Playdate is bumping its price to $199 in April

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge

Playdate is announcing a suite of new games and a pricing update. The $179 USD handheld is going up by $20, effective April 7th, bumping the price to $199.

According to Playdate’s website, the price increase is due to increased manufacturing costs. Makes sense since the price of just about everything (insulin, happily notwithstanding) is going up. Originally, the Playdate was announced at a $149 price point until parent company Panic increased the price to $179 while increasing the number of games players would get for free from 12 to 24, as well as the device’s storage capacity.

If you haven’t yet gotten one and if your budget allows (and if you don’t live in one of the many countries where it isn’t available, including its...

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Playdate’s new store launches today — here are some great games to check out

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge

As part of a showcase event, Panic announced that Catalog, a game store for its Playdate handheld, would be launching today. The store is available both on the device and on the web and is described as a “boutique” storefront featuring “software curated by the team at Panic.” As part of the announcement, Panic also announced that the handheld is getting a $20 price bump and will cost $199 starting in April.

It was — and still is — possible to sideload games purchased on platforms like Itch.io, but Catalog theoretically makes it easier to find the good stuff. At launch, Catalog has 16 titles, 11 of which are brand-new. Two of those games — Real Steal and Recommendation Dog!! — are being released as a free “bonus” to the season one...

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Messenger’s finally coming back to the Facebook app

Illustration: Alex Castro / The Verge

Messenger will soon reunite with the Facebook app. Buried in a blog post that attempts to reassure users that Facebook’s most definitely not dying, Meta officially announced that it’s conducting a test that adds Messenger back into the Facebook app. “You’ll see us expand this testing soon,” Facebook leader Tom Alison writes in the post.

Facebook and Messenger first split in 2014, with CEO Mark Zuckerberg stating at the time that having Messenger as a separate app allows for “a better experience.” Now, Meta’s reversing that change, and it doesn’t come as much of a surprise. Last June, The Verge’s Alex Heath reported on Meta’s plans to finally bring Messenger back into Facebook, while social media consultant Matt Navarra also spotted Meta...

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I forgot how good the Apple Watch Ultra’s GPS is until I tried track detection

The Ultra was great at detecting when I arrived and left a track. | Photo by Victoria Song / The Verge

Apple’s automatic track detection feature is impressively accurate and convenient, even without any calibration.

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Niantic’s adorable pet game Peridot launches in May

Image: Niantic

Niantic, the studio behind Pokémon Go, is releasing its next big game very soon. The developer announced that the virtual pet game Peridot, which was first announced last year, will be available on both iOS and Android on May 9th. It’ll be a global launch.

I had the chance to check out Peridot last summer, and that early version was an adorable mash-up of Pokémon Go’s augmented reality aspects with a Tamagotchi-style pet sim. In a blog post today, David Hollin, Peridot’s creative director, went into more detail about how the game will work when it does launch:

Our team has been hard at work making Peridots real. They are immersive, amazing magical creatures that eat, sleep, play with toys, explore their environment, get bored, develop...

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Sonos CEO says old products have long life ahead as new ‘era’ arrives

Sonos isn’t about to make the same mistake twice. In hindsight, its transition in 2020 to a major new software platform, S2, could’ve been communicated better and handled with more consideration for longtime customers. A few very old products were left behind, though only one speaker was affected: the first-generation Play:5. For those devices, Sonos has continued to maintain the old S1 controller app and deliver bug fixes / security patches. But the whole thing got messy and took some time for Sonos to straighten out.

So with the introduction of two new speakers at the same time — a first for Sonos — some owners of existing speakers are having flashbacks to the S1 / S2 controversy and wondering if the Era 300 and 100 will mark the...

