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Samsung’s first Copilot Plus PC is everything a thin and light laptop should be — but its performance is limited.  Qualcomm’s latest Snapdragon chips have quickly turned Windows on Arm into a viable platform. We’ve tested over half a dozen laptops with the new processors, and even the least powerful chip matches Intel and last-gen AMD on CPU performance and beats them on battery life. But I’ve been eager to get my hands on a laptop with Qualcomm’s fastest Snapdragon processor to see if it can do even more. I got to see the high-end model in action back in April on a demo machine, and it seemed like it would be the chip to help usher in a new era of faster, more power-efficient Windows PCs and take on Apple’s MacBook Air M3 in a way that Intel or AMD hadn’t been able to accomplish.
That chip — the Snapdragon X Elite X1E-84-100 — is only available in one Copilot Plus PC: Samsung’s Galaxy Book4 Edge. It’s Samsung’s thinnest and lightest 16-inch laptop, designed for everyday web browsing, a mix of business- and creative-focused work, and running Windows Copilot Plus AI apps like Live Captions and Cocreator. The Edge has similar features to the Intel-based Galaxy Book4 Ultra, like an AMOLED display and a fingerprint reader, but it also offers faster ports and faster Wi-Fi.
The X1E-84-100 chip is supposed to be up to 20 percent faster than the next model down. Samsung had a chance to make the laptop that could show the platform’s full potential. Instead, it underpowered the hell out of that chip to have the thinnest chassis possible. There’s still a good laptop in the Book4, but you don’t need to buy the best chip to get it — and you’d actually be better off saving the cash.

Surprisingly portable
Heavy, barely portable 16-inch laptops have nearly become a thing of the past, making larger screens an increasingly appealing choice. The Book4 Edge pushes the limits of a 16-inch machine even further. It’s one of a few 16-inch laptops that’s under half an inch thick and under 3.5 pounds, making it one of the most portable large laptops available. It doesn’t strain my back when I carry it in my shoulder bag, and it feels like I can be nimbler with it since its weight is distributed across a larger area compared to some lighter and smaller Copilot Plus PCs I tested. It’s easier to hold, so I’m not afraid of dropping it.
The Edge’s build quality is solid. Its metal chassis is totally rigid, the lid doesn’t flex when you open or close the laptop, and the hinge keeps a firm grip on the lid regardless of how you tilt it. Aesthetically, the machine’s gray keys blend in nicely with its silver body. Samsung says the body color is actually a sapphire blue, but I don’t see any blue in it.

One of the best things about this laptop: 14 hours of battery life.

The keyboard is responsive but not attention-grabbing. I like that the keys are not too shallow and that they don’t make a lot of noise, especially for a heavy-fingered typist like myself. But they feel sluggish. The actual press feels slower and softer than I anticipated. I don’t outright dislike them, but after typing on the Asus Zenbook S 16 — a competing 16-inch laptop that’s nearly the same size and weight — I don’t want to go back to Samsung’s.
Disappointing performance
The Book4 Edge would be great for work, school, or any environment where all you need is a fast, reliable machine to handle the basics. The laptop opens programs a smidge faster than a lot of competing AMD or Intel-based machines, and it can handle a bunch of browser tabs or streaming movies just as well. But since Samsung prioritized design over performance, it passed over a chance to show off what Qualcomm’s fastest Snapdragon chip is capable of at its best.
The base Book4 Edge model comes with a Snapdragon X Elite X1E-80-100 processor, but the higher-end model I reviewed has the X1E-84-100 chip, which is supposed to be up to 20 percent faster. It’s also supposed to be capable of boosting the max clock speed of two of its cores from 3.8GHz to 4.2GHz.

The keyboard is good, but the layout doesn’t suit my small hands.

I monitored the X1E-84-100’s clock speeds during testing. Even in our most punishing multicore benchmarks, none of its 12 cores hit 4.2GHz. Samsung wouldn’t tell me exactly how much power it’s giving the CPU in the Book4 Edge, but it’s clearly not enough. I also track power consumption during benchmarks. The Book4 Edge never drew more than 35W from the wall in my testing; every other laptop I’ve tested with a Qualcomm chip drew closer to 50W.
Like many processors, the Snapdragon X Elite chips can work within a pretty wide power range: give it more power, and it’ll go faster. It will also produce more heat. The thinner the laptop, the less room there is for the cooling system to dissipate that heat, and the less power you can give the processor as a result. By giving the chip less power, Samsung keeps the temperature under control and the chassis thin. Fortunately, the Book4 Edge not hitting its max clock speed does not have any effect on how it feels to use every day. It’s still around the same speed as the other Snapdragon X Elite laptops we’ve tested.
But it was a letdown when I compared its benchmark scores to laptops with lower-tier Snapdragon chips, like the Dell XPS 13 and Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x, and saw lower numbers; the Book4 Edge was 13 to 16 percent slower in multicore performance than those laptops, respectively. The Edge is currently the only laptop with Qualcomm’s fastest processor, and I wanted to see it fly!
Long battery life
The upside to the laptop not running full tilt is that it’s fairly power efficient: I typically got around 14 hours of battery life on a charge. I was able to use it for nearly two full work days while loading up Microsoft Edge with dozens of tabs, streaming music, writing, and taking the occasional video call. I had the laptop’s power mode set to the most efficient setting, but there wasn’t a change in Book4 Edge’s responsiveness. (I didn’t see a notable difference in power draw between efficiency mode and performance mode.)

No shortage of ports on this laptop.

And there’s a microSD slot.

