android

Google Play Games for PC is getting more premium titles and cross-buy with Android

android, gaming, Google, google play, mobile games / Kelly Newman / March 11, 2026

Buy once (or more) to play anywhere

While Google announced last year it was opening the door to all Android games on Windows, things haven’t exactly worked out like that. It should have been easy, though. None of these “Windows” games is actually built for Windows—Play Games uses virtualization to run a lightweight Android OS in a container for the games. Hypothetically, all Android games should work, but there are still some big gaps.

For example, Play Games for Windows has thus far not supported paid games outside of those on Play Pass, and even some Play Pass content has been absent. In the latter case, that may be because developers have opted out. Google now says developers can choose to have Play Pass content available on both platforms. Regardless, the selection of free-to-play microtransaction factories in Play Games for PC hasn’t exactly screamed “premium experience.”

We should start seeing more paid games for Windows pop up, but Google’s going about it in an odd way. While these are still Android games at their core, Google is treating Windows as a separate platform. Thus, it has announced, “Buy once, play anywhere.” The idea is that developers can offer premium games in Google Play that include both Android and Windows access.

On mobile devices, anything you buy is always available on all other Android phones and tablets, but it’s apparently not the same for Windows. Developers have to join this program to offer cross-buy functionality, and it does not work for games you’ve previously purchased on Android. In addition, premium upgrades purchased on Android don’t necessarily carry over. Google says that depend son developer support and is unrelated to the new cross-buy program.

Google is making strides as it builds its desktop gaming catalog, but it still has a long way to go before it can attract any new players. In the distant past, Google might have just mirrored all mobile games on PC and called it a day, but Play Games on PC isn’t shaping up to be a Wild West. Google today is more deliberative and interested in controlling how apps are distributed. This is just another example of that mentality.

Updated 3/11 at 9PM ET with additional comment from Google.

Google Play Games for PC is getting more premium titles and cross-buy with Android Read More »

The Galaxy S26 is faster, more expensive, and even more chock-full of AI

AI, android, Galaxy s26, samsung, smartphones, Tech / Kelly Newman / February 25, 2026

Samsung’s Galaxy S26 series is available for preorder today and ships on March 11.

The Galaxy S26 lineup doesn’t change much on the outside. Credit: Samsung

There used to be countless companies making flagship Android phones, but a combination of factors has narrowed the field over time. Today, Samsung is the undisputed king of the Android device ecosystem with its Galaxy S line. So we can safely assume today’s Unpacked has revealed the most popular Android phones for the next year—the Galaxy S26 Ultra, Galaxy S26+, and Galaxy S26.

Samsung didn’t swing for the fences this time around, producing phones with a few cosmetic tweaks and upgraded internals. Meanwhile, Samsung is investing even more in AI, saying the S26 series includes the first “Agentic AI phones.” Despite limited hardware upgrades, the realities of component prices in the age of AI mean the prices of the two cheaper models have gone up by $100 this year. The Ultra remains at an already eye-watering $1,300.

Faster and more private

Looking at the Galaxy S26 family, you’d be hard-pressed to tell them apart from last year’s phones. The camera surround is different, and the measurements of the smallest and largest phone are ever so slightly different. You probably won’t be able to tell just by looking, but the S26 Ultra has regressed from titanium to aluminum, a reversion Apple also made with its latest high-end phones. This phone also retains its S Pen stylus.

Specs at a glance: Samsung Galaxy S26 series
	Galaxy S26 ($900)	Galaxy S26+ ($1,100)	Galaxy S26 Ultra ($1,300)
SoC	Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 (3 nm)	Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 (3 nm)	Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 (3 nm)
Memory	12GB	12GB	12GB, 16GB
Storage	256GB, 512GB	256GB, 512GB	256GB, 512GB, 1TB
Display	6.3-inch OLED, 10-bit color, 2340×1080, 1-120Hz	6.7-inch OLED, 10-bit color, 3120×1440, 1-120Hz	6.9-inch OLED, 10-bit color, 3120×1440, 1-120Hz, S Pen support
Cameras	50MP primary, f/1.8, 1.0 μm; 12MP ultrawide, f/2.2, 1.4 μm, 10MP 3x telephoto, f/2.4, 1.0 μm; 12MP selfie, f/2.2, 1.12 μm	50MP primary, f/1.8, 1.0 μm; 12MP ultrawide, f/2.2, 1.4 μm, 10MP 3x telephoto, f/2.4, 1.0 μm; 12MP selfie, f/2.2, 1.12 μm	200MP primary, f/1.4, 0.6 μm; 50MP ultrawide, f/1.9, 0.7 μm; 10MP 3x telephoto, f/2.4, 1.12 μm; 50MP 5x telephoto, f/2.9, 0.7 μm; 12MP selfie, f/2.2, 1.12 μm
Software	Android 16	Android 16	Android 16
Battery	4,300 mAh	4,900 mAh	5,000 mAh
Connectivity	Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 5.4, USB-C 3.2, Sub6 5G	Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 5.4, USB-C 3.2, Sub6 and mmWave 5G	Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 5.4, USB-C 3.2, Sub6 and mmWave 5G
Measurements	71.7×149.6×7.2 mm, 167g	75.8×158.4×7.3 mm, 190g	78.1×163.6×7.9 mm, 214 g

These phones will again have the latest Snapdragon flagship processor (in North America, Japan, and China) with customizations exclusive to Samsung. The Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 for Galaxy is a 3 nm chip with third-gen Oryon CPU cores, an Adreno 840 GPU, and a powerful Hexagon NPU for on-device AI processing. Samsung promises double-digit performance gains across the board, which is what we hear every year.

