Tag: how to

How Google’s Satellite eSOS Works During Emergencies on the Pixel 9

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You should be sure to keep your personal information up to date. That includes your emergency contacts (which you can configure at Settings > Safety & Emergency > Emergency Contacts) and your Google Account. Your “name, email, phone number, location, device information, and emergency contacts are shared with emergency services and satellite service providers.”

When you tap Start on Satellite SOS, you’ll first be prompted to answer a few questions about your emergency, like whether you’re in a vehicle, and if anyone is in immediate danger. Once you answer these questions, you can then connect to a satellite. You’ll see a giant circle on the screen suggesting directions to point your phone. It’ll need to be flat in your palm, and you’ll need to be outdoors, away from buildings, trees, and mountains (as best as you can). For the best signal, make sure your grip doesn’t interact with the upper half of the Pixel.

Photograph: Julian Chokkattu

Once you point your phone in the right direction, it should connect. Now you’ll get a text message view where you can send messages to emergency services detailing the situation, and hopefully, you’ll have first responders en route soon after.

Now just because you can use smartphones like the Pixel 9 or iPhone 15 to reach emergency responders via satellite doesn’t mean your phone is suddenly the best option for backcountry connectivity. Satellite messengers are more rugged and durable, and since you’re probably not using them all the time like you would be using a smartphone, they have better battery life. They also offer more features, like creating waypoints. All in all, Satellite eSOS is a helpful backup feature, but if you’re regularly going to be in remote areas with limited to no cell connectivity, there’s still a place for dedicated satellite messengers.

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Julian Chokkattu

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August 24, 2024
The Best Apps for Distraction-Free Writing

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iA Writer has dark mode and shortcut integration for macOS, iOS, and iPadOS. Plus it’s just plain pretty. Given the high price though, you have to be pretty dedicated to the idea of a distraction-free working environment to spring for iA Writer.

Ulysses

The basic layout and feature set of Ulysses isn’t terribly different from iA Writer. There’s a sidebar for navigating and organizing your files, and a large main pane for composing. But it’s definitely more feature-rich, including tools for goal tracking and proofreading. Thanks to its simple but thoughtful organization system, you could probably even use Ulysses as a note-taking app in a pinch.

Like iA Writer it has a typewriter mode with line highlighting and text scrolling. But you have to turn on the various parts of it individually the first time. One of its bigger draws is its styles that allow you to export documents using templates customized for scripts, novels, blog posts, and more.

The knock against Ulysses is that it’s available only as a $40 annual subscription. And it’s strictly for macOS, iOS, and iPadOS. If you’re a Windows user, you’re out of luck.

FocusWriter

This is perhaps the most bare-bones of the bunch, but it shouldn’t be overlooked. FocusWriter has all the basics you’d expect from a text editor, including spell check and the ability to have multiple documents open simultaneously. It also has tools for serious writers, like stat tracking and goal setting.

Unlike most of the other apps here, FocusWriter uses rich text (RTF) for formatting instead of Markdown. It probably has the most customizable interface of the bunch, though. You can meticulously choose the interface colors, fonts, and background.

One of the biggest draws will be that it’s free and open source, though right now it’s available for Windows and Linux only. While you can probably get it running on macOS if you know your way around a command line, it will take some legwork, and there’s no mobile client or file syncing.

OmmWriter

The idea of distraction-free writing is, inherently, kind of gimmicky. But OmmWriter is probably the most gimmicky of the bunch. It doesn’t just strip away the extraneous nonsense; it aims to immerse you in an environment conducive to a flow state. That includes gentle soundscapes to help you focus and even various typing sound effects to enhance the vibes.

If you want more audible feedback while typing, but don’t want to invest in a nice mechanical keyboard, this might do the job. Though, the very slight lag between your fingers hitting the keys and the sound coming out of the speakers bugged me.

Otherwise, the UI is pretty bare, with a resizable text box in the center and a few buttons to the right for changing settings. It’s the cheapest of the commercial options here at $9.93 for macOS or Windows. But you can also give it a whirl in your browser by playing with a stripped down version for free.

Scrivener

Scrivener has a dedicated following among long-form writers, and for good reason. While the app does have an excellent distraction-free mode, complete with typewriter-style scrolling, it also sports advanced organizing tools that you’re sure to appreciate if you’re working on a book or a screenplay. It’s made specifically with longer writing projects in mind.

Its project outlines make it simple to collect research or rearrange ideas until you find what clicks. When it comes time to actually write, the full screen composition mode gets rid of everything but the text box. It’s the most minimal of editors.

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Terrence O’Brien

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August 21, 2024
How to Print Something in 2024

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Whatever printer you buy, make sure you’re happy with its wireless-printing capabilities. Modern printers typically allow you to print from any device on your home Wi-Fi network—from both computers and mobile devices—eliminating the old-school need to hook a cable up to a PC. On some printers, leaving the device unused for a long time can affect the ink and clog up the works; if you think you won’t be using the printer more than a few times a year, it might be more economical (and less frustrating) to outsource your printing instead.

Printing on Demand (in Person)

If you don’t have or want a printer, but you need something printed immediately, your best option, other than asking a friend or family member to do it for you, may be to visit a nearby print shop or your local library.

FedEX Office can copy or print documents on a variety of papers, in color or black-and-white, and the employees working there can even give you some design help. For basic documents, you might be paying about 21 cents per page. You can bring your document to a FedEX Office store on a USB drive to plug into a copier device, or email the document to FedEx and have them print it for you. Staples, UPS Stores, and Office Depot offer similar printing services.

Of course, other local print shops offer customized service as well. You might also find print-for-a-fee services at your supermarket’s business center.

For photos, you’ve likely seen printing kiosks at retailers like CVS or Walmart. You can usually connect your mobile devices to the kiosk, plug in a USB drive, or upload photos through an app. If you’re using an app or the photo service’s website, you can upload your images at home, pay for your prints, and pick them up later when they’re ready.

Many people are surprised to learn they can print for free (within certain limits) at their local library. My nearby public library charges 10 cents a page for black-and-white printing and 50 cents a page for color, but gives patrons $5 of their first prints for free. It’s hard to beat that deal.

If you’re traveling, your hotel is likely to offer free printing in its business center—helpful if you need to get a last-minute boarding pass on paper or have other travel-related print needs.

Printing on Demand (Not in Person)

If you can wait a few days or longer, you can shop around for the best deal from a variety of online printing services. Photo printing services like Printique and Snapfish have evolved quite a bit and are great for projects like photo books or custom gifts like personalized calendars or holiday photo cards.

VistaPrint, CatPrint and GotPrint are among the services that offer a wide range of printing jobs, from documents to business cards to T-shirts to wedding invitations.

We may be moving to a cashless, all-digital society, but printing is still a requirement for some tasks. Thankfully, these days that doesn’t automatically mean you have to own or maintain a printer of your own.

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Omar L. Gallaga

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August 11, 2024
LCD, IPS, OLED, and Quantum Dots: All the Confusing Display Terms, Explained

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This tech comes at the expense of lower response times and more shallow viewing angles, which is why it’s less common than IPS. They’re also usually a little more expensive than IPS panels, so if contrast is important to you, you might expect to pay more for it.

Mini-LED: Local Dimming on a Smaller Scale

The backlights on most LCD displays are usually lit up across the entire screen, but TVs found a way to get better contrast by introducing local dimming. The only problem is that creating an array of backlights that could be controlled independently was difficult to scale down to smaller screens.