The thing that impressed me the most about this laptop’s battery life was that it lasted that long on a relatively small 61.8Wh battery, showing how power-efficient Qualcomm made its Snapdragon processors. Just how efficient? Consider the almost identical 16-inch Galaxy Book4 Ultra, which has an Intel Core Ultra chip and a 76Wh battery. The Book4 Edge outlasts it by about 20 minutes, even with a battery that’s 18 percent smaller. Yeah, the chip is that efficient.
Its 2880 x 1800 (3K) AMOLED display also helps save power. It has around half the pixel count of a 4K display, so the laptop doesn’t need to work as hard to power it. But there are still plenty of pixels to keep images looking clean and sharp while generating an expanse of accurate, vibrant colors. It’s a happy middle ground that doesn’t sacrifice image quality for battery life — a big reason why displays with similar resolutions are starting to crop up more often in productivity and gaming laptops alike.
A compelling base model
The Book4 Edge is a good, thin, and lightweight laptop for someone like a student who needs a big-screen machine that can handle multiple open apps with ease. It has excellent battery life, a nice screen, and good looks. I just can’t see why Samsung put the most powerful Snapdragon X Elite chip into a laptop and then didn’t take advantage of it. There’s no reason to get the $1,750 model I tested; the $1,450 base model is a much better value for 16GB of RAM, 512GB of storage, and the Snapdragon X Elite X1E-80-100 chip.

The Snapdragon processor makes the Book4 Edge one of the thinnest, lightest 16-inch Windows laptops you can get, with great battery life and performance. But power users who need a Windows laptop for creative work or gaming are still much better off with an AMD or Intel machine. Those machines will have better app compatibility and better graphics performance, even if, yes, you will have to trade at least a few hours of battery life. Asus’ Zenbook S 16, for instance, starts at $1,699. It has faster performance, comes with more RAM, and costs a little less than the Book4 Edge, but it’s about a third of a pound heavier and gets around 11 hours of battery instead of 14.
Samsung’s Galaxy Book4 Edge is a good laptop for everything that it does offer. But I still haven’t seen what Qualcomm’s most powerful Snapdragon X Elite chip is capable of.
Photography by Joanna Nelius / The Verge

Samsung’s first Copilot Plus PC is everything a thin and light laptop should be — but its performance is limited. 

Qualcomm’s latest Snapdragon chips have quickly turned Windows on Arm into a viable platform. We’ve tested over half a dozen laptops with the new processors, and even the least powerful chip matches Intel and last-gen AMD on CPU performance and beats them on battery life. But I’ve been eager to get my hands on a laptop with Qualcomm’s fastest Snapdragon processor to see if it can do even more. I got to see the high-end model in action back in April on a demo machine, and it seemed like it would be the chip to help usher in a new era of faster, more power-efficient Windows PCs and take on Apple’s MacBook Air M3 in a way that Intel or AMD hadn’t been able to accomplish.

That chip — the Snapdragon X Elite X1E-84-100 — is only available in one Copilot Plus PC: Samsung’s Galaxy Book4 Edge. It’s Samsung’s thinnest and lightest 16-inch laptop, designed for everyday web browsing, a mix of business- and creative-focused work, and running Windows Copilot Plus AI apps like Live Captions and Cocreator. The Edge has similar features to the Intel-based Galaxy Book4 Ultra, like an AMOLED display and a fingerprint reader, but it also offers faster ports and faster Wi-Fi.

The X1E-84-100 chip is supposed to be up to 20 percent faster than the next model down. Samsung had a chance to make the laptop that could show the platform’s full potential. Instead, it underpowered the hell out of that chip to have the thinnest chassis possible. There’s still a good laptop in the Book4, but you don’t need to buy the best chip to get it — and you’d actually be better off saving the cash.

Surprisingly portable

Heavy, barely portable 16-inch laptops have nearly become a thing of the past, making larger screens an increasingly appealing choice. The Book4 Edge pushes the limits of a 16-inch machine even further. It’s one of a few 16-inch laptops that’s under half an inch thick and under 3.5 pounds, making it one of the most portable large laptops available. It doesn’t strain my back when I carry it in my shoulder bag, and it feels like I can be nimbler with it since its weight is distributed across a larger area compared to some lighter and smaller Copilot Plus PCs I tested. It’s easier to hold, so I’m not afraid of dropping it.

The Edge’s build quality is solid. Its metal chassis is totally rigid, the lid doesn’t flex when you open or close the laptop, and the hinge keeps a firm grip on the lid regardless of how you tilt it. Aesthetically, the machine’s gray keys blend in nicely with its silver body. Samsung says the body color is actually a sapphire blue, but I don’t see any blue in it.

One of the best things about this laptop: 14 hours of battery life.

The keyboard is responsive but not attention-grabbing. I like that the keys are not too shallow and that they don’t make a lot of noise, especially for a heavy-fingered typist like myself. But they feel sluggish. The actual press feels slower and softer than I anticipated. I don’t outright dislike them, but after typing on the Asus Zenbook S 16 — a competing 16-inch laptop that’s nearly the same size and weight — I don’t want to go back to Samsung’s.

Disappointing performance

The Book4 Edge would be great for work, school, or any environment where all you need is a fast, reliable machine to handle the basics. The laptop opens programs a smidge faster than a lot of competing AMD or Intel-based machines, and it can handle a bunch of browser tabs or streaming movies just as well. But since Samsung prioritized design over performance, it passed over a chance to show off what Qualcomm’s fastest Snapdragon chip is capable of at its best.

The base Book4 Edge model comes with a Snapdragon X Elite X1E-80-100 processor, but the higher-end model I reviewed has the X1E-84-100 chip, which is supposed to be up to 20 percent faster. It’s also supposed to be capable of boosting the max clock speed of two of its cores from 3.8GHz to 4.2GHz.

The keyboard is good, but the layout doesn’t suit my small hands.

I monitored the X1E-84-100’s clock speeds during testing. Even in our most punishing multicore benchmarks, none of its 12 cores hit 4.2GHz. Samsung wouldn’t tell me exactly how much power it’s giving the CPU in the Book4 Edge, but it’s clearly not enough. I also track power consumption during benchmarks. The Book4 Edge never drew more than 35W from the wall in my testing; every other laptop I’ve tested with a Qualcomm chip drew closer to 50W.

Like many processors, the Snapdragon X Elite chips can work within a pretty wide power range: give it more power, and it’ll go faster. It will also produce more heat. The thinner the laptop, the less room there is for the cooling system to dissipate that heat, and the less power you can give the processor as a result. By giving the chip less power, Samsung keeps the temperature under control and the chassis thin. Fortunately, the Book4 Edge not hitting its max clock speed does not have any effect on how it feels to use every day. It’s still around the same speed as the other Snapdragon X Elite laptops we’ve tested.

