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Does Visible work in Mexico?
Visible's premium Visible+ plan not only comes with faster 5G access, but roaming in Mexico and Canada is inlcuded in the price.
Visible is a prepaid carrier owned by Verizon that specializes in unlimited data and plan simplicity. In the United States, customers get totally unlimited data on Verizon’s LTE and 5G network with taxes and fees included. Visible’s cheapest plan comes in at $30 per month with its only international features being free calls to Mexico and Canada. If you want to roam in these countries, you’ll need to upgrade to the $45 Visible+ plan which also comes with some domestic perks like access to faster 5G speeds and 50GB of premium data.
Play Store accepting gambling apps in US and 14 other countries starting March 1
Non-gambling contests get a boost in new policies
Up to now, Google has only Android users in the U.K., Ireland, France, and Brazil to download apps from the Play Store to partake in real money gambling. But starting from this spring, the company will enact a policy update to expand their availability to 15 countries including the United States.
Xiaomi rolls out Mexican firmware to global Mi A3 units, breaks dual-SIM functionality
That's a 'yikes' from us
Xiaomi is cautioning Mi A3 owners not to download a global firmware update because of "a serious bug" that prevents dual-SIM customers from utilizing both slots. The warning comes after an Indian user came into trouble with his OTA.
Spotify has been working on proper lyrics support for ages. It likely takes this long to implement the seemingly simple feature in part due to licensing issues surrounding songtexts, which already led to a lawsuit against Google. Spotify seems to have finally found a suitable solution, as TechCrunch reports that the company is planning to roll out lyrics synced with music to 26 markets today. The US, Canada, and the UK aren't among these, though.
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- While a lot of Google services start out as US exclusives, many ultimately expand their reach internationally. But the nature of that expansion can vary wildly, and while some offerings are quick to find global support, others spread at a far more reserved pace. A couple months back we saw the first, early steps Google was taking to bring YouTube Premium discounts to students in more countries. Now that access is seriously expanding, with availability extending to students in an additional 20 countries:
Until today, YouTube Music Premium and YouTube Premium plans offered special pricing for students, though only in the USA. But now, the reduced cost option is available in eight new countries.
A few days ago, we reported that the Play Store is beginning to offer a new payment option for users. Starting in Mexico, users can top up their balance at a convenience store, so they don't need to have a credit card, carrier billing, or any other payment method linked to their account. At I/O, Google officially introduced the feature and explained how it works.
For users around the world, there are different ways to pay for purchases on Google Play. The most widely supported method is a credit card, but that's far from a ubiquitous possession in many countries. That's why Google Play offers carrier billing, Paypal integration, gift cards, and various other ways to simplify paying for apps, games, and other digital goods. But the easiest way of all is cash, and this is how you could soon start topping up your Play balance.
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Google One's launch has been fraught with delays and pseudo-announcements. The unifying storage service was introduced in May, but only select users got invited to try it out, then Google re-announced it again a few weeks ago, saying it was available to everyone in the US. But we all know that just meant it was starting to be available to all. Now comes the news that One is finally stepping outside the borders of the USA and going south to Mexico, Brazil, and Argentina, then sailing across the Pacific to Australia.
With mobile data getting faster and smartphones having larger storage, you'd be forgiven if you thought the need for slimmer and more efficient apps is dwindling. Quite the contrary, many developers are building bigger apps with overflowing features, which are not optimized enough for the lower-end devices and slower networks that are still found all around the world. To provide an alternative and avoid alienating this large user base, these developers are making "lite" versions of their apps — we've already seen this happen with Facebook, Facebook Messenger, Twitter, Uber, LinkedIn, Skype, Shazam, and all of Google's Go apps. Instagram is now joining the fold with its own Lite app.
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We knew it was bound to happen when Google Home added support for Mexican Spanish, but now the Home and Home Mini speakers have officially launched in Mexico and are available for purchase.
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- Google has announced this officially.