Samsung flagship phones have extremely fast hardware, so they benchmark well. However, they also tend to heat up and throttle quickly during sustained use. Perhaps that won’t be as much of a problem with the S26 series. Samsung says it has implemented its largest vapor chamber ever to better control temperatures.

The batteries have also been redesigned for greater efficiency and charging speed, but the base model is the only one that saw a capacity boost (4,000 to 4,300 mAh). Charging speeds have gotten a much-needed increase at the Ultra level. Samsung has only said you can now get a 75 percent charge in 30 minutes using its most expensive phone—it peaks at 60 W, up from 45 W for the last Ultra.

Samsung has been using the same camera sensors for a few cycles now, and it’s not changing anything major this time around. The Ultra still has four cameras (including two telephotos) that top out with the 200 MP primary, and the S26+ and base model still have three cameras with a 50 MP primary. The apertures on the Ultra sensors are a bit wider to allow for brighter photos in challenging conditions. More interesting, though, is the option to record high-quality 8K video directly to an external drive. The S26 also brings support for the Advanced Professional Video (APV) codec.

While the display specs haven’t changed much, they are home to the phone’s most notable new feature: Privacy Display. As smartphone screens have improved, they have emphasized high brightness and wide viewing angles, which is what you want most of the time. However, that also makes it easy for people nearby to see what’s on your screen. With one tap, the S26 can make it harder for shoulder surfers to see what you’re doing.

Privacy Display prevents shoulder surfers from peeking at your screen. Credit: Samsung

Privacy Display uses a technology called Black Matrix, which activates “narrow pixels.” These pixels focus light more directly on the user to limit the viewing angle. Privacy Display can be activated system-wide as you like, but it can also be activated on a per-app basis or even just in the part of the screen where notifications appear.

What is an Agentic AI phone anyway?

Unsurprisingly, AI takes the lead with the S26 launch. Part of that is just Samsung following the zeitgeist, but companies can also add new AI capabilities to fill out spec sheets without a bunch of increasingly expensive hardware upgrades. In Samsung’s words, it has sought to have “AI integrated into every layer” of the Galaxy S26 experience.

That starts with expanded awareness of screen context. The company’s Now Brief feature, which is supposed to pull together useful information from across your apps, has not been very impressive so far. With the S26, Samsung is piping notification content into Now Brief, allowing it to remind you about things even if you never added them to your calendar or to-do list. Like many of Samsung’s Galaxy AI features, this data is processed on-device and won’t go to the cloud.

A Galaxy AI Nudge that helps you select photos.

In a similar vein, Galaxy AI is also getting “Nudges,” which look similar to Google’s Magic Cue on the Pixel 10 series. The Galaxy S26 will be able to suggest content and apps based on what’s happening on the screen. For example, Galaxy AI might see you want to share images and suggest the right ones, or perhaps it will check your calendar for openings to save you from switching apps. Of course, that assumes the AI will correctly recognize the context and call the right action.

AI features will also be expanding in Samsung’s stock apps. In the Browser, Samsung has partnered with Perplexity for a new “Ask AI” feature. Rather than juggling tabs to read original sources yourself, you can have the AI do it. It basically gives you a research report like you could get from Perplexity itself (or Gemini Deep Research), but it’s integrated with the browser. Samsung’s gallery app also gets expanded AI editing tools with the S26. These capabilities will really allow you to change the substance of photos, so Samsung has added a visible watermark to label them. We’ve asked if there are AI labels in the image metadata, like you get with some other editing systems.

AI-edited photos have a visible watermark. Credit: Samsung

A major component of Samsung’s “Agentic AI phone” pitch comes from a partnership with Google. For starters, Google’s AI-powered scam detection features in the Messaging app, previously exclusive to Pixels, will launch on the S26 in preview before expanding to more devices later. Circle to Search is getting an upgrade that lets it identify multiple objects in a single image—this is in testing on both the Pixel 10 series and the Galaxy S26.

The other Google tie-in is more in keeping with the goal of agentic AI. For the first time, Gemini will be able to handle multistep tasks for you. You can watch it work if you prefer, but this can also happen entirely in the background while you do other things. It’s a bit like the recently launched Chrome Auto Browse but for apps.

The selection of apps is pretty slim during this testing period. Samsung and Google say you’ll be able to order food and groceries in apps like DoorDash and Grubhub, and there will be a tie-in with Uber for both rides and food. Google currently says you should “supervise closely” when the agent is working on your behalf. So we’ll see how that goes.

When you can get it

Samsung is accepting preorders for its new phones starting today. You can get them at every mobile carrier or directly from Samsung’s website. Carriers will offer a variety of deals with monthly credits to reduce the sting of the new, higher prices. Samsung has enhanced trade-in values right now, which is a more straightforward way to get a discount if you have an old phone to unload. It’s offering up to $900 off instantly with an S25 Ultra or Z Fold 6 trade-in. Even a phone from a couple of years ago can cut the price of a Galaxy S26 way down.

S26 colors — The Galaxy S26 comes in a variety of understated colors. Credit: Samsung

The phones are available in violet cobalt, sky blue, white, and black at all retailers. Samsung’s exclusive colors this time are silver shadow and pink gold. Devices will be on shelves and the doorsteps of preorderers on or around March 11.

Ryan Whitwam is a senior technology reporter at Ars Technica, covering the ways Google, AI, and mobile technology continue to change the world. Over his 20-year career, he’s written for Android Police, ExtremeTech, Wirecutter, NY Times, and more. He has reviewed more phones than most people will ever own. You can follow him on Bluesky, where you will see photos of his dozens of mechanical keyboards.

