Two years ago I attended a picturesque outdoor wedding in August where the hot and humid weather had guests occasionally ducking into their cars to enjoy a blast of AC. Dyson’s new $99.99 handheld fan would have provided some much-needed relief then, although I’m not sure I would have been comfor...
Hi, friends! Welcome to Installer No. 124, your guide to the best and Verge-iest stuff in the world. (If you're new here, welcome, send me your Coachella fits, and also you can read all the old editions at the Installer homepage.) This week, I've been reading about restaurant bread and GLP-1s a...
With a vacation comes a big choice: What game should I focus on during the trip? I thought about grinding out the harder levels of Super Meat Boy 3D, but I was looking for something more chill. I could have dabbled more with Slay the Spire II, but I already know that's a game I'll be playing for ...
Welcome to our latest roundup of what's going on in the indie game space. Once again, there are some neat new games for you to check out this weekend. We've got a bunch of updates and announcements for upcoming titles to tell you about too. There have been a bunch of solid indie showcases lately ...
The James Bond franchise has a long history of getting pop stars to record its theme songs (perhaps most memorably with Live and Let Die), and it looks like that tradition will now extend to video game adaptations about the fictional spy. IO Interactive has announced that Lana Del Rey co-wrote an...
Last month, OpenAI gave up on its Sora video generation tool, and on Friday, the Sora team's leader, Bill Peebles, announced that he is leaving the company. OpenAI has been shifting its priorities as part of an effort to avoid "side quests," and Peebles' departure is just one of many recent chang...
The crew of NASA's Artemis II mission have safely returned to Earth, but if your Moon fever has yet to break, or you're curious to get a big picture view of how the second of a planned five Moon missions was pulled off, PBS has a new documentary you'll want to watch. The hour-long Return to the M...
Tinder users who prove they're a real person by visiting an identity-verifying orb will soon be able to get five free boosts in the app - and it's just the latest service to embrace the orb. World, which was co-founded by OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, initially tested Tinder verification using its facia...
The Trump administration has spent nearly two months fighting with AI company Anthropic. It's dubbed the company a "RADICAL LEFT, WOKE COMPANY" full of "Leftwing nut jobs" and a menace to national security. But some of the ice may reportedly be melting between the two, thanks to Anthropic's buzzy...
The specter of price hikes caused by the current AI-driven demand for memory and storage appears to have convinced a fair share of people to buy a new computer. According to data analyzed by Counterpoint Research, global PC shipments grew around 3.2 percent year-over-year in Q1 2026, "driven by p...
Prediction market exchanges have created an environment where just about any piece of information is potentially monetizable: How well will BTS's new song perform this week? How hot will Los Angeles get? Will Donald Trump be impeached? Users can wager on all of that and, on some platforms, more g...
I kind of wish it just took pictures. I've never been as charmed and frustrated by one gadget as I have with the Poetry Camera. It's a delightful object. White and cherry red with a color-matched woven strap, it looks playful and adorably lo-fi. If I saw it on a store shelf, I'd absolutely pick...
Sam Altman's cryptocurrency turned identity verification startup Tools for Humanity is offering a new set of perks to people who scan their eyes at one of the company's orbs. Among them, is a new tool called Concert Kit that could help bands and artists fight back against ticket scalping bots. T...
NASA has confirmed the pending launch of the European Space Agency's (ESA) Rosalind Franklin rover, which is being sent to Mars. The current plan is to launch via a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket from Kennedy Space Center. The timing is still being worked out, but the space agency says this won't hap...
Panic, the company behind the tiny and excellent Playdate console, is taking a stand on generative AI. The company has published an AI disclosure that says as of this month, the Playdate Catalog “will no longer accept titles that use ‘Generative AI’ for art, audio, music, text, or dialog.” Panic ...
The iPhone 17E is the best cheap iPhone, no surprises there. | Photo: Allison Johnson / The Verge Over the last few months, every phone maker under the sun has refreshed its lineups, especially at the affordable end, with no major budget phone launches now expected until next year. That made it...
Some of us take a kind of “eat to live” rather than a “live to eat” approach to gadgets. They’re tools that help you get things done, not something you want to invest a lot of time or money in. If that’s you — and there’s no judgment here from a certifiable gadget nerd — then you can probably thi...
Dairy Queen is becoming the latest fast food chain to get in on AI, as it's bringing a chatbot to dozens of its drive-thrus across the US and Canada. It aims to help speed up drive-thru service and "encourage customers to add more food to their orders," according to The Wall Street Journal. Follo...
The rules of Exit 8, both the cult indie game and the recent film adaptation, are simple: You're stuck in a subway station that loops around endlessly. If you notice any anomalies on your current loop, you turn around. If everything is the same, you keep going forward. Each successful guess takes...
The latest AirPods Pro $50 off at multiple retailers, which is their second-best price to date. From OLED TVs to smartphones, Best Buy’s Upgrade Sale has slashed prices on all kinds of tech, including a wide range of Apple devices. We’ve rounded up the best deals from the sale here, but one of ...