¡Hola! If you speak Spanish and prefer to talk to your virtual assistants in that language, then I have good news for you. Google Home's settings have been updated now so you can choose Español as your default language for your smart speakers.
It's really easy to take internet connectivity for granted: between increasingly capable cellular networks, and high-speed private Wi-Fi access points in our homes and workplaces, staying connected 24/7 is more effortless than it's ever been. At least, that may be the case for some of us, but wireless infrastructure varies wildly around the globe, and there are millions of fellow users out there who would no doubt love to see their local internet access seriously overhauled. Today Google's doing what it can to help, as it announces the availability of free public Wi-Fi in over sixty popular areas across Mexico as part of an expansion of Google Station.
Samsung Pay launched in South Korea back in 2015, then expanded into the US, China, and more for a total of 19 official markets before today. Now, Samsung adds number 20: Mexico. You may be thinking, "didn't that already happen?" Well, apparently the appearance of the landing page last November was not the full launch.
Back in August, Verizon split its unlimited data plan into three separate plans - Go Unlimited, Beyond Unlimited, and Business Unlimited. All three plans have limitations on video streaming, tethering, and international usage. But starting on January 25, Go Unlimited will include limited service to Mexico and Canada.
WhatsApp Business was officially announced in September of 2017 but back then you had to sign up for a beta, register your interest, and hope to be picked to give it a try. Now the app is made official and it's launching for Android in 5 countries to begin with, with a roll out "around the world" in the coming weeks. The lucky five are: Indonesia, Italy, Mexico, the UK, and the US. Yes, the US, where everyone says they don't use WhatsApp. I also find it odd that the launch post mentions how businesses in India and Brazil rely on WhatsApp a lot for their communications, but then these two countries aren't among the list to get it first. Maybe WhatsApp wants to make sure things are smooth before rolling it out to its widest potential markets.
Our neighbor up north, Canada, has had Samsung Pay for some time now, though the service has only just begun to expand there. Now it's our southern neighbor's turn; the MST-based mobile payment service has just hit Mexico.
Google has another major event lined up for today, where the announcement of the Pixel 2, Google Home Mini, Pixelbook, and other devices will likely take place. It looks like more countries could get the chance to buy Google hardware (maybe including the upcoming products), because the Google Store is expanding to more nations.
Amazon introduced calling and messaging to its Echo speakers back in May then implemented the same feature inside the Alexa app so you could start a call or receive one from your phone, without having to be near your Echo. However, the feature had one main limitation: the person you were calling had to have an Echo or at least Alexa calling set up. Calls to phone numbers weren't possible, but now they are.Amazon secretly enabled the option a couple of days ago and has now officially added it to the Alexa app changelog. After setting up Alexa calling and messaging in the app's Conversations tab, you can say something like, "Call dad's phone," or, "Call dad's mobile phone number," and it will perform a call to the phone number. Your dad will see the number associated with your Amazon account or an "unknown caller" if you decide to opt out of showing your number. You can also call a specific number if you don't have the contact in your address book, by saying, "Call 123456789."The function is live for phone numbers in the US, Canada, and Mexico. It works on Echo devices (Echo, Echo Show, Echo Plus, Echo Dot, Echo Spot, but not on the Echo Tap seemingly) as well as through the Alexa app which was updated to add the function.
In the wake of natural disasters, it seems like an unofficial race begins between all the US carriers. Which among them will be the first to provide free calls or credits? With the double-whammy of Hurricane Maria and the earthquake in Mexico, T-Mobile, AT&T, and Verizon have all released statements about how customers in affected areas can continue to access service. To make things easy, we've put all the statements from each of the carriers together here.
At 11:50 PM local time on Thursday (4:50 AM GMT), an 8.1-magnitude earthquake struck off the coast of Mexico, near its border with Guatemala and Belize. The tremors were felt in Mexico City, hundreds of miles away from the epicenter, and caused extensive damage in the southern cities of Juchitán, Oaxaca, Chiapas. In response to this disaster, several US carriers are making calls and texts free to Mexico.