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The browser wars have entered a new phase this year: The fight isn’t just over search results anymore — it’s over which company’s AI gets to act on your behalf inside the browser. Google Chrome and Apple’s Safari still dominate the market overall, with Chrome’s edge coming largely from how aggressively it has woven generative AI into search. But 2026 has brought a wave of new entrants — from well-funded startups to Big Tech — all betting that the browser is about to become less like a window onto the web and more like an assistant that gets things done…
Ahead of the premiere of Spider-Man: Brand New Day on July 31, Samsung is tingling spidey senses with an original story showing how its Galaxy Z Fold 8 can withstand the superhero’s lifestyle.The tech giant is capitalizing on the world’s highest-grossing media franchise to promote series 8 of its foldable Galaxy Z products, which it unveiled today (July 22) at Samsung Galaxy Unpacked Live, alongside its Spider-Man campaign created in partnership with Sony Pictures.The ad stars Jacob Batalon reprising his role as Spider-Man’s trusty sidekick Ned Leeds, while the actor behind the superhero’s mask is never revealed. Behind the scenes,…
Cascade, a startup building a platform to help architecture, engineering, and construction firms find and win projects, has raised a $3.5 million seed round from Andreessen Horowitz Speedrun, Ada Ventures, and Snowball VC. Launched in 2025, Cascade is a result of its founders, Hannia Zia and Joana Ferreira, witnessing firsthand the difficulty construction businesses face with predictably securing work. “My mother worked in a company that sold materials to construction companies, and my uncle built mansions in the Middle East. They’re incredible at their craft but just don’t have access to the right tools to get more work,” Ferreira told…
Think “folding phone,” and Samsung probably comes to mind. The company has led the charge in the category since it debuted the first Galaxy Fold in 2019. It has refined the hardware of its Fold and Flip devices ever since, making them thinner, lighter, and stronger.So what’s next? A new shape, apparently. On Wednesday, at its second Galaxy Unpacked event of the year, Samsung revealed a brand-new design for the Galaxy Fold8—a passport-shaped, book-like fold—which sits in between the now-rebranded Galaxy Z Fold8 Ultra and the compact Galaxy Z Flip8.Drew Blackard, Samsung’s senior vice president of Mobile Product Management, says…
WhatsApp is rolling out a suite of new features, including a revamped Apple CarPlay and Android Auto experience as part of the Meta-owned company’s broader push to make its app a more complete cross-device communication platform rather than one just used for mobile messaging. The platform is also launching the ability for users to sign up for WhatsApp directly from their iPad, share what they’re listening to, and open PDFs directly in the app. WhatsApp has also improved its integration with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto — apps that run on a smartphone and wirelessly communicate with a vehicle’s infotainment…
Samsung has steadily improved its foldables, but the eighth annual update includes a fresh face, the Z Fold8, which features the long-rumored wide form factor. It slots in between the flagship Z Fold8 Ultra, which is the successor to last year’s Fold7, and the smaller Flip8, which succeeds the Flip7. Is the newcomer an awkward middle child or the glue that holds Samsung’s folding family together? Samsung also has a couple of new smartwatches, the Galaxy Watch Ultra2 and Watch9.The new phones are available for preorder, but before you get yours, let’s dig into the details to help you decide…
Within a day of Spain winning the FIFA 2026 World Cup, American Eagle made a bold move. The retailer temporarily rebranded as “Lamine’s Eagles,” honoring Lamine Yamal, Spain’s star player and an American Eagle brand ambassador since January. It also renamed one of its classic jeans The AE 19, after Yamal’s jersey number and age. Now, the brand is applying the same kind of speed and fluidity to win the back-to-school season. The stakes are high in a busy and competitive retail period, or what chief marketing officer Craig Brommers has dubbed “the World Cup of denim.”