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Amazon’s Fire TV Stick 4K Max returns to its best price to date

Amazon’s Fire TV Stick 4K Max is on sale for $34.99 ($20 off) at multiple retailers today. | Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge

Sad you missed out on all the good Amazon streaming device deals we saw before the Super Bowl? Turn that frown upside down, because today, they’re back on sale again — and at the perfect time, too, given that we’re just days away from the season finale of The Last of Us. Right now, Amazon, Best Buy, and Target are all selling Amazon’s Fire TV Stick 4K Maxat an all-time low of $34.99 ($20 off).

The Fire TV Stick 4K Max is one of our favorite streaming devices, largely because of how well it integrates with Alexa. With the included remote, you can make voice commands as specific as “turn to ESPN on Sling TV” or just “turn off the lights.” Plus, it offers access to a wide selection of streaming apps, speedy performance, and support for...

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How Reddit is getting simpler — and dealing with TikTok, with chief product officer Pali Bhat

illustration: William Joel / The Verge

Reddit announces a scrolling video view for your timeline.

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Reddit’s new features include a TikTok-style video feed

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Reddit is working on a TikTok-esque feature and splitting text and video posts into separate feeds, the company announced today. Video content on Reddit will be pulled into the Watch feed view, while text content will appear in the Read feed.

The feeds will have a combination of posts from subreddits users are subscribed to, plus recommendations to start over the next few weeks as the company tests how users respond to the split views.

Creating a feed dedicated solely to video content is like a “videofication” of the platform, Pali Bhat, Reddit’s chief product officer, said on Decoder today. Bhat says the change will allow Reddit’s 500 million monthly users to engage in the format they’re most interested in and to move between formats...

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Slack’s new ChatGPT bot will talk to your colleagues for you

Illustration: Alex Castro / The Verge

ChatGPT is coming to Slack. The Salesforce-owned Slack announced the new AI-powered app on Tuesday that will help you craft replies to your colleagues “in seconds.”

Those with access to the app can click the three-dots icon in a thread and hit “Draft reply” instead of typing out the response themselves. It’s still not clear how detailed these responses will get — or if they might get a bit wonky at times. Obviously, you can probably edit any responses to better suit the conversation, but I honestly feel that I can type up a reply in the time it takes to command ChatGPT to write one for me.

Image: Slack

ChatGPT for the Slack app in action.

Additionally, the ChatGPT Slack bot can help you find answers “on any...

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Sonos Era 300 and Era 100 first look: you’re gonna want to hear these speakers

Both Era speakers launch together on March 28th. | Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge

Available for preorder today and shipping March 28th, both speakers make a good first impression with new features and upgraded sound.

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GM’s Ultra Cruise will use radar, camera, and lidar to enable hands-free driving

Illustration: Alex Castro / The Verge

General Motors’ next-generation Ultra Cruise driver-assist system will come equipped with lidar as well as several other high-tech sensors designed to enable hands-free driving and cover “95 percent” of driving maneuvers, the automaker announced today.

In its first major update since announcing Ultra Cruise in late 2021, the automaker outlined several of the sensors that will power the driver-assist system, including cameras, short- and long-range radar, and a lidar sensor. The vehicles will also come with an all-new computer to process the data input from the sensors, which the automaker previously indicated would include Qualcomm’s new Snapdragon Ride Platform.

The lidar will be located inside the vehicle, behind the windshield and...

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11 ways to power up your gaming on Steam

Samar Haddad / The Verge

If you’re a PC gamer, then you’re probably familiar with Steam — but there’s more to Valve’s application than just launching your games. Dig a little deeper into the software, and you’ll find numerous options and features that you can take advantage of.

These can change the look of Steam, make it easier to find your games, improve your Steam store recommendations, and plenty more.

We’ve picked out 11 of our favorites below.

Download games remotely

You can manage game downloads from anywhere you can access a web browser.

You don’t have to be sitting in front of your PC to install games: as long as your computer is switched on and connected to the web with the Steam client running, you can manage game...

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Giles Martin and Sonos CEO Patrick Spence believe this is the moment for spatial audio

Giles Martin and Sonos CEO Patrick Spence | Photo illustration: The Verge

They join The Vergecast to discuss Sonos’ new Era 300 and 100 speakers, the ins and outs of spatial audio, and why this is the time to get behind it.

