Android

Mobile ads are becoming a significant issue on Android. I’ve recently encountered a spate of surprisingly manipulative pop-ups masquerading as genuine notices or system update alerts. While I’ve learned to sniff out the rubbish from the real, some people haven’t developed this skill. I’ve previously written about my dad, who once encountered a deceptive PDF ad on his phone. He promptly tapped the fake “Update” button and installed numerous bogus PDF apps from the Play Store onto his device. This ad was lurking in a preinstalled office app, but now, it seems that even Google’s own apps are part of the growing problem.

The Pixel Launcher has picked up some long-requested features over the last year. We can hide icon labels and remove the At A Glance widget, and there are some AI icon packs that can add some fun and flair to your home screen. Even with those improvements, there are still a lot of features the Pixel Launcher is missing, and these are the ones I want the most. Proper icon packs

The impact of AI was much further-reaching than first imagined — and in the opposite direction. AI data centers are devouring memory chips, leading to a shortage across the industry, including consumer devices. We have seen products run out of stock (in the case of the Mac Mini) and even serious price hikes on top of already expensive OEM storage options. Having ample onboard storage is actually becoming a luxury feature that not everyone can easily afford. This is a problem that we had solved long ago but are pretending to ignore the solution that sits right in front of our eyes. A teeny-tiny piece of tech from the forgotten era of the mid-2010s can easily fix all our woes — yes, I’m talking about microSD cards.

https://youtu.be/RGTGAkNOjCU The Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8 series has officially arrived, and for the first time, it introduces an Ultra model to the mix. While the Fold 8 Ultra might sound tempting, it’s also a pretty expensive device, coming in at a hefty $2,100 starting price. It’s never been more important to understand your options.

Samsung has finally announced the Galaxy Z Fold 8, Galaxy Z Fold 8 Ultra, and Galaxy Z Flip 8 at its Unpacked event. All three smartphones deliver slim designs, powerful chipsets, and silicon-carbon batteries. On the surface, it’s impressive stuff. However, there’s one problem I have with these new foldable phones. Samsung is sticking with an IP48 rating once again, and I’m completely sick of it.

First impressions matter, and Google’s learned that the hard way with its Tensor chipsets. We’re weeks away from the introduction of the company’s sixth-generation custom SoC, and there appear to be more questions than answers. Our recent survey found that users are frustrated and wary of buying a Pixel 11 until it’s clear what the Tensor G6 can do. I’ve used every Tensor chipset, and my outlook is different from the voters in our poll. The road hasn’t been perfect, and market circumstances have boxed Google in with the upcoming Pixel 11, but it hasn’t been the disaster some make it out to be. Here’s where Google went wrong with Tensor, and what I hope happens in the (very) near future.

After years of reviewing and testing foldable phones, 2026 was the year I finally found the foldable for me — and it’s none other than the Motorola Razr Fold. It didn’t take long after getting my hands on the Razr Fold to realize it was one of my favorite Android phones from the last several years. Everything from the displays to the battery life to the charging speed and software, Motorola knocked the Razr Fold out of the park. It’s a phone I truly love, and up until recently, I didn’t think there would be another foldable to steal me away from it.

With the Galaxy Z Flip 7, Samsung made the controversial choice to ship the foldable with its in-house Exynos 2500 chip everywhere in the world. To many, the shift from Snapdragon to Exynos was viewed as a downgrade, especially in a year when Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 Elite had a breakthrough moment. Motorola put a Snapdragon 8 Elite chip inside the Razr Ultra 2025 in the same year, padding its lead over Samsung and the Galaxy Z Flip 7 on the spec sheet and in most benchmarks. Samsung changed course with the newly announced Galaxy Z Flip 8, which runs on the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 for Galaxy chip in North America. It’s easily the biggest Galaxy Z Flip 8 upgrade on paper, considering the displays, battery capacity, and cameras haven’t materially changed.