The Galaxy S26 is faster, more expensive, and even more chock-full of AI Read More »

Google’s Pixel 10a arrives on March 5 for $499 with specs and design of yesteryear

android, Google, pixel 10a, smartphones, Tech / Kelly Newman / February 18, 2026

It’s that time of year—a new budget Pixel phone is about to hit virtual shelves. The Pixel 10a will be available on March 5, and pre-orders go live today. The 9a will still be on sale for a while, but the 10a will be headlining Google’s store. However, you might not notice unless you keep up with the Pixel numbering scheme. This year’s A-series Pixel is virtually identical to last year’s, both inside and out.

Last year’s Pixel 9a was a notable departure from the older design language, but Google made few changes for 2026. We liked that the Pixel 9a emphasized battery capacity and moved to a flat camera bump, and this time, it’s really flat. Google says the camera now sits totally flush with the back panel. This is probably the only change you’ll be able to identify visually.

Specs at a glance: Google Pixel 9a vs. Pixel 10a
Phone	Pixel 9a	Pixel 10a
SoC	Google Tensor G4	Google Tensor G4
Memory	8GB	8GB
Storage	128GB, 256GB	128GB, 256GB
Display	1080×2424 6.3″ pOLED, 60–120 Hz, Gorilla Glass 3, 2700 nits (peak)	1080×2424 6.3″ pOLED, 60–120 Hz, Gorilla Glass 7i, 3000 nits (peak)
Cameras	48 MP primary, f/1.7, OIS; 13 MP ultrawide, f/2.2; 13 MP selfie, f/2.2	48 MP primary, f/1.7, OIS; 13 MP ultrawide, f/2.2; 13 MP selfie, f/2.2
Software	Android 15 (at launch), 7 years of OS updates	Android 16, 7 years of OS updates
Battery	5,100 mAh, 23 W wired charging, 7.5 W wireless charging	5,100 mAh, 30 W wired charging, 10 W wireless charging
Connectivity	Wi-Fi 6e, NFC, Bluetooth 5.3, sub-6 GHz 5G, USB-C 3.2	Wi-Fi 6e, NFC, Bluetooth 6.0, sub-6 GHz 5G, USB-C 3.2
Measurements	154.7×73.3×8.9 mm; 185 g	153.9×73×9 mm; 183 g

Google also says the new Pixel will have a slightly upgraded screen. The resolution, size, and refresh rate are unchanged, but peak brightness has been bumped from 2,700 nits to 3,000 nits (the same as the base model Pixel 10). Plus, the cover glass has finally moved beyond Gorilla Glass 3 to Gorilla Glass 7i, which supposedly has improved scratch and drop protection.

Google notes that more of the phone is constructed from recycled material, 100 percent for the aluminum frame and 81 percent for the plastic back. There’s also recycled gold, tungsten, cobalt, and copper inside, amounting to about 36 percent of the phone’s weight. The phone also continues to have a physical SIM slot, which was removed from the Pixel 10 series last year. The device’s USB-C 3.2 port can also charge slightly faster than the 9a (30 W versus 23 W), and wireless charging has gone from 7.5 W to 10 W. There are no Qi2 magnets inside, though.

Internally, the Pixel 10a is even more like its predecessor. Unlike past A-series phones, this one doesn’t have the latest Tensor chip—it’s sticking with the same Tensor G4 from the 9a. That’s a bummer, as the G5 was a bigger leap than most of Google’s chip upgrades. The company says it stuck with the G4 to “balance affordability and performance.”

Google’s Pixel 10a arrives on March 5 for $499 with specs and design of yesteryear Read More »

The first Android 17 beta is now available on Pixel devices

android, android 17, Google, smartphones, Tech / Mike M. / February 13, 2026

In short, the first Android 17 beta is chock full of things that may interest developers and modders, but there’s little in the way of user-facing changes right now.

Android 17 release schedule

Google has made some notable changes to how it releases Android updates, and Android 17 continues the trend. Like last year, there will be two Android 17 releases in 2026. The first one, coming in Q2, will be the more significant of the two. It will include a raft of new APIs, behavioral changes, and feature updates. This split release setup was implemented to better align with when major OEMs release new devices, but Android 17 availability still focuses mainly on Pixels. Google’s phones receive immediate updates, but everyone else has to wait for OEMs to roll out updates over the following weeks or months.

At the end of the year, another version (you can think of it as Android 17.1 even though Google doesn’t give it a name) will become available on supported devices. This “minor SDK release” will include some API and feature changes, but Google doesn’t have any details at this time.

Android release schedule — Credit: Google

Before we get to that, Google plans to launch a second beta release in March. The company says Beta 2 will include final APIs, allowing developers to complete testing and roll out updates. Developers will have “several months” to get that work done before the final version hits Pixels.

In 2025, Google also changed the way it updates the open source parts of Android. Rather than regular code dumps, Google now only updates the Android Open Source Project (AOSP) twice yearly, in the second and fourth quarters, when new versions are released. That makes it harder to know what to expect from upcoming versions of Android, but Google insists this is more efficient.

If you want to check out Android 17 today, you’ll need a Pixel device. It supports the Pixel 6, Pixel 7, Pixel 8, Pixel 9, and Pixel 10 generations. The Pixel tablet and original Pixel Fold are also included. Other phone makers may release beta builds in the weeks ahead, but it’s a Google-only event for now. You can opt in to get an OTA to Android 17 on the beta program website.

