How Jsaux rode the Steam Deck to escape the Amazon wilderness

How Jsaux rode the Steam Deck to escape the Amazon wilderness

Where Valve makes just one accessory for its Steam Deck, Jsaux makes dozens, with some answering pretty niche needs.

A Chinese accessory maker with an alphabet-soup name struck while the iron was hot. Now, it wants to be the next Anker.

Amazon is filled with copycat companies selling tech accessories. Many of them have barely pronounceable names written in all caps, and it’s hard to tell them apart. But Jsaux, pronounced JAY-saw, a seven-year-old Shenzhen accessory maker, has become almost synonymous with Valve’s Steam Deck gaming handheld.

How on Earth did this Chinese brand go from generic USB-C cables, iPhone accessories, and a weird acorn-shaped Bluetooth speaker to producing over 30 different bespoke products for a Linux gaming handheld audience?

The right place, the right time, and with the right resources, Shenzhen Wuyishi Technology Company founder and CEO Jason Cai tells The Verge. Specifically, Jsaux intentionally beat Valve to market with a Steam Deck dock of its own, then feverishly iterated on it while fleshing out a whole ecosystem of accessories. Cai tells me he wanted to get into the world of gaming, and “now with the Steam Deck, it is good timing,” he says via translator.

And ow that that company’s established itself with a passionate subset of the gaming community, Jsaux not only wants to dominate other niches — like PSVR 2 — it’s also pulling an Anker, building new sibling brands to reach entirely different categories.

Let’s flash back to June of 2022 when Valve was still trickling out waves of Steam Decks to customers who plunked down preorder deposits. Then, Valve announced that its Docking Station, a USB-C hub for external displays it’s been showing off since the Steam Deck’s 2021 announcement, was being delayed due to shortages and covid closures.

This was the kind of moment Jsaux had been waiting for.

Valve’s Steam Deck Dock is dwarfed in number and options by the myriad docking stations Jsaux currently sells.

Though the company had already started building a few simple USB-C cables and cases for the Steam Deck, it decided to pump out a dock of its own while the perfect window of opportunity was open. “We were buying time,” Cai tells The Verge. Jsaux wanted to beat Valve at its own accessory game, and it did — by about four whole months.

Jsaux saw a golden opportunity

Even though a Steam Deck owner could plug most any USB-C hub into the handheld and output to a monitor or TV from day one, there was fan thirst for a proper standing dock akin to the Nintendo Switch. I remember early murmurs from Redditors who took a chance on this unknown brand’s dock at less than half the price of Valve’s and were enthusiastic to find they’d gotten a quality accessory well ahead of Valve’s release.

And those Reddit reactions, in turn, likely helped shape Jsaux’s next wave of products. By that point, the company had already decided to use Reddit as a sounding board — even asking for feedback directly from Steam Deck owners. It reminded me of the deep-rooted customer communication I’ve seen in the world of mechanical keyboards when small, obscure companies strive to establish some clout with a dedicated community.

Once Jsaux began its big push on Steam Deck accessories, its homepage became all about Valve’s handheld.

Jsaux made just 100 docks to start, but it had already decided to go full steam ahead on Steam Deck products. Peeking into the Wayback Machine, we can see how Jsaux’s site went from offering five basic Steam Deck accessories in May 2022 to double that in late June — when the Steam Deck began to take over the company’s entire homepage.

Fast forward to today, and Jsaux could be easily perceived as That Steam Deck Company, even if it prefers not to be pigeon-holed.

“We would not like to be think [sic] of only as a Steam Deck accessory brand, as we’re building more than that,” says Jacky Wang, the company’s head of marketing, via translator. But for now, Jsaux’s website is dominated by the Steam Deck, where it sells 31 compatible products, ranging from docks and adapters to add-on coolers.

Remember that first dock it rushed to market over a year ago? Jsaux still sells it, along with four others that offer different arrays of ports (including a dual-display dock akin to Valve’s for half the price). Jsaux produces three different kinds of carrying cases, three different protective cases, and four kinds of screen protectors. One of its docks even has a built-in M.2 slot for adding your own full-length SSD, which you’d be forgiven for not knowing is even possible via the Steam Deck’s USB-C port.

Despite the litany of overlapping accessories, Jsaux never seems to discontinue anything — it just offers more and more to hit every little niche request a Steam Deck owner might have. “...We don’t replace them. We wanted to keep all for all kinds of users,” Wang replied when I asked.

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Let’s make our Steam Deck look cooler… and RUN cooler, too. #SteamDeck #Gaming #DIY #Tech #TechTok

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By far, one of Jsaux’s coolest accessory options is a transparent rear shell that doesn’t just look neat but also utilizes a metal plate for better passive cooling, which it now offers in a variety of sick colors — including atomic purple. Since that wasn’t enough, it’s about to release an updated version with improved passive cooling, plus a new replacement transparent shell for the front of the Steam Deck to complete the see-through look. Installing the front shell will be a labor-intensive operation, bordering on a full teardown, but it probably helps when your customers are mostly self-selecting nerds who may be brave enough to try.

Jsaux also tells The Verge it’s been working on a new docking station with RGB lighting that “looks different from all the Steam Deck docking stations we’ve released in the past,” as well as an anti-glare screen replacement for those Deck owners who regret not paying extra for Valve’s (which only came with the highest-end model).

That new dock is only one piece of the puzzle in going full Gamer Lights with your Steam Deck setup, as Jsaux is also working on an RGB back cover with lighting that runs off its own battery (so as not to drain the Steam Deck’s), which I imagine will go great (or garishly) with its recently launched RGB external fan. Some DIY enthusiasts already experimented with using Jsaux’s rear transparent shells to create their own ill-conceived RGB-ified Steam Deck, so this is a clear-cut case of Jsaux giving the people what they want.

Video: Jsaux

A render of Jsaux’s upcoming RGB dock and RGB back plate for the Steam Deck.

It’s just one example of fan feedback influencing Jsaux’s product development. When the company first debuted a rear transparent shell, it had a large Jsaux logo on it, which didn’t go over well with fans because, frankly, it looked bad and tacky. But Jsaux promptly responded and omitted its branding before it ever shipped — yielding a better product. Jsaux talks directly to its diehard Steam Deck community via Twitter as well as Reddit and tells us it gets further visibility through connections with YouTubers.

Brace yourselves: the RGB Steam Decks are coming

We asked its founder why Jsaux bet so big on the Steam Deck and were slightly surprised to learn he didn’t view it as such a risk. Cai says the company simply shifted half of its eight-person design team’s time to developing those early products, a strategy it’s used before. If Jsaux didn’t successfully find a foothold in gaming with the Steam Deck, it was simply going to try VR accessories next.

It also doesn’t hurt that Jsaux apparently has such tight relationships with its suppliers that it can turn around small batches of products fast. While the entire company employs around 110 people in design, product and supply chain management, marketing, sales, shipping, and support, it relies on contract manufacturers to actually produce the gear. Jsaux sees that as a strength rather than a weakness, though, allowing the company to remix its suppliers’ expertise in, say, charging and stands to quickly create something new.

While Jsaux’s representatives may be playing it cool, it’s worth remembering how small the potential customer base for Steam Deck is — especially for an accessory maker. Valve has sold maybe 2 million Steam Decks thus far (it hasn’t revealed exact figures), with some estimating it’ll approach 3 million by the end of this year. Compare that to a juggernaut device like Apple’s iPhone, which sells about 200 million units per year, and you quickly see how hitching its horse to the Steam Deck gives Jsaux a much lower ceiling by comparison.

How it started vs. how it’s going. On the left is Jsaux’s original, first-to-market dock. On the right is a newer, more premium option with an internal M.2 SSD slot.

But when you’re in a world of niche hobbyists, there’s also a whole lot less noise to drown out — which is also why Jsaux tells us it didn’t jump into the very competitive world of the Nintendo Switch.

The bet on the Steam Deck seems to be paying off for now. Jsaux tells The Verge it has sold around 550,000 Steam Deck accessories (of which 30 percent are docking stations), accounting for around 20 percent of the company’s overall $70 million in revenue. Around 60 percent of its sales come from the USA, with Europe in second, and unsurprisingly, most people buy them via Amazon. Now that Jsaux has found some success in this niche of gaming, it’s looking to broaden its reach.

