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Google introduced Live Caption as a feature back in Google I/O 2019. This underrated accessibility feature can create captions of any speech coming out of your device. I’ve frequently used it in situations where I couldn’t audibly listen to my phone audio but still needed to figure out what was being spoken. Google is working on adding new improvements to Live Caption that would make it even more useful.

Android Authority contributor Assemble Debug spotted several upcoming customization features related to Live Caption in the Android System Intelligence app.

Some of the upcoming changes revolve around emojis. Live Caption will soon include emoji icons in the transcript and will let you choose whether to show the emoji icon, too. You can show emotional intensity in speech and even choose to emphasize emotional intensity in transcription. You can also show emotional tags and include them in the transcript.

Beyond this, you can show the word duration effect and include the word duration effect in transcription.

As you can see, these changes are in the interest of giving users more options and customizability for their captions and transcripts. These upcoming features were spotted in the oemfull variant of the Android System Intelligence app, which is available on several devices beyond just Google Pixels, so we’re crossing our fingers on seeing these roll out to plenty of phones.

Would you find these upcoming Live Caption features useful? Let us know in the comments below!

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Google Photos has several neat features that make it one of the best photo storage apps around where you can upload all your photos. Many people also use it as their primary photo management app (aka the default Gallery app), but there’s room for improvement here. And then there are people who use Google Photos as both, for storage and for viewing all their photos. If you fall in the second category, then there’s an important new feature that is coming soon to Google Photos that will let you back up photos from other apps while still keeping your primary Photos feed clean of unnecessary clutter.

To understand the change, one must understand the current behavior. Google Photos’ primary Photos view displays all your photos present and backed up in the DCIM folder. If you want to view photos that are present outside of the DCIM folder, i.e., media generated by other apps, then you can view those at Library > Photos on device, arranged by the respective device folders.

If you want to back up any of these folders, you can manually turn on the backup, with the caveat that these photos and images will now also show up in the primary Photos view. So if you turn on backup for the WhatsApp or Office Lens folders, for example, the images (including GIFs, user-generated stickers, scanned documents etc) present will show up alongside your camera photos in the DCIM folder.

Android Authority contributor Assemble Debug spotted an upcoming feature in Google Photos v6.813.

In the future, Photos settings will have a dedicated “Photos view” section, which will house settings for photo stacking, photos from other apps, and layout. The Photos from other apps section is new, and as the name implies, you will soon be able to customize whether backed-up images from other apps show up in your primary Photos feed.

Photos from other apps will give you four options: Show all, Hide clutter, Show none, and Custom. Show all will show all backed-up images in your primary Photos view. Hide clutter will hide lower-priority content like GIFs and memes from the Photos view. Show none will show no backed-up images from other apps (while those images continue to be backed up).

The Custom option lets you individually set the preference for specific third-party apps. This setting is available for WhatsApp for now, but it’s fair to presume that support for other apps will be available in the future.

The benefit of these changes is that you can back up media from other apps while still retaining visibility control for your primary Photos view. All backed-up content remains searchable within Photos, so there are other ways to access the images.

Backed-up images from other apps will bear the relevant tag, so you can view those details on secondary devices and hide those photos there, too. We presume that a similar setting will be available on Google Photos on the web too.

This new feature is not currently live within the app. Google is currently testing it within the app, so it may roll out in the future. It’s not clear if and when this will roll out, but considering its utility in keeping your Photos view organized, we hope to see it roll out soon.

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For those who want to play retro PlayStation games, the PPSSPP emulator is one of the top Android emulator choices. Ever since Apple relaxed its App Store guidelines to allow emulators, we’ve been holding our breath on finally being able to play retro PlayStation games on our iPhones and iPads. That day is finally upon us, as PPSSPP has finally been released on the Apple App Store.

PPSSPP creator Henrik Rydgård has announced on the official PPSSPP website that the emulator has been approved for the App Store. The first release of PPSSPP for iOS has some limitations compared to earlier unofficial builds:

• Vulkan support through MoltenVK is not yet enabled
• Magic Keyboard (iPad Keyboard) is not supported
• The JIT recompiler is not supported
• RetroAchievements is temporarily disabled

The developer mentions that MoltenVK will be re-enabled in the future. Magic Keyboard will be supported through another method (since the older method relied on an undocumented API that wouldn’t fly for the App Store). Even RetroAchievements will be back with a better login UI.

Unfortunately, the JIT recompiler will not be coming back as it clashes with Apple’s rules. Consequently, CPU emulation performance is reduced, but the silver lining is that iOS devices are generally fast enough to run nearly all PSP games at full speed. The PSP CPU is not that resource-intensive to emulate, and the IR-based caching interpreter currently in use also has further room for improvement.

You can download PPSSPP on any iPhone running iOS 12.0 or later straight from the App Store now. The app is also compatible with the iPad, iPod touch, and Apple Vision Pro.