Enter Mini-LED. Mini-LEDs are smaller than typical LED backlights (around 200 microns), which means that display manufacturers can fit a lot more into a smaller space. To the tune of thousands of local dimming zones in laptop and tablet displays. Strictly speaking, Mini-LED is a backlight technology and can be combined with several different types of LCD panels, but it will improve contrast and black levels on any panel it’s used in. There is also a technology called “Micro LED,” where the pixels act as their own backlight, but that’s limited to super large (and insanely expensive) displays at the moment.

OLED: The Holy Grail of Black Levels

One of the few alternatives to liquid crystals are organic light emitting diodes (or OLED). These panels use pixels that emit their own light, avoiding the need for a backlight. Since each pixel can emit its own light, there’s no extra light bleed in dark parts of the image. The black levels on OLED panels are effectively infinite, since any pixel that isn’t activated is functionally the same as when the display is turned off.

Since there are no backlights involved, OLED panels are incredibly good at producing high-contrast images and accurately reproducing color. However, unlike LCD displays, they’re more prone to burn-in. There also aren’t many companies manufacturing these panels. In fact, the majority of OLED panels are produced by one manufacturer: LG.

This has made OLED panels more expensive than typical LCD displays, though they’ve gotten down to more reasonable prices in recent years. Still, if you want to get the best possible picture, you’re likely to run into OLED panels, and they’re likely to come at a premium versus comparable LCD screens.

QD OLED and WOLED: Brighter OLED

Quantum dot OLEDs (or QD-OLED) are a relatively new entry into the display scene from Samsung. While OLEDs emit their own light, they still need to use filters to produce red, green, and blue wavelengths. Typical OLEDs use a white subpixel to produce that light, increasing the brightness from each pixel.

Similar to other quantum dot displays, QD-OLED uses blue OLEDs as a light source that then strikes quantum dots to generate the red and green light necessary to produce a full-color image. This approach marries the benefits of OLED (no need for a separate backlight, high-contrast images) with the advantages of quantum dots (less light lost while passing through filters, more direct control over color precision).

Recent displays that use QD-OLED are among some of the prettiest panels we’ve ever tested here at WIRED. For example, the Samsung S95C (8/10, WIRED Recommends) blew away WIRED senior editor Parker Hall, with its perfect black levels, vibrant colors, and wide viewing angles.

WOLED is a similar technology that is also aimed at making things brighter, but comes with a white OLED layer as well. This is used in high-end models from LG like the new C4 (9/10, WIRED Recommends) to achieve peak brightness well over 1000 nits.

Since QD-OLED and WOLED panels are relatively new, displays using them are likely to be on the more expensive side for now, but you’ll likely be hard-pressed to find better image quality on monitors without them.

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Eric Ravenscraft

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August 3, 2024
How to Control Android Auto or Apple CarPlay With Your Voice While Driving

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A pretty major part of staying safe while driving is keeping your eyes on the road. When you need to take a call, switch playlists, or change the destination you’re navigating to, that’s not always easy. We should all pull over when these jobs need doing (or get a passenger to do them), but that doesn’t always happen.

By using your voice to interact with Android Auto or Apple CarPlay, you can get directions, look up information, and control media playback without moving your hands from the wheel or your eyes away from what’s ahead of you. Here’s how it’s done when you’re connected to Android Auto or Apple CarPlay in your vehicle.

Speaking to Android Auto

Enabling hands-free activation on Android Auto via a Pixel phone. (David Nield)

There are a few ways to get Android Auto to listen to you. One is to tap the microphone icon that appears at the side of the interface, alongside the list of recently used apps. Another is to press the voice command button on your car’s steering wheel, if there is one. It looks different in some cars, but it typically shows an illustration of a person’s face in profile, mouth open, with sound waves coming out of their mouth. (Check your vehicle’s documentation if you’re not sure.)

If you want to go completely hands-free and use a “Hey Google” prompt to get Android Auto to listen, you need to make sure voice prompts are enabled on your phone. From Settings, pick Connected devices > Connection preferences (Google Pixel phones) or just Connected devices (Samsung Galaxy phones), then Android Auto.

Choose ‘Hey Google’ detection and you’ll see two toggle switches—so you can either enable hands-free voice activation on your phone all of the time, or only when you’re driving. Note that if you haven’t already done so, enabling this feature will require you to record a few audio speech samples so your phone knows how to recognize you when you’re talking and making requests.

Speaking to Apple CarPlay

Enabling hands-free activation on Apple CarPlay via an iPhone. (David Nield)

As with Android Auto, there may be a voice command button on your car’s steering wheel that you can press before talking to Siri on Apple CarPlay. It depends on the make, model, and age of your vehicle, so if the voice control button doesn’t appear obvious, you may have to check in the manual to find it. (Look for the button with a picture of a person speaking.)

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David Nield

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August 3, 2024
How to Create Your Own Browser Extension

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Most of us spend a lot of time inside a web browser. If you’re a Chrome, Firefox, or Edge user, then you’ll know these browsers come with a huge number of third-party extensions to augment the features already built into the software.

But what if you need some kind of specific extra functionality, some tool or feature that’s not covered by existing add-ons? Then it might be time to consider writing your own browser extension. That might sound daunting, but It’s not that difficult to do once you learn how. And once you’ve created a custom extension, you can either keep it for your own private use or make it public so anyone can use it.

Some coding knowledge is required, so you’ll need to learn the basics of how web pages and scripts are written if you don’t already know them. If you’re a beginner, you can start small and work your way up. There are also a lot of helpful resources out there on the web if you need them, everything from code libraries to online courses.

Get Started

You’re going to need an idea for an extension you can write.

Photograph: David Nield

There are certain components that make up a browser extension. First is the manifest, which takes the filename manifest.json and contains various bits of metadata identifying the extension and what it does. You put the name of the extension in the manifest, describe what it does, and specify a default action that the extension carries out.

Check out the manifest file format documentation provided by Google for Chrome. You can see some examples there, including a minimal manifest only containing the basics. The manifest points to all of the other required files for the extension, which should be kept in the same folder as you develop it.

Some of the files the manifest points to are the icon files, which visually represent your extension in the browser. Users will look for your icon to see that your extension is running, and they’ll click on the icon to access the extension’s settings or to disable it. You should create a 128 x 128-pixel icon as a minimum, and icons at other sizes (as listed here) are recommended, so the extension looks the same everywhere it appears in the browser, from the settings screen to the tab bar. If you don’t provide an icon, a generic one showing the first letter of the extension name will be used instead.

You then have your scripts, which do the actual work of the extension and can come in a variety of forms: HTML (Hypertext Markup Language) for basic web design, CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) for more advanced styling and manipulation of objects on the web, and JavaScript to do the bulk of the programming tasks (assuming your extension does something more than simply loading a page on screen).

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David Nield

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July 31, 2024
How to Buy an Air Purifier: A Step-by-Step Guide

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You don’t buy an air purifier in a vacuum, literally. Perhaps your old purifier is no longer working or you’re an indoor air novice, but the moment has come for you to buy an air purifier.

While you might be tempted to purchase something small that can be tucked away under a desk or that viral purifier that keeps showing up your FYP, I suggest the very act of buying an air purifier gets reframed. And, while in your research you might read about aesthetics or how the purifier blows air, such as from the bottom or horizontally, none of that matters if the purifier is too small to clean your room or if it’s placed in the wrong location such as a windowsill or against a wall.

For more tips on how to keep your indoor air quality under control, check out our guides to Best Air Purifiers and Best Indoor Air Quality Monitors.

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Step 1: You’re Not Buying an Air Purifier, You’re Fitting Your Room for an Air Purifier

Photograph: Lisa Wood Shapiro

Before you browse online or head to the store, think of the process of buying an air purifier as fitting your room for an air purifier. While we don’t use the word “horsepower” in terms of air purifiers, by fitting your room, you are really looking for air exchange power.

