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Google launched an app on iOS last year called Motion Stills that could capture short videos as GIFs with advanced stabilization technology. Android users were a bit miffed to be left out, but Google has finally produced an Android version of the app. You can grab it now in the Play Store.
Tasker is a massively popular app with those who want to mod and tweak their Android devices to the extreme. This automation app has looked dated lately, but the new version fixes that. This v5.0 update hit beta testing last month, and now it's rolling out in the Play Store for everyone to enjoy.
The Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus launched with three color options in the US, but now Samsung is adding a new one to the mix. The Coral Blue Galaxy S8 is launching on July 21st, but you won't be able to get it everywhere. This phone will be sold by Samsung and Best Buy only.
Google launched Wear 2.0 many moons ago in early 2017, and here we are in the middle of summer and some watches are still waiting on the update after a series of delays. The ZenWatch 2 is no longer among them... at least the larger version. That watch is getting the Wear 2.0 update as we speak while the small version continues to wait.
Newer builds of OnePlus' OxygenOS include a custom weather app. It's not as comprehensive as some apps, but it looks nice. Now, that app has arrived in the Play Store. It's only for OnePlus phones, but the company will be able to update it with new features without updating the whole phone.
The OnePlus 5 offers a lot of features you don't usually see in a phone that costs under $500 like a dual camera, lightning fast fingerprint sensor, and a Snapdragon 835 SoC. However, owners of this phone say it may not be so good at one very basic and important feature—calling 911. Apparently the OnePlus 5 might reboot if you dial emergency services, which is a pretty serious problem.
It's time for the next installment of "The Messaging Mess," an unintentional comedy series from Google. After focusing on Allo as a consumer messaging platform, Google has taken to removing features from Hangouts. At the same time, it's launched a pair of business-oriented Hangouts services known as Meet and Chat. However, only Meet is generally available. Starting today, Meet has chat, but it's not Hangouts Chat. It's all so simple.
Adobe Lightroom is getting an update today that apparently includes a completely redesigned interface. The company says it's now fully native to Android, but don't expect it to look considerably different. It does most of the same things, but it's a bit smoother and faster while doing them.
Google is preparing to kill the blob emoji in Android O, which will feature more conventional emoji faces. I just want to go on record saying I love the Android blob emoji, or blobmoji if you will. As if this injustice was not enough, Google is using World Emoji Day to talk about the death of the blobmoji. It's giving us some stickers to make up for it, but you have to use Allo to send them.
Google Wifi came out last year to join the increasingly competitive mesh router market. It has a competitive price compared to the competition, and we found the performance to be solid. It might be nice if it had a few more features, though, right? That's where the GaleForce project comes in. You can use GaleForce to tweak your Google Wifi and gain root access, but it's not for the faint of heart.
We're coming up on a year since Allo launched, and some features we all wanted remain missing. There's no SMS support, no multi-device messaging, and no desktop client. Oh, Google keeps promising the desktop app, but instead we're getting message reactions. Yay?
RuneScape is one of the oldest MMORPGs still in active development, and developer Jagex isn't just keeping the lights on. It's planning a substantial expansion of RuneScape's capabilities in the coming months. A mobile client for the current version of RuneScape is on the way, and that's not all. The classic "Old School RuneScape" is also heading to mobile.
Samsung Pay started with support for a subset of credit and debit cards when it launched almost two years ago. Over time, Samsung added new cards and banks to the service. Today, it's adding something that isn't a card—PayPal accounts. Plug in your account, and you can pay with PayPal anywhere Samsung Pay is accepted.
Netgear's Arlo cameras are a solid choice if you need to stick some cameras in places where you don't have a power outlet. The current-gen Arlo Pro cameras can run for about six months on a charge, and they reliably detect motion... all motion. That can mean a lot of notifications if you place a camera outside, but the upcoming Arlo Smart feature will let you filter notifications based on what the camera has actually seen.
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The addition of Chromecast network notifications probably seemed like a good idea at the time. They allow you to control media even if you aren't the one who started playback. However, you see those notifications on your device even if you're not watching or listening to the content, and you can end up with multiple cast notifications on a busy network. Google is finally making these notifications optional with a toggle that turns off all the network notifications for your Chromecast or Google Home.
There's a nice weekend sale going on right now over at eBay with 20% off various items. The sale is technically for back to school (a little early for that, no?), but it includes a lot of phones and other bits of phone-related tech. There are 38 stores participating in the deal, so you've got lots of options.
As AT&T continues to push for approval of its $85 billion acquisition of Time Warner, the company's leadership has released details of how the new mega-corporation would be structured. The plan calls for the new AT&T to split into independent arms, one handling media and the other doing telecom. This may appease regulators, but things aren't changing at the top.
Google is always adding something new to Maps, but not everyone gets the new stuff at the same time. Right now, it looks like Google has added a nifty travel time graph to directions so you'll know how much traffic there will be. This appears to be one of the rare instances where a new feature was quietly rolled out to all users in the space of a few weeks.
A new version of the Daydream VR app is rolling out today, and it's more than just a bug fix. Google says the Daydream Home interface has been tweaked for better content discovery, and the controller should be less annoying in several ways. If you don't want to wait, we've got the APK all set for you to sideload.
Maybe you saw our big Pixel 2 leak the other day? Now that the cat is out of the bag, other bits of info are beginning to leak out. Over at XDA, they've got a few more potential details on this upcoming phone, including what we can expect the fancy new edge-to-edge display to do.