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TikTok introduces paywalled content, with videos up to 20 minutes long

Illustration by Nick Barclay / The Verge

TikTok is adding another way for creators to make money on the platform: by putting exclusive content behind a paywall. And those videos can be much longer than the typical TikTok, too.

The company today announced a new program, Series, that allows content creators to make collections of videos that are available for purchase. Each collection can have up to 80 videos in it, and clips can be up to 20 minutes long — a length that feels closer to a YouTube vlog than a bite-size TikTok. Creators will be able to set their rates from $1 to $190, and fans can buy access using direct in-video links or from the creator’s profile page.

The paywall monetization model is akin to other creator platforms like Patreon or OnlyFans, but content...

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Apple reveals a yellow iPhone 14 and 14 Plus

Image: Apple

Apple is releasing a new yellow colorway for the iPhone 14. Unlike last year, the new color variant won’t be available for the Pro models and will only ship with the base iPhone 14 and the 14 Plus.

The new yellow adds a nice pop of color to the device that otherwise comes in black, blue, purple, white, and red. We last saw a yellow iPhone with the release of the iPhone 11 back in 2019, the successor of the yellow iPhone XR that launched in 2018. In addition to the new iPhone color, Apple also released several new spring-themed Watch band colors and silicone iPhone cases.

Image: Apple

Apple has released a new iPhone color every spring for a few years now, revealing an “alpine green” iPhone 13 and 13 Pro last spring,...

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I hate how much I enjoy the Remarkable 2’s $199 keyboard case

As much as I love E Ink, I struggle to get behind using it as part of a 21st-century typewriter. Devices like the Freewrite are very cool in practice but simply too finicky for me to use as anything more than a gimmick. So I am frankly shocked by how much I like Remarkable’s new keyboard case, the $199 Type Folio.

As the name implies, this is a keyboard case for the Remarkable 2. If you have a Remarkable 2 and it’s fully updated, you can go buy this case, attach it to your E Ink tablet, fold up the keyboard, and start typing. Things work so well, you’ll likely find yourself charmed by the ease of it all. I certainly was. I plopped in my Remarkable 2 and was instantly able to start typing out notes. My tablet was suddenly a very...

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Medium wants you to pay $5 a month to join its Mastodon server

Usernames have been reserved for current Medium subscription members until March 20th. | Image: The Verge

Popular publishing platform Medium is now fully embracing the Twitter alternative Mastodon by opening up its new me.dm instance to paying Medium community members. Joining the Mastodon server requires a subscription to Medium for $5 per month (or $50 per year) which enables perks on the site like ad-free browsing and offline reading. Mastodon instances are generally free to join.

Medium is one of the first notable tech companies to utilize Mastodon as a premium social media experience, which is interesting given the publishing company’s historic connections with Twitter. Medium co-founders Ev Williams and Biz Stone also co-founded Twitter back in 2007. A great deal of Mastodon’s recent success was born out of ongoing turmoil with Twitter...

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Uber’s new pickup directions and walking ETAs can finally help you escape the airport

Uber’s app is adding walking directions inside airports to get you to the baggage claim and out the door. | Image: Uber

We’ve somehow gone years without Uber holding our hands from the gate to the baggage claim area, out the door, and to an Uber pickup zone where a normal reserved Uber X ride is waiting for us. Now the company is making all of that possible: giving users full walking instructions — complete with photos — for various airports, adjusted ETA times that include walking to baggage claim, and expanding Uber Reserve options that includes booking rides up to 90 days in advance.

“You’re not just getting to and from the airport, but also getting through it with less stress,” Uber’s head of product for rides, Jen You, states in a press release. Step-by-step directions from gate to baggage claim to Uber pickup are rolling out to 30 airports worldwide...