The main question: Is that cute viral air purifier powerful enough to clean the air in your bedroom or living room? And how does one figure that out? The first part is doing third-grade math. You will need a tape measure. I used a basic 25-foot measure that I bought at a hardware store years ago. With the help of one of my kids, I measured the length of the room and then the width, and then multiplied the length times the width to get the area or square footage.

Step 2: The Height of Your Ceiling Matters

Even though you’ve found the area of your room by doing the length-times-width formula, you’re not done. And before we go any further, the height standard used in many air purifier calculations—known as the clean air delivery rate, or CADR—is an 8-foot-high ceiling. When you add height by multiplying the length times the width times the height, it will give you the room’s volume or cubic square footage. Sometimes, depending on the model of air purifier, you’ll need the cubic square footage; sometimes you will need only the square footage.

Yes, figuring out the sizing of an air purifier in the US is confusing due to American measurement systems—Nate Bargatze explains it well in this skit from Saturday Night Live. I digress. Getting back to your room: Rooms with high ceilings such as A-frames, cathedral ceilings, double height ceilings, and the like will have the added burden of figuring out the cubic square feet of their room, because this will mean you need either a bigger air purifier or two purifiers to clean the air.

Step 3: It’s All About the Numbers

Photograph: Coway

The most important room is the one you spend the most time in. For most people, that’s the bedroom. Say you’ve found your bedroom size and it’s 200 square feet, and your ceiling height is around 8 feet. You find an air purifier with an advertised CADR of four air exchanges an hour for 200 square feet. That’s not going to be strong enough. Why? Most air purifiers make the most noise at their highest setting, like 50 decibels or higher—similar to a modern refrigerator. That means when you run that same air purifier at a lower setting, it won’t efficiently clean the air in that 200-square-foot room.

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Lisa Wood Shapiro

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July 29, 2024
HOW TO MAKE YOUR OWN BROWN SUGAR SUBSTITUTE
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If you are a fan of handy food tips, you may also love these tips on Baking Cookies! These are wonderful for the holiday season when you are making lots of goodies for your friends and family.

❤️WHY WE LOVE THIS RECIPE

We cook a lot with brown sugar, and there have been occasions when we ran out and needed a quick substitute. This homemade brown sugar will work in a pinch and it’s always nice to know you can make this up! It keeps well too!

This is also a great food tip if you enjoy just making your own and knowing what is in your food. Reading food labels can be eye opening and if you want just two simple ingredients this is a fantastic way to accomplish just that!

🍴KEY INGREDIENTS
- White Granulated Sugar
- Molasses
Yep, those are the only two ingredients you need to make a brown sugar substitute! We always have molasses on hand, so if you don’t, this won’t be that handy, but we cook with molasses quite a bit.

🍽️HOW TO MAKE

This recipe is for light brown sugar and if you need dark brown sugar you can change the ratio to 2 tablespoons to one cup.

FAVORITE RECIPES WITH BROWN SUGAR AND MOLASSES
Molasses Cookies – These cookies are made with both brown sugar and molasses and they are always a hit!

Brown Sugar Pie – This old fashioned recipe is one your family will love. It comes together really quickly and it’s always a hit.

Brown Sugar Meatloaf – This is one of our most popular recipes for a reason! It’s so good and your family will love it.

Brown Sugar Banana Bars – These are made in a snack size pan and super simple! Great addition to any gathering.
OTHER FOOD TIPS
Make Your Own Brown Sugar Substitute Recipe

Anne Walkup

Use this simple food tip to make your own brown sugar. Great for if you run out or if you just want to make your own to have on hand.

Prep Time 5 minutes

Total Time 5 minutes

Course Ingredient

Cuisine American

1 cup white granulated sugar

1 tablespoon molasses

To make dark brown sugar use 2 tablespoons molasses. You can always make more and store in an air-tight container for later use.

Keyword Make Your Own Brown Sugar

Let us know by commenting below!

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Anne Walkup

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July 29, 2024
You’re Probably Using Your Air Purifier Wrong

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I’m not saying I would do this, but if I visit your home, I might look around to see if you have an air purifier. If you have one, I might estimate the cubic footage of your room and then, if I’m left alone, I might open the purifier to look at the filter.

I know I’m being a bad guest, but I am in the service of a greater good.

Depending on what I find, I will fight the urge to tell you that your air purifier is too small to effectively clean the room, or that the purifier shouldn’t be placed against a sofa or a wall, or that the filters need to be changed, or worse—the plastic encasing the filter was never removed when the purifier was first purchased.

This urge to give unsolicited indoor air advice goes deep. I knew no better until I was on the air quality beat. I didn’t think about my indoor air, nor did I understand how making a few changes and using an appliance or two could have a lasting impact on my health, the quality of my sleep, and my mental acuity. And I want the same for you. Be sure to check out our related guides, like the Best Air Purifiers, Best Indoor Air Quality Monitors, and Best Robot Vacuums.

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Size Matters

Know the room size

Photograph: Lisa Wood Shapiro

Ceiling height relates to purifier strength needed

Photograph: Lisa Wood Shapiro

You might have an air purifier already. Is that the right air purifier for the room? I, too, used to think a small, aesthetically pleasing air purifier was all I needed. Not anymore.

First, find out the square footage your air filter is sized for and realize that air purifiers are often sold promoting the square footage at their highest setting. Remember, the highest setting is also the loudest setting.

Most likely, you’re not blasting your purifier, so then what is the square footage for the setting you usually use? And you’re looking for this formula: What are the number of air exchanges that can happen in a specific-sized room within an hour?

The ideal number, known as the clean air delivery rate, or CADR, is found on the air purifier’s label. The higher the number, the larger the room it can clean. Be aware that the CADR is based on rooms with 8-foot ceilings. If your ceilings are higher, like those found in an A-frame, you’ll need a purifier with a higher CADR.

The Right Fit for the Right Speed

Photograph: Lisa Wood Shapiro

You’re not entirely done when you figure out the CADR. There’s still an air quality Goldilocks process that needs to happen. For example, if you’re using your air purifier in your bedroom, know that “sleep mode,” means the purifier is working at its lowest setting.

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Lisa Wood Shapiro

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July 28, 2024
HOW TO MAKE DELICIOUS HONEY MUSTARD SAUCE WITH SIMPLE INGREDIENTS
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This homemade version of Honey Mustard Sauce is super easy to make and wonderful on salads or as a dip for chicken tenders!

You may also love this delicious Homemade Vanilla Sauce! It’s wonderful on bread pudding, ice cream, waffles, etc.

❤️WHY WE LOVE THIS RECIPE

This Honey Mustard Sauce recipe is so easy and goes well with chicken nuggets and chicken tenders. Make your own honey mustard sauce as a dip for fresh vegetables and add a couple teaspoons to scrambled eggs or an omelet. Honey mustard sauce is good on baked pork chops and fish. You can brush it on meats you are grilling, too.

🍴KEY INGREDIENTS
- Dijon Mustard
- Honey
- Mayonnaise
- Red Pepper or Cayenne
- Garlic Powder
- Lemon Juice or White Vinegar
🍽️HOW TO MAKE

Making any sauce is usually very simple and this is no exception. You will just whisk the ingredients together in a bowl and that is pretty much it! Can’t get much simpler than that and you have a wonderful sauce!

⭐TIP

You can play with this recipe, to make it more honey or less to your liking. That is one thing that we love about making your own sauce you can play with the ingredients.