The first Android 17 beta is now available on Pixel devices Read More »

Google hints at big AirDrop expansion for Android “very soon”

AirDrop, android, file sharing, Google, IPhone, Tech / Mike M. / February 5, 2026

Android has its own AirDrop-like feature called Quick Share (formerly Google Nearby Share), but until recently, it couldn’t communicate with Apple’s AirDrop. As we reported in November, the European Union required Apple to implement the Wi-Fi Aware standard in AirDrop, which enabled Google to add support for the Pixel 10 lineup. Google confirmed it didn’t need to work with Apple at all to make that happen.

As part of the Quick Share updates, Google has added an extension to the Play Store that allows Quick Share to operate as a full, updatable APK rather than an element of Play Services. That should make it easier to roll out new features to the entire Android ecosystem. Currently, the extension only supports a smattering of Android phones, but we can expect that list to expand as AirDrop comes to more devices this year.

With AirDrop support, Android devices can send files to iOS and macOS devices without downloading third-party apps. However, the functionality requires Apple users to enable the “Everyone for 10 minutes” connectivity option. While Google can shoehorn Android into the Wi-Fi Aware system, it cannot use Apple’s contact-based sharing options. That probably won’t change with the pending update.

Of course, “very soon” in Google-speak can mean many things. The company does like to pair Android ecosystem updates with Pixel Drops, and the next one of those is expected in March, with changes to location privacy, At a Glance, and more.

Google hints at big AirDrop expansion for Android “very soon” Read More »

Google court filings suggest ChromeOS has an expiration date

aluminium, android, ChromeOS, Google / Shannon Garcia / February 3, 2026

The documents suggest that Google will wash its hands of ChromeOS once the current support window closes. Google promises 10 years of Chromebook support, but that’s not counted from the date of purchase—Chromebooks are based on a handful of hardware platforms dictated by Google, with the most recent launching in 2023. That means Google has to support the newest devices through 2033. The “timeline to phase out ChromeOS is 2034,” says the filing.

Android goes big

From the start, the ChromeOS experience was focused on the web. Google initially didn’t even support running local apps, but little by little, its aspirations grew. Over the years, it has added Linux apps and Android apps. And it even tried to get Steam games running on Chromebooks—it gave up on that last one just recently. It also tried to shoehorn AI features into ChromeOS with the Chromebook Plus platform, to little effect.

Android was barely getting off the ground when ChromeOS began its journey, but as we approach the 2030s, Google clearly wants a more powerful desktop platform. Android has struggled on larger screens, but Aluminium is a long-running project to fix that. Whatever we see in 2028 may not even look like the Android we know from phones. It will have many of the same components under the hood, though.

Aluminum vs ChromeOS — Aluminium will have Google apps at the core. Credit: US v. Google

Google could get everything it wants with the upcoming Aluminium release. When running on powerful laptop hardware, Android’s performance and capabilities should far outstrip ChromeOS. Aluminium is also expected to run Google apps like Chrome and the Play Store with special system privileges, leaving third-party apps with fewer features. That gives Google more latitude in how it manages the platform and retains users, all without running afoul of recent antitrust rulings.

Google court filings suggest ChromeOS has an expiration date Read More »

Inside Nvidia’s 10-year effort to make the Shield TV the most updated Android device ever

android, Android TV, Features, NVIDIA, Set-top boxes, Tech / 9u50fv / January 31, 2026

“Selfishly a little bit, we built Shield for ourselves.”

The Shield TV has that classic Nvidia aesthetic. Credit: Ryan Whitwam

It took Android devicemakers a very long time to commit to long-term update support. Samsung and Google have only recently decided to offer seven years of updates for their flagship Android devices, but a decade ago, you were lucky to get more than one or two updates on even the most expensive Android phones and tablets. How is it, then, that an Android-powered set-top box from 2015 is still going strong?

Nvidia released the first Shield Android TV in 2015, and according to the company’s senior VP of hardware engineering, Andrew Bell, supporting these devices has been a labor of love. And the team at Nvidia still loves the Shield. Bell assures us that Nvidia has never given up, even when it looked like support for the Shield was waning, and it doesn’t plan to stop any time soon.

The soul of Shield

Gaming has been central to Nvidia since its start, and that focus gave rise to the Shield. “Pretty much everybody who worked at Nvidia in the early days really wanted to make a game console,” said Bell, who has worked at the company for 25 years.

However, Nvidia didn’t have what it needed back then. Before gaming, crypto, and AI turned it into the multi-trillion-dollar powerhouse it is today, Nvidia had a startup mentality and the budget to match. When Shield devices began percolating in the company’s labs, it was seen as an important way to gain experience with “full-stack” systems and all the complications that arise when managing them.

“To build a game console was pretty complicated because, of course, you have to have a GPU, which we know how to make,” Bell explained. “But in addition to that, you need a CPU, an OS, games, and you need a UI.”

Through acquisitions and partnerships, the pieces of Nvidia’s fabled game console slowly fell into place. The purchase of PortalPlayer in 2007 brought the CPU technology that would become the Tegra Arm chips, and the company’s surging success in GPUs gave it the partnerships it needed to get games. But the UI was still missing—that didn’t change until Google expanded Android to the TV in 2014. The company’s first Android mobile efforts were already out there in the form of the Shield Portable and Shield Tablet, but the TV-connected box is what Nvidia really wanted.

“Selfishly, a little bit, we built Shield for ourselves,” Bell told Ars Technica. “We actually wanted a really good TV streamer that was high-quality and high-performance, and not necessarily in the Apple ecosystem. We built some prototypes, and we got so excited about it. [CEO Jensen Huang] was like, ‘Why don’t we bring it out and sell it to people?’”