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Fairphone 2 gets its final software update, seven years after original release

The Fairphone 2, released in 2015. | Photo by James Vincent / The Verge

After over seven years and 43 software updates, Fairphone’s second-generation Android smartphone is finally reaching the end of its software support period. The company says today’s software update for Android 10 will be the phone’s last, capping off a remarkably long support period for a phone that originally ran Android 5 when it started shipping in 2015. Not bad considering Fairphone says it had originally hoped to support the phone with “three to five years” of updates.

These kinds of lengthy support periods are important for Fairphone, given the company’s emphasis on the sustainability of its devices. As well as attempting to ethically source the materials that go into each of its phones, the company also designs them to be easily...

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Alex Gibney is making a documentary about Elon Musk

Illustration by Laura Normand / The Verge

If the constant deluge of news about Elon Musk hasn’t been enough for you, there’s good news: a new documentary about him is in the works from filmmaker Alex Gibney, who’s directed movies like Steve Jobs: The Man in the Machine, Zero Days, and The Inventor: Out for Blood in Silicon Valley. It aims to be “a rigorous portrait of Elon Musk,” said Zhang Xin, a producer for the film, according to Variety.

Right now, the project is just titled Musk, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Other than the name and the general vibe that it’ll be taking a hard look at one of the world’s richest men and most famous tech CEOs, there currently aren’t a lot of details about the documentary. There’s no release date (or even release year), and it’s unclear...

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Apple’s iPhone SE 4 may use OLED screens from a Chinese supplier, not Samsung or LG

The LCD panel used by the 2022 iPhone SE (above) will likely be replaced by a 6.1-inch OLED from Chinese supplier BOE. | Photo by Allison Johnson / The Verge

China-based display maker BOE (Beijing Oriental Electronics) has a complicated relationship with Apple. But despite some missteps, it looks like the two companies will be working together for a while longer, at least: a new report from The Elec (spotted by MacRumors) pegs BOE as the display supplier for the rumored iPhone SE 4. This latest report comes as Apple is allegedly working on its own display tech — and trying to lessen reliance on its main display maker and rival, Samsung.

Things got off to a rough start with Apple in 2020 when some of BOE’s screens for the iPhone 12 reportedly failed quality tests. Later, Apple caught BOE making unapproved changes to its iPhone 13 display design. And while BOE eventually secured a deal to make...

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Microsoft’s latest AI CoPilot could be the voice behind a deluge of work emails

Image: The Verge

If you notice that emails from salespeople or responses from customer support agents seem a bit off — or that they’ve gotten a significant bump in writing quality — you may be have AI to thank. Microsoft has announced that it’ll be introducing AI features into Dynamics 365, its set of enterprise apps for customer relationship management and resource planning.

The company calls the set of features “CoPilot,” and is pitching it as a way to help businesspeople “create ideas and content faster, complete time-consuming tasks, and get insights and next best actions.” That involves things like having an AI write customizable emails to customers and automatically generate meeting summaries, write a response to customer service chats and emails...

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Here are the best AirPods deals you can get right now

Apple’s second-gen AirPods Pro are on sale for $50 off at Verizon, matching their all-time low.

If you know where to look, there are often some great discounts available on Apple’s ever-popular AirPods. Since Apple launched the third-gen AirPods toward the end of 2021, we’ve seen the starting price of the second-gen, entry-level model slowly dip to around $100. And now that you can buy the second-gen AirPods Pro at most retailers, we’re seeing even better discounts on the last-gen Pro and other models.

Below, we’ve curated the best deals currently available on each model, including the entry-level AirPods, the AirPods Pro, the third-gen AirPods, and the AirPods Max.

The best entry-level AirPods (second-gen) deals

In 2021, Apple lowered the list price of the second-gen AirPods — now the entry-level model — from $159 to $129. It...

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How to use Zoom on a Chromebook

Image: Samar Haddad / The Verge

Until last year, the way to use Zoom on a ChromeOS device was to download and use Zoom’s ChromeOS app. However, in August of 2022, that app was sunsetted and replaced by the Zoom PWA (progressive web app) for ChromeOS. According to the Zoom blog, the idea was to leverage “web-based technology to deliver a native desktop experience.”

