Google is reducing its long-standing 30 percent cut, which it takes from each Play Store digital purchase for all Android developers around the world, on the first $1 million they make on the digital storefront each year, starting on July 1st. According to Google, that change means the 99 percent of Android developers that make less than $1 million each year will see a 50 percent reduction in fees.
Google’s news follows Apple’s announcement of a reduced 15 percent fee last year as part of a new small business program, with one critical difference: Apple’s fee reduction only applies to developers that make under $1 million per year. But if an app maker goes over the $1 million threshold at any point in the year, they’ll be booted from Apple’s program and subject to the standard 30 percent rate.
Google’s program is a flat cut to the first $1 million developers make each year. That means whether you’re a student making your first app or a multibillion-dollar company, the first $1 million you make on the Play Store each year will only get charged a 15 percent service fee by Google. Any money you make after that will then be subject to the usual 30 percent cut. A Google spokesperson says the company felt that applying the reduced fees equally to all companies was a fair approach in line with Google’s goals of helping developers of all sizes.
Google has charged a 30 percent cut for any purchases through the Google Play Store since it first launched as the “Android Market” — although originally, the company claimed that “Google does not take a percentage,” with the 30 percent cut going toward “carriers and billing settlement fees.” In its more modern incarnation as the Play Store, Google now puts that 30 percent cut toward its “distribution partner and operating fees.”
The 30 percent fee has been constant for the lifespan of Google’s storefront. The only exception is subscriptions: in 2018, Google (in another similar move to Apple) announced that it would reduce its cut down to 15 percent for subscription products after users had been subscribed for a full year.
The number of developers that make more than $1 million each year — and will end up still being charged the full 30 percent — is proportionally tiny. Google notes that only about 3 percent of Android developers actually charge for either downloading their apps or for digital in-app purchases to begin with, and only 1 percent of those developers make more than the $1 million threshold that would see the 30 percent cut kick in.
The new policy also comes at a critical moment when Google (and Apple’s) app store policies are under intense public scrutiny, kicked off by the removal of Epic Games’ Fortnite from both the App Store and Play Store and the game developer’s subsequent antitrust lawsuits against Apple and Google.
The issue is also coming to a head in legislation, with states like Arizona and North Dakota debating new laws that would force Apple and Google to offer more alternative software distribution methods and payment options on their platforms.
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Like many people, I have spent much of the pandemic rekindling my love of bike riding. When I’m out, I usually want to be able to listen to something as I’m riding so I don’t get too bored. The problem, of course, is that blocking noise from the outside world is a very bad idea when you’re on a bike. It’s incredibly dangerous when you’re riding in a city — especially a city with little to no bike infrastructure to protect you from cars.
So I have gone on a short quest to solve this problem with open-ear headphones. Open-ear headphones do exactly what you expect: let you listen to music or podcasts while keeping your ears open for traffic or whatever else is around you.
It turns out that when you’re testing open-ear headphones for riding a bike, your feature priorities are nearly inverted. Sound quality is nice but suddenly way less important than getting a secure fit on (or near) your ear. Noise cancellation is right out — it’s literally the opposite of what we’re going for here. Volume also ends up mattering a lot.
Of the five or six different options I’ve tried, those different priorities drove my decision-making. My top pick doesn’t have great sound, but it’s the least hassle to use while pedaling around.
AfterShokz Aeropex
The best open-ear headphones on a bike: AfterShokz Aeropex
The best headphones to use when you’re biking are the $159.95 AfterShokz Aeropex bone conduction headphones. They work by pressing two fully enclosed “speakers” up against your head right in front of your ears. The audio then travels (conduces) through your literal skull into your eardrums, leaving your actual ears completely open to the world.
There are many reasons not to love bone conduction headphones. While generally comfortable, it does eventually get tiring to have vibrating pods pressed into your head. It’s