The first Shield box in 2015 had a heavy gaming focus, with a raft of both local and cloud-based (GeForce Now) games. The base model included only a game controller, with the remote control sold separately. According to Bell, Nvidia eventually recognized that the gaming angle wasn’t as popular as it had hoped. The 2017 and 2019 Shield refreshes were more focused on the streaming experience.

“Eventually, we kind of said, ‘Maybe the soul is that it’s a streamer for gamers,’” said Bell. “We understand gamers from GeForce, and we understand they care about quality and performance. A lot of these third-party devices like tablets, they’re going cheap. Set-top boxes, they’re going cheap. But we were the only company that was like, ‘Let’s go after people who really want a premium experience.’”

Shield controller — Nvidia used to sell Shield-branded game controllers. Credit: Ryan Whitwam

And premium it is, offering audio and video support far beyond what you find in other TV boxes, even years after release. The Shield TV started at $200 in 2015, and that’s still what you’ll pay for the Pro model to this day. However, Bell notes that passion was the driving force behind bringing the Shield TV to market. The team didn’t know if it would make money, and indeed, the company lost money on every unit sold during the original production run. The 2017 and 2019 refreshes were about addressing that while also emphasizing the Shield’s streaming media chops.

A passion for product support

Update support for Internet-connected devices is vital—whether they’re phones, tablets, set-top boxes, or something else. When updates cease, gadgets fall out of sync with platform features, leading to new bugs (which will never be fixed) and security holes that can affect safety and functionality. The support guarantee attached to a device is basically its expiration date.

“We were all frustrated as buyers of phones and tablets that you buy a device, you get one or two updates, and that’s it!” said Bell. “Early on when we were building Shield TV, we decided we were going to make it for a long time. Jensen and I had a discussion, and it was, ‘How long do we want to support this thing?’ And Jensen said, ‘For as long as we shall live.’”

In 2025, Nvidia wrapped up its tenth year of supporting the Shield platform. Even those original 2015 boxes are still being maintained with bug fixes and the occasional new feature. They’ve gone all the way from Android 5.0 to Android 11 in that time. No Android device—not a single phone, tablet, watch, or streaming box—has gotten anywhere close to this level of support.

The best example of Nvidia’s passion for support is, believe it or not, a two-year gap in updates.

Across the dozens of Shield TV updates, there have been a few times when fans feared Nvidia was done with the box. Most notably, there were no public updates for the Shield TV in 2023 or 2024, but over-the-air updates resumed in 2025.

“On the outside, it looked like we went quiet, but it’s actually one of our bigger development efforts,” explained Bell.

The origins of that effort, surprisingly, stretch back years to the launch of the Nintendo Switch. The Shield runs Nvidia’s custom Tegra X1 Arm chip, the same processor Nintendo chose to power the original Switch in 2017. Soon after release, modders discovered a chip flaw that could bypass Nintendo’s security measures, enabling homebrew (and piracy). An updated Tegra X1 chip (also used in the 2019 Shield refresh) fixed that for Nintendo, but Nvidia’s 2015 and 2017 Shield boxes ran the same exploitable version.

Initially, Nvidia was able to roll out periodic patches to protect against the vulnerability, but by 2023, the Shield needed something more. Around that time, owners of 2015 and 2017 Shield boxes had noticed that DRM-protected 4K content often failed to play—that was thanks to the same bug that affected the Switch years earlier.

With a newer, non-vulnerable product on the market, many companies might have just accepted that the older product would lose functionality, but Nvidia’s passion for Shield remained. Bell consulted Huang, whom he calls Shield customer No. 1, about the meaning of his “as long as we shall live” pledge, and the team was approved to spend whatever time was needed to fix the vulnerability on the first two generations of Shield TV.

According to Bell, it took about 18 months to get there, requiring the creation of an entirely new security stack. He explains that Android updates aren’t actually that much work compared to DRM security, and some of its partners weren’t that keen on re-certifying older products. The Shield team fought for it because they felt, as they had throughout the product’s run, that they’d made a promise to customers who expected the box to have certain features.

In February 2025, Nvidia released Shield Patch 9.2, the first wide release in two years. The changelog included an unassuming line reading, “Added security enhancement for 4K DRM playback.” That was the Tegra X1 bug finally being laid to rest on the 2015 and 2017 Shield boxes.

The refreshed Tegra X1+ in the 2019 Shield TV spared it from those DRM issues, and Nvidia still hasn’t stopped working on that chip. The Tegra X1 was blazing fast in 2015, and it’s still quite capable compared to your average smart TV today. The chip has actually outlasted several of the components needed to manufacture it. For example, when the Tegra chip’s memory was phased out, the team immediately began work on qualifying a new memory supplier. To this day, Nvidia is still iterating on the Tegra X1 platform, supporting the Shield’s continued updates.

“If operations calls me and says they just ran out of this component, I’ve got engineers on it tonight looking for a new component,” Bell said.

The future of Shield

Nvidia has put its money where its mouth is by supporting all versions of the Shield for so long. But it’s been over six years since we’ve seen new hardware. Surely the Shield has to be running out of steam, right?

Not so, says Bell. Nvidia still manufactures the 2019 Shield because people are still buying it. In fact, the sales volume has remained basically unchanged for the past 10 years. The Shield Pro is a spendy step-top box at $200, so Nvidia has experimented with pricing and promotion with little effect. The 2019 non-Pro Shield was one such effort. The base model was originally priced at $99, but the MSRP eventually landed at $150.