But it was a letdown when I compared its benchmark scores to laptops with lower-tier Snapdragon chips, like the Dell XPS 13 and Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x, and saw lower numbers; the Book4 Edge was 13 to 16 percent slower in multicore performance than those laptops, respectively. The Edge is currently the only laptop with Qualcomm’s fastest processor, and I wanted to see it fly!

Long battery life

The upside to the laptop not running full tilt is that it’s fairly power efficient: I typically got around 14 hours of battery life on a charge. I was able to use it for nearly two full work days while loading up Microsoft Edge with dozens of tabs, streaming music, writing, and taking the occasional video call. I had the laptop’s power mode set to the most efficient setting, but there wasn’t a change in Book4 Edge’s responsiveness. (I didn’t see a notable difference in power draw between efficiency mode and performance mode.)

The thing that impressed me the most about this laptop’s battery life was that it lasted that long on a relatively small 61.8Wh battery, showing how power-efficient Qualcomm made its Snapdragon processors. Just how efficient? Consider the almost identical 16-inch Galaxy Book4 Ultra, which has an Intel Core Ultra chip and a 76Wh battery. The Book4 Edge outlasts it by about 20 minutes, even with a battery that’s 18 percent smaller. Yeah, the chip is that efficient.

Its 2880 x 1800 (3K) AMOLED display also helps save power. It has around half the pixel count of a 4K display, so the laptop doesn’t need to work as hard to power it. But there are still plenty of pixels to keep images looking clean and sharp while generating an expanse of accurate, vibrant colors. It’s a happy middle ground that doesn’t sacrifice image quality for battery life — a big reason why displays with similar resolutions are starting to crop up more often in productivity and gaming laptops alike.

A compelling base model

The Book4 Edge is a good, thin, and lightweight laptop for someone like a student who needs a big-screen machine that can handle multiple open apps with ease. It has excellent battery life, a nice screen, and good looks. I just can’t see why Samsung put the most powerful Snapdragon X Elite chip into a laptop and then didn’t take advantage of it. There’s no reason to get the $1,750 model I tested; the $1,450 base model is a much better value for 16GB of RAM, 512GB of storage, and the Snapdragon X Elite X1E-80-100 chip.

The Snapdragon processor makes the Book4 Edge one of the thinnest, lightest 16-inch Windows laptops you can get, with great battery life and performance. But power users who need a Windows laptop for creative work or gaming are still much better off with an AMD or Intel machine. Those machines will have better app compatibility and better graphics performance, even if, yes, you will have to trade at least a few hours of battery life. Asus’ Zenbook S 16, for instance, starts at $1,699. It has faster performance, comes with more RAM, and costs a little less than the Book4 Edge, but it’s about a third of a pound heavier and gets around 11 hours of battery instead of 14.

Samsung’s Galaxy Book4 Edge is a good laptop for everything that it does offer. But I still haven’t seen what Qualcomm’s most powerful Snapdragon X Elite chip is capable of.

Photography by Joanna Nelius / The Verge

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The Vision Pro got its first Virtual Boy emulator in an app called VirtualFriend, finally giving me, a person with an irrational love for Nintendo’s most short-lived console, a chance to play it in immersive 3D once more. The app is also available for iOS and iPadOS, where it’s a virtually identical experience, minus the 3D effect.
The first games I played after downloading VirtualFriend were those I owned as a kid: Red Alarm, Wario Land, and Mario’s Tennis. I’m pleased to say that apart from some minor audio glitches in Red Alarm, the games run well — it’s all just as I remember it.

GIF: VirtualFriend
The preset “Game Boy” color scheme might be my favorite.

VirtualFriend supports Bluetooth controllers and keyboard control on the Vision Pro, as well as touchscreen buttons if you’re playing on an iPhone or iPad. Visually, the games look as good as a Virtual Boy game can and have a little help from the app, which lets you customize the console’s two-tone color palette. VirtualFriend also has an eye adjustment slider that helps adjust the image if you find a particular game isn’t working for you.
The big missing features are controller mapping and the ability to save your game at any point using save states. (Developer Adam Gastineau acknowledged the latter in an open issue on the project’s GitHub page.)

Still, VirtualFriend is easy to recommend if you’re at all curious about playing Virtual Boy games or, like me, you once owned and loved the console. It’s free with the option to tip the developer, doesn’t show ads, and according to its App Store listing, won’t collect your data. It’s just good, clean, mid-90s VR fun.

The Vision Pro got its first Virtual Boy emulator in an app called VirtualFriend, finally giving me, a person with an irrational love for Nintendo’s most short-lived console, a chance to play it in immersive 3D once more. The app is also available for iOS and iPadOS, where it’s a virtually identical experience, minus the 3D effect.

The first games I played after downloading VirtualFriend were those I owned as a kid: Red Alarm, Wario Land, and Mario’s Tennis. I’m pleased to say that apart from some minor audio glitches in Red Alarm, the games run well — it’s all just as I remember it.

GIF: VirtualFriend
The preset “Game Boy” color scheme might be my favorite.

VirtualFriend supports Bluetooth controllers and keyboard control on the Vision Pro, as well as touchscreen buttons if you’re playing on an iPhone or iPad. Visually, the games look as good as a Virtual Boy game can and have a little help from the app, which lets you customize the console’s two-tone color palette. VirtualFriend also has an eye adjustment slider that helps adjust the image if you find a particular game isn’t working for you.

The big missing features are controller mapping and the ability to save your game at any point using save states. (Developer Adam Gastineau acknowledged the latter in an open issue on the project’s GitHub page.)

Still, VirtualFriend is easy to recommend if you’re at all curious about playing Virtual Boy games or, like me, you once owned and loved the console. It’s free with the option to tip the developer, doesn’t show ads, and according to its App Store listing, won’t collect your data. It’s just good, clean, mid-90s VR fun.

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Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

Tesla has stopped selling the $60,990 RWD Cybertruck, the cheapest version of its angular EV truck, Jalopnik writes. At the same time, the company increased the price of the next-in-line AWD Cybertruck by $20,000. Now $99,990, it elevates the EV’s price floor by a whopping $39,000.
The Cyberbeast — the tri-motor version of the truck with more torque and a higher top speed than the standard all-wheel drive EV — is also costlier, at $119,990 (it was $99,990 before August 6th). The updated prices are especially bleak when you consider Tesla had said in 2019 that the Cybertruck would start at $39,990.

