Google and Gemini
News related to Google and Gemini.
Which Android is the closest counterpart to the iPhone 18 Pro Max?
The iPhone 18 Pro Max is a brilliant phone, but not everyone wants to live in Apple's walled garden. This is the closest competitor Android can offer.
Empathetic prompts can turn AI chatbots into seemingly traumatized conversational partners
Researchers in Luxembourg put ChatGPT, Grok, and Gemini on the therapist's couch and found a safety problem: a warm, empathetic conversational style is enough to make the models tell coherent stories of suffering about their own training, with scores in the moderate-to-severe range on clinical anxiety scales. This could put mentally vulnerable users at risk. Anthropic's Claude, the model its makers anthropomorphize…
How to clear the cache on your Android device
Your apps and browsers may be overdue for some tidying up.
This Android gaming benchmark app does something I’ve never seen before
Credit: Harish Jonnalagadda / Android Authority I like benchmarks a little too much and use them on every new phone I test. Synthetic benchmarks like Geekbench and 3DMark do a good job of simulating real-world usage and gaming scenarios, and they predict a device’s performance potential reasonably well. As someone who gets over 75 phones a year, a synthetic benchmark lets me easily measure how a particular device…
Google wants video AI to understand what people need as they work
A Google-led research team built StreamVibe, a video agent designed to watch people cook or assemble furniture and speak up only when help is needed. A benchmark shows that none of the tested models reliably pick the right moment in longer videos, as errors compound and response quality drops sharply. The article Google wants video AI to understand what people need as they work appeared first on The Decoder .
The Pixel 11 Pro’s 5x zoom portrait mode is mind-blowing, and you have to try it
Telephoto cameras on our phones are played out, right? After all, there’s one on the back of most big-name flagship phones, and we’ve been spoiled with 3x, 5x, and even 10x optical zooms for a while. You can even buy teleconverter kits for some phones to extend the zoom range even further. Equally, portrait modes are just as common and a feature we probably all take for granted. The Google Pixel 11 Pro has done…
Here are the easiest ways to share your live location on Android
There are a variety of reasons you might want to share your live location with a contact on your Android phone . Maybe you’re meeting up in a crowded area with few visual landmarks. Maybe someone wants to track your journey home to see that you arrive safely. Or you might be on your way to visit someone, and you want them to see your progress as it happens. Whatever the reason, there are a few ways to share your…
Celeste and TowerFall have delisted from Xbox's digital storefronts to support BDS boycott
Earlier this month, Big Walk developer House House explained why their co-op puzzle adventure wouldn't be available for sale on Xbox : Microsoft's gaming division is a priority target of the the Palestinian-led BDS (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions) movement, which names the tech giant in general as a pressure target alongside Google, Amazon, and a host of other companies . House House isn't alone in taking this…
French lawmakers approve $11.2 billion internet tax based on traffic usage, costs $0.65 per gigabyte of content accessed — US tech giants like Google and Meta face new levies on content delivered to French subscribers
France has approved a proposed tax that aims to tax the amount of internet data per gigabyte sent to French users in the country, with major companies like Google, Netflix, TikTok, and Meta now in the crosshairs. According to minutes released by the National Assembly, members voted 11-10 in support of the motion on October 30 — which now means the new law has been added to the country’s next budget, despite major…
5 Samsung One UI features you won't get with other Android phones
Samsung doesn't just make great phone and tablet hardware; its One UI is also a standout, offering many features you just can't get elsewhere.
How to improve audio quality on your Android phone with Bluetooth or wired headphones
Maximizing your listening experience on Android can get very complicated, but we'll guide you through settings and headphone choices to get you there.
The Anker MagGo Power Bank 2 Pro is brilliant, but not for Android
Anker is one of the top brands for charging tech, and likely one of the first places someone might look for a portable charger to go with a brand-new phone, or if their long-running handset needs a little help lasting a full day away from the outlet. So I was hoping that when I received the Anker MagGo Power Bank 2 Pro () in the mail, it would become one of the top picks from one of the top brands. Turns out that…
This Niagara-inspired launcher could (eventually) be better than the original
Niagara Launcher is undoubtedly one of the best Android home screens you can run on a modern Android phone. It’s nippy, loaded with features, and rewards both minimalists and maximalists with its thoughtful feature set. Through its obvious and lesser-known features, I’ve used it to build a brilliant productivity setup that piloted my phone for years . There’s not too much criticism I could level against Niagara, but…
Google joins OpenAI and Anthropic in promising new scraping controls
Google, OpenAI, Anthropic and Microsoft pledge to support a new common signal for robots.txt that blocks scraping for AI training.