“No matter how much we dropped the price or how much we market or don’t market it, the same number of people come out of the woodwork every week to buy Shield,” Bell explained.

That kind of consistency isn’t lost on Nvidia. Bell says the company has no plans to stop production or updates for the Shield “any time soon.” It’s also still possible that Nvidia could release new Shield TV hardware in the future. Nvidia’s Shield devices came about as a result of engineers tinkering with new concepts in a lab setting, but most of those experiments never see the light of day. For example, Bell notes that the team produced several updated versions of the Shield Tablet and Shield Portable (some of which you can find floating around on eBay) that never got a retail release, and they continue to work on Shield TV.

“We’re always playing in the labs, trying to discover new things,” said Bell. “We’ve played with new concepts for Shield and we’ll continue to play, and if we find something we’re super-excited about, we’ll probably make a go of it.”

But what would that look like? Video technology has advanced since 2019, leaving the Shield unable to take full advantage of some newer formats. First up would be support for VP9 Profile 2 hardware decoding, which enables HDR video on YouTube. Bell says a refreshed Shield would also prioritize formats like AV1 and the HDR 10+ standard, as well as support for newer Dolby Vision profiles for people with backed-up media.

And then there’s the enormous, easy-to-press-by-accident Netflix button on the remote. While adding new video technologies would be job one, fixing the Netflix button is No. 2 for a theoretical new Shield. According to Bell, Nvidia doesn’t receive any money from Netflix for the giant button on its remote. It’s actually there as a requirement of Netflix’s certification program, which was “very strong” in 2019. In a refresh, he thinks Nvidia could get away with a smaller “N” button. We can only hope.

But does Bell think he’ll get a chance to build that new Shield TV, shrunken Netflix button and all? He stopped short of predicting the future, but there’s definitely interest.

“We talk about it all the time—I’d love to,” he said.

Inside Nvidia’s 10-year effort to make the Shield TV the most updated Android device ever Read More »

Asus confirms its smartphone business is on indefinite hiatus

android, ASUS, smartphones, Tech / Shannon Garcia / January 19, 2026

An unconfirmed report early this month suggested Asus was pulling back on its smartphone plans, but the company declined to comment at the time. Asus chairman Jonney Shih has now confirmed the wind-down of its smartphone business during an event in Taiwan. Instead, Asus will focus on AI products like robots and smart glasses.

Shih addressed the company’s future plans during a 2026 kick-off event in Taiwan, as reported by Inside. “Asus will no longer add new mobile phone models in the future,” said Shih (machine translated).

So don’t expect a new Zenfone or ROG Phone from Asus in 2026. That said, very few phone buyers were keeping tabs on the latest Asus phones anyway, which is probably why Asus is throwing in the towel. Shih isn’t saying Asus won’t ever release a new phone, but the company will take an “indefinite wait-and-see” approach. Again, this is a translation and could be interpreted in multiple ways.

The Zenfone line might not be missed—its claim to fame was being slightly smaller and cheaper than competing devices, but Asus’ support and update policy were lightyears behind the market leaders. The ROG Phone line has been prominent in the gaming phone niche, offering the latest chipsets with active cooling, multiple USB-C ports, game controller accessories, blinking lights, and even a headphone jack. However, ROG Phones are even more expensive than Samsung’s flagship devices, with the most recent ROG Phone 9 Pro starting at $1,200. Apparently, the market of those who aren’t happy gaming on the latest iPhone or Samsung Galaxy is miniscule.

Existing Asus devices should continue to get updates, but Asus never took the lead there. The lavishly expensive ROG Phone 9 Pro is only guaranteed two OS updates and five years of security patches. The most recent Zenfones are also only eligible for two Android version updates, but they get just four years of security support.

A tough business

Shih’s comments imply that Asus won’t get back into the phone game unless something changes, and that’s not likely. Asus is not the first OEM to drop phone plans, and this is a continuation of a trend that has been underway for years as people upgrade phones less often.

Asus confirms its smartphone business is on indefinite hiatus Read More »

Google announces second Android 16 release of 2025 is heading to Pixels

AI, android, android 16, Google, Google Pixel, smartphones, Tech / Shannon Garcia / December 2, 2025

Material 3 Expressive came to Pixels earlier this year but not as part of the first Android 16 upgrade—Google’s relationship with Android versions is complicated these days. Regardless, Material 3 will get a bit more cohesive on Pixels following this update. Google will now apply Material theming to all icons on your device automatically, replacing legacy colored icons with theme-friendly versions. Similarly, dark mode will be supported across more apps, even if the devs haven’t added support. Google is also adding a few more icon shape options if you want to jazz up your home screen.

By way of functional changes, Google has added a more intuitive way of managing parental controls—you can just use the managed device directly. Parents will be able to set a PIN code for accessing features like screen time, app usage, and so on without grabbing a different device. If you want more options or control, the new on-device settings will also help you configure Google Family Link.

Android for all

No Pixel? No problem. Google has also bundled up a collection of app and system updates that will begin rolling out today for all supported Android devices.

Chrome for Android is getting an update with tab pinning, mirroring a feature that has been in the desktop version since time immemorial. The Google Messages app is also taking care of some low-hanging fruit. When you’re invited to a group chat by a new number, the app will display group information and a one-tap option to leave and report the chat as spam.

Google’s official dialer app comes on Pixels, but it’s also in the Play Store for anyone to download. If you and your contacts use Google Dialer, you’ll soon be able to place calls with a “reason.” You can flag a call as “Urgent” to indicate to the recipient that they shouldn’t send you to voicemail. The urgent label will also remain in the call history if they miss the call.

