The Google Phone app is one of the best dialers for Android today, especially with all of the unique and exciting features it brings to the table. Unfortunately, without owning a Pixel phone, you are unable to officially download the app, making a modified version your only option. However, this version of Google Phone is missing a few key features, such as spam protection and business search.
To combat their poor coverage in rural areas, T-Mobile spent nearly $8 billion on 600 MHz spectrum in 2017, which was converted to LTE Band 71. With such a low frequency, the signal can travel further, providing LTE speeds to more Americans. But your phone also has to support this frequency, and so far, only a handful do.
If you want to root your phone, it's a huge plus. If you want to install a custom ROM like LineageOS, it's an absolute must-have. Custom kernels like ElementalX, custom recoveries like TWRP — none of this happens unless you buy a phone with an unlockable bootloader.
Let's say you gave your Wi-Fi password to your neighbor a while back, under the assumption that they'd only use it while they were at your house sharing stuff via Chromecast. But now, your connection is slower than it normally should be, and you have this sneaking suspicion that the dude in apartment 3C is flat-out piggybacking off of your home network.
For Android smartphones, the latest craze is high refresh rate displays, and many popular flagships have them. But until now, there has been no way to confirm it is, in fact, running at higher hertz besides a menu option. Android 11 changes this.
QR codes are supposed to make life easier, but having to install potentially shady third-party apps just to scan one is more trouble than it's worth. Thankfully, there's a QR code reader built into all Google Pixels, but you wouldn't know it unless you stumbled across the feature.
Your phone is loaded with contacts you've collected over the years. They're an asset, and you should use your library of connections outside the confines of your mobile device. Luckily, your Pixel uses a standardized medium to store contacts that can be used by the likes of LinkedIn, Outlook, Hubspot, iCloud, and more.
Though primarily a Pixel exclusive, Google Camera has become the go-to camera app for many Android users. Not only does come with a standout features like Night Sight and capture better photos than most stock camera apps, but it's also packed with functionality that makes it a one-stop-shop for all your photo and video needs.
With Android Pie, Google added a genuinely useful feature for Pixels called App Suggestions, which uses AI to predict the apps you might want to use next. These show up at the top of your app drawer and in the new dock in the revamped multitasking UI for quick access. But here's the trouble: Muscle memory is a thing.
Now that Android Nougat lets you add your own custom Quick Settings tiles, your pull-down menu is probably getting a lot more crowded than it used to be, with all sorts of new and useful toggles. But the trouble is, you can only add up to nine entries before your Quick Settings tiles spill over into a second pane that you have to access by swiping, and that's not exactly "quick."
Regardless of what they call them—be it Pixel or Nexus—Google's line of smartphones have a cool feature called "Ambient Display" that wakes your screen in a low-power black and white state when you receive a notification. This feature was added back when Google owned Motorola, as Moto's phones had a similar lock screen effect called "Active Display."
Android 11 is available as a simple beta install for Pixel devices right now. Just visit Google's beta signup page, make sure you're signed in with the same account used on your Pixel, then opt into the program. You'll get an OTA update that will put you on Android 11 in no time. But is it ready to be a daily driver?
Some of the Pixel 3's coolest features are software related, which means you can get many of them on non-Pixel devices. "Flip to Shhh" is a perfect example of this. It lets you quickly put your phone into do not disturb mode by placing it face down, and this can be replicated on other Android phones with the help of a simple app.
When new Android versions come out, the modding community has to find new ways to root the OS. It's a fun cat and mouse game to follow, but it also means the process of rooting isn't exactly the same as it was the last time you did it. Android 10 changes how root works on a system level for some devices, but luckily, the developers are already on top of things.
It just keeps getting harder to enjoy all of the benefits of root without sacrificing features. Thanks to SafetyNet, we've lost the ability to use Android Pay, Pokémon GO, and even Snapchat to an extent. But the most recent news on this front is perhaps worst of all: Netflix has already stopped showing up on the Play Store for rooted users, and soon, it may refuse to run even if you've sideloaded the app.
If you were a particularly good little girl or boy this year, Santa might have finally brought you that cool new smartphone you've been wanting. Or perhaps you just took advantage of a great sale and treated yourself to a new gadget this holiday season—totally justifiable, and surely a well-deserved gift.
The beauty of Android is that nearly everything can be customized. But sometimes, we get so caught up in tweaking functionality and other minutiae that one of the most important interfaces gets neglected—the home screen wallpaper.
We all know Google keeps a history of everything we do on our phones unless we say otherwise. However, you might not realize just how detailed it is until you check it for yourself — even the actions you do in each app are tracked by default.
Google Lens can perform many different tasks with your smartphone's camera thanks to advanced machine learning, such as foreign text translations, landmark identification, and business cards to contacts conversion, to name a few. With this year's Google I/O conference, we have another cool Lens feature to look forward to — receipt calculations.