On the bright side, the company bumped up delivery times. Tesla estimates it can get AWD Cybertrucks to customers between August and September 2024, while it cites October to December 2024 for the Cyberbeast. Before, orders were pegged for 2025 deliveries, as shown on The Internet Archive earlier this month.
Other recent bad news for the Cybertruck has included two recalls this year, the first over bad accelerator pedals, then another for faulty wiper blades. More broadly, Tesla has been trudging through a rocky period of falling profits, federal investigations, lawsuits, and recalls.

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

Tesla has stopped selling the $60,990 RWD Cybertruck, the cheapest version of its angular EV truck, Jalopnik writes. At the same time, the company increased the price of the next-in-line AWD Cybertruck by $20,000. Now $99,990, it elevates the EV’s price floor by a whopping $39,000.

The Cyberbeast — the tri-motor version of the truck with more torque and a higher top speed than the standard all-wheel drive EV — is also costlier, at $119,990 (it was $99,990 before August 6th). The updated prices are especially bleak when you consider Tesla had said in 2019 that the Cybertruck would start at $39,990.

On the bright side, the company bumped up delivery times. Tesla estimates it can get AWD Cybertrucks to customers between August and September 2024, while it cites October to December 2024 for the Cyberbeast. Before, orders were pegged for 2025 deliveries, as shown on The Internet Archive earlier this month.

Other recent bad news for the Cybertruck has included two recalls this year, the first over bad accelerator pedals, then another for faulty wiper blades. More broadly, Tesla has been trudging through a rocky period of falling profits, federal investigations, lawsuits, and recalls.

Read More 

Illustration by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) proposed a new set of rules this week that would require robocallers to disclose when they’re using artificial intelligence for phone calls and text messages.
The proposal builds on the FCC’s ban on making AI-generated robocalls without the express prior consent of the person being called. The agency now hopes to require callers to say, while seeking that consent, whether they plan to use AI for future calls and messages, the FCC writes. Similar disclosures would have to be added to any AI-generated phone calls, which the agency says “contain an enhanced risk of fraud and other scams.”

The regulator suggests defining an “AI generated call” as any that uses technology to create “an artificial or prerecorded voice or a text using computational technology or other machine learning, including predictive algorithms, and large language models, to process natural language and produce voice or text content to communicate with a called party over an outbound telephone call.”
Finally the agency hopes to carve out an exception for when those with speech and hearing disabilities use AI-generated voice software to help them communicate on outbound phone calls. The FCC would also require that there be no “unsolicited advertisement” in such calls, and that people on the receiving end of the phone calls not be charged for them. The agency asked for specific comments on whether scammers could abuse the exemption, and how it could update its rules to prevent that.

Illustration by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) proposed a new set of rules this week that would require robocallers to disclose when they’re using artificial intelligence for phone calls and text messages.

The proposal builds on the FCC’s ban on making AI-generated robocalls without the express prior consent of the person being called. The agency now hopes to require callers to say, while seeking that consent, whether they plan to use AI for future calls and messages, the FCC writes. Similar disclosures would have to be added to any AI-generated phone calls, which the agency says “contain an enhanced risk of fraud and other scams.”

The regulator suggests defining an “AI generated call” as any that uses technology to create “an artificial or prerecorded voice or a text using computational technology or other machine learning, including predictive algorithms, and large language models, to process natural language and produce voice or text content to communicate with a called party over an outbound telephone call.”

Finally the agency hopes to carve out an exception for when those with speech and hearing disabilities use AI-generated voice software to help them communicate on outbound phone calls. The FCC would also require that there be no “unsolicited advertisement” in such calls, and that people on the receiving end of the phone calls not be charged for them. The agency asked for specific comments on whether scammers could abuse the exemption, and how it could update its rules to prevent that.

Read More 

Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge

Using the Fold can feel special, but Google needs to make some obvious upgrades for the follow-up. I wasn’t sold on the era of foldable smartphones until I tried the Pixel Fold. For one, we get a fairly limited selection of folding phones to choose from in the US compared to China. And the cramped, too-narrow outer display of Samsung’s Galaxy Z Fold series has never worked for my large hands. So Google grabbed my interest immediately when it introduced a squat, passport-shaped folding phone.
I’ve used Pixels for years, so I’m well acquainted with Google’s strengths and weaknesses. The software is clean, you get some genuinely handy Pixel-only features (the Recorder app is a blessing in my line of work), and the camera performance is unbeatable — at least for still photography. But on the flip side, performance never measures up to Qualcomm’s latest Snapdragon chips, the devices tend to run a little warm, and there are sometimes odd hardware quirks. (Did you know that every Pixel 8 and 8 Pro has tiny bumps under the display only visible in just the right light? Now you do.)

Going into the Pixel Fold, I knew there would be additional tradeoffs. Foldable phones are heavy. Their cameras don’t measure up to the best traditional phones. And several years into this form factor, they often remain wildly expensive. Samsung and Motorola offer lower-priced flip versions, but no such luck if you’re a Pixel fan.

The Fold’s short and squat outer display has been easy to use.

Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge
But it’s a very heavy phone.

However, it took practically no time at all for the Pixel Fold to overcome those collective downsides. It’s far from a perfect gadget, but this is a case where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. I’ve grown to like a lot about the first-gen Pixel Fold, but there are also some nagging frustrations that I hope to see rectified in the upcoming Pixel 9 Pro Fold.
It’s easy to ignore the bigger screen
The first thing I learned was that when you’ve got an adequate phone on the outside, you won’t open the inner display as frequently as you might expect — at least once the honeymoon phase wears off. The Fold’s exterior screen is perfectly usable for most of what I do with a smartphone. I usually unfold it when I want to watch YouTube, Netflix, or check the news with The New York Times app. Sure, I’ve multitasked with two apps at once on occasion — and Google has made that workflow easier with software updates — but it’s not a common scenario. I’m still mostly using the large canvas to focus on one thing a a time, albeit with far greater immersion.

Reading The New York Times (or anything else) on this inner screen is a joy.