Jsaux sold over half a million Steam Deck accessories

Over the past year, Jsaux / Shenzhen Wuyishi Technology Company has been building a new holding company to develop side brands for other product categories like sports accessories, fitness equipment, portable monitors, “RGB devices,” and baby supplies — the last of which it tells us will be called Nehneh Baby. And while that range may sound a little strange for a gaming accessory vendor, it’s reminiscent of how Anker first established itself as the big phone charger accessory company before it built sub-brands like Soundcore and Eufy for audio accessories and home electronics. Jsaux’s managers didn’t shy away from telling us how they look up to Anker, so it makes sense they’re trying to follow that mold.

Image: Jsaux

One of Jsaux’s next non-Steam Deck teases — a wireless speaker that can seemingly play two different songs simultaneously.

Image: Jsaux (via Wayback Machine)

Kind of a far cry from this odd little guy Jsaux was making back in 2018.

But ambition alone doesn’t make a company the next Anker. One of the key threads along Jsaux’s journey to gaining relevance is that the products are actually good. I’ve spent time testing nearly every Steam Deck accessory that Jsaux makes —including docks, cases, and its more novel accessories like the transparent back and external add-on fan — and I haven’t come across any that wasn’t at least pretty good.

Jsaux’s Mod Case has a built-in stand and is partially translucent, so you can look into your Steam Deck’s see-through rear shell (if you squint).

This setup is a bit Frankenstein-y, but the attachable fan dropped the Steam Deck’s internal temperatures by up to 10 degrees Celsius in testing. It does get noisy, though.

Jsaux’s docks work perfectly fine and can even double as your laptop’s USB-C hub in a pinch. The transparent rear shell is an especially cool accessory that was not difficult to install. As for cases, while many of Jsaux’s silicone protective shells and carrying cases are pretty utilitarian, I really like its ModCase, which lets me protect my 512GB Steam Deck in a smaller footprint than Valve’s bundled zip-up one.

And I’ll be damned, but Jsaux’s Steam Deck sling backpack case that I thought I’d never be caught dead wearing in a million years actually proved to be quite handy when traveling — it surprisingly fits a Steam Deck in a ModCase, a Nintendo Switch in one of its own zipper cases, and some charging accessories.

When you factor in how affordable most of these products are, it becomes easy to recommend most Jsaux stuff to any fellow Steam Deck owner. Even Jsaux’s standard tech and gadget accessories like USB-C cables and adapters for phones and laptops have proved perfectly capable for full-time daily driver use — my editor uses two.

If it hadn’t been for the Steam Deck, maybe Jsaux would have remained just another generic brand selling commodity tech. But by using Valve’s ultra-geeky handheld as a proving ground, it’s gotten a foothold with gamers that let it rise above the Amazon alphabet soup.

Photography by Antonio G. Di Benedetto / The Verge

HMDs first repairable Nokia wasnt a one off

HMD’s first repairable Nokia wasn’t a one off

Image: HMD

HMD’s Nokia G42 is the company’s latest smartphone designed to be easy for users to repair from spare parts and kits sold in partnership with iFixit. The purple version of the device with 6GB of RAM and 128GB of storage is going on sale in the UK from today for £199 (around $255), and will be available in Europe for €249. There’ll also be a model with 4GB of RAM sold in select European markets for around €229, but there’s no sign of either model coming to the US for now.

Like the Nokia G22 announced earlier this year, HMD is focusing on making four key components easy to replace if they break or wear out over time: the phone’s battery, screen, charging port, and back cover. HMD plans to make spare parts available from iFixit for five years, according to the company’s head of product marketing Adam Ferguson.

Although I haven’t had a chance to try to repair the Nokia G42 myself, I found it relatively easy to perform a battery swap on HMD’s last repairable phone, the Nokia G22, while attending Mobile World Congress in Barcelona earlier this year. It’s not quite at the level of the tool-free battery replacement that Fairphone’s phones offer, but it’s designed to be carried out with simpler tools and less steps than most other smartphones including those from Samsung, Google, or Apple.

Image: HMD

The HMD Nokia G42 is designed to be an affordable phone, and that shows in its chunky bezels.

As its name suggests, the Nokia G42 is designed to offer a step-up in features and performance versus the £149.99 (€179) Nokia G22. There’s support for 5G networks included this time, for example, and it’s powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 480 Plus processor rather than the Unisoc T606 found in the Nokia G22. Unfortunately, like the Nokia G22, the new Nokia G42 is also only set to receive two major Android updates (it ships with Android 13) and three years of security updates.

In a briefing, HMD’s Ferguson said the length of software support came down to the price point of the device, and suggested that the length of support offered by chipset manufacturers has also played a part. “There is a cost to every additional OS update and even security update that you build in,” Ferguson says. “So whilst you’re able to build in many, many more years of devices that are £400, £500, or £900 hundred pounds — down at this sort of £199 level, it really becomes a struggle to continue to do that.” He added that feedback from consumers suggests longer software support is “not a dealbreaker.”

The Nokia G42 ships with a rather low IP52 rating, which effectively means it can survive a limited amount of dust and water spray. For reference, the Fairphone 4 comes with a slightly more robust rating of IP54, which means it can survive water splashes from more directions.

Rounding out the specs, the HMD Nokia G42 has a triple rear camera consisting of a 50-megapixel main, a 2-megapixel depth sensor, and a 2-megapixel macro sensor. There’s an 8-megapixel selfie camera housed within a teardrop notch atop the phone’s 6.56-inch 720p 90Hz display, and internally its battery is rated at 5,000mAh with support for fast charging at up to 20W. There’s a microSD card slot for adding up to 1TB of additional storage, and available colors will eventually include purple, grey, and pink.

HMD’s announcement of the Nokia G42 comes shortly after a vote by the European Parliament in which lawmakers strongly endorsed a proposal to mandate user-replaceable batteries for smartphones and other electronic devices sold in the European Union later this decade. But Ferguson says HMD’s plans are being influenced by consumer needs rather than upcoming legislation.

“We’re not doing it just to play into some regulation that may or may not come in some form, because even when it does, that would still be many years away from implementation,” Ferguson said. “This is something our users want now. This is something we as a business want to do now. And so that’s why we are investing so much in the design and working out how to do that.”

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Veloretti Ace Two e-bike review: rarified heir

Veloretti Ace Two e-bike review: rarified heir

Belt drive, removable battery, smooth automatic shifting, and built to be serviced anywhere. This Dutch e-bike checks all the boxes.

First, let me apologize: most readers of The Verge can not buy the latest electric bikes from Amsterdam-based Veloretti. But for everyone living in the Netherlands, Belgium, or Germany with €3,299 to spend... well, congratulations because you can buy one of the best e-bikes available at any price and far and away my favorite ride of the year so far.

I recently reviewed the top-of-the-line (€3,498) VanMoof S5, in which I longed for a removable battery, simple belt drive, and smoother automatic shifting. That’s exactly what you get with Veloretti’s new Ace Two and step-thru Ivy Two e-bikes — the “Two” signifying their second-gen status.

Each new Veloretti comes fitted with a 250W mid-drive motor and 540Wh battery from Bafang, a rugged carbon CDX belt drive from Gates, MT200 hydraulic disc brakes from Shimano, a front light from Osram, and a comfortable saddle from Selle Royal. In other words, Veloretti — a company purchased by transportation behemoth Pon Holdings at the end of last year — is using off-the-shelf parts that most bike shops can replace or repair. That’s important because things are guaranteed to go wrong eventually on any high-tech commuter e-bike ridden daily in sun, rain, and snow.

So, if you’re a fan of premium e-bikes built with Dutch know-how but distrust VanMoof’s specialized parts and history of service issues, then you’re going to love the new second-generation Ivy and Ace electric bikes from cross-town rival Veloretti.

‌The Enviolo AutomatiQ shifter and Enviolo City hub fitted to my Ace Two review bike is really something that everyone should experience at least once. It’s a very civilized way to bicycle.