Credit: RingConn TL;DR RingConn has launched its Gen 3 smart ring alongside an official Lord of the Rings partnership with Warner Bros. The $349 wearable tracks sleep, activity, women’s health, and sleep apnea patterns without requiring a subscription. Eligible US buyers can apparently receive LOTR-themed rewards. Linking your new smart ring with the most notoriously corrupting piece of jewelry in fiction might not seem like the obvious marketing move. Then again, plenty of people have spent the last 25 years wishing they could get their hands on the One Ring, and RingConn is now leaning into that enthusiasm with an official Lord of the Rings partnership. As reported by TechRadar, the company has teamed up with Warner Bros. to mark the 25th anniversary of The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. The collaboration arrives alongside the wider release of the RingConn Gen 3, which is now available to buy for $349 after going up for preorder earlier this year.

Credit: Ryan Whitwam / Android Authority TL;DR Google Home users are having trouble controlling their Nest Thermostats through voice commands. Users are getting a message that says, “Sorry, I can’t reach the Nest Thermostat right now.” There appears to be no issues with controlling the thermostat through the app. One of the benefits of having a smart home is being able to control devices without having to lift a finger. For example, a Google Home user can simply use their voice to tell their thermostat what to do. However, that convenience all comes crashing down if there’s a connection issue. That appears to be what’s happening for some Nest Thermostat owners. Over on Reddit, one user details a situation where their Google Home speakers refuse to connect to their Nest Rhermostat. When attempting to use voice commands to control the thermostat, the user is getting a message in return that says, “Sorry, I can’t reach the Nest Thermostat right now.” Adding to the confusion, it appears that there is no issue with controlling the thermostat via the Google Home app.

TL;DR Leaks have suggested Pixel 11 prices will start higher than ever this year, beginning at $899. A new interview with Google’s VP of Devices and Services confirms that “adjustments” are impacting Pixel prices. Beyond the upcoming Pixel 11 series costing more, the existing Pixel 10a will also likely be impacted. With Samsung Unpacked now officially behind us, we are staring straight ahead at the Made By Google event coming up on August 12 where we expect to meet the new Pixel 11 series. These phones have already leaked six ways from Sunday, and that’s included an early look at pricing. If you haven’t been happy about the idea of the most affordable phone starting at $899 instead of the $799 we saw with Pixel 10 devices, we’ve got bad news from you. Shakil Barkat is Google’s Vice President of Devices and Services, and 9to5Google recently spoke with him about Pixel hardware, including what we should expect in terms of pricing. While Barkat isn’t sharing any specific figures, he confirms that Google’s been struggling to absorb recent spikes in memory prices, and warns that this simply isn’t a situation that’s going to last.

TL;DR Roku streaming hardware is getting more expensive. Listed MSRPs for Roku streamers have increased by between $10 and $50. As of writing, the streaming devices can still be purchased for less than their new sticker prices. Roku devices are getting more expensive. The streaming hardware maker quietly raised the prices of its products this week, with increases ranging from $10 to $50. As spotted by The Desk (via The Verge), the listed retail prices of Roku’s current-generation streaming hardware have gone up. The Roku Ultra and the Roku Streambar SE saw the largest increases: both have jumped 50% from $99.99 to $149.99.

Credit: Calvin Wankhede / Android Authority TL;DR A US man is being prosecuted after allegedly offering a GrapheneOS duress PIN that wiped his Pixel phone. The charge treats the alleged wipe as destruction of property intended to prevent a government seizure. The incident happened during a border search at Atlanta airport after agents demanded access to his phone. GrapheneOS offers one of the more drastic privacy tools available on an Android phone. Known as a duress PIN, the dummy PIN wipes the device instead of unlocking it, for use in situations when you may be forced to hand over access to your device against your will. We’ve previously seen the value in such a code, but we did wonder if using the feature around law enforcement could create a legal minefield. It appears that a US prosecution is in the process of giving us an answer. According to The Guardian, the US Department of Justice is prosecuting Atlanta resident Samuel Tunick after he allegedly gave a GrapheneOS duress PIN while border agents were trying to search his Google Pixel phone. Experts told the publication that they had not seen a similar case brought over the feature before.