The 10 best custom chat themes I made in Google Messages
2026 is one of the biggest years in recent memory for Google Messages. In addition to the massive redesign that’s likely coming any day now, 2026 also gave us a long-awaited customization feature: chat themes. Chat themes rolled out to Google Messages in late August, letting you add custom colors and wallpapers to all your conversations. It’s a feature most other messaging apps have had for a while, and finally…
Google Deepmind creates a global map of forests with satellite data and AI
Google Deepmind and the World Resources Institute have released ForTy, a global map that classifies forests and other land into six categories, including primary forest, plantations, and tree crops. The map could help track deforestation under EU rules, but it identifies only about half of planted forests and tree-crop areas, and 60% of plantations. The article Google Deepmind creates a global map of forests with…
Skipped upgrading this year? 5 upcoming Android phones worth saving for
This year’s smartphone crop wasn’t the most exciting. Iterative releases, paired with steep price increases, made it much easier to keep your money in your wallet. As an enthusiast (and someone with column inches to fill), it’s been difficult to watch. Foldables provided a breath of fresh air, but I can’t help wondering whether better devices are on the horizon. Thankfully, the roadmap for the next few months gives…
I’d choose these earbuds over the Pixel Buds Pro 2 every time, for one simple reason
I have a love/hate relationship with the Google Pixel Buds Pro 2 . The design, sound quality, and functionality are excellent. However, the fit has never been quite right for me. I’ve worked to overcome this, but they always feel compromised. Then I tried the OPPO Enco X4 true wireless earbuds and found what I’ve been looking for all this time.
9to5Mac Daily: October 30, 2026 – New HomePod features, more
Listen to a recap of the top stories of the day from 9to5Mac . 9to5Mac Daily is available on iTunes and Apple’s Podcasts app , Stitcher , TuneIn , Google Play , or through our dedicated RSS feed for Overcast and other podcast players. Sponsored by Backblaze : Backup you can rely on. Save 20% with code 9to5daily . more…
The biggest names in AI are backing a new way to opt out of scraping
OpenAI, Google, Microsoft, and Anthropic say they will adopt a new standard that publishers can use to opt out of being scraped by AI, as reported earlier by Search Engine Roundtable . With this control, publishers can apply their AI training preferences across multiple AI companies, instead of setting them individually. The shared "policy token" signal is proposed by Kevin Kelley, a technical lead for standards at…
Android Auto can run sideloaded apps for free with this new tool
Credit: Andy Walker / Android Authority TL;DR Someone has created a tool called UnknownAuto that lets self-built or sideloaded apps run on Android Auto. The tool marks the app as “installed from Google Play,” so Android Auto accepts it. UnknownAuto is billed as a free, open-source alternative to AA Enabler. Android Auto can run a large variety of apps, but not every app. The platform refuses to run apps that have…
YouTube bug keeps kicking viewers out of full screen and killing audio
TL;DR Some YouTube users are reporting a bug that randomly kicks videos out of full-screen mode and into the floating mini player. The glitch also kills audio playback, forcing users to restart videos or the YouTube app to restore sound. Common troubleshooting steps haven’t helped. We’ve contacted Google to ask whether a fix is in the works. Despite its never-ending battle against ad blockers , YouTube otherwise…
Everything you need to know about Googlebooks
Despite good initial hardware, the Googlebook OS still needs a lot of work.
Google’s satellite AI server transmits its first response to Earth
Google's AI chip-equipped satellite has generated its first response from space. In a blog post on Friday, Google says it successfully booted up the satellite's Tensor Processing Units (TPUs), allowing the on-board Gemma 4 model to follow through on a prompt to create a haiku about being in space: Blue marble below Data streams in silent grace Starlight feeds my core. ✨ Google says it tried out other space-themed…