OTHER SAUCE AND DRESSING RECIPES

STORING & SERVING SIZE

We store this in the refrigerator for about a week and it makes a little over a cup. You can easily double this recipe or triple it.
Honey Mustard Sauce

Anne Walkup

This is a simple recipe for homemade Honey Mustard Sauce. This sauce is wonderful on a delicious summer salad and also great for dipping chicken tenders in!

Prep Time 10 minutes

Course Sauce

Cuisine American

1/4 cup Dijon mustard

1/4 cup honey

3/4 cup mayonnaise

pinch red pepper or cayenne optional

1/8 teaspoon garlic powder

1 teaspoon lemon juice or white vinegar optional

Keyword Honey Mustard Sauce

Let us know by commenting below!

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Anne Walkup

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July 25, 2024
How to Watch the 2024 Summer Olympics
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If you only want to see highlights or don’t care about streaming specific events, there will be plenty of coverage available for free on NBCOlympics.com.

If you live in the UK and you prefer to stream select events live or on-demand that aren’t available on the BBC’s player, your best option is Discovery+, which will be streaming every event at the Games. It’s running a special deal this summer that gives you access for £4 per month. There are also additional savings if you already pay for Sky TV.

Read on for the specific timing of some of the biggest events. Just know that the times might change as the actual games play out. You can find the full schedule of events on the official Olympics website.

Note: Unless specified otherwise, all times below are listed in US East Coast time.

Opening Ceremony

The four-hour-long opening ceremony will be broadcast by almost every Olympic media outlet live on July 26. It starts at 8 pm Paris time, which is 2 pm Eastern and 11 am Pacific. Most broadcasts will start 30 minutes before the ceremony begins.

3×3 Basketball

The three-on-three variant of basketball starts July 30 with men’s and women’s rounds. The medal matches are played on August 5.

Archery

Archery ranking rounds begin on July 25. The medal matches are on July 28 for the women and July 29 for the men.

Badminton

Badminton starts with both doubles and singles games on July 26. The finals are spread out over several days, from August 2 to August 5.

Basketball

There’s a ton of hoops to watch this year. Games start on July 27. The US men’s team plays its first game on July 28 at 11:15 am, and the US women play on July 29 at 3 pm. The gold medal games are on August 10 for the men and August 11 for the women.

See the whole schedule.

Boat Stuff
- Rowing: Men and women’s single, double, and quadruple sculls heats start July 27. The medals matches are spread out between July 29 and August 2.
- Sailing: Events start on July 28. Finals for all the categories—windsurfing, one-person dinghy, two-person dinghy, skiff, and mixed multihull—are spread out between August 1 and August 8.
- Canoe/kayak slalom: Starts July 27 with men’s and women’s heats. Finals in all slalom events take place between July 28 and August 5.
- Canoe/kayak sprint: Starts August 6, with finals on August 8, 9, and 10.
Breaking

New this year! Very exciting. B-Girls compete on August 9, and B-Boys throw down on August 10. Here’s the full schedule.

Cycling
- BMX freestyle: All events take place on July 30 and 31.
- BMX racing: All events take place on August 1 and 2.
- Mountain bike races: The women race on July 28 and the men race on July 29.
- Road bike races: Men’s and women’s time trials are on July 27. The men’s road race is on August 3, and the women race on August 4.
- Track: Track races start on August 5, with the medal races out between August 5 and August 9. Check out the Madison event, it’s wild.
Diving

Diving events are quite spread out. The events start on July 27 and go until the men’s 10-meter platform final on August 10. Here’s the full schedule.

Golf

Men’s individual rounds start August 1 and conclude with the medal round on August 4. Women’s rounds start August 7 with the medals on August 10.

Gymnastics

The official schedules for gymnastics are broken up into specific categories, each with their own schedule. Artistic gymnastics start on July 27, rhythmic gymnastics start August 8, and trampoline gymnastics take place entirely on August 2.

Hockey

Hockey in the summer? Yes—field hockey. Men’s field hockey starts July 27 with the finals on August 8. Women’s games start July 27 with the finals on August 9. Here’s the full schedule.

Horses

There are lots of equestrian events, from dressage and cross-country to jumping and grand prix. Everything starts July 27. Behold the full horse schedule.

Martial Arts (and Miscellaneous Fighting)
- Fencing: All the lunging, swiping, and parrying begins July 27. Full fencing schedule here.
- Boxing also begins on July 27, with dozens of matches across all the weight classes. Here are all the boxing times.
- Judo starts July 27. There are a bunch of weight classes in judo as well, so check the full schedule.
- Taekwondo: Competition starts August 7 and ends August 10. Here’s the full list.
- Wrestling takes place between August 6 and August 11. Here’s the full schedule.
Soccer (aka Football)

Soccer matches start early on July 24. The gold medal games are August 9 for the men and August 10 for the women. The full soccer schedule is here.

Skateboarding

Skateboarding is enjoying its second Olympics as an official sport, which is pretty rad. The street events are July 27 and 28, and the park events are August 6 and 7.

Sport Climbing

The new sensation of climbing up a wall is making its Olympic debut in Paris. All of the events take place between August 5 and 10. Here’s the full schedule for the various matches. Also be sure to read our interview with US climber Jesse Grupper about the gear he’s bringing to Paris.

Surfing

They have waves in Paris? Not really; the surfing events this year are being held at Teahupo’o, Tahiti, which is a French territory. Surfing events are mostly happening at weird hours because of the time difference. There will be some days where the surf is lousy, and they’ll just hold the heats on a different day if that’s the case. Check out the schedule, but just know that it will likely change.

Swimming

There are many swimming events, each with a different distance, stroke, and number of competitors. See the full schedule to find the ones you want to watch. There are medal matches nearly every day. And keep an eye out for the mayor of Paris.

Tennis

Tennis kicks off July 27, with matches every day leading up to the medal events for singles and doubles on August 2, 3, and 4. Here’s the schedule.

Oh, and you’d like to watch some table tennis? There’s a schedule for that too, and you’ll need it. Table tennis spans the entirety of the Games, with matches from July 27 to August 10. The medal matches are on the last two days.

Track & Field

There are a variety of different track and field events that we now call athletics. These individual and team events—decathlon, high jump, hammer throw, and so on—take place from August 2 through August 10. You’ll need the full schedule to keep tabs on what you want to see.

The men’s marathon is August 9, and the women’s is August 10.

Triathlon

Watch the great swim-bike-run effort. The men race on July 29, and the women race on July 30. The mixed relay is on August 4.

Volleyball

Indoor volleyball runs the whole length of the Games, from July 27 to August 10. The medal matches for men and women are on the last two days. Find your favorite country on the schedule.

Beach volleyball takes place over the same time span—just at a sandier venue—and the schedule is stacked.

Weightlifting

These matches are separated based on weight lifted (i.e., how swole the athletes are). The heavy objects will be lifted from August 7 to August 11, with medals awarded every day. Here’s the full schedule.

Water Polo

Much like volleyball, there are water polo matches for the whole two weeks of the Games. Events start on July 27 and go to August 11. The women’s gold medal match is August 10, and the men’s is August 11.
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Michael Calore, Boone Ashworth

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July 24, 2024
You Can Actually Use a Chromebook Offline. Here’s How

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Chromebooks are often sold on their tight integration with the cloud: They’re essentially windows to the web and not much else. That comes with a variety of benefits, like never having to worry about losing an unsaved document, but it also means Chromebooks are less useful than Windows or macOS laptops when you don’t have an internet connection.

However, it’s not true that Chromebooks are complete bricks while they’re offline. With advances in web app and browser technology, you can now get quite a lot done on a Chromebook without an internet connection, with all your work resyncing when Wi-Fi is available again.