Snap is the latest big tech company to settle a lawsuit that claimed social media platforms are harmful to children and young adults. The company has reached a “tentative” agreement in a case that was set to go to trial later this month. TikTok recently settled its portion of the case with the plaintiff, known by the initials “R.K.C.,” ahead of a jury trial that starts next week in Los Angeles. YouTube has also reached a deal, leaving Meta as the only remaining defendant. Meta has lost similar child safety lawsuits focused on social media, including one in New Mexico…
I used the Busy Bar in WIRED’s open office, and my coworkers mostly just ignored it. One person jokingly asked if I was too busy for him, but then we just talked about other things anyway. When I needed to record audio in our studio, I flipped the Busy Bar to ON AIR mode and faced it outside on the glass. While the screen is bright, the small device isn’t exactly easy to spot from across the vast expanse of an open office. (To be fair, we also have a much larger ON AIR sign on the studio as well,…
Kaiwei Tang helped create the iconic Motorola Razr over 20 years ago. Now, 10 years into building Light, the startup behind the minimalist smartphone alternative Light Phone, he’s as surprised as anyone that his customers are begging for a flip phone. “We’ve been interviewing young people that use flip phones for a few years,” Tang told TechCrunch, describing a pattern his team kept running into: Gen Z users love their flip phones but say the build quality is bad. “They’re describing the flip phones in negative language, but they stick with it, and they feel proud.” So Tang and co-founder…
The Trump administration has sued at least five states and the city of Philadelphia over laws that supporters say would hold law enforcement—including Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers—accountable for misconduct on the job. The specifics of the laws vary, but the Trump administration takes particular issue with the fact that the laws would prohibit ICE officers from wearing masks during immigration raids, and require them to wear some sort of individual identifier.Having to show their faces, lawyers for the Trump administration argue, would put ICE officers in danger.In complaints filed against New York, Virginia, Connecticut, New Jersey, and Philadelphia, attorneys…
Glow, a cybersecurity startup founded by former Meta and Snowflake executives, emerged from stealth as a unicorn, betting that artificial intelligence is reshaping how enterprises secure employee devices. The Palo Alto-headquartered startup on Wednesday said it raised $180 million in an all-equity Series A funding round that valued it at $1.2 billion, with backing from Sequoia Capital, Cyberstarts, Greenoaks, and Redpoint Ventures, alongside participation from Index Ventures, Swish Ventures, Lux Capital, Operator Collective, and Holly Ventures. The investment made Glow one of the latest cybersecurity startups to achieve unicorn status before publicly disclosing revenue metrics. As more enterprises deploy AI…
Increasingly convinced that they hadn’t defamed anyone, the Bark staffers weighed their options. After school, Mueller, Schneider, Bishop, and another Bark editor sat down on the blue couches in their newsroom for a grueling four-hour debate. Painstakingly, they double-checked every single word on Mueller’s slide, verifying it against the federal documents.They were on the verge of deciding to leave the Instagram post alone. But after Schneider headed out for the evening, the students kept second-guessing themselves. They ended up deciding to temporarily archive Mueller’s most controversial slide until they could meet with school officials in person. “I think at the…
Meta is bringing parental supervision tools to Threads, the company announced on Tuesday. With the new tools, parents and guardians will be able to view their teen’s time spent on Threads, set daily time limits, adjust sleep mode, and manage their privacy settings through Family Center, Meta’s hub for parental controls across its apps. The rollout follows growing pressure on Meta from regulators and lawmakers to better protect young users online. The company has spent the last several years expanding parental controls across its apps in response to concerns over excessive screen time, harmful content, and teen safety, and is…
For years, Synthesia’s pitch was to use AI to help enterprises create interactive training videos, in minutes, for a fraction of the cost normally associated with developing corporate educational materials. The startup’s newest product is making a different bet — that the real moat in enterprise AI isn’t just generating content, but in proving that it worked. On Wednesday, the British startup launched Roleplay Sessions, an interactive training product where employees can practice high-stakes conversations like sales pitches, performance reviews, and customer complaints with an AI avatar that talks back, pushes back, and then scores them against a rubric. Roleplay…
Tesla has brought an unspecified number of its unsupervised Model Y SUVs to Orlando and Tampa, just one day ahead of the company’s scheduled second-quarter earnings call. That marks the third city in Florida where Tesla is trialing its nascent robotaxi service, following a small launch in Miami a few weeks ago. The two new cities appear to have fairly small operational areas, and Tesla did not offer any further details about the launch. As some fans have noticed, Tesla announced autonomous fleets in Dallas and Houston before its first-quarter earnings release but has yet to scale those operations. The…