Credit: Anthropic TL;DR Anthropic has announced the launch of Claude Opus 5. The new model is described as coming close to Fable 5, but at half the cost. The company claims that the model doubles the performance of its predecessor on knowledge work and software engineering tasks. Google just pulled the covers off of Gemini 3.6, as well as two new entries in the 3.5 Flash line. Not to be outdone, Anthropic is unveiling a new model of its own. This model adds on to the Opus series and is said to give the company’s powerful Fable 5 model a run for its money. Anthropic has announced the launch of Claude Opus 5, which is described as being more efficient than other models. In the blog post, the company heaps praise upon the model, claiming that it approaches Fable 5 levels of intelligence, but at half the cost. It also claims that Opus 5 is “state-of-the-art” when it comes to coding and knowledge work, but trails behind Mythos 5 on cybersecurity tasks.

TL;DR Android’s screen zoom settings currently impact all apps equally. New Samsung firmware reveals work towards separate zoom settings for each app. Android users already have a nice assortment of options for making it easier to see what their apps are doing. We can adjust text size, magnify specific areas of the screen, or just zoom everything at once. The problem is, not all apps are created equally, and some may look better at different levels of zoom than others. Thankfully, Samsung appears to be working on an easy solution. You’re reading an Authority Insights story. Authority Insights brings you all the latest exclusive reports, app teardowns, leaks, and in-depth tech coverage from the Android Authority team that you won’t find anywhere else.

Credit: Oliver Cragg / Android Authority TL;DR PlayStation Network is currently down. Sony says that all of its services are experiencing issues. This includes account management, gaming and social, video content, the PS Store, and PS Direct. If you’re having problems with the PlayStation Network, know that there’s nothing wrong with your setup. Any issues you’re experiencing are on Sony’s side. The PlayStation Network is currently experiencing an outage. According to the PlayStation status page, every service is experiencing problems at the moment. This includes account management, gaming and social, video content, the PS Store, and PS Direct. As such, the company warns that you might have trouble signing in, editing account details, streaming games, making purchases, and so on.

Credit: Damien Wilde / Android Authority TL;DR Nothing’s co-founder denies a recent report that the company is leaving 12 markets. He states that the company is going through a reorganization to operate more efficiently. Akis Evangelidis also says that the Phone 4b sold 29,537 units on the first day alone. OnePlus recently confirmed it would be leaving North America and Europe. A new report claims that OnePlus won’t be the only phone company looking to reduce its footprint this year. The report alleges that London-based manufacturer Nothing is planning to exit 12 markets. Now the company’s co-founder has come forward, strongly denying the claims made in the report. Nothing co-founder Akis Evangelidis has taken to X (formerly Twitter) to respond to the report in question. Evangelidis calls the report “FAKE NEWS,” adding that they are not shutting down in any markets. The executive explains that the company is undergoing a “reorganising our teams to prepare for our next phase of growth.”

TL;DR BOOX has teased it’s upcoming Picco e-reader. The Picco features a 3.97″ ePaper display and expandable storage. Pricing and availability have not been announced. The BOOX Palma 2 is a great Kindle alternative for readers who want something a little more pocketable. Today, though, BOOX is teasing an even more portable e-reader. The BOOX Picco comes with a truly tiny 3.97″ ePaper screen, and it’ll be offered at an “accessible price point.” We don’t know much about the Picco yet. It’ll come with a front-lit, sub-4″ monochrome screen, and it’ll offer expandable storage via microSD cards. At first blush, the Picco looks quite a bit like the similarly small Xteink X4, which has a 4.3″ display.