The idea of augmented reality isn't new, but the world of smartphones is looking to push it forward in a big way. As with any platform, both product demand and technological advancements have to catch up to the industry before it can become a viable solution for daily consumer life. Apple and Google are working to introduce the smartphone consumer to AR for the first time with basic features for now.
It's a sad day for one of the most beloved series of Android phones. For the first time since 2009, there's a new version of Android, but it's not being made available to Google's own Nexus devices.
Following in iOS 11's footsteps, Android 9.0 Pie will include a security feature that lets you immediately disable the fingerprint scanner as well as extended Smart Lock features. After initiating the feature, you will be required to insert your PIN, pattern, or password before any other unlock methods will work again.
Android O doesn't have an official code name yet, but it's certainly got plenty of cool new features. The OS won't officially debut until Q3 2017, but we've gotten our hands on some of the updated stock apps thanks to the Android beta program.
We have some bad news for BlackBerry fans: It looks like the upcoming KeyOne flagship won't be shipped in April after all.
If you've ever tried to update your Android phone manually, you know the process can be unnecessarily hard. There are so many steps and parts, that if one thing goes wrong, the whole process doesn't work. Recognizing this, the Android team came up with an even easier way.
The Pixel 3 runs stock Android, so you might think that since you've used an Android device before, you should know your way around the new phone by default. But Google has actually added several great Pixel-exclusive software features to its flagships, and not all of them are easily discoverable.
One option you won't find buried in the Galaxy Note 9's Settings is the ability to return the navigation bar to black. Samsung changed the default color to white with the Note 8, removing any ability to bring the black color back. But thanks to a neat app, Note 9 users can do it themselves.
Over the past week, we've had a number of important launches take place in the Android community. Samsung is in the middle of their rollout of the Galaxy S9, with preorders in the US shipping this week. Google also rolled out the first Android P developer preview last week. While these may seem unrelated, there are actually a number of Android P features inspired by Samsung software.
Spam calls are one of the most annoying things to happen in the world of smartphones for more than one reason. Not only are they bothersome, but they can also be dangerous to people who don't know any better. Google has come up with a crafty solution known as "Call Screen" to let the Google Assistant handle the call for you while you listen in on the caller like a stealth ninja.
Google launched the Pixel 2 XL with a unique pinch-to-zoom feature in the YouTube app. The feature is pretty basic, allowing users to expand the video to full-screen on devices with 18:9 aspect ratios with a simple pinch gesture. Considering its simplicity, it was strange that the feature was limited to the Pixel 2 XL. Today that exclusivity has ended as the feature is rolling out to the Galaxy S8, Galaxy S8+, Note 8, LG V30, and LG G6.
With the recent launch of the LG V30 and the Pixel 2 XL, LG has reintroduced the world to POLED. This display tech was showcased at CES 2015 and billed as a rival to Samsung's AMOLED displays, then promptly disappeared from the market for two years. But now that two of the biggest flagship phones this year are using the technology, many folks will be wondering what makes POLED different.
According to a study done by Kaspersky, 7.6% of Android users root their phones. That may not sound like a lot, but with over 2 billion Android devices out there, the math works out to over 150 million rooted phones — more than the total population of Russia, Mexico, or Japan — so root nation is an important demographic that deserves being catered to.
These days, it seems new phones get announced every other week. We've grown accustomed to glossing over the specs, looking at some press renders, then moving on to check out the next phone. If you had done this in September 2008, you might have overlooked what would become one of the most important phones of all time.
Everyone feels a little safer with Android's security updates, which are welcome and often necessary protective measures. But what happens when the update that's supposed to safeguard your phone actually ends up wreaking havoc with its security system?
The first sneak peak of Android O is finally here. The developer preview promises more features, stabilization, and better performance, according to the Android Developers Blog. Furthermore, there's speculation that the latest operating system will be code-named "Android Oreo," so it definitely sounds like we're in for a treat.
Google has a lesser-known Android app called Device Assist that might just be one of the most useful programs the company has ever published. It offers interactive guides and general tech support for Android, plus it can diagnose your device and help you fix any issues it finds.
The AMOLED display on the Nexus 6 wastes no power to show black pixels. This is because pixels on such a screen emit their own light, and black can be easily achieved by simply not lighting any given pixel.
For Android 11, Google is doubling down on the handy App Suggestions feature that debuted in Android 10's app drawer by expanding it to the home screen dock.
So, you rooted your Pixel 2 or 2 XL and everything seems to be working quite well. However, a month passes, and you get a notification to install the monthly security update. Like clockwork, Google has been pushing out OTA security patches every single month for a while, but there is a new problem for you at this point — as a rooted user, you are unable to apply the update correctly.
While 2017 saw the rise of "bezel-less" smartphones, none truly lived up to the name. Samsung shrank its bezels significantly, while Apple went with the infamous "notch." However, Samsung seems on the verge of kicking bezels out the door with a new patent application that embeds the front camera into the display.