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If you live in a region where WhatsApp is the primary messaging app, you'll realize that the chat list can get crowded pretty quickly. This is particularly true today with businesses joining the platform to touch base with their customers (although it's largely just spam). Makers of WhatsApp understood way back in 2017 that the ability to pin your favorite conversations to the top of the chat list should be a thing, but restricted users to just three chats. Nearly seven years have passed since, and WhatsApp is finally getting around to letting users pin two additional conversations, according to the app's latest beta for Android.
Nothing's latest feature is highly illegal in many regions
A 'discreet' call recording functionality is now available
The Nothing Phone 2a is now official and reaching customers, but it's only available as part of a developer program in the US, missing out on standard retail availability via Amazon, Best Buy, etc. Hot on the heels of the phone's global release, Nothing CEO Carl Pei has announced the rollout of a new "discreet" recorder widget for all three of its phones — the Phone 1, Phone 2, and the Phone 2a.
Samsung Galaxy S23 picks up the March 2024 security update in the US
It's not the update you were eagerly waiting for
Samsung is ahead of the curve among smartphone makers in terms of timely software updates. Despite taking a while to issue the first security patch for the Galaxy S24 series, the company was quick to make amends by rolling out the March update for the flagship trio on the first day of the month. It's now the turn of the unlocked models of the Galaxy S23 to pick up the March security patch in the US, days after some carrier variants received it.
WhatsApp is testing a label to specify that your chats are encrypted
The chat app has come a long way since 2021
Encryption is one of the crucial aspects of modern-day messaging apps, ensuring conversations always remain protected. While WhatsApp has offered end-to-end encryption on chats and video calls for a while now, and the chat app has also gradually worked on increasing the visibility of encryption indicators, like the one we've seen in WhatsApp beta releases dating back to 2021. The latest version of the app's beta contains one such indicator directly below the contact or group's name.
Google casually confirms the Pixel 8a's existence
Meanwhile, the Battery information page is coming back with the midranger
The Google Pixel 8a is expected to debut in a couple of months' time, possibly at I/O 2024. There's not much we know about the device except for the information gleaned from pre-launch leaks and unofficial renders of the midranger. However, a Googler has now revealed that a recently removed Android feature would be coming back on the Pixel 8a and newer devices.
Google is busy fine-tuning its AI chatbot, Gemini, although much of the recent coverage has revolved around its inability to generate accurate images of people. However, the team behind the company's current AI efforts also has other obstacles to deal with, such as inconsistent Wi-Fi speeds, a new report has found.
Google Wallet will auto-add boarding passes and movie tickets from Gmail
A new manual archiving option is also available
Google Wallet is the singular destination for viewing all your credit/debit cards, passes, tickets, digital car keys, etc., while also supporting tap-to-pay transactions on your Android smartphone. But there's always room for improvement, and the service is now making things easier for users by automatically pulling info from Gmail to add boarding passes and movie tickets to Wallet.
Android will soon get Windows-style sticky keys for physical keyboards
Future Android versions could also add support for slow keys
Android 14 QPR3 won't be out for the masses until June, but we already have a decent idea about what it will bring to the table, thanks to beta releases. The second Android 14 QPR3 beta dropped this week, and although some are experiencing bricked devices while sideloading the update, we've learned a fair bit more about what the next quarterly platform release (QPR) will look like. Android sleuth Mishaal Rahman has detailed several of the changes, both big and small, included with the new release. We can now add another to the list, focusing on physical keyboards.
WhatsApp will unleash all-new Unicode 15.1 emojis on Android
The latest beta includes a phoenix, lime, an edible mushroom, and more
There have been a couple of interesting additions to WhatsApp over the past few days, with a beta version revealing the long-awaited inclusion of a sticker maker/editor. Not much later, we learned that Android could soon start showing WhatsApp calls in the Google Phone app, something that iOS already does with its stock Phone app. Similarly, the all-new Unicode 15.1 emojis are now visible on WhatsApp for Android's emoji keyboard, a feature that made its way to iPhones with iOS 17.4 recently.
Some Samsung Pass users have found the fingerprint scanner is missing
Where did the fingerprint scanner go?
We can find a plethora of password manager apps scattered across the internet today. However, Samsung Galaxy device owners have a first-party solution to perform this task, known as Samsung Pass. However, the introduction of Samsung Wallet — which consolidated the attributes of Samsung Pass and Samsung Pay — meant that Pass went on the backburner a little bit. Despite this change, there are still many who continue to use Pass as a password manager on their Galaxy smartphones. But things seemingly aren't working as they should, with multiple user reports claiming the Pass app is failing to let users in.