Amazon has the Google Pixel 10 Pro down to $699, which is $300 off its $999 recommended retail price. That is a 30% discount relative to RRP, and it puts Google’s current compact Pro flagship within reach for a lot more buyers. This deal has been around for a bit, but stock-clearing discounts like this can end at any time, so it is worth a look while the price is still live. See the deal at Amazon

TL;DR Google has phased out Play services support for Android 6.0 Marshmallow, with Android 7.0 now required for this core function. This caps off a nearly 11-year run for Android 6.0, longer than any other Android version has been supported by Google. While core functions like calling and texting will still work, Android 6.0 devices will miss out on security updates, leaving them vulnerable to cyber threats. Given that Android phones have been around for nearly two decades now, there comes a time when Google has to end support for one of its older software versions. For a couple of years now, Google Play services has been supported on devices running Android 6.0 Marshmallow or newer. That has changed over the past few weeks, with Google deciding to retire this software version after a nearly 11-year run. A thread on Reddit highlights this relatively recent development, while also pointing to the Google support page that now lists Android 7.0+ as the software requirement for Play services to operate. We were able to view snapshots of the support page from June, which mentions Android 6.0 and up being the requirement.

The Mammotion YUKA mini 2 1000H is a premium robotic lawn mower built for smaller yards, and it stands out by skipping the a wire setup. There’s a solid Amazon deal on it right now, too, which makes this a good time to look at what it offers. See the deal at Amazon

Credit: Nothing TL;DR Nothing has launched a new app called Essential Apps. The app lets users build, preview, and deploy Essential Apps directly on their Nothing phone. The company also announced that it is temporarily pausing publishing new apps to Playground. In a bit of bad news, a recent report claims that London-based manufacturer Nothing could be planning to exit up to 12 markets. But on a more positive note, the company has been working on a new native experience for its phones. That experience is available now, but you may have to wait a little before you can take advantage of it. Nothing has announced the launch of a new app called Essential Apps. This app will allow you to build, preview, and deploy Essential Apps directly on your Nothing phone. While you previously had the ability to deploy and use Essential Apps on your phone, you could only create these apps while on the web. This new experience lets you do it all from your handset.

The Apple Watch Series 11 is one of the most full-featured smartwatches Apple makes, and there’s a strong deal on it at Amazon right now. This 42mm GPS + Cellular model is built for people who want Apple Watch features on a smaller size, plus the freedom to stay connected even when their phone isn’t nearby. See the deal at Amazon

Credit: Nothing TL;DR London-based Nothing is allegedly exiting 12 markets (including Japan, the Middle East, and parts of Europe), slashing global headcount by 40%, and laying off 30–50% of R&D staff following sharp drops in global shipments. Recent launches show weak momentum with Phone 4b shipping ~20,000 units and Phone 4a/4a Pro totaling 150,000 units, compared to 2 million global units sold in 2025. Skyrocketing RAM and storage costs forced Nothing to cancel the sub-$250 CMF Phone 2 Pro successor, leaving the CMF lineup without a hero product. All is not well with the smartphone world. Rising component prices have wreaked havoc — not only are we seeing higher phone prices across the board, but the resultant economic headwinds are also directly affecting how well companies can survive in the market. The situation is bad enough that OnePlus had to exit the North American and European markets, and it seems even Nothing could exit some European markets. According to a report by Digit, London-based Nothing is allegedly scaling down its global footprint by exiting 12 markets over the next few weeks. This follows a sharp drop in global device shipments, even though the company continued to grow in key regions like India.

Credit: Hadlee Simons / Android Authority TL;DR Samsung is reportedly testing silicon-carbon batteries in the Galaxy S27 range, after debuting them in its new foldables. A leaker claims that these batteries might only deliver 10% more capacity than the Galaxy S26 series. There’s also a chance that the vanilla Galaxy S27 misses out on this new battery tech. Samsung has finally embraced silicon-carbon batteries, as its new foldable phones all have this technology. We’re expecting the Galaxy S27 range to adopt this new solution as well, and a Korean tipster may have revealed more details about Samsung’s plans. Tipster Lanzuk (@yeux1122) reports that Samsung is currently testing silicon-carbon batteries in the Galaxy S27 series. Don’t expect gigantic batteries in these new phones, though. The company hasn’t apparently decided on a final battery capacity for these phones just yet, but it’s believed that they could be 10% larger. That means the Galaxy S27 Ultra might have a 5,500mAh battery.