Enviolo — a company that’s also HQ’d in Amsterdam — builds its automatic shifter around an internally geared (0.55 – 1.7 / 310 percent ratio range) rear hub, which is why it can be used with a belt drive instead of an oily chain, cassette full of toothy sprockets, and derailleur that all require regular maintenance. With the Enviolo AutomatiQ, you simply choose the speed at which you’d like to pedal, and all the shifting is done automatically while your cadence remains the same. And because it’s “stepless,” you won’t ever feel it change gear ratios even under heavy load, but you will often hear an electromechanical purrrr above the nearly silent Bafang motor mounted between the pedals.

I tested a Veloretti Ace Two e-bike for almost a month and only have two extremely minor complaints with the overall ride. The powertrain can sometimes — though rarely — feel a bit uncertain at very low speeds, characterized by a slight unevenness in the pedal assist. And a few times after riding over some decent-sized bumps, I felt the motor cut out for about a quarter revolution of the pedals — but it’s not something I’m able to recreate no matter how hard I’ve tried. The vast majority of the time, the ride is effortless and absolutely intuitive.

In general, the Ace Two provided a nice torque-y (65Nm) pedal assist all the way up to 27km/h (17mph), just above the EU limit of 25km/h (16mph) but within allowed tolerances.

From a full battery, I managed to ride 51km (32mi) in max power mode, with the app saying I had 4km (2.5mi) remaining on a battery near empty, reading 7 percent. The thing is, Veloretti begins throttling power around 20 percent to both preserve the lifetime of the battery and warn you that it’s time to recharge. There’s also a toggle in the app to alert you automatically when the battery is low, which is something all e-bikes should do. At 7 percent, I was riding with so little assist that I decided to go ahead and plug in; 55km (34mi) total range is just shy of Veloretti’s low-end estimate of 60km (37mi).

No messy welds on Veloretti’s second-generation of premium e-bikes.

The user experience is built around a 2.5-inch color display flanked by four buttons: two next to the left grip and two next to the right. From left to right, you have the horn next to the on / off / next button, then the minus and plus buttons for scrolling through pedal-assist levels and preferred bicycling cadence (more on that later).

Press and hold the plus key, and you’ll see a Safety Tracking countdown that will alert your emergency contract (defined in the app) to your current location. The alert arrives via text message with a link to a website that shows your geolocation sourced from your paired telephone. This can be useful in an accident or whenever you might feel unsafe. The tracking stops automatically after an hour to ensure your personal privacy.

Both the Ace and Ivy feature integrated front and rear always-on running lights. A press and hold on the minus button near the right grip toggles the brighter Osram front light to better illuminate the path ahead at night. The rear light also functions as an LED brake indicator.

I’m not a fan of the built-in display found on the new Velorettis, but that’s only because I don’t think most people who regularly commute by bicycle need an integrated display — it’s extra cost and another thing that can break. It’s much easier to just attach your phone to the bike using any number of cheap mounts and fire up your favorite mapping app whenever you need navigation. The display on the new Ace and Ivy packs in so much information that it needs four pages to display it all.

The UX is made up of four buttons and a display with four screens. It’s a bit much.

Page one is a dense overview menu for stat nerds; page two shows your five pedal-assist power levels (from zero to “superhero”), speed, and range remaining; page three shows turn-by-turn navigation, which you initiate in the app; and page four shows the current cadence setting. The battery’s current charge and pedal-assist power are displayed on all four pages.

To turn on the e-bike, you long-press the handlebar button second from the left — no app required. It boots in about three seconds showing the last page used on the display. Importantly, the bike also remembers all your previous settings for pedaling cadence and power assist, which can also be changed in the nicely designed app. So if you ride with the same settings every day, then you just need to hit start and hop on the bike to ride away. The same button that powers on the e-bike also lets you progressively pan through each page on the display.

The navigation built into the Veloretti app and bike display is based on Mapbox — a staple for e-bikes. In my testing in Amsterdam, it’s been terrible. Directions are inaccurate or so slow to update that I miss approaching turns. I can’t look up places in the area that have been around for years, and it thinks the bridge near my house isn’t bikeable (it is!). These are all issues I don’t have with Google Maps or even Apple Maps, making me want to mount my phone right on top of that dedicated display. It’s a shame Veloretti hasn’t integrated Google Maps into its app like Cowboy recently did.

Pedaling cadence can only be changed with the plus or minus buttons on the handlebar when the built-in display is showing the cadence rpm menu. Otherwise, those same buttons will increase or decrease the pedal-assist power. Cadence can be set anywhere from 30 to 120 revolutions per minute. In flat Amsterdam, I had the pedals set for 50rpm, which I increase to 65rpm to unburden my quadriceps when hitting a series of semi-steep dunes along the seaside. In normal use I rarely had to adjust it, but that would be different if I lived around lots of steep hills where the 120rpm setting might be required.

Frankly, the four-button interface, like the four-page display, all seem a bit much, but I eventually mastered the UX. I do wish the horn button was raised a bit higher so that I could quickly find it by feeling with my left thumb in the moments I need to suddenly warn a tourist that’s blindly stepping into my bike path. In time we’ll see just how waterproof those custom-made (and easily replaceable) buttons prove to be — a common issue on other e-bikes. And while I’m not a fan of e-bike displays in general, just existing isn’t necessarily a bad thing so long as its electronics and cabling are sufficiently robust to avoid creating costly support issues down the road.

The automatic shifter and internally geared rear hub from Enviolo tied to a Carbon belt drive make for a very intuitive and sophisticated ride.

For all my minor criticisms, the Ace Two from Veloretti is one of the best e-bikes I’ve ever ridden at any price. Impressively, this is only the company’s second generation of electrics — while it’s been selling stylish city bikes since 2013, it didn’t start selling electric bikes until 2021. And now that there’s Pon money backing the company, things can only get better. Even so, founder Ferry Zonder tells me that he wants to keep tight control over geographic distribution to ensure a high degree of support.

“We’re not looking to take over the world,” said Zonder. But if Veloretti keeps building e-bikes like the Ace Two and Ivy Two that prove to be as serviceable over time as they are desirable at launch, the world might not give him a choice.

All photography by Thomas Ricker / The Verge

Google is laying off employees at Waze

Google is laying off employees at Waze

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

Google is laying off employees at Waze, CNBC reported on Tuesday. The company is moving Waze over to Google’s ads system, and that change will mean cuts at Waze in “sales, marketing, operations and analytics,” Chris Phillips, VP and GM of Google’s Geo unit, wrote in an email seen by the publication. Phillips’ email didn’t indicate the number of jobs that would be cut at Waze, which has more than 500 staffers, according to CNBC.

Waze confirmed the layoffs in a statement to The Verge. “Google remains deeply committed to growing Waze’s unique brand, its beloved app and its thriving community of volunteers and users,” Caroline Bourdeau, Waze’s head of PR, said in the statement. “In order to create a better, more seamless long term experience for Waze advertisers, we’ve begun transitioning Waze’s existing advertising system to Google Ads technology. As part of this update, we’ve reduced those roles focused on Waze Ads monetization and are providing employees with mobility resources and severance options in accordance with local requirements.” We’ve asked Bourdeau for details about how many employees will be laid off.

The layoffs are happening several months after Google said it would be folding Waze into the Geo team, a group that also includes products like Google Maps, Google Earth and Street View. At the time, Google wasn’t planning layoffs as part of the change, The Wall Street Journal reported.

The best Chromebook for 2023

The best Chromebook for 2023

Illustration by William Joel / The Verge

The best Chromebook for anyone who wants Chrome OS on their laptop

The best Chromebooks aren’t just laptops that run a few Google apps anymore. Chromebooks can cover a wide variety of computing needs now, and a good Chrome OS laptop or two-in-one can be more useful than a mediocre Windows or macOS laptop. That’s why our pick for the best Chromebook of 2023 is the Asus Chromebook Flip CX5, which is one of the best-built, longest-lasting, and best-performing Chromebooks you can buy.