Clearly, you can’t send an email or stream a video while you’re disconnected from the web—but you can work on documents and emails in an offline mode, as well as cache content to watch and listen to while you’re offline, as I’ll explain here.

Using Gmail Offline

Enabling offline access in Gmail.

Photograph: David Nield

Perhaps unsurprisingly, considering it develops ChromeOS, Google has been at the forefront of making web apps work offline for the benefit of Chromebook users. Gmail is one of the big-name apps that works offline, up to a point—you won’t be able to send or receive emails without an internet connection, but you can still work on them.

From the main Gmail interface on the web, click the gear icon (top right), then See all settings. Open the Offline tab, check the Enable offline mail setting, and a number of new options pop up. Chief among them is the drop-down menu that lets you choose how much email to sync to your Chromebook: 7, 30, or 90 days’ worth. A higher value gives you more messages to work with, but takes up more storage space. You’ll see how much space Gmail is currently using on the same screen.

On the same page, you need to choose what happens if you log out of your Google account in the ChromeOS browser. You can either keep the synced data in place (convenient if you sign back in, but potentially risky from a security standpoint), or delete it from your Chromebook (a safer option, but you will need to resync all the messages again if you sign back into Google).

Click Save Changes, and you’re done. When you’re offline, you’re able to search through and read the emails you’ve cached, as well as compose new emails and save them as drafts. Finished emails can be sent too, without actually being sent; they’ll be stored in a newly created Outbox folder, and dispatched as soon as web access is restored.

Using Google Drive Offline

Files can be accessed offline in Google Drive.

Photograph: David Nield

You can use Google Docs, Google Sheets, and Google Slides while offline, as well as certain aspects of the broader Google Drive app—but as with Gmail, you need to do some preparation in advance. From Google Drive on the web, click the gear icon (top right), then select Settings.

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David Nield

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July 24, 2024
How to Properly Archive Your Digital Files

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The original proposal for the World Wide Web, written by Tim Berners-Lee in 1989, is an important piece of internet history. It also can’t be opened on modern computers.

John Graham-Cumming, a British software engineer and writer, attempted to open the Word document containing the proposal. Modern versions of Microsoft Word and Apple’s Pages both utterly failed to open the file, as he outlined in a blog post. The open-source word processor LibreOffice worked, albeit with messy formatting. Graham-Cumming ultimately found a PDF exported by CERN in 1998, which was the only way he was able to see the document as it existed in 1989.

It’s worrying that such an important piece of history, in such a common file format, could be almost completely lost to the passage of time and software updates. Anyone with a collection of old digital documents, photos, and videos might be wondering if the same thing will happen to their files, which is the sort of question digital archivists deal with all the time, it turns out. So I reached out to one.

“Twenty years, in the digital realm, is ancient,” says Lance Stuchell, director of digital preservation services at the University of Michigan. His team is frequently tasked with recovering digital files from old computers and storage mediums. “We have a lab that can deal with old media—floppy drives, CDs, older computers. We can get that off of those types of media and move it into our preservation system while ensuring we don’t mess it up while we’re doing it.”

But getting the files off the drive is just the first step: Then you have to open them, and leave them in a state that will be openable for decades to come. It’s a job that’s given Stuchell a reason to think about strategies for keeping documents around as long as possible. I asked him what those of us who aren’t professional archivists should do to ensure our files last decades.

Use Open Formats

The Word document I mentioned before could no longer be opened by Microsoft Word because the software has changed over time. This is part of the challenge of archiving digital files.

“With physical stuff, the less you look at it the longer it lasts,” Stuchell says. “Digital stuff, we’re constantly fighting with obsoleteness. As the file moves through time, it’s losing information.”

Updates to software like Microsoft Word mean that files that opened fine in the ’80s don’t open in the 2020s. Part of the problem: Microsoft, and only Microsoft, controls the file format, or even knows how it works. For this reason, Stuchell says he encourages people to export files in an open file format—especially files they want to keep accessible for the long term.

For documents he recommends PDF/A, an open standard built on top of Adobe’s PDF format that includes everything the file needs in order to be opened, including the fonts used in the document. Microsoft Office, LibreOffice, and Adobe Acrobat all support exporting to PDF/A, meaning it’s relatively easy to make such a file. Stuchell recommends that you archive any document that you want to keep to that format.

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Justin Pot

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July 14, 2024
Classic Basil Pesto Sauce Recipe | Oh Sweet Basil
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This post covers how to make pesto sauce, how to store it, and more! If you’ve never made homemade pesto before, you’ve been missing out!

This a perfect summer recipe to use up all that basil in the garden! I swear basil multiplies overnight. I can’t keep ahead of it, but homemade pesto is one of my favorite ways to use it up!

Homemade Basil Pesto Sauce Recipe

I don’t know why, but I had never had pesto until college. At least I’m pretty sure I hadn’t. And I honestly don’t even remember who made it when I did finally have it. All I remember was that it was a basic pesto pasta and I loved it.

I’ll be the first to admit that I ate waaaaaay more than I should have. It was slightly nutty, cheesy, and super fresh. Could there be a better combo? We use pesto all the time now and we even make it a few different ways depending on how much of everything we have like our 15-Minute Pesto Pasta, pesto butter grilled cheese, creamy pesto chicken pizza, or the bacon pesto grilled cheese sandwich contest I won with Tillamook. However, in the end this is our ultimate, absolute favorite classic pesto recipe.

A classic pesto recipe is easy enough to make, but storing is a bit tricky. I have two ways that I store it and a third that I’ve heard great things about but never tried it. But we can talk about storing it after we discuss the actual classic pesto recipe.

Basil Pesto Recipe Ingredients

This is such an easy pesto recipe! It requires minimal ingredients to whip up. Here’s what all goes into this homemade pesto sauce:
- Fresh Basil
- Garlic Cloves
- Pine Nuts
  
  NOTE: The best substitutes for pine nuts are walnuts, almonds or cashews.
- Olive Oil
- Grated Parmesan Cheese
  
  NOTE: The best substitute is pecorino romano cheese.
- Salt
The measurements for each can be found in the recipe card below.

How to Make Pesto Sauce

To start this homemade pesto recipe, I just heat up a skillet over medium heat, add both the garlic cloves and the pine nuts and let it cook until golden, shaking the pan occasionally. Then, I remove the nuts and allow the garlic to finish turning golden as well.

An added bonus is that the garlic slides right out of its skin when it’s toasted this way. I love that. So, yes you read right, toast the garlic in its thin skin and then remove after it’s golden.

Place everything except the cheese and salt in the bowl of a food processor or blender and pulse until smooth. Stir in the cheese and add salt to taste. Yes, making this classic pesto recipe is that easy. If you want to go totally authentic, you can use a mortar and pestle to blend the pesto together. That’s just too much work for me, so food processor it is!

How to Store Pesto

Storing Pesto in a Jar

Make your classic pesto and then fill a jar to to almost the very top. Drizzle a thin layer of olive oil over the top and seal closed to keep pesto green. This can keep for a few weeks in the fridge if you continue to cover the top with olive to keep the herbs fresh. You can also choose to freeze the jar, but I wouldn’t keep it in the freezer for more than a month before switching it to the fridge.

Storing Pesto in a Vacuum Bag

I love the foodsaver. Yes, it costs a little money, but you end up saving tons. You can easily make your pesto, stick it in a bag, suck out the air and freeze it for up to 9 months. BOOYAH! When you’re ready to use it just move it down to the fridge to defrost and use on your favorite dish.

How Long Does Pesto Last?