This thing desperately needs a brightness boost
From day one, my primary gripe with the Pixel Fold has always been its display brightness — or lack thereof. Only a few months after its release last year, the $1,700 device was outshined by the significantly more affordable Pixel 8 series and Google’s new Actua / Super Actua displays. They get extremely bright and are no trouble to use outdoors. With the Fold, I’ve constantly got the brightness slider up over 80 percent, which doesn’t do its battery life any favors. It can be a struggle to see this phone when the sun is shining, and the very reflective inner screen only makes things worse.
If there’s one weakness I’m relatively confident Google is going to fix the second time around, it’s this lack of pop. All indications are that the company will bring its latest (and brightest) display tech to its second-gen foldable.
The other key improvement I hope to see is a lighter frame. The Pixel Fold is one seriously hefty phone, even for me — a 6’1” man with big hands — and can get taxing to hold over time.
The battery life has gotten me by
I wasn’t expecting miracles from the Pixel Fold’s battery endurance. Is it fair to want that from any foldable? Plus, Google’s Tensor chips have never been known for efficiency. But even on days when the large display barely got any use, the Fold did… fine. It wasn’t always a lock that there would be much juice remaining when I got home after a long day, but the phone almost always made it. Like other Pixels, the Fold can sometimes charge at a snail’s pace when you’re actively using it while plugged in. Overall, its stamina is trounced by the more conventional Pixel 8 Pro, but that’s to be expected when you’re pitting two screens against one.

I’m partial to the porcelain version, myself.

The phone has held up well, though the glossy camera bar is prone to scratches and scuffs.

Many apps aren’t optimized for the wide display
The Pixel 9 Pro Fold is rumored to be going in the direction of the OnePlus Open, with a taller design. You’ll basically be getting a regular phone on the outside. That means the aspect ratio of the inner display will also be changing, which is a good thing since I found that many apps had black bars on both sides when I held the Fold open. This is Android, so you really can’t count on developers quickly embracing an individual device. Google eventually added an option to force apps to go full-screen in software, but the new dimensions of the 9 Pro Fold should theoretically mean that more apps will do that by default.
Plenty of apps do play nice with the Fold. Editing photos from my mirrorless camera in Adobe Lightroom has been a great experience from the jump — even if the device sometimes gets a little warm while doing so. If I’m not traveling with my iPad, this is the next best thing for making some adjustments on the move.

This is way better than editing photos on a regular phone.

Durability, camera, speakers, etc.
I’ve used two Fold review units over the last year, and neither of them has broken or had any catastrophic screen problems. But not everyone has been so lucky, and having any foldable repaired or replaced under warranty can be an ordeal. The glossy camera bar inevitably shows wear and tear, and scratches on the soft inner display are unavoidable. But they’re also easy to forget about when the screen is lit up — as is the crease.
The speakers on this $1,700 phone are decidedly mid. They’re blown away by Apple’s iPhone 15 Pro Max, the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra, and Google’s own Pixel 8 Pro. Give me something with a little more oomph, Google. Please!

Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge
The cameras are reliable (like any Pixel) but not as advanced as Google’s more conventional phones.

The Pixel Fold’s camera(s) do the job. They’re reliable, as Allison wrote in her review. But they’re nothing to write home about, either. Google’s computational photography magic can help pretty up your shots, but you’re dealing with a smaller sensor than what’s in ordinary flagship phones, and software can’t fully compensate for that.
Google is set to announce the Pixel 9 Pro Fold (and a lot more) at its August 13th event. The first Pixel Fold got enough right to make me a believer in foldables. Now the company just needs to prove that it can take that potential and versatility to the next level — and hopefully the screen brightness, too.
Photography by Chris Welch / The Verge

Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge

Using the Fold can feel special, but Google needs to make some obvious upgrades for the follow-up.

I wasn’t sold on the era of foldable smartphones until I tried the Pixel Fold. For one, we get a fairly limited selection of folding phones to choose from in the US compared to China. And the cramped, too-narrow outer display of Samsung’s Galaxy Z Fold series has never worked for my large hands. So Google grabbed my interest immediately when it introduced a squat, passport-shaped folding phone.

I’ve used Pixels for years, so I’m well acquainted with Google’s strengths and weaknesses. The software is clean, you get some genuinely handy Pixel-only features (the Recorder app is a blessing in my line of work), and the camera performance is unbeatable — at least for still photography. But on the flip side, performance never measures up to Qualcomm’s latest Snapdragon chips, the devices tend to run a little warm, and there are sometimes odd hardware quirks. (Did you know that every Pixel 8 and 8 Pro has tiny bumps under the display only visible in just the right light? Now you do.)

Going into the Pixel Fold, I knew there would be additional tradeoffs. Foldable phones are heavy. Their cameras don’t measure up to the best traditional phones. And several years into this form factor, they often remain wildly expensive. Samsung and Motorola offer lower-priced flip versions, but no such luck if you’re a Pixel fan.

However, it took practically no time at all for the Pixel Fold to overcome those collective downsides. It’s far from a perfect gadget, but this is a case where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. I’ve grown to like a lot about the first-gen Pixel Fold, but there are also some nagging frustrations that I hope to see rectified in the upcoming Pixel 9 Pro Fold.

It’s easy to ignore the bigger screen

The first thing I learned was that when you’ve got an adequate phone on the outside, you won’t open the inner display as frequently as you might expect — at least once the honeymoon phase wears off. The Fold’s exterior screen is perfectly usable for most of what I do with a smartphone. I usually unfold it when I want to watch YouTube, Netflix, or check the news with The New York Times app. Sure, I’ve multitasked with two apps at once on occasion — and Google has made that workflow easier with software updates — but it’s not a common scenario. I’m still mostly using the large canvas to focus on one thing a a time, albeit with far greater immersion.

This thing desperately needs a brightness boost

From day one, my primary gripe with the Pixel Fold has always been its display brightness — or lack thereof. Only a few months after its release last year, the $1,700 device was outshined by the significantly more affordable Pixel 8 series and Google’s new Actua / Super Actua displays. They get extremely bright and are no trouble to use outdoors. With the Fold, I’ve constantly got the brightness slider up over 80 percent, which doesn’t do its battery life any favors. It can be a struggle to see this phone when the sun is shining, and the very reflective inner screen only makes things worse.