Chromebook users were given until February 2023 to switch over to the new app. If you haven’t done that yet or if you’re a little unsure of how to use the new app, here are some quick directions:

• First, of course, install the app from Google’s Play Store.
• You’ll immediately have the option to either join an existing meeting or sign in. If you’re not in a hurry for a meeting, it’s a good idea to sign in and...

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Google’s one step closer to building its 1,000-language AI model

Illustration: The Verge

As Microsoft and Google butt heads over whose AI chatbot is better, that isn’t the only use for machine learning and language models. Along with rumored plans to show off more than 20 products powered by artificial intelligence during its annual I/O event this year, Google’s progressing toward its goal of building an AI language model that supports 1,000 different languages. In an update posted on Monday, Google shared more information about the Universal Speech Model (USM), a system Google describes as a “critical first step” in realizing its goals.

Last November, the company announced its plans to create a language model supporting 1,000 of the world’s most-spoken languages while also revealing its USM model. Google describes USM as “a...

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How a single engineer brought down Twitter

Illustration: Alex Castro / The Verge

Twitter’s website is breaking in novel new ways — and while the company managed to recover from its latest outage within a couple of hours, the story behind how it broke suggests there are likely to be similar problems in the near future.

On Monday morning, Twitter users logged on to find a thicket of connected issues. Clicking on links would no longer open them; instead, users would see a mysterious error message reporting that “your current API plan does not include access to this endpoint.” Images stopped loading as well. Other users reported that they could not access TweetDeck, the Twitter-owned client for professional users.

Chaos took over the timeline, as users tweeted vociferously about the outage — often illustrating their...

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Here are the best Apple Watch deals right now

The Apple Watch Series 8 isn’t a massive step up from the prior model, but it does offer a few new features. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

In September, Apple launched its latest batch of smartwatches, introducing the first-ever Ultra ($799) alongside the Series 8 ($399) and a new Apple Watch SE ($249). Each wearable has its own pros and cons associated with it, but the introduction of the high-end Ultra also means there are now more Apple Watch models on the market before than ever before — and a lot more deals to be had.

But with all of those options, which one should you pick? Generally speaking, you want to buy the newest watch you can afford so that it continues to receive software updates from Apple. The latest update, watchOS 9, launched on the Apple Watch Series 4 and newer models in September, though no one can say with certainty whether the Series 4 will get the...

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The new Google Docs and Drive UI starts rolling out today

Illustration: Alex Castro / The Verge

Google has started to roll out an updated UI for Google Drive, Docs, Sheets, and Slides that’s meant to fit in with its Material Design 3 language. The apps still work the same way they used to, but Google writes in an announcement post that they should now be a bit more “simplified,” with less clutter and a few improvements and additions.

Writing about the update when it was announced in February, my colleague Jay Peters noted that it’s similar to Gmail’s new look, which makes sense given that Google says it’s trying to “streamline core collaboration journeys across our products.”

GIF: Google

Easily accessible filters are a nice new feature coming with the design update.

I’ll point you toward Jay’s article...

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Samsung’s 43-inch Mini LED Neo G7 comes in at $999.99

It’s a big screen. | Image: Samsung

Samsung has announced that its Odyssey Neo G7 monitor, which it revealed earlier this year, will cost $999.99 and is available today. For the money, you’ll be getting a 43-inch 4K Mini LED display that can run at 144Hz along with Samsung’s Smart Hub software that lets you use streaming services like GeForce Now, Xbox Game Pass, and Netflix without having to connect to a computer or console.

Samsung says the display has a matte coating that should help cut down on reflections and glare and that it has VESA Display HDR600 certification and FreeSync Premium Pro. The monitor also includes a healthy selection of I/O, including two HDMI 2.1 ports (one of which supports eArc), a DisplayPort 1.4 connector, and two USB 3 Type-A ports. It also...

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