This easy basil pesto sauce will last up to 5 days in the refrigerator if stored in an airtight container. If you use the olive oil method shared above, the shelf life will be extended.

Can You Freeze Pesto?

Yes! Homemade basil pesto sauce freezes incredibly well. Simply make the recipe as instructed, then seal the pesto in an airtight container or freezer bag.

Alternately, spoon the homemade pesto into ice cube trays and freeze until solid. Once hardened, transfer the pesto cubes to a freezer bag. This way, you wind up with single servings of frozen pesto!

Our Favorite Pesto Uses

We love pesto on everything from egg whites to garlic bread to chicken to pasta to salads. I love having a jar handy in the fridge or freezer! Here are a few of our favorite recipes that use pesto sauce:

Tips for the Best Pesto Sauce
- Put ice in the food processor and mix. This will cool your machine before preparing your pesto and will help in keeping your pesto greener.
- Because this easy pesto recipe uses so few ingredients, it’s important that you buy the best quality ingredients you can.
- Use extra virgin olive oil and freshly grated Parm for the best flavor.
Other Italian Sauce Recipes

Looking for more Italian Sauce recipes? Who doesn’t love Italian sauces!? Make sure you try these out the next time you are making that Italian dish:
Servings: 1

Prep Time: 1 minute

Cook Time: 3 minutes

Total Time: 4 minutes

Description

This post covers how to make pesto sauce, how to store it, and more! If you’ve never made homemade pesto before, you’ve been missing out!

Cook ModePrevent your screen from going dark

Heat a skillet over medium heat and add the pine nuts and garlic.

1/4 Cup Pine Nuts, 3 Cloves Garlic

Toast for a few minutes or until golden brown, shaking the pan occasionally to toss the pine nuts and promote even color.

Once the pine nuts are done, remove them from the pan and continue to toast the garlic.

Remove garlic from the pan and remove the skin.

Wait until both garlic and pine nuts are cooled.

Place the basil, pine nuts, garlic, and olive oil in a blender and pulse until smooth, but still a tad grainy in texture.

3 Cups Fresh Basil, 1/4 Cup Olive Oil

Place everything in a bowl and stir in the cheese.

1/4 Cup Parmesan Cheese

Salt to taste and store according to post directions.

Salt

You can adjust the garlic to your own taste. It you don’t love it, just use 2 cloves!

See the post for details on storing pesto in a mason jar with a little olive oil in the fridge.

Serving: 0.5CupCalories: 842kcalCarbohydrates: 10gProtein: 17gFat: 85gSaturated Fat: 13gCholesterol: 22mgSodium: 388mgPotassium: 482mgFiber: 3gSugar: 2gVitamin A: 4025IUVitamin C: 16mgCalcium: 427mgIron: 5mg

Author: Sweet Basil

Course: 50+ Homemade Condiment Recipes

Cuisine: Italian
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Sweet Basil

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July 14, 2024
7 Lesser-Known Google Maps Features

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Hover the cursor over the Layers panel (bottom right), then click Biking. The map will then adjust the way routes are marked for cyclists, with different types of lines for trails, dedicated bike lanes, bicycle-friendly roads, and unpaved trails.

Add Your Own Locations

There are some spots that may be personal to you—the picnic area, usual parking space, the park bench, the friend’s house—that aren’t publicly marked on Google Maps. If they’re not marked, they’re harder to get to when you’re searching or navigating.

You can fix this by creating your own place: Tap and hold on a spot in the mobile app to drop a pin, then pull up the info card and choose Add label. These labels then show up in search results as flags on the map, and in your saved places.

Remember Where You Parked

Never lose your parking spot again.

Courtesy of David Nield

There’s no need to waste time hunting for your car after a long day. Google Maps can remember it for you. When you’ve parked up, tap on the blue dot on the map in the mobile app, then choose Save parking from the panel that pops up.

When it’s time to get back, just search for “parking” in the app, to see the created label. You can also pan around the map to find the “you parked here” flag—tap on it and you can get directions right to the exact spot.

Report an Accident on the Road

Help out fellow Google Maps users by reporting accidents you come across on your travels: If you’re in navigation mode in the mobile app, tap the icon on the right (a plus symbol inside a search bubble), then choose one of the options listed.

These options actually vary by country, but you should see Crash as one of them. (Roadworks, congestion, and stalled vehicles are also sometimes listed.) If Google Maps gets enough of these individual reports, a warning will appear on the map for everyone.

Answer Questions About Places

Ask questions to help out other Google Maps users.

Courtesy of David Nield

The social and community aspects of Google Maps tend to go overlooked, but you can find them via the Contribute tab in the mobile app. Tap Contribute now and you can answer some simple yes or no questions about places you’ve visited recently.

Maps will ask you about the place’s opening hours, whether it has valet parking, accessible entrances, and so on. Remember that one day you might be grateful that someone else made contributions like this, because they’ve helped you out in your own travels.

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David Nield

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July 9, 2024
Why the Run-Up to Prime Day Is the Worst Time to Shop on Amazon

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As product experts, a large part of our job here at WIRED is to help you get the best products at the best prices. That includes helping you find great deals during massive sales events like Black Friday and, of course, Amazon Prime Day. If you’re looking to get the best price on that gadget that’s been sitting on your cart for months, it’s important to know when to pull the trigger—and when not to. Other than a handful of good early Prime Day deals, now is almost certainly the time to hold your fire.

Amazon, Walmart, and other major retailers tend to jack up pricing on all sorts of products that have long since sunk below their manufacturer’s suggested retail price ahead of a major sale. That way once you see it on the big day it looks like a really great deal—even when it would have been impossible to buy the product at the inflated price displayed even if you had tried. This isn’t a new phenomenon, and it’s not limited to online sellers. A Harvard business professor wrote a paper about the phenomenon in 2018. There have been unsuccessful class action suits against classic brick-and-mortar retailers like Kohl’s and JCPenney over the practice.

We do our best to guide you through this sale-price chicanery with our daily coverage and Prime Day posts, but we can’t do it all alone. There are plenty of ways you can prepare as a savvy buyer to get the best gear and still keep your budget intact, from timing your moves to grabbing last year’s best. Here are some helpful tips and tricks to follow now, and throughout the year, to save some serious dough.

Price Tracking Tools

If you’re focused on prices and shopping on Amazon you should be using a price tracker to keep a close eye on product price drops (and jumps). The best options are Keepa (the one I use most often) and CamelCamelCamel. Both trackers are free and work across all the top browsers. (You can read our in-depth guide for more tips to find the best Amazon deals.)

While it’s true these tools are primarily for Amazon shopping, where Amazon goes many other retailers tend to follow, often including manufacturer sites. If you’re shopping outside the Amazon universe, there are some other good price tracking tools worth checking out, including deals sites like SlickDeals, Honey, and Pricerunner.com.

While none of these tools or specialty sites is perfect, they can all be helpful in keeping you aware of what is a good deal and what isn’t.

Pick Your Moment

While price tracking is key, it’s important to know the best times of year to shop. As mentioned above, you’ll generally want to hold back on buying big-ticket items, especially tech gear, just before a major sales event like Amazon Prime Day, which this year is scheduled for July 16 and 17.

The same is generally true for other big-store events like Wayfair Day, as well as general sales based around holidays like Labor Day and Presidents Day. Not only is the product you’re after often being sold at a higher price than it would be during the big sale, it may well be jacked up to its highest price of the year.

On the other hand, Black Friday (and Cyber Monday) sales tend to work the opposite way, becoming more of a monthlong free-for-all than a one- or two-day event. We often see prices dropping across product categories for weeks before Black Friday as retailers court folks aiming to get their holiday shopping done early.