If there’s one weakness I’m relatively confident Google is going to fix the second time around, it’s this lack of pop. All indications are that the company will bring its latest (and brightest) display tech to its second-gen foldable.

The other key improvement I hope to see is a lighter frame. The Pixel Fold is one seriously hefty phone, even for me — a 6’1” man with big hands — and can get taxing to hold over time.

The battery life has gotten me by

I wasn’t expecting miracles from the Pixel Fold’s battery endurance. Is it fair to want that from any foldable? Plus, Google’s Tensor chips have never been known for efficiency. But even on days when the large display barely got any use, the Fold did… fine. It wasn’t always a lock that there would be much juice remaining when I got home after a long day, but the phone almost always made it. Like other Pixels, the Fold can sometimes charge at a snail’s pace when you’re actively using it while plugged in. Overall, its stamina is trounced by the more conventional Pixel 8 Pro, but that’s to be expected when you’re pitting two screens against one.

Many apps aren’t optimized for the wide display

The Pixel 9 Pro Fold is rumored to be going in the direction of the OnePlus Open, with a taller design. You’ll basically be getting a regular phone on the outside. That means the aspect ratio of the inner display will also be changing, which is a good thing since I found that many apps had black bars on both sides when I held the Fold open. This is Android, so you really can’t count on developers quickly embracing an individual device. Google eventually added an option to force apps to go full-screen in software, but the new dimensions of the 9 Pro Fold should theoretically mean that more apps will do that by default.

Plenty of apps do play nice with the Fold. Editing photos from my mirrorless camera in Adobe Lightroom has been a great experience from the jump — even if the device sometimes gets a little warm while doing so. If I’m not traveling with my iPad, this is the next best thing for making some adjustments on the move.

Durability, camera, speakers, etc.

I’ve used two Fold review units over the last year, and neither of them has broken or had any catastrophic screen problems. But not everyone has been so lucky, and having any foldable repaired or replaced under warranty can be an ordeal. The glossy camera bar inevitably shows wear and tear, and scratches on the soft inner display are unavoidable. But they’re also easy to forget about when the screen is lit up — as is the crease.

The speakers on this $1,700 phone are decidedly mid. They’re blown away by Apple’s iPhone 15 Pro Max, the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra, and Google’s own Pixel 8 Pro. Give me something with a little more oomph, Google. Please!

The Pixel Fold’s camera(s) do the job. They’re reliable, as Allison wrote in her review. But they’re nothing to write home about, either. Google’s computational photography magic can help pretty up your shots, but you’re dealing with a smaller sensor than what’s in ordinary flagship phones, and software can’t fully compensate for that.

Google is set to announce the Pixel 9 Pro Fold (and a lot more) at its August 13th event. The first Pixel Fold got enough right to make me a believer in foldables. Now the company just needs to prove that it can take that potential and versatility to the next level — and hopefully the screen brightness, too.

Photography by Chris Welch / The Verge

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Photo: Dennis Troper (Facebook)

Susan Wojcicki, Google’s 16th employee who helped jumpstart the company in her garage, ran its advertising business, and then helmed YouTube for most of the past decade, has died at 56, according to posts by her husband Dennis Troper and Google CEO Sundar Pichai.
She joined Google in 1998 and was CEO of YouTube from February 2014 until February 2023, when she stepped down to focus on “family, health, and personal projects.” Troper and Pichai say she had been battling non-small cell lung cancer. Her son, Marco Troper, died earlier this year.
In 2014, we called her one of the 50 most important people shaping the world. Beyond helping build Google into one of the most important companies of the past two decades, she helped transform YouTube into the place where the next generation of celebrities and influencers are born.
Wojcicki was long considered one of the most powerful women in the company, reporting directly to Google’s co-founders for most of her tenure. In 2011, The San Jose Mercury News reported that she personally convinced Google’s board to buy YouTube.
Google CEO Sundar Pichai has published this public memo about Wojcicki’s death, which is also being distributed to Google employees:

Googlers,
By now you may have heard the news that Susan Wojcicki has passed away after two years of living with lung cancer. Even as I write this it feels impossible to me that it’s true. Susan was one of the most active and vibrant people I have ever met. Her loss is devastating for all of us who know and love her, for the thousands of Googlers she led over the years, and for millions of people all over the world who looked up to her, benefited from her advocacy and leadership, and felt the impact of the incredible things she created at Google, YouTube, and beyond.
Susan’s journey, from the garage she rented to Larry and Sergey … to leading teams across consumer products and building our Ads business … to becoming the CEO of YouTube, one of the world’s most significant platforms, is inspiring by any measure. But she didn’t stop there. As one of the earliest Googlers — and the first to take maternity leave — Susan used her position to build a better workplace for everyone. And in the years that followed, her advocacy around parental leave set a new standard for businesses everywhere. Susan was also deeply passionate about education. She realized early on that YouTube could be a learning platform for the world and championed “edutubers” — especially those who extended the reach of STEM education to underserved communities.
Over the last two years, even as she dealt with great personal difficulties, Susan devoted herself to making the world better through her philanthropy, including supporting research for the disease that ultimately took her life. I know that was very meaningful to her and I’m so glad she took the time to do it.
Susan always put others first, both in her values and in the day to day. I’ll never forget her kindness to me as a prospective “Noogler” 20 years ago. During my Google interview she took me out for an ice cream and a walk around campus. I was sold – on Google and Susan.
I feel so fortunate to have spent so many years working with Susan closely, as I’m sure many of you do — she was absolutely loved by her teams here. Her time on earth was far too short, but she made every minute count.
We’re in close touch with Susan’s family, including her husband and fellow Googler, Dennis. We will share more soon about how we’re going to celebrate her incredible life. In the meantime, let’s honor Susan’s memory by continuing to build a Google she would be proud of.
-Sundar

Photo: Dennis Troper (Facebook)

Susan Wojcicki, Google’s 16th employee who helped jumpstart the company in her garage, ran its advertising business, and then helmed YouTube for most of the past decade, has died at 56, according to posts by her husband Dennis Troper and Google CEO Sundar Pichai.