Google announces second Android 16 release of 2025 is heading to Pixels Read More »

Commercial spyware “Landfall” ran rampant on Samsung phones for almost a year

android, malware, samsung, Security, smartphones, spyware, Tech / Mike M. / November 8, 2025

Before the April 2025 patch, Samsung phones had a vulnerability in their image processing library. This is a zero-click attack because the user doesn’t need to launch anything. When the system processes the malicious image for display, it extracts shared object library files from the ZIP to run the Landfall spyware. The payload also modifies the device’s SELinux policy to give Landfall expanded permissions and access to data.

Landfall flowchart — How Landfall exploits Samsung phones. Credit: Unit 42

The infected files appear to have been delivered to targets via messaging apps like WhatsApp. Unit 42 notes that Landfall’s code references several specific Samsung phones, including the Galaxy S22, Galaxy S23, Galaxy S24, Galaxy Z Flip 4, and Galaxy Z Fold 4. Once active, Landfall reaches out to a remote server with basic device information. The operators can then extract a wealth of data, like user and hardware IDs, installed apps, contacts, any files stored on the device, and browsing history. It can also activate the camera and microphone to spy on the user.

Removing the spyware is no easy feat, either. Because of its ability to manipulate SELinux policies, it can burrow deeply into the system software. It also includes several tools that help evade detection. Based on the VirusTotal submissions, Unit 42 believes Landfall was active in 2024 and early 2025 in Iraq, Iran, Turkey, and Morocco. The vulnerability may have been present in Samsung’s software from Android 13 through Android 15, the company suggests.

Unit 42 says that several naming schemes and server responses share similarities with industrial spyware developed by big cyber-intelligence firms like NSO Group and Variston. However, they cannot directly tie Landfall to any particular group. While this attack was highly targeted, the details are now in the open, and other threat actors could now employ similar methods to access unpatched devices. Anyone with a supported Samsung phone should make certain they are on the April 2025 patch or later.

Commercial spyware “Landfall” ran rampant on Samsung phones for almost a year Read More »

The Android-powered Boox Palma 2 Pro fits in your pocket, but it’s not a phone

android, boox, e-readers, Google, Tech / Beth Washington / October 25, 2025

Softly talking about the Boox Palma 2 Pro

For years, color E Ink was seen as a desirable feature, which would make it easier to read magazines and comics on low-power devices—Boox even has an E Ink monitor. However, the quality of the displays has been lacking. These screens do show colors, but they’re not as vibrant as what you get on an LCD or OLED. In the case of the Palma 2 Pro, the screen is also less sharp in color mode. The touchscreen display is 824 × 1648 in monochrome, but turning on color cuts that in half to 412 × 824.

In addition to the new screen, the second-gen Palma adds a SIM card slot. It’s not for phone calls, though. The SIM slot allows the device to get 5G mobile data in addition to Wi-Fi.

The Palma 2 Pro runs Android 15 out of the box. That’s a solid showing for Boox, which often uses much older builds of Google’s mobile OS. Upgrades aren’t guaranteed, and there’s no official support for Google services. However, Boox has a workaround for its devices so the Play Store can be installed.

The new Boox pocket reader is available for pre-order now at $400. It’s expected to ship around November 14.

The Android-powered Boox Palma 2 Pro fits in your pocket, but it’s not a phone Read More »

Hackers can steal 2FA codes and private messages from Android phones

android, Biz & IT, Google, pixnapping, privacy, Security, side channel / 9u50fv / October 14, 2025

STEALING CODES ONE PIXEL AT A TIME

Malicious app required to make “Pixnapping” attack work requires no permissions.

Samsung’s S25 phones. Credit: Samsung

Android devices are vulnerable to a new attack that can covertly steal two-factor authentication codes, location timelines, and other private data in less than 30 seconds.

The new attack, named Pixnapping by the team of academic researchers who devised it, requires a victim to first install a malicious app on an Android phone or tablet. The app, which requires no system permissions, can then effectively read data that any other installed app displays on the screen. Pixnapping has been demonstrated on Google Pixel phones and the Samsung Galaxy S25 phone and likely could be modified to work on other models with additional work. Google released mitigations last month, but the researchers said a modified version of the attack works even when the update is installed.

Like taking a screenshot

Pixnapping attacks begin with the malicious app invoking Android programming interfaces that cause the authenticator or other targeted apps to send sensitive information to the device screen. The malicious app then runs graphical operations on individual pixels of interest to the attacker. Pixnapping then exploits a side channel that allows the malicious app to map the pixels at those coordinates to letters, numbers, or shapes.

“Anything that is visible when the target app is opened can be stolen by the malicious app using Pixnapping,” the researchers wrote on an informational website. “Chat messages, 2FA codes, email messages, etc. are all vulnerable since they are visible. If an app has secret information that is not visible (e.g., it has a secret key that is stored but never shown on the screen), that information cannot be stolen by Pixnapping.”

The new attack class is reminiscent of GPU.zip, a 2023 attack that allowed malicious websites to read the usernames, passwords, and other sensitive visual data displayed by other websites. It worked by exploiting side channels found in GPUs from all major suppliers. The vulnerabilities that GPU.zip exploited have never been fixed. Instead, the attack was blocked in browsers by limiting their ability to open iframes, an HTML element that allows one website (in the case of GPU.zip, a malicious one) to embed the contents of a site from a different domain.

Pixnapping targets the same side channel as GPU.zip, specifically the precise amount of time it takes for a given frame to be rendered on the screen.