Download PPSSPP from the App Store

The emulator comes with a homebrew store that features a few free indie games, but you’ll have to source your favorite PSP games through other means. The developer has instructions on dumping physical games into ISO and CSO files, while PSP games downloaded from PSN onto a PSP can also be copied off that device. Long story short, you will need to load ISO files into the PPSSPP app to play the game.

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We’re expecting some big AI announcements in the coming days, as both OpenAI and Google have events scheduled this week. While ChatGPT could become more of a search engine, Google could be looking to integrate more of Gemini into its ecosystem. Google has been testing a Gemini Extension for YouTube Music, which we have previously detailed with a demo video. Now, we have a better idea of its functionality with a list of commands that Gemini will accept for YouTube Music.

Android Authority contributor Assemble Debug spotted that Google has added official documentation on connecting YouTube Music to Gemini apps. The documentation states that YouTube Music isn’t available in Gemini in Google Messages and that the extension works with English prompts only for now.

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Everyone seems to have a love-hate relationship with Windows. The newer versions of Windows are quite nice, but Microsoft has the habit of overdoing things often and spoiling a good thing, like the forced Copilot integration. Microsoft seems to be testing some new changes for the Windows 11 Start Menu, mainly by adding in floating widgets, in case you didn’t already have some elsewhere on your desktop.

X user Albacore spotted support for “Start Menu Companions” on Windows 11 beta, build 26212 (h/t The Verge). As the leaker describes, these companions are apps that provide Adaptive Cards that display on a floating island alongside the Start Menu.

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Google has several messaging apps, but the Google Messages app is and remains one of the best texting apps for Android. Many of us use it for our SMS and RCS needs, and it gets the job done without a lot of fuss. Google was spotted working on a message editing feature for Google Messages in February, which now seems to be rolling out to beta users.

X user Jhowkira2000 mentions (via AssembleDebug on X) that Google Messages’ message editing feature is now available on some of their devices on the beta track.

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OnePlus is having a good run with the OnePlus 12, considered one of the best Android flagships this year. But that doesn’t stop the rumor mills from working their way up to the OnePlus 13, which is expected to launch in China at the end of this year if OnePlus follows its own tradition. A new leak is giving us a very early look at the rear camera island outline for the OnePlus 13 and the OnePlus 13R.

Leaker Yogesh Brar has shared an outline of what the OnePlus 13 and OnePlus 13R could look like. The caveat here is that these are still based on very early development prototypes. Hence, there will remain a probability that OnePlus could decide to make some substantial changes to the final products.

Android 14 was publicly launched with the Pixel 8 series back in October 2023. We’re a few months into the new year, and Google has begun testing the next version of Android, now up to the Android 15 Beta 1.2. This is still only intended for early adopters, but things are coming along.

In this article, we’re going to tell you everything we know (and think we know) about Android 15 so far!

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Most people don’t need to spend thousands of dollars on an Android flagship, as their needs and usage patterns often don’t justify dropping that much money. A lot of us can get by just fine with a budget Android device instead, which would serve our needs quite modestly. However, if you want a new smartphone with a stylus, you unfortunately do not have a lot of options. You can either drop a lot of money on a Galaxy S24 Ultra, or you can opt for the budget Moto G Stylus 5G. Motorola has just updated its budget stylus phone with a new design and wireless charging, giving it a better chance at taking on the year ahead.

Motorola continues to call its phones without numeral prefixes, so the new Moto G Stylus 5G (2024) succeeds the old Moto G Stylus 5G (2023). Thankfully, there is a new countered design here, so you can tell the two phones apart with just a look. The highlight upgrade this year is the addition of wireless charging, which many users would appreciate, especially in the budget range.

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ChatGPT is an amazing tool once you learn how to use it properly. If you are a ChatGPT Plus subscriber, you can supercharge ChatGPT by uploading your files and asking the AI assistant questions based on the data in your file. For folks who have migrated most of their lives to online storage solutions, ChatGPT appears to be working on a Context Connector feature, which would connect with Google Drive and Microsoft OneDrive and make it easier for you to feed online files to the AI assistant.

X user legit_rumors has shared an early look at the upcoming Context Connector feature. This feature connects Google Drive, OneDrive Personal, and OneDrive Business to ChatGPT, making it super convenient to feed any file stored in these online storage services.

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The Nintendo Switch was a runaway success, thanks to its design, which allowed it to be enjoyed both as a handheld and as a console docked to your TV. The gaming console was launched in 2017 and is desperately due for a refresh. Nintendo has confirmed that a successor will be announced soon, and now, new leaks have merged that give us an early idea of what the specs of the Nintendo Switch 2 could be, how it could measure against its predecessor, and what its launch timeline could be.

Community members at Famiboards, a discussion forum for Nintendo games and consoles, have been tracking shipment and customs data between Nintendo, NVIDIA, and other companies in an attempt to find hints of the Switch 2’s specifications. Famiboards forum member LiC claims to have analyzed the various shipment listings and arrived at these possible specifications for the Switch 2.