She joined Google in 1998 and was CEO of YouTube from February 2014 until February 2023, when she stepped down to focus on “family, health, and personal projects.” Troper and Pichai say she had been battling non-small cell lung cancer. Her son, Marco Troper, died earlier this year.

In 2014, we called her one of the 50 most important people shaping the world. Beyond helping build Google into one of the most important companies of the past two decades, she helped transform YouTube into the place where the next generation of celebrities and influencers are born.

Wojcicki was long considered one of the most powerful women in the company, reporting directly to Google’s co-founders for most of her tenure. In 2011, The San Jose Mercury News reported that she personally convinced Google’s board to buy YouTube.

Google CEO Sundar Pichai has published this public memo about Wojcicki’s death, which is also being distributed to Google employees:

Googlers,

By now you may have heard the news that Susan Wojcicki has passed away after two years of living with lung cancer. Even as I write this it feels impossible to me that it’s true. Susan was one of the most active and vibrant people I have ever met. Her loss is devastating for all of us who know and love her, for the thousands of Googlers she led over the years, and for millions of people all over the world who looked up to her, benefited from her advocacy and leadership, and felt the impact of the incredible things she created at Google, YouTube, and beyond.

Susan’s journey, from the garage she rented to Larry and Sergey … to leading teams across consumer products and building our Ads business … to becoming the CEO of YouTube, one of the world’s most significant platforms, is inspiring by any measure. But she didn’t stop there. As one of the earliest Googlers — and the first to take maternity leave — Susan used her position to build a better workplace for everyone. And in the years that followed, her advocacy around parental leave set a new standard for businesses everywhere. Susan was also deeply passionate about education. She realized early on that YouTube could be a learning platform for the world and championed “edutubers” — especially those who extended the reach of STEM education to underserved communities.

Over the last two years, even as she dealt with great personal difficulties, Susan devoted herself to making the world better through her philanthropy, including supporting research for the disease that ultimately took her life. I know that was very meaningful to her and I’m so glad she took the time to do it.

Susan always put others first, both in her values and in the day to day. I’ll never forget her kindness to me as a prospective “Noogler” 20 years ago. During my Google interview she took me out for an ice cream and a walk around campus. I was sold – on Google and Susan.

I feel so fortunate to have spent so many years working with Susan closely, as I’m sure many of you do — she was absolutely loved by her teams here. Her time on earth was far too short, but she made every minute count.

We’re in close touch with Susan’s family, including her husband and fellow Googler, Dennis. We will share more soon about how we’re going to celebrate her incredible life. In the meantime, let’s honor Susan’s memory by continuing to build a Google she would be proud of.

-Sundar

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Disney

After The Way of Water, James Cameron’s Avatar franchise is turning the fire up next December.
At this year’s D23 Exp James Cameron, Zoe Saldana, and Sam Worthington announced that Avatar: Fire and Ash will hit theaters on December 19th, 2025. Disney also revealed a new title card that makes it seem like the film will focus on Pandora being engulfed in flames.

Just announced at #D23, our title for the next Avatar film:Avatar: Fire and Ash. Get ready to journey back to Pandora, in theaters December 19, 2025. pic.twitter.com/gZkCCsTl9x— Avatar (@officialavatar) August 10, 2024

Though Cameron directed Fire and Ash, he’s indicated that he might not direct the fourth and fifth installments of the franchise. And while Disney hasn’t released any footage, Cameron teased that while the film’s probably not what audiences are expecting, it’s “definitely” going to be something they want.

Disney

After The Way of Water, James Cameron’s Avatar franchise is turning the fire up next December.

At this year’s D23 Exp James Cameron, Zoe Saldana, and Sam Worthington announced that Avatar: Fire and Ash will hit theaters on December 19th, 2025. Disney also revealed a new title card that makes it seem like the film will focus on Pandora being engulfed in flames.

Though Cameron directed Fire and Ash, he’s indicated that he might not direct the fourth and fifth installments of the franchise. And while Disney hasn’t released any footage, Cameron teased that while the film’s probably not what audiences are expecting, it’s “definitely” going to be something they want.

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Just look at those eyes. | Image: Sony

As expected, Sony’s limited edition Astro Bot DualSense controller for the PS5 is now available for preorder for $79.99. The forthcoming gamepad, which is currently only available through the PlayStation Direct storefront and Antonline, will launch alongside the next Astro Bot game on September 6th, giving those who’ve secretly been wishing their peripherals had more, huh, eyes, another option to consider.

This isn’t the first time Sony Interactive Entertainment has released a special edition controller to commemorate an upcoming exclusive — it launched a symbiote-themed controller alongside Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 last year — but its latest collaboration with developer Team Asobi is far cuter. The new PS5 controller features shiny blue grips and buttons inspired by Astro’s signature blue accents, along with a pair of gawking blue eyes on the touch pad. It also sports some subtle, carved lines on both handles, giving the controller a bit of a sci-fi vibe.

The distinctions stop there, though. The limited edition Astro Bot model touts the same robust compatibility and battery life as your standard DualSense Wireless Controller, along with the same adaptive triggers, motion controls, and haptics. That being said, Team Asobi has supposedly added a ton of new interactions between the controller and the next Astro Bot game, allowing you to feel a wider variety of textures and surfaces while giving power-ups a more distinct feel. The original Astro’s Playroom felt like a glorified tech demo, and if our hands-on time with Astro Bot is any indication, the sequel will follow suit.

Just look at those eyes. | Image: Sony

As expected, Sony’s limited edition Astro Bot DualSense controller for the PS5 is now available for preorder for $79.99. The forthcoming gamepad, which is currently only available through the PlayStation Direct storefront and Antonline, will launch alongside the next Astro Bot game on September 6th, giving those who’ve secretly been wishing their peripherals had more, huh, eyes, another option to consider.

This isn’t the first time Sony Interactive Entertainment has released a special edition controller to commemorate an upcoming exclusive — it launched a symbiote-themed controller alongside Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 last year — but its latest collaboration with developer Team Asobi is far cuter. The new PS5 controller features shiny blue grips and buttons inspired by Astro’s signature blue accents, along with a pair of gawking blue eyes on the touch pad. It also sports some subtle, carved lines on both handles, giving the controller a bit of a sci-fi vibe.