Chromebooks from companies like Acer, Lenovo, and Asus are known to deliver good value. The message that many people actually want good Chromebooks — rather than just cheap ones — has gotten through to manufacturers. Many are around $500 or $600, though there are good options in the higher and lower ranges as well. The extra money goes a long way toward getting something you’ll be happy with.

For the first time, the quality of the Chromebooks in this range has been consistent. There are so many similarities between the offerings from Asus, Lenovo, Google, HP, Dell, and Samsung that a conspiracy-minded person might suggest they’re all sourcing their components from the same factory. That’s great news if you’re comparison shopping; the majority of this list would be good buys if you can find them at a discount. They can even rival some of the best laptops, best budget laptops, and best student laptops on the market.

We’ve selected the Lenovo Chromebook Duet 3 for shoppers on a budget. Other strong picks are the Asus Chromebook Detachable CM3 and the Lenovo C13 Yoga Chromebook.

What most buyers want in a Chromebook are likely the same things they want in any laptop: a good keyboard, solid build quality, long battery life, a nice screen, and enough power to do the things you want. More Chromebooks can meet those qualifications than ever before, but these are the ones that rise above the rest.

1. Asus Chromebook Flip CX5

Best Chromebook of 2023

CPU: Intel Core i5-1135G7 / GPU: Intel Iris Xe / RAM: 16GB / Storage: 128GB / Display: 15.6-inch IPS, 1920 x 1080, 60Hz, touch option / Dimensions: 14.08 x 9.48 x 0.73 inches / Weight: 4.3 pounds

Folks may understandably balk at the Chromebook Flip CX5’s price, but it really is that good. It’s sturdy enough to withstand all kinds of jolts and jostles in a backpack or briefcase, and has a unique velvety texture that’s very pleasant to hold. Add a wide port selection, a smooth and comfortable keyboard, and a vivid display, and you’ve got a chassis that can hold its own against plenty of midrange Windows laptops.

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales

The Asus Chromebook CX5 is the best Chromebook of 2023.

The CX5’s performance is equally impressive. We never once heard its fan in our testing, even when pushing a workload that slows most devices down. Battery life is quite satisfactory and easily lasted us all day. And the CX5 delivered some of the loudest audio we’ve ever heard from a Chromebook. While the CX5 isn’t a perfect device, it’s currently the best Chromebook you can buy.

Read our Asus Chromebook Flip CX5 review.

2. Lenovo Chromebook Duet 3

Best cheap Chromebook

CPU: Snapdragon 7c Gen 2 / GPU: Qualcomm Adreno graphics / RAM: 4Gb, 8GB / Storage: 128GB / Display: 10.95-inch IPS, 2000 x 1200, 60Hz, touch option / Dimensions: 10.16 x 6.48 x 0.31 inches / Weight: 1.14 pounds

The Lenovo Chromebook Duet 3 is a great, tiny laptop for budget shoppers. It comes with a magnetic detachable keyboard that’s a breeze to pop on and off. The screen also supports USI styluses, though a stylus is not included in the price. The keyboard is included in the price, however, as is the magnetic back cover and kickstand.

Day-to-day, this laptop is quite usable for light work and leisure. It has a sharp, bright 11-inch screen and a surprisingly comfortable keyboard and touchpad. The battery life is close to all-day. But the real draw of this device is its portability — it’s just 2.09 pounds with the keyboard attached, making it quite convenient to carry around and whip out to use on the go.

Photo by Monica Chin / The Verge

The Lenovo Chromebook Duet 3 has a slim and portable design with a bright and sharp 11-inch screen.

There are a few compromises: there are only two ports (and no headphone jack), and the processor gets slow if you attempt a heavier multitasking workload. But Chrome OS fans who want a portable device for fun and multimedia can’t do better than this Chromebook at this price.

Read our Lenovo Chromebook Duet 3 review.

3. Lenovo C13 Yoga Chromebook

Best premium Chromebook

CPU: AMD Athlon Gold 315, Ryzen 3 3250C, Ryzen 5 3500C, Ryzen 7 3700C / GPU: AMD Radeon / RAM: 4GB, 8GB, 16GB / Storage: 32GB, 64GB, 256GB / Display: 13.3-inch IPS/OLED, 1920 x 1080/3840 x 2160, 60Hz, touch option / Dimensions: 21.09 x 8.35 x 0.7 inches / Weight: 3.3 pounds

Many modern Chromebooks are oriented towards kids and students, but not this one. The C13 Yoga Chromebook is a sturdy, pricey, convertible Chromebook for grown-ups. It’s part of Lenovo’s renowned ThinkPad business line, and has all kinds of ThinkPad perks including a red Trackpoint, discrete touchpad clickers, a fingerprint sensor, a webcam shutter, and an aluminum design. Put this Chromebook next to any number of Windows ThinkPads, and we might not be able to pick it out.

Photo by Monica Chin / The Verge

The ThinkPad C13 Yoga Chromebook is a premium Chromebook for grown-ups.

The C13 is also unique in that it’s the first Chromebook to include AMD’s Ryzen 3000 Mobile C-series processors, which are marketed specifically for Chromebooks. The chips run all kinds of programs — even mobile games — quite smoothly. We do wish the battery life was a bit better — we only averaged just over six hours on one charge. We averaged seven and a half hours from our top pick, the Chromebook Spin 713, and plenty of the devices here break eight hours with no problem.

Read our Lenovo C13 Yoga Chromebook review.

4. Lenovo Flex 5 Chromebook

A Chromebook for midrange shoppers

CPU: Intel Celeron 5205U, Core i3-10110U, Core i5-10210U / GPU: Intel UHD / RAM: 4GB, 8GB / Storage: 32GB, 64GB, 128GB / Display: 13.3-inch IPS, 1920 x 1080, 60Hz, touch option / Dimensions: 12.2 x 8.34 x 0.7 inches / Weight: 2.97 pounds

The Lenovo Flex 5 looks a lot nicer than its sub-$400 price might indicate. It’s built to withstand all kinds of jolts and jostles in a backpack or briefcase, but also has a smooth soft-touch texture that’s pleasant to hold. Add a sleek backlit keyboard, a physical webcam shutter, and front-facing speakers, and you’ve got a chassis with hallmarks of a much more expensive device.

You get some other perks as well. The Flex 5 has one of the better keyboards I’ve ever used on a Chromebook, let alone a Chromebook at a midrange price point. It also has a useful port selection including a microSD reader and a USB-C port on each side, as well as a crisp 1920 x 1080 touch display.

Photography by Monica Chin / The Verge

The Lenovo Flex 5 Chromebook is a good Chromebook for midrange shoppers.

The one caveat is that the Flex 5 has somewhat disappointing battery life, averaging just over five and a half hours in our testing. If you’ll be using the device while you’re out and about, you’ll want to make sure you bring the 45W charger with you.

Read our Lenovo Flex 5 Chromebook review.

5. HP Chromebook x360 14

Best Chromebook for video conferencing

CPU: Intel Core i3-1215U, Core i5-1235U / GPU: Intel UHD, Iris Xe / RAM: 8GB, 16GB / Storage: 128GB, 256Gb, 512GB / Display: 14-inch IPS, 1920 x 1200 / 1920 x 1080, 60Hz, touch option / Dimensions: 12.3 x 8.68 x 0.71 inches / Weight: 3.34 pounds

If you’re looking for an affordable Chromebook with strong performance and a solid build, the Chromebook x360 14c is an option for you. Nobody does laptop builds quite like HP, and this convertible Chromebook is no exception.

Sitting comfortably in the $500-$600 range the device is powered by Intel Core processors (our test unit had an i3), and it ran our standard office workload without issue. We saw little heat and little fan noise throughout. Battery life was acceptable, though we didn’t quite get a full day. We even found the webcam to be surprisingly good.

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

For students or anyone looking for a solid device, the HP Chromebook x360 14c is a good pick.

The primary drawback worth considering is the dim screen – it maxes out at 250 nits, and we had to deal with quite a bit of glare in brighter areas. It’s also far from the most portable product on this list, weighing in at 3.35 pounds. But ultimately, this is a nice-looking and nice-feeling device that’s particularly good for video conferencing.

