It’s partnered with Starlink rival AST SpaceMobile on a direct-to-smartphone satellite service it plans to launch in Europe later this year.
The feature is supposed to help prevent malicious apps from gaining access to your phone’s storage, camera, and photos.
Google’s cheaper Pixel A-series phones usually launch in the summer, but the 9A might come early. Android Headlines reports that Google will open preorders on March 19th, with shipping a week later. Previous leaks reported that the phone will once again start at $499, but may break from recent Pixel design philosophy by ditching the camera bar.
[androidheadlines.com]
A teaser hints that we can expect the 3A series to have Nothing’s first triple-camera along with updated Glyph lighting when it launches on March 4th. Last year’s affordable 2A and 2A Plus never officially released in the US, and we don’t yet know if the 3A will change that. It’s separate from the regular Phone 3, which CEO Carl Pei promised would be “flagship” when it arrives.
According to Bloomberg and user reports, T-Mobile’s list of eligible devices for beta testing Starlink direct-to-cell connections now includes iPhones. While only a few Samsung Galaxy devices were supported at first, now iPhone owners with the most recent update can reportedly connect, as well as some people with Android 15 devices.
That gives those owners an alternative to Apple’s Globalstar-connected service while off the grid that works without pointing their phone at the sky first.
Carl Pei’s upstart tech brand teases a new launch on March 4th, right in the middle of the Mobile World Congress (MWC) event. The post hints at what might be the company’s first triple camera on a phone. Earlier this month Pei promised “a landmark smartphone launch” in Q1, but will this be the “flagship” Phone 3, or something else entirely?
Head of customer experience Jay Kim mentioned “multifold” devices during his section of the keynote, though we didn’t get any more detail than that. So far only Huawei has released commercial hardware that can fold more than once, but Samsung has demonstrated the tech in concept devices, and is rumored to have a launch planned this year.
The S25 will come with its own photo face swapping feature called Best Face. It looks a lot like Google’s Best Take on Pixel phones, letting you pick the best face from a series of photos so you can make sure everyone’s eyes are open in a group photo. No full body swaps, though.
Google’s Gemini VP Sissie Hsiao took the stage to show us how Gemini Live will now allow users to ask questions about images or PDFs onscreen. She also says Galaxy S25 owners will get six months of Google’s Gemini Advanced plan to try out the latest Gemini models and features. Not quite the year that Pixel 9 owners get, but nice!
Samsung is doubling down on the “AI will change your life” stuff. TM Roh calls it a “paradigm shift,” and it seems like “paradigm” was even the internal codename for the S25 phones — at least that’s the name that I spotted on a spec sheet last night. Setting the bar pretty high here!
Confused? It just means Samsung’s new flagships lack the magnets that Qi2 certification requires, but they will wirelessly juice at up to 15W on a Qi2 charger when using one of Samsung’s official Qi2 Ready magnet cases. They’re the first of what are expected to be a lot of Qi 2 Ready Android phones this year.
George Zhao, who’s led the smartphone brand since 2015, is stepping down for “personal reasons.” He oversaw the split from Huawei in 2020, and leaves following the global launch of the Magic 7 Pro flagship. He’s replaced by Jian Li, who’s been on Honor’s senior team since 2021 and — you’ll never guess — was at Huawei before that.
[Honor]
That’s according to Bloomberg’s sources, who say Germany and the UK are the company’s #2 and #3 biggest markets for phones, while earbuds sell best in the US, then the UK, Germany, and Japan.
As Nothing founder Carl Pei knows quite well from his time at OnePlus, you can’t truly push hard into the US without strong Verizon support. Here’s hoping!
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The Xiaomi spin-off brand just announced its latest affordable smartphones, the X7 and X7 Pro, which both pack flagship IP68 ratings despite starting at just £249 (around $306). The Pro model also marks the global debut of MediaTek’s flagship-adjacent Dimensity 8400-Ultra chip, which debuted in China last week in the Redmi Turbo 4 — which is almost exactly the same phone by another name.