If you’re looking for TVs, soundbars, and home theater deals, you may also see a lot of sale fanfare ahead of the all-important “big game,” aka the Super Bowl. Brands and retailers figure you’ll want a solid big screen and good sound not only for the game itself but also for the halftime show, the puppy bowl, and those gazillion-dollar commercials. That said, with the Super Bowl following a slew of big shopping events, and right after new TV models are announced, these deals aren’t always what they seem.

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Ryan Waniata

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July 8, 2024
How to Clean Your Keyboard
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Spending hours at your computer, whether for work or play, is unavoidable for most of us. Constant use is going to take a toll on your keyboard. Dust and hair buildup is inevitable, and fallen tortilla chips and sandwich crumbs can be avoided only by the kind of discipline many of us do not possess. We’re not here to judge; we’re here to help you clean up. In this guide, we’ll highlight the supplies you might need, and run through how to clean your keyboard step by step.

These tips will work well on the picks from our guide to the Best Mechanical Keyboards. You may also want to check some of our other cleaning guides, like How to Clean Your Computer, How to Clean Your Smartphone, and last but not least, How to Clean Yourself.

Updated June 2024: We added some photos, an electric air blower, and refreshed our tips (thanks to our readers’ suggestions).

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Keyboard Cleaning Supplies

Photograph: Simon Hill

You can definitely clean your keyboard with stuff you already have in the house, so don’t feel like you have to buy special cleaning supplies. Here are some things you might consider and a few household alternatives you likely have lying around.
- Brush: I have had a pop-up brush ($7) for a few years, and it’s perfect for sweeping debris out of your keyboard, but you can use any soft-bristled brush you have at home (a toothbrush or a 1.5-inch paintbrush can work).
- Compressed air: A 10-ounce can of Dust-Off ($11) will last you for ages and can be very effective at blasting things loose from your keyboard.
- Electric Air Blower: A good alternative to compressed air is a rechargeable electric air blower that you can use again and again. I have the KiCa Jetfan 2 ($99), which has a sliding control for upping the power and blasting everything out and a couple of attachments to concentrate the air. Battery life is surprisingly good and you can recharge via the USB-C port on the bottom. It’s pricey, but I love it. You can use it to blast dust out of anything, from keyboards and PCs to radiators and mesh chairs.
- Cloth: You probably have microfiber cloths already, and any cloth will do, but I have found the fancy thin ones you use for glasses work best—pack of microfiber cloths ($10).
- Cleaning slime: A tub of cleaning gel ($6) can be effective for removing dust from hard-to-reach places like a keyboard, but I don’t recommend it. Apart from general ickiness, it leaves a residue, gets dirty, and deteriorates quickly, leaving you with a slimy mess that can’t be eco-friendly.
- Cotton swabs: You might have Q-Tips already, or you can snag cheap cotton swabs ($3) and use them to clean between keys. Wooden toothpicks work well for caked-on grime.
- Isopropyl alcohol: Dampening your cloth or cotton swab with water will usually do the trick, but alcohol is a very effective cleaner. This Max Professional spray ($10) is easy to use.
- Magic eraser: For scuff marks and stubborn dirt, magic erasers ($7) made of melamine can be amazingly effective. Sometimes regular pencil erasers can do the trick.
- Keycap removal tool: If you’re really going to town and deep cleaning your mechanical keyboard, you may want a keycap removal tool ($6). (This one includes a switch puller and a pair of brushes.)
You probably won’t need most of this stuff unless your keyboard is truly filthy, so try cleaning it with what you have before springing for extras.

How to Clean Your Keyboard

It’s time to get to work. Start by turning your computer off, disconnecting your keyboard, and removing cables. Clear your desk or table and assemble your cleaning tools.

Shake, Brush, Blow, and Vac

For relatively well-kept keyboards, the following four steps might be enough:
1. Begin by turning your keyboard upside down and gently shaking it to see what falls out.
2. Use your brush to gently sweep debris loose. It works best if you tilt your keyboard one way then another, and brush down the rows.
3. If you have compressed air or an electric blower, use short blasts (but don’t get too close) to dislodge dirt that’s lodged in the depths. Tilt your keyboard at different angles and blow into the gaps.
4. If you have a small brush tool for your vacuum or a handheld vac, use it to suck up the dirt you’ve uncovered and run it gently over the keyboard.
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Simon Hill

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July 7, 2024
Google’s Repair Policy Is Broken

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Photograph: Simon Hill

Pixel Imperfect

What is particularly egregious about this lack of repair options is Google knows how to handle this properly. If your Pixel breaks, you can very likely get it fixed.

“Repair options include mail-in service, walk-in repairs at authorized locations, and even DIY repairs with official parts and guides provided by our partner iFixit,” Nickel told WIRED in an email. “Our repair support site, located here, is the best entry point for support.”

You can get genuine parts for the Pixel 2 through the new Pixel 8A from iFixit. If you’re unfamiliar, the iFixit website is a wonderful resource for anyone looking to repair their gadgets. It provides parts, repair kits, and video tutorials, and the company consults with many major manufacturers, including Microsoft, Fairphone, Logitech, HP, and Lenovo, to make their devices more repairable.

Currently, iFixit provides official parts for Google, HTC, Fairphone, Motorola, Teenage Engineering, Vaude, and Valve devices, among others. However, the repair company recently ended its partnership with Samsung due to a lack of follow-through from the electronics giant, though iFixit still offers repair kits for Samsung devices.

Apple maintains rigid control over its repairs, fiercely resisting proper support for unapproved third-party repair shops or amateur home repairs, though it conceded a little ground on iPhone parts recently. Regardless, iFixit does offer kits for many Apple devices too. Still, Apple will at least fix your broken devices, even if it charges a premium.

Nickel says Google does offer replacement parts to DIY support partners, like iFixit, where possible, and it hopes to improve repairability for its gadgets, though this seems to be driven by legislation. While the right-to-repair movement has gained some ground, the impact of federal legislation in the US and the UK remains to be seen, and tech companies continue to resist, making what many campaigners feel are minimal efforts.

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Simon Hill

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July 7, 2024
How to Choose the Right TV

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These days, you wouldn’t want to buy a TV that doesn’t support HDR unless you’re after a small/cheap HD TV. Even if you’re on a tight budget, you’ll also want to consider an LED TV with quantum dots (aka a QLED or NeoQLED display) for their brighter and more vivid colors.

Gaming Performance

Sony Playstation 5

Photograph: Ryan Waniata

If you’re going to be gaming on your TV, I highly recommend paying attention to two factors: refresh rate and input lag. You can often find these specs on the product listing or the box itself. Most standard TVs have a refresh rate of 60 Hz, which means the display can natively reach 60 frames per second (fps), or 60 images on the screen per second. However, modern consoles and games can support up to 120 frames per second, or 120 images per second. This offers smoother motion on the screen, making your game feel more fluid and responsive. For this reason, the best gaming TVs utilize a 120-Hz panel.

Input lag is the time it takes for your movement on a gamepad or keyboard to register on the screen. The lower the better. Most TVs hover at around 15 milliseconds of input lag (less if the game is running at 1080p and 60 frames per second). LG’s OLED models have shockingly low input lag times, but this is primarily beneficial for fast-paced games that require speedy interactions, like first-person shooter games.

If you’re an avid gamer, you’ll also want to ensure your TV offers advanced gaming features like VRR (Variable Refresh Rate) to sync with a game’s changing refresh rate without “tearing” or feeling sluggish, and ALLM (Auto Low Latency Mode), which automatically optimizes the TV’s input lag when turning on a modern console or gaming PC. In order to get those features in high resolution, you’ll need a high-bandwidth HDMI connection, and that means a TV with HDMI 2.1.