Read our HP Chromebook x360 14c review.

6. Acer Chromebook Spin 714

Best Chromebook for power users

CPU: Intel Core i5-1235U, Core i7-1260P / GPU: Intel Iris Xe / RAM: 8GB / Storage: 256GB / Display: 114-inch IPS, 2560 x 1600, 60Hz, touch option / Dimensions: 12.31 x 8.82 x 0.71 inches / Weight: 3.09 pounds

With a hefty Intel processor and Thunderbolt 4 support, Acer’s Chromebook Spin 714 is one of the most powerful Chromebooks you can buy. It’s lightning fast, generating little noise and heat even under fairly intense professional workloads.

Photo by Becca Farsace / The Verge

The Acer Chromebook Spin 714 is the best Chromebook for those who need raw power.

The keyboard is excellent with a comfortable, quiet feel, and nice backlighting. There’s even an HDMI port, which you don’t see on a thin Chromebook every day. It’s a well-built device as well, with a professional finish suitable for an office setting. The main drawbacks to consider are that the Spin’s speakers aren’t great, and the battery life is a bit lower than last year’s model’s was.

Read our Acer Chromebook Spin 714 review.

7. Lenovo Chromebook Duet 5

Best OLED Chromebook

CPU: Qualcomm Snapdragon 7c Gen 2 / GPU: Qualcomm Adreno / RAM: 8GB / Storage: 128GB / Display: 13.3-inch OLED, 1920 x 1080, 60Hz, touch option / Dimensions: 12.05 x 7.32 x 0.27 inches / Weight: 2.22 pounds

The Chromebook Duet 5 is a compact convertible device with an OLED screen. It’s thinner and lighter than most Chromebooks out there, and its back cover doubles as a kickstand. And it’s often available for under $400, making it one of the cheapest OLED devices you can buy.

The OLED display makes for quite enjoyable viewing, and the detachable keyboard is great as well with excellent spacing and satisfying feedback. Performance (our unit was powered by the Snapdragon 7c Gen 2) was snappy, and the device could handle our standard office workload with no issue. But the standout feature was battery life: We saw between 10 and 12 hours to a charge, even when doing fairly demanding tasks like Zoom calls and high-resolution YouTube videos.

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

The Lenovo Chromebook Duet 5 is one of our favorite Chromebooks of 2023.

There are a few unfortunate omissions: there’s no fingerprint sensor, and there’s no included stylus (though one is supported). But we think Chrome OS fans who want a great screen for multimedia viewing can’t do better than this Chromebook at this price.

Read our Lenovo Chromebook Duet 5 review.

8. HP Elite Dragonfly Chromebook

Best business Chromebook

CPU: Intel Core i3-1215U, Core i5-1235U, Core i5-1245U, Core i7-1265U / GPU: Intel integrated / RAM: 8GB, 16GB, 32GB / Storage: 128GB, 256GB, 512GB / Display: 13.5-inch LED/WLED, 1920 x 1080/2256 x 1504, 60Hz, touch option / Dimensions: 11.59 x 8.73 x 0.65 inches / Weight: 2.8 pounds

The HP Dragonfly Chromebook is one of the best built and most powerful Chromebooks you can get. It’s one of few Chrome OS devices to support Intel’s vPro platform, and it includes HP’s Sure View Reflect privacy screen to hide sensitive information from snoops in public. It’s also quite thin and light with a magnesium and aluminum chassis, making it ideal for business travel.

In terms of performance, the Core i5 unit that we tested was more than adequate for photo editing, office work, and any other necessary tasks; you don’t need a fully specced-out model in order to get fast performance. Our one real hangup was that battery life could be better; we only saw around seven hours of continuous use, which is less than you’ll see from some of the other Chromebooks on this page. We tested a QHD model, so you may see a longer lifespan from the 1920 x 1080 option.

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

If your company has the funds for it, the Elite Dragonfly Chromebook is the ultimate enterprise package.

The Dragonfly Chromebook won’t be accessible to everyone. Its starting price is very high and tailored towards an enterprise audience. But if you’re looking for a Chrome OS device for the C-suite and have a large budget to work with, this model is worth a look.

Read our HP Elite Dragonfly Chromebook review.

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The Mac Pros biggest problem is the MacBook

The Mac Pro’s biggest problem is the MacBook

Apple’s latest Mac Pro targets professionals with highly demanding computing workloads. But we talked to those professionals, and they don’t want it — because Apple’s other computers are just too good.

Apple’s latest Mac Pro was finally revealed at this year’s Worldwide Developers Conference as a machine for the most power user of power users. The video discussed audio engineering, color grading, and video transcoding. Apple’s product page mentions code compiling, animation, compositing 8K scenes, 3D rendering, and “analyzing enormous datasets.” This isn’t just for pros, Apple seems to claim; it’s for capital-P Pros.

Exactly who these pros are and why the Mac Pro is the perfect device for them remains somewhat unclear to me, even after testing the new machine for a few days and speaking to various professionals that Apple is ostensibly targeting. That’s in part because Apple, on the same day it announced the Mac Pro, also announced a smaller, M2 Ultra Mac Studio with the exact same RAM, storage, and processor options. The former, nevertheless, costs at least $3,000 more and carries a towering starting price of $6,999.

I wanted to know whether Apple’s purported target demographic — people who spend their days animating, making visual effects, and doing various other tasks generally associated with big, powerful computers — were actually interested in purchasing this machine. So I asked a bunch of them, and the answer, basically across the board, was no. Not because the Mac Pro is bad but because Apple’s other computers, namely its laptops, have just gotten too good.

Zach Passero, who does editing, animation, and visual effects for films, has been a diehard Mac Pro user for over a decade. “I’m still a big champion of the old trash can,” he says, referring to the oft-maligned 2013 design. He was skeptical when the M1 Max chip was announced — he’d never envisioned that a laptop could handle his heavy workload. But he gave the 16-inch MacBook Pro a shot and was surprised — and a little bit sad — to find that it felt just as fast as his older desktop. “Video editing, even doing effects, compositing, animating — it has been a smooth and fluid process,” he says. “I’m like, ‘This might actually suffice for a while.’”

Passero still loves the Mac Pro, but he can’t justify buying the latest one when his laptop is so good. “There’s something about my experience using the M1 chip where I’m like, ‘I don’t know if I need the full Mac Pro,’” he says, with some disappointment in his voice.

Vikram Bodicherla, a staff privacy engineer at WhatsApp, previously owned two Intel-based Mac Pro models — one for home and one for work. The minute the M1 Max came out, he jettisoned both of them. Like Passero, Bodicherla now spends his day — he works on mobile apps for Android and iOS, as well as “server-side stuff” — on a MacBook Pro with the M1 Max. He can build much faster. He hasn’t even considered buying Apple’s new desktop. “I don’t really need any other computer,” he says.

Kevin Ford, who shoots and edits documentaries, has been using the Mac Pro for years. He’s owned both the tower models and the trash can. But he switched to the latest 16-inch MacBook Pro with the M2 Max a few weeks ago, and he’s not looking back — it can do everything he needs. He can cut 4K and 6K footage. He can color correct. He can even create graphics and titles. As a bonus, he can now do it all on the road; the last project he cut, which is now on Netflix, was done entirely in hotel rooms and airplanes.

“I’m very practical when I’m looking at a piece of equipment — what will allow me to do what I need to do for the best cost?” Ford says. “If the cheese grater was priced at a certain point, would that have been more attractive to me? Possibly.” But, he adds, his new MacBook is “working very well.”

We tested our machine with a Pro Display XDR.

But it’s not just that the MacBook has gotten better with the release of Apple’s M-series chips. The Mac Pro, with the release of the Mac Studio, has also gotten significantly more confusing.

The Pro I received to test vastly outperforms Intel models from 2019 — even those with Apple’s fancy Afterburner card that cost thousands of dollars more. But it’s a step backward from those other models in another way: modularity.

The 2019 Mac Pro was endlessly configurable, and ports could be swapped out and upgraded as users needed. Much has changed. Spec choice is now more limited (there are only two processor options, for example, and memory is now capped at 192GB where previously up to 1.5TB was available). The 2023 Mac Pro’s memory is not upgradeable after purchase for the first time in the model’s history.