The Google Pixel Watch 3 might supercharge Watch Unlock with UWB
A big step up from the existing Bluetooth-based Watch Unlock
The Google Pixel Watch 2 ranks among the top Android-based smartwatches you can get today. One of the many features we like about the wearable is Watch Unlock, first teased over a year ago and formally introduced to the first-gen Pixel Watch and the Pixel Watch 2 last December. This basically enables the Pixel Watch to unlock a nearby Pixel phone by bringing the two close together, leveraging Bluetooth to communicate with the smartphone. We're now learning that Google could make Watch Unlock even better with the rumored Pixel Watch 3 by introducing UWB (ultra-wideband).
WhatsApp's sticker creator is finally making it to Android
Create your own fun stickers using images
Stickers have been a big part of WhatsApp's feature set since 2018 when it was made available to both Android and iOS versions of the app. Animated stickers made their way to WhatsApp a couple of years later, with not much changing since then, barring some minor improvements. Despite going toe-to-toe with some of the best messaging apps in the business today, the Meta-owned platform didn't allow users to create their own stickers from photos. That could be changing soon for Android users, with the latest beta version of the app featuring a dedicated sticker maker/editor.
WhatsApp inches closer to enabling chats from third-party apps
The latest WhatsApp beta offers more details on third-party chats
The European Commission's landmark Digital Markets Act (DMA) is set to come into effect by March 6, 2024, and we've already learned how companies like Google plan to comply with the regulation. Meta-owned messaging service WhatsApp is among the few apps designated as a gatekeeper, meaning it has to provide interoperability with other messaging apps like Signal or Telegram before the deadline. We've already seen an under-development version of third-party messaging way back in September. A couple of the app's beta versions over the weekend have revealed how this could be implemented.
One can currently find more than a dozen decent web browsers for Android, but Mozilla Firefox is undoubtedly among the best out there. While the browser's experience on Android phones is as smooth as it can get, the same cannot be said for Firefox on Android tablets. It is essentially a scaled-up version of the smartphone app and doesn't properly utilize the additional real estate on offer. Thankfully, we learned in January that Mozilla is working on a tablet-optimized version of the app. It now looks like developers are closer to rolling out this redesign more widely, with the updated tab bar appearing on the latest Nightly.
New Google Drive update will help videos load much faster
The long-awaited search filters are also making it to Drive
Google Drive is one of our favorite cloud-based file storage solutions, and the seamless integration with Workspace makes it all the more desirable to those in the ecosystem. Uploading videos to Google Drive is as easy as it gets, thanks to sharing tools built into the Android share sheet. But video playback hasn't been on par with fellow Google-run service, YouTube, even if the video player looks indistinguishable from the video streaming platform. The Google Drive team has now announced a couple of features for Drive, one of which tries to remedy the subpar video playback on the file storage app.
YouTube Music's enhanced overflow menu is now widely available
The redesign includes three large buttons in the overflow menu
While YouTube Music may not be as big as Spotify or Apple Music, the service continues its efforts to become a viable competitor. Although big features like podcasts only made it to the app less than a year ago, developers behind the streaming service have been busy at work testing new visual elements for YouTube Music. Then in December, we learned that Google could introduce large buttons in the overflow menu to shrink the long list of controls. These enlarged buttons for Play next, Save to playlist, and Share, are now widely making it to YouTube Music on Android.
The next Samsung Galaxy Unpacked could happen sooner than you think
The Galaxy Z Fold 6 and Z Flip 6 may launch by early July
Samsung took the wraps off the Galaxy Z Fold 5 and the Z Flip 5 in late July last year, although leaks prior to their arrival had revealed everything we needed to know. But the company may not wait that long for the Galaxy Z Flip 6 and the Z Fold 6 this year, according to a new report.
The Google Pixel 8 wins GSMA's Best Smartphone award at MWC 2024
Beating the iPhone 15 Pro, OnePlus Open, Samsung Galaxy S23, and others
The Google Pixel 8 is one of the best smartphones you can buy today, with the Pixel 8 Pro being Android Police's best smartphone of 2023. The accolades don't stop here for the Pixel 8 series, as the Google flagship has now been adjudged the Best Smartphone (2023) at the Global Mobile Awards (GLOMO) organized by the GSMA each year.
A new clamshell folding phone is coming this year as competition heats up
Honor just announced that it will enter the flip phone market this year
Flip phones today are significantly different from what we used to see a decade or so ago. While the likes of Samsung and Motorola are ahead of the curve in terms of modern-day clamshell foldables, plenty of other manufacturers have since joined the fray. Chinese manufacturer Honor has now confirmed plans to launch a clamshell foldable of its own, with the company's book-style foldable, the Magic V2, already making an impact with its thin form factor.
Your Google TV's home screen is getting a nice makeover
Google has been working on this redesign for a while now
We really love the Google TV platform for all that it brings to the table, with the platform receiving a performance upgrade back in December, bringing faster load times and other enhancements. Google is now announcing a visual overhaul for Google TV with a couple of visual changes and minor tweaks to existing functionality.