The Right Ports

Samsung S95D One Connect Box

Most TVs include an optical output for audio, Wi-Fi, and Ethernet connection, and three or four HDMI ports. As noted above, you should make sure your new TV supports at least one high-bandwidth HDMI 2.1 port (or more if you have multiple modern gaming devices), which allows for 4K resolution at up to 120-Hz for the best gaming performance, among other benefits.

All new TVs provide one HDMI ARC (Audio Return Channel) port, which lets you easily connect modern soundbars, powered bookshelf speakers, and A/V receivers with an HDMI cable—and even control volume and power from the TV remote. Most midrange TVs or higher will support the more advanced version of ARC, HDMI eARC (enhanced Audio Return Channel). With higher bandwidth, eARC allows a TV to send uncompressed sound formats to a supported audio device. In essence, it supports better sound quality to raise the performance of the best soundbars and surround sound systems, but you’ll need a great setup to tell the difference.

I recommend buying all-new high-speed cables if you’re getting a new TV for the first time in a while like the affordable Amazon Basics cable linked above. Modern cables support higher data speeds than those from years past, and HDMI cables can wear out over time.

What About TV Software?

Photograph: Google

All major TV brands have a baseline smart interface with support for a large number of streaming services, including Vizio’s Home Screen, Samsung’s Tizen OS, and LG’s webOS. New Sony TVs, as well as most new Hisense and TCL models, come with Google TV, while Roku TVs come with Roku OS, the streaming brand’s simplified, tile-based interface.

Roku and Google TV are our current favorite smart TV interfaces, but if you’re not keen on your TV’s built-in operating system, worry not—you can easily add your desired streaming platform for very little money with one simple purchase. Just grab one of our favorite streaming devices, plug it in, and let your preferred smart interface do the heavy lifting.

How Much Should You Expect to Pay?

Hisense U8H

Photograph: Hisense

You’ll see quite a range of prices when shopping for a new TV. A lot of it comes down to the features you want. Here’s a basic price guide on what you can expect for the money. Be sure to check out our list of the Best TVs for specific model information.

Under $500

If you just want a TV with a large screen that can stream your favorite shows, this is a good starting place, especially if you’re on a budget. I highly suggest you avoid TVs that aren’t made by the likes of Samsung, LG, Sony, TCL, Hisense, Vizio, or Roku. Also, avoid spending less than $300 on anything, unless it’s smaller than 55 inches.

Between $500 and $1,000

If you watch TV often and want something between 40 and 65 inches, this is a great price category to shop in. Stick to the major brands above—especially our favorite value-oriented brands like TCL, Hisense, and Roku—and you can hardly go wrong. If you want the best from more premium brands like Samsung, LG, and Sony you’ll likely need to spend up.

More Than $1,000

This price range is for TVs 65 inches or larger, and/or those with advanced panel technologies, like OLED, and QLED/mini-LED. You’ll also typically get higher-end processing for improved upscaling, and better hardware like a 120Hz panel for video games and sports. Get into the $2,000 range and you’ll find top-rated 4K TVs from Samsung, LG, and Sony. Spend more than a few thousand, and you can begin to expect 8K resolution—not that there is currently much 8K content to watch.

Get a Soundbar or Bookshelf Speakers

Photograph: Ryan Waniata

TV speakers suck. Companies have tried to improve them, but even the best models still sound tinny. Just buy a soundbar already. Many modern soundbars come with built-in smart assistants like Google Assistant or Alexa, connect to streaming services like Apple Music and Spotify Connect, and offer advanced sound formats like Dolby Atmos and DTS:X to immerse you in sound. Our Best Soundbars guide has several recommendations at multiple price ranges.

If you’re more music-oriented and don’t care as much about surround sound formats, we recommend considering a pair of bookshelf speakers as a soundbar alternative. Many options in our Best Bookshelf Speakers guide come with built-in amplification and advancements like wireless streaming and HDMI ARC, so you don’t need a separate amplifier—just plug and play. If you’ve been listening to TV speakers up to now, you won’t believe what you’ve been missing.

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Parker Hall, Ryan Waniata

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July 6, 2024
How to Shop for a Smart Lock

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You might already have a smart home hub if you have certain smart speakers like an Amazon Echo (4th Gen) ($100) or smart displays like the Amazon Echo Show 8 (3rd Gen) ($150). If you’re an Apple HomeKit user, you might have a HomePod or Apple TV to act as your home’s hub, but HomeKit compatibility is much trickier than more common options like Zigbee and Z-Wave, or choosing Amazon and Google.

Do You Want Multiple Codes?

Entry or access codes, in my opinion, are one of the best parts of smart locks. Not all smart locks come with one, but most have an accessory keypad you can add on and place wherever you want on the exterior of your home. While a digital lock lets you set a single code, a smart lock app will let you create multiple codes and assign them to certain people, and set limits on the code use, so you can give a code to your dog walker or your favorite neighbor and know when they use it to enter your home. It makes it easy to revoke codes without needing your entire household to adapt to a code change.

Some locks, like the Ultraloq U-Bolt Pro ($109) and Schlage Encode Plus ($319), come with a keypad built into the front of the lock, but others require purchasing the add-on keypad. If codes are a key feature for you, prioritize a lock with an attached keypad so you don’t have to spend extra cash, or worry about installing two things instead of one.

Do You Want Biometric or Keyless Entry?

The real future is no keys or codes at all! There are a few locks that let you unlock your front door with a press of your fingerprint. Some, like the Ultraloq mentioned above, include the fingerprint reader built into the lock itself, while some have external keypads, like the Abode Lock, with a biometric reader on it. I like using it as a one-touch open if I don’t have my keys handy, and it’s certainly faster than typing a code.

Most smart locks do have a keyhole, and I’d recommend sticking to ones that offer it. Smart locks run on batteries (more on this below), so it’s good to have the battery-free backup of a physical key if you run out of battery power. (Locks will alert you about low battery life in advance, but I’m a procrastinator, so I know how this story will go.) Some locks use your phone’s geofencing to alert it to unlock your door, so if your phone dies, you could also lose the convenience you’re looking for and need a separate access option.

Do You Have Other Entry Points?

If you’re interested in getting a smart lock on a door without a deadbolt, or even a sliding door, good news! There are options for you too. Schlage, for example, makes the Encode Level ($310) designed for doors without an existing deadbolt. Instead, it adds a keyhole in the doorknob along with a keypad. You can also add smart home control for your garage with MyQ’s Smart Garage Door Openers (8/10, WIRED Recommends), and you can add a keypad to it.

What About Battery Life? Hidden Fees?

All those smart tricks need a power source: batteries. Most smart locks promise a battery life of at least a few months, if not the better part of a year, but performance depends on how hard the lock is working—more frequent requests and automations will naturally drain the battery a little faster over time. Either way, be prepared to charge or replace batteries in your smart lock. Some have ways to juice up the lock if it’s completely dead—the Ultraloq U-Bolt Pro, for example, has a hidden MicroUSB port at the bottom if it needs juice in a pinch.

Some locks also have features hidden behind subscription fees. The Abode comes to mind for this—it offers notifications that your lock was activated, but it doesn’t clarify if it was unlocked or locked. You have to sign up for one of Abode’s subscription plans for that perk, and it’s also the only way to use it with other smart home devices. This isn’t super common with smart locks—Abode is also a smart home security company, so its subscription fee works with several other products beyond the locks—but it’s worth keeping an eye out.

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Nena Farrell

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July 5, 2024