And now, of course, the Mac Studio is here. And while the Pro delivers impressive performance, you can now get that same performance in a less expensive and much more compact chassis.

I had similarly specced models of the Pro and the Studio on hand to test. Both included Apple’s 24-core M2 Ultra processor with 76 GPU cores, as well as 128GB of unified memory. While the two look quite different, and the Mac Pro has a couple extra ports, I can confirm that their performance is close to the same.

It’s much bigger than the Studio, but the numbers are not far apart.

The primary advantage that the Mac Pro can claim over the Studio is the fact that the former has PCIe expansion slots — six full-length PCIe Gen 4 slots, specifically, as well as a half-length Gen 3. These, in theory, allow for some degree of modularity, where a user could slot in additional storage, IO, or other peripherals.

Except: that doesn’t include external GPUs, which mitigates the utility of these slots for graphic use cases significantly. The Mac hasn’t supported Nvidia cards for quite some time, and Apple’s own silicon doesn’t support AMD’s GPUs, either. Further muddling this matter is the fact that most PCI-E cards can now be used with Thunderbolt via an external enclosure — you specifically need to require the PCI-E 4 x16 speeds in order to gain a tangible benefit from those extra thousands of dollars.

The slots, with those caveats, didn’t blow anyone I spoke to out of the water. “Would it be nice to have? Yeah, totally… if it wasn’t a machine that started at $7,000,” said Evan Stone, a senior iOS engineer at the software development agency MartianCraft. (Stone also works on the MacBook Pro with M1 Max, and he’s a fan; he has one for work and another at home.)

Passero used to be a huge fan of the Mac Pro’s expandability, but his new MacBook performs so well that he doesn’t feel the need to add anything extra. “The new silicon chips and these built-in GPUs that they have, and the neural networks, I’m finding that most of my needs are met,” he says. “I’m like, ‘Do I just settle in and see how this goes?’”

Sadly, no SD slot..

The lack of support for external GPUs makes the feature particularly confounding for graphic professionals. “GPU support, that’s what we mostly use PCIe for,” said Tom Lindén, who runs a 3D animation agency. Other than a capture card, he says, “there are not that many expansion cards that would be useful.”

The only aspect of the Pro that Lindén finds particularly compelling for his studio is its double ethernet port. “We’re simulating huge simulations, so fast networking is really important,” Lindén says. “I don’t know how much we’d be able to utilize two slots — like if that would help the speed.” He thinks for a moment. “I guess it could, probably.”

“I would probably just get the Mac Studio and be done.”

Emilio Guarino, a music producer and engineer, thinks that feature is mostly useful for “edge case kind of scenarios” in his field. “If you’re doing game development, I’ve seen session files where the track count is like two or three thousand. You might need the added expansion for that,” he says. “But if I’m just doing commissions or just building virtual instruments and samples... I would probably just get the Mac Studio and be done.”

What about additional storage? People mostly shrugged. “I’ve never really hit that limit, and I have a very large chunk of the company’s code base on my computer,” WhatsApp’s Bodicherla says — companies as large as his, he explains, generally have processes in place that mean their engineers don’t need to hold unreasonable amounts of data on their personal machines. “If you’re doing a huge ML model, it might make sense to download everything. But even then, I feel like for running that one odd job, you could always go to, like, a server cluster,” he muses.

“I can’t justify paying double for a machine that has a couple of slots,” said Danny Nathan, founder and CEO of the product design and venture studio Apollo 21.

In general, the attitude among the professionals I spoke to was not skepticism so much as confusion.

“I don’t know why they made two different products,” said Vyacheslav Drofa, a UX director at Alty, which engineers mobile applications for banks, as he looked bemusedly at the Studio’s and Pro’s identical spec sheets.

“The offering across the board from Apple has gotten so powerful that, frankly, the Mac Pro feels a little unnecessary,” echoes Nathan, who has owned a number of Mac Pros throughout his career but is now very happy with his 14-inch MacBook. “I think we all appreciate it for what it is and what it demonstrates, but at no point has anyone said to me, ‘So when are we getting an office load of these?’”

Here’s where the ports live.

Many people across industries, who were confident that the Mac Pro wasn’t a good investment for them, spitballed about who it might be ideal for but weren’t exactly sure. Maybe architects need it, Stone suggested. “Really, really tough machine learning tasks,” posited Serhii Popov, a software engineer at Setapp. 3D rendering, Guarino proposed, but only if you’re doing a lot of it. DevOps, others said. But there was one use case that pretty much everyone suspected might tangibly benefit from the Mac Pro and its plethora of slots: VFX.

David Lebensfeld, founder and VFX supervisor at Ingenuity Studios, was dubious. “That doesn’t seem like something a VFX studio would use,” he said after I described the product. Nobody on Lebensfeld’s team has expressed interest in the Mac Pro — there has been “zero chatter” about the product, he says.

Lebensfeld’s company is all in on Windows and Linux, and that’s common for studios of Ingenuity’s size. Switching over to the Mac Pro, given its price point, would just be impractical. Lebensfeld gets better value out of Windows PCs, which support the latest GPUs from Nvidia and can be equipped with the exact parts and specs that each team needs. When a part breaks, they can grab another one off the shelf.

In fact, some of the VFX and animation professionals I contacted for this story declined to be interviewed because they simply don’t know much about Macs — they just aren’t widely used in that industry at this point. The reality is that these types of studios need to keep their hardware functional and up to date. Replacing a full Mac Pro system — let alone a fleet of them — regularly would be an absurd cost.

“It feels like they’re gonna put this chip in every laptop and iPad that they can, and then later, they’re gonna fuse 20 of them together, and that’s the Pro.”

Lebensfeld speculated that the Mac Pro might be better for small businesses and independent artists who work with heavy graphics. But Lindén’s smaller studio is also fully a Windows shop, decked out with high-end Nvidia cards (which decisively outperform the M2 Ultra in programs like Blender), largely for the same reason. “We like to keep updating our machines with new hardware when we need to,” he says.

Deborah Wright, a digital sculptor, has the same hang-ups; she also uses a Windows PC. “I really, really love Mac... but it’s become prohibitively expensive,” she says. “Part of the attractiveness of a PC is my ability to customize the heck out of it,” she adds. “You buy a Mac, and you hold onto it for a few years. Buying a PC, you’re switching out your hardware pretty regularly.”

Wright suspects her next purchase might be a MacBook Pro, which, while not modular, is at least more affordable. “Their displays are just exquisite,” she says. “Velvet on the eyes.”

But the larger issue among the professionals I spoke to, and one that will likely take many more product cycles for Apple to truly fix, is one of trust. Apple, the business behemoth that it is, still has a reputation to build in the enterprise space. In order to become a go-to purchase for studios, Apple doesn’t just need to make the Mac Pro more competitive on price — it needs to reestablish itself as a brand that industries can rely on for years to come. And it needs to make some amends.

“Apple doesn’t really have a great history of servicing this market,” Lebensfeld said. “Do you want to hang millions of dollars of equipment purchases on a company where you know this isn’t their main focus?” He added, “It really feels like an afterthought. It feels like they’re gonna put this chip in every laptop and iPad that they can, and then later, they’re gonna fuse 20 of them together, and that’s the Pro.”

The middle handle is what you use to open the case and jam some PCI cards in.

And while Apple’s decision to overhaul Final Cut Pro was over a decade ago, studios still haven’t forgotten. Almost all of the video professionals I spoke to brought it up. “Every filmmaker in the world was using this,” Lebensfeld complained. “And they lost that whole market. They just don’t take it seriously.”

“They really did screw us over on that,” Ford, the documentarian, agreed. “I was really upset.”

I searched high and low and ended up connecting with over 20 professionals for this story in order to locate someone who enthusiastically wanted to buy the Mac Pro. I found exactly one: Drofa. He loves the cheese-grater design.

“The killer feature is when somebody comes and says, ‘Okay, you have a Mac Pro,’ and I say, ‘Yeah, I can make a cheesesteak,’” he explained. Asked about the Mac Studio, he replied, “I don’t trust that small thing.”