The distinctions stop there, though. The limited edition Astro Bot model touts the same robust compatibility and battery life as your standard DualSense Wireless Controller, along with the same adaptive triggers, motion controls, and haptics. That being said, Team Asobi has supposedly added a ton of new interactions between the controller and the next Astro Bot game, allowing you to feel a wider variety of textures and surfaces while giving power-ups a more distinct feel. The original Astro’s Playroom felt like a glorified tech demo, and if our hands-on time with Astro Bot is any indication, the sequel will follow suit.

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Nova Launcher, in a very dated screenshot on top of the project’s website. | Image: Nova Launcher

Nearly the entire team working on Nova Launcher, one of the biggest names in Android homescreen replacements, has been laid off. The team is now down to just one full time developer: Kevin Barry, the launcher’s founder.
Barry said development will continue and that he will remain in charge of the project. But team members who were laid off said work on Nova will have to slow down, and Barry has already posted that he needs to “cut scope” on the next major version of Nova compared to what was initially planned.
“Development will undoubtedly slow with less people working on the app, but the current plan is for updates to continue in some form,” Rob Wainwright, one of the laid off developers, wrote in the project’s Discord.
Nova has been a standby in the Android Launcher community for years, offering a highly customizable twist on the platform’s standard home screen options. The app was acquired by Branch, a mobile analytics company, in July 2022. Branch is now laying off more than 100 people across the entire company, including the bulk of Nova’s team, according to Cliff Wade, Nova Launcher’s customer relations lead. There were previously “around a dozen people” working on Nova, Wainwright said.
The launcher will continue to work for anyone who’s already using it. And while the launcher has been developed by a team for many years now, it was a one-developer-job at the start. “The original Nova team, for many years, was just me,” Barry wrote in a post today, reflecting on the layoffs.

Nova Launcher, in a very dated screenshot on top of the project’s website. | Image: Nova Launcher

Nearly the entire team working on Nova Launcher, one of the biggest names in Android homescreen replacements, has been laid off. The team is now down to just one full time developer: Kevin Barry, the launcher’s founder.

Barry said development will continue and that he will remain in charge of the project. But team members who were laid off said work on Nova will have to slow down, and Barry has already posted that he needs to “cut scope” on the next major version of Nova compared to what was initially planned.

“Development will undoubtedly slow with less people working on the app, but the current plan is for updates to continue in some form,” Rob Wainwright, one of the laid off developers, wrote in the project’s Discord.

Nova has been a standby in the Android Launcher community for years, offering a highly customizable twist on the platform’s standard home screen options. The app was acquired by Branch, a mobile analytics company, in July 2022. Branch is now laying off more than 100 people across the entire company, including the bulk of Nova’s team, according to Cliff Wade, Nova Launcher’s customer relations lead. There were previously “around a dozen people” working on Nova, Wainwright said.

The launcher will continue to work for anyone who’s already using it. And while the launcher has been developed by a team for many years now, it was a one-developer-job at the start. “The original Nova team, for many years, was just me,” Barry wrote in a post today, reflecting on the layoffs.

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Illustration: Alex Castro / The Verge

Instagram has starting testing a new feature that looks a whole lot like Snap Maps.
This allows Instagram users to post text and video updates to a map based on where they were taken. The map is shared with friends, whose updates can all appear alongside each other. It is, pretty much, just Snap Maps, which was originally launched in 2017.
The difference for now seems to be that Instagram may have much more limited privacy settings. Users have to choose a “specific group of people” to share their location with, such as “Close Friends or only followers they follow back,” Christine Pai, a Meta spokesperson, told The Verge. Snapchat allows public posts to Snap Maps.
Instagram’s feature is currently only available as a “small test” in a few markets, Pai said. The tool is opt-in and includes controls over location sharing. “As always, we are building this feature with safety in mind,” Pai said. She didn’t immediately respond to follow up questions about whether fully public sharing would be offered or how long the posts would stay up for.

Image: The Edge
A screenshot of Instagram’s shared map feature.

The maps feature was first spotted in development back in February under the name “Friend Map.” Then this week, some images of the feature in use began trickling out into public. Pai didn’t say where the feature is currently being tested.
Instagram had a photo feature back in 2012 that placed all of your images on a map, but the feature was entirely private — it couldn’t be shared with friends and only included your own images. It was a fun way to look over your photo collection, but the company shut it down four years later, citing low usage.
If it rolls out widely, the maps feature would be a throwback to something Instagram has always done well: ripping off ideas from its competitors. Stories came from Snapchat, Reels from TikTok, and — if we’re calling this an Instagram feature — Threads from Twitter. Now, it’s time to loop back to Snapchat.

Illustration: Alex Castro / The Verge

Instagram has starting testing a new feature that looks a whole lot like Snap Maps.

This allows Instagram users to post text and video updates to a map based on where they were taken. The map is shared with friends, whose updates can all appear alongside each other. It is, pretty much, just Snap Maps, which was originally launched in 2017.

The difference for now seems to be that Instagram may have much more limited privacy settings. Users have to choose a “specific group of people” to share their location with, such as “Close Friends or only followers they follow back,” Christine Pai, a Meta spokesperson, told The Verge. Snapchat allows public posts to Snap Maps.

Instagram’s feature is currently only available as a “small test” in a few markets, Pai said. The tool is opt-in and includes controls over location sharing. “As always, we are building this feature with safety in mind,” Pai said. She didn’t immediately respond to follow up questions about whether fully public sharing would be offered or how long the posts would stay up for.

The maps feature was first spotted in development back in February under the name “Friend Map.” Then this week, some images of the feature in use began trickling out into public. Pai didn’t say where the feature is currently being tested.

Instagram had a photo feature back in 2012 that placed all of your images on a map, but the feature was entirely private — it couldn’t be shared with friends and only included your own images. It was a fun way to look over your photo collection, but the company shut it down four years later, citing low usage.

If it rolls out widely, the maps feature would be a throwback to something Instagram has always done well: ripping off ideas from its competitors. Stories came from Snapchat, Reels from TikTok, and — if we’re calling this an Instagram feature — Threads from Twitter. Now, it’s time to loop back to Snapchat.

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