“This allows a malicious app to steal sensitive information displayed by other apps or arbitrary websites, pixel by pixel,” Alan Linghao Wang, lead author of the research paper “Pixnapping: Bringing Pixel Stealing out of the Stone Age,” explained in an interview. “Conceptually, it is as if the malicious app was taking a screenshot of screen contents it should not have access to. Our end-to-end attacks simply measure the rendering time per frame of the graphical operations… to determine whether the pixel was white or non-white.”

Pixnapping in three steps

The attack occurs in three main steps. In the first, the malicious app invokes Android APIs that make calls to the app the attacker wants to snoop on. These calls can also be used to effectively scan an infected device for installed apps of interest. The calls can further cause the targeted app to display specific data it has access to, such as a message thread in a messaging app or a 2FA code for a specific site. This call causes the information to be sent to the Android rendering pipeline, the system that takes each app’s pixels so they can be rendered on the screen. The Android-specific calls made include activities, intents, and tasks.

In the second step, Pixnapping performs graphical operations on individual pixels that the targeted app sent to the rendering pipeline. These operations choose the coordinates of target pixels the app wants to steal and begin to check if the color of those coordinates is white or non-white or, more generally, if the color is c or non-c (for an arbitrary color c).

“Suppose, for example, [the attacker] wants to steal a pixel that is part of the screen region where a 2FA character is known to be rendered by Google Authenticator,” Wang said. “This pixel is either white (if nothing was rendered there) or non-white (if part of a 2FA digit was rendered there). Then, conceptually, the attacker wants to cause some graphical operations whose rendering time is long if the target victim pixel is non-white and short if it is white. The malicious app does this by opening some malicious activities (i.e., windows) in front of the victim app that was opened in Step 1.”

The third step measures the amount of time required at each coordinate. By combining the times for each one, the attack can rebuild the images sent to the rendering pipeline one pixel at a time.

As Ars reader hotball put it in the comments below:

Basically the attacker renders something transparent in front of the target app, then using a timing attack exploiting the GPU’s graphical data compression to try finding out the color of the pixels. It’s not something as simple as “give me the pixels of another app showing on the screen right now.” That’s why it takes time and can be too slow to fit within the 30 seconds window of the Google Authenticator app.

In an online interview, paper co-author Ricardo Paccagnella described the attack in more detail:

Step 1: The malicious app invokes a target app to cause some sensitive visual content to be rendered.

Step 2: The malicious app uses Android APIs to “draw over” that visual content and cause a side channel (in our case, GPU.zip) to leak as a function of the color of individual pixels rendered in Step 1 (e.g., activate only if the pixel color is c).

Step 3: The malicious app monitors the side effects of Step 2 to infer, e.g., if the color of those pixels was c or not, one pixel at a time.

Steps 2 and 3 can be implemented differently depending on the side channel that the attacker wants to exploit. In our instantiations on Google and Samsung phones, we exploited the GPU.zip side channel. When using GPU.zip, measuring the rendering time per frame was sufficient to determine if the color of each pixel is c or not. Future instantiations of the attack may use other side channels where controlling memory management and accessing fine-grained timers may be necessary (see Section 3.3 of the paper). Pixnapping would still work then: the attacker would just need to change how Steps 2 and 3 are implemented.

The amount of time required to perform the attack depends on several variables, including how many coordinates need to be measured. In some cases, there’s no hard deadline for obtaining the information the attacker wants to steal. In other cases—such as stealing a 2FA code—every second counts, since each one is valid for only 30 seconds. In the paper, the researchers explained:

To meet the strict 30-second deadline for the attack, we also reduce the number of samples per target pixel to 16 (compared to the 34 or 64 used in earlier attacks) and decrease the idle time between pixel leaks from 1.5 seconds to 70 milliseconds. To ensure that the attacker has the full 30 seconds to leak the 2FA code, our implementation waits for the beginning of a new 30-second global time interval, determined using the system clock.

… We use our end-to-end attack to leak 100 different 2FA codes from Google Authenticator on each of our Google Pixel phones. Our attack correctly recovers the full 6-digit 2FA code in 73%, 53%, 29%, and 53% of the trials on the Pixel 6, 7, 8, and 9, respectively. The average time to recover each 2FA code is 14.3, 25.8, 24.9, and 25.3 seconds for the Pixel 6, Pixel 7, Pixel 8, and Pixel 9, respectively. We are unable to leak 2FA codes within 30 seconds using our implementation on the Samsung Galaxy S25 device due to significant noise. We leave further investigation of how to tune our attack to work on this device to future work.

In an email, a Google representative wrote, “We issued a patch for CVE-2025-48561 in the September Android security bulletin, which partially mitigates this behavior. We are issuing an additional patch for this vulnerability in the December Android security bulletin. We have not seen any evidence of in-the-wild exploitation.”

Pixnapping is useful research in that it demonstrates the limitations of Google’s security and privacy assurances that one installed app can’t access data belonging to another app. The challenges in implementing the attack to steal useful data in real-world scenarios, however, are likely to be significant. In an age when teenagers can steal secrets from Fortune 500 companies simply by asking nicely, the utility of more complicated and limited attacks is probably of less value.

Post updated to add details about how the attack works.

Dan Goodin is Senior Security Editor at Ars Technica, where he oversees coverage of malware, computer espionage, botnets, hardware hacking, encryption, and passwords. In his spare time, he enjoys gardening, cooking, and following the independent music scene. Dan is based in San Francisco. Follow him at here on Mastodon and here on Bluesky. Contact him on Signal at DanArs.82.

Hackers can steal 2FA codes and private messages from Android phones Read More »