TikTok is discontinuing its BeReal clone

TikTok is discontinuing its BeReal clone

Illustration by Nick Barclay / The Verge

TikTok is killing off its BeReal clone TikTok Now, according to notifications being sent to users. Multiple Twitter users have posted screenshots of the message in different languages, which says that ByteDance is “updating the TikTok experience and [is] discontinuing TikTok Now.” News of its discontinuation comes a little over nine months after TikTok Now was officially announced, although it’s unclear exactly when the feature will disappear for good.

TikTok Now was launched in September with the stated aim of fostering “authentic and spontaneous connections on TikTok.” But it was hard to ignore the fact that its format (asking users to capture a moment once a day using the front and back cameras of their phone) was all but identical to BeReal, which exploded in popularity last year.

TikTok’s twist was that TikTok Now supported up to 10-second-long videos in addition to just still photos. In the US, TikTok Now has been available in the main TikTok app, while owner ByteDance also launched a dedicated TikTok Now app in other regions around the world. Social media consultant Matt Navarra confirmed to The Verge that he was shown the notification announcing the discontinuing of TikTok Now within the main TikTok app on iOS.

TikTok is killing its BeReal clone TikTok Now pic.twitter.com/8uPn88HQV4

— Matt Navarra (@MattNavarra) June 27, 2023

Although TikTok’s notification doesn’t give an exact reason for why TikTok Now is being discontinued, it’s hard to ignore the fact that BeReal isn’t the viral sensation it once was. “They’re over being real,” was The New York Times’ conclusion in April, when it cited a 61 percent drop in BeReal daily active users between October 2022 and March 2023 according to third-party data. Per Apptopia, user numbers had dropped from around 15 million to under six million people in March, the NYT reported.

Although BeReal disputes these numbers (“BeReal has over 20 million daily active users around the world” it wrote in April), anecdotally I’m seeing far fewer mentions of the app on social media platforms these days. Regardless of the exact figures, it feels like the viral spotlight has moved on.

TikTok hasn’t been the only social media company to experiment with adding BeReal-style features to its app. SnapChat launched a dual-camera feature in August, which traded the daily notification and limits of BeReal for more editing and layout options. Meanwhile Instagram has also been testing its own take on the feature called “Candid Stories.” My colleague Casey Newton has taken to referring to these kinds of copycat features as “murder clones.” In other words, they represent an attempt by dominant social media apps to fend off would-be competitors by aping their unique features.

A spokesperson for TikTok did not immediately respond to The Verge’s request for comment. As of this writing, the service’s support page about TikTok Now has not been updated to mention a shutdown.

Ford targets US and Canadian engineers in latest wave of layoffs

Ford targets US and Canadian engineers in latest wave of layoffs

The layoffs are connected to Ford’s growth plan announced back in 2021. | Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

A new wave of layoffs primarily targeting Ford Motor employees in engineering roles in the US and Canada are expected to take place this week as part of the company’s latest cost-cutting efforts. Leaders of the teams impacted by the job cuts received confirmation on Monday, according to CNBC News, while employees are expected to be notified over the next few days.

Ford declined The Verge’s request to clarify how many employees would be affected by the layoffs. Roles are expected to be cut across all three of Ford’s business units — Ford Blue (the company’s arm for vehicles with traditional combustion engines), Ford Pro (its commercial vehicle services and distribution business), and Model e (focusing on electric vehicles).

“People affected by the changes will be offered severance pay, benefits and significant help to find new career opportunities”

The layoffs are related to the Ford Plus growth plan announced in 2021 — restructuring efforts designed to reduce costs, according to T.R. Reid, Corporate & Public Policy Communications for Ford Motor, in an email to The Verge.

“Delivering on the plan includes adjusting staffing to match focused priorities and ambitions, while raising quality and lowering costs. The actions we’re taking this week in the US and Canada are mostly (but not only) related to engineering roles,” said Reid. “People affected by the changes will be offered severance pay, benefits and significant help to find new career opportunities.”

Ford CEO Jim Farley claimed in February that the automaker has an annual cost disadvantage of $7 billion to $8 billion compared to its competitors. “We can cut the cost, we can cut people, we can do that really quickly and we’ll do whatever we need to,” Farley said at the time. Farley plans to reduce expenses related to those overheads by “mid-decade.”

In the SEC filing for Ford’s first-quarterly earnings report this year, the company estimated that it would incur charges between $1.5 billion and $2 billion in 2023 that primarily relate to “employee separations and supplier settlements.”

This isn’t the first wave of job cuts linked to Ford’s restructuring plans. 8,000 roles were cut from the Ford Blue business arm in July 2022 in a bid to remain “fully competitive with the best in the industry,” and 3,000 employees and contract workers from departments across the US, Canada, and India were laid off in August 2022. An additional 3,800 employees in Europe were laid off in February this year as part of the company’s shift to EV production.

A.I. and TV Ads Were Made for Each Other

A.I. and TV Ads Were Made for Each Other A string of uncanny videos show what generative A.I. and advertising have in common: They chew up the cultural subconscious and spit it back at us.

Tesla May Have Already Won the Charging Wars

Tesla May Have Already Won the Charging Wars Deals with Ford and G.M. will make it easier to find a charger but could give Elon Musk control of critical infrastructure.

New Samsung foldable leaks give us the best look yet at the Z Flip 5

New Samsung foldable leaks give us the best look yet at the Z Flip 5

Leaked renders of the Galaxy Z Flip 5 and Galaxy Z Fold 5. | Image: SnoopyTech

With about a month to go until the next Samsung Galaxy Unpacked event, we may have a pretty comprehensive idea about what to expect from the next version of the Galaxy Z Flip 5 and the Galaxy Z Fold 5. Several leaks over the last few days have revealed a lot about what the phones may look like — and what’s under their respective hoods — ahead of their official unveiling.

A Twitter leak from Revegnus on July 25th showed a photo of a folded phone that looks to be to be the Galaxy Z Flip 5 in a blocky, black case (via 9to5Google). The case hides a lot of the design, but what you can see backs up previous alleged renders. For instance, the screen on the back may be the same 3.4-inch 720 x 748 cover screen that’s been predicted. You can also make out the side-by-side camera lenses, another rumored update to the design.

Breaking) Flip 5 device leaks pic.twitter.com/9At8qe3j75

— Revegnus (@Tech_Reve) June 25, 2023

The phone looks like it folds flat, but it’s hard to say for sure with the case on it. Still, that could mean Samsung may use its new droplet-style folding technique that’s been rumored for the Galaxy Z Fold 5 as well, which the frequently reliable tipster Ice Universe has indicated in the past.

A droplet-style fold has been used already in competitors’ phones like the Oppo Find N2 and it should reduce the visible crease where the phones fold — something that has plagued folding phones since their inception.

Next up, prolific leaker SnoopyTech sent people on a bit of a scavenger hunt on Monday that led to sets of leaked renders of both the Galaxy Z Flip 5 and the Galaxy Z Fold 5 in various colors, using a binary-coded tweet as the first clue. When translated, it directed readers to Pastebin for more clues, and eventually, to renders and specs. I’ve collected some of the renders in the gallery below:

In the spec sheet SnoopyTech also included in the crumb trail, the colors are listed as Cream; Graphite; Mint; and Lavender for the Z Flip 5 and Icy Blue; Cream; and Phantom Black for the Z Fold 5.

Apart from new color shades and obvious design tweaks, other changes to Samsung’s foldables include upgraded Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 CPUs and a thinner chassis for both phones — partially backing up an April rumor that the Z Fold 5’s depth would be shaved.

According to SnoopyTech’s leaked specs, the Fold 5 will shrink from 14.2mm — the thinnest point of a folded Galaxy Z Fold 4 — to 13.4mm. The Z Flip 5 will also thin up, coming in at 15.1mm when folded versus 15.9mm at the thinnest point of a folded Z Flip 4. The Galaxy Z Fold 5 may also lose some weight, dropping 10 grams from last year’s model. Finally, the leak shows the Fold 5’s camera array may have a 12MP telephoto lens — other previous leaks have put its telephoto at 10MP, which the Fold 4 used.

There are two notable absences in SnoopyTech’s leak: no 128GB model and no 1TB model for either phone. While that doesn’t mean we won’t see those storage levels in the final phones, it’s worth looking out for next month. Otherwise, based on SnoopyTech’s listed specs, no other differences stood out — the specs for battery life, Wi-Fi connectivity, RAM, and more all point to mostly unchanged internals.

Lucid Motors strikes deal to power Aston Martins future lineup of EVs

Lucid Motors strikes deal to power Aston Martin’s future lineup of EVs

Photo by Tim Stevens for The Verge

Lucid Motors will supply powertrain technology to Aston Martin for the British brand’s future lineup of electric vehicles, the two companies announced Monday. The deal brings together two companies with deep ties to motorsports, as well as brand identities centered on performance luxury.

Under the deal, Lucid will supply Aston Martin with its electric motors and batteries that have been used to power the California-based company’s only model, the Lucid Air sedan. Aston Martin will then take that technology and plug it into its own bespoke EV models. Lucid CEO Peter Rawlinson hailed the deal as “a landmark collaboration.”

Under the deal, Lucid will supply Aston Martin with its electric motors and batteries that have been used to power the California-based company’s only model, the Lucid Air sedan

Aston Martin, an iconic British luxury car brand with wins in Le Mans and F1 under its belt, plans to launch its first plug-in model, the mid-engine hybrid Valhalla, in early 2024, followed by a pure battery-electric vehicle (BEV) the following year. All of the company’s models will be hybrid or BEV by 2026 and purely electric by 2030.

Lucid’s dual-motor Air has distinguished itself in the crowded luxury EV market with its long-range and high-performance specs. The $154,000 Air GT, for example, includes a 112kWh battery that can put out 819 horsepower and propel the vehicle to 60 mph in about two seconds. The base model Air has an EPA range of over 500 miles — though it’s been found to get slightly less in testing.

Under the agreement, Aston Martin will pay a “technology access fee” of $232 million to Lucid, comprising $100 million in shares of the British company and “aggregate cash payments” of $132 million. Aston Martin will also commit to an “effective minimum spend” with Lucid on powertrain components of $225 million. In total, the entire deal is said to be valued at $450 million.

Both companies have had their respective financial difficulties. Aston has survived seven bankruptcies throughout its 110-year history, while Lucid has seen its stock price plummet since going public in 2021. The company, which is majority owned by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, recently announced a $3 billion stock sale amid its rapidly dwindling cash stockpile.

Until recently, Aston Martin has relied on Mercedes-Benz as its technology partner, but those terms appear to be changing. In a separate announcement on Monday, the company said the German auto giant would not be increasing its stake in Aston but would instead be maintaining its 9 percent ownership.

Updated June 26th 9:55AM ET: Updated to reflect the deal is valued at $450 million.

WinGPT is a new ChatGPT app for your ancient Windows 3.1 PC

WinGPT is a new ChatGPT app for your ancient Windows 3.1 PC

ChatGPT running on Windows 3.1. | Image: dialup.net

Someone has created a ChatGPT app for Windows 3.1 PCs. WinGPT brings a very basic version of OpenAI’s ChatGPT responses into an app that can run on an ancient 386 chip. It’s built by the same mysterious developer behind Windle, a Wordle clone for Microsoft’s Windows 3.1 operating system.

“I didn’t want my Gateway 4DX2-66 from 1993 to be left out of the AI revolution, so I built an AI Assistant for Windows 3.1, based on the OpenAI API,” says the developer in a Hacker News thread.

WinGPT is written in C using Microsoft’s standard Windows API and connects to OpenAI’s API server using TLS 1.3, so there’s no need for a separate modern PC. That was a particularly interesting part of getting this app running on Windows 3.1, alongside managing the memory segmentation architecture on 16-bit versions of Windows and building the UI for the app.

Image: dialup.net

The icon file was designed in Borland’s Image Editor.

Neowin notes that the ChatGPT responses are only brief due to the limited memory support that can’t handle the context of conversations. The icon for WinGPT was also designed in Borland’s Image Editor, a clone of Microsoft Paint that’s capable of making ICO files.

“I built most of the UI in C directly, meaning that each UI component had to be manually constructed in code,” says the anonymous WinGPT developer. “I was surprised that the set of standard controls available to use by any program with Windows 3.1 is incredibly limited. You have some controls you’d expect — push buttons, check boxes, radio buttons, edit boxes — but any other control you might need, including those used across the operating system itself, aren’t available.”

If you still have a Windows 3.1 machine gathering dust in an attic, garage, or basement, then you can download the WinGPT binaries for 16-bit and 32-bit versions of Windows over at dialup.net — the most appropriate domain name I’ve ever seen for old Windows apps.

UK police blame Android SOS feature for influx of false emergency calls

UK police blame Android SOS feature for influx of false emergency calls

Android’s Emergency SOS feature is so easy to activate that users in the UK are accidently calling emergency services. | Illustration: Alex Castro / The Verge

An Android feature designed to help users contact emergency services is making life difficult for first responders in the UK. The BBC reports that police forces across the nation have reported an influx of false emergencies to the 999 switchboard (The UK’s equivalent of 911) in recent weeks which have largely been attributed to the Emergency SOS feature for Android phones.

Law enforcement in Scotland, and the English counties of Wiltshire, Devon, Cornwall, and Gloucestershire have reported receiving a higher number of silent or abandoned calls since an Android update released between October 2022 and February 2023 introduced an Emergency SOS calling feature to more Android phones. The BBC reports that each errant call can take around 20 minutes to deal with as operators ensure it wasn’t made by someone who is otherwise unable to verbally communicate an emergency situation.

The update added a new SOS emergency function for devices to call 999 through the power button being pressed 5 times or more.

These ‘silent calls’ as they are named, are directed to police control rooms and the result has been a significant increase in silent calls.

— National Police Chiefs' Council (NPCC) (@PoliceChiefs) June 17, 2023

The SOS feature allows Android users to quickly contact emergency services by pressing their device’s power button multiple times. The action is easy to perform accidentally, however, resulting in a deluge of “butt dialed” false emergencies.

Earlier this month, the National Police Chiefs Council highlighted the issue on Twitter, noting that users can disable the Android feature to lessen the burden on emergency responders. “Calls to 999 where the operator cannot hear anyone on the line (silent calls) are never just ignored. Call handlers will then need to spend valuable time trying to call you back to check whether you need help,” the account tweeted on June 17th. “If you do accidentally dial 999, please don’t hang up. If possible, please stay on the line and let the operator know it was an accident and that you don’t need any assistance.”

Introduced with the release of Android 12 on Google Pixel phones back in 2021, Emergency SOS is designed to make it easier to call for help in situations where users may otherwise be unable to physically dial. While the feature has technically been available for almost two years on Pixel phones — with similar issues reported by Pixel users shortly after its release — Emergency SOS has taken a while to arrive on other Android phone brands because device manufacturers are responsible for rolling out the feature (with customizations) to their own devices. Essentially, Emergency SOS has only recently rolled out to enough Android phones to draw significant attention to the issue.

Google reccomends disabling Emergency SOS until Android device manufactureres can update the feature.

Google has responded to the situation, informing the BBC that phone manufacturers are responsible for offering the Emergency SOS feature and managing how it will work on their respective devices.

“To help these manufacturers prevent unintentional emergency calls on their devices, Android is providing them with additional guidance and resources,” said a Google spokesperson to the BBC. “We anticipate device manufacturers will roll out updates to their users that address this issue shortly. Users that continue to experience this issue should switch Emergency SOS off for the next couple of days.”

To disable it head into the device settings and search for “Emergency SOS.” From there you switch the toggle to “off.”

The issue with accidental calls to emergency services isn’t unique to the UK or to Android. Law enforcement across Europe and Canada have similarly reported a significant increase in accidental emergency calls related to Android’s Emergency SOS feature. Apple has also experienced issues with its own emergency calling, such as the Crash Detection feature on the iPhone 14 being activated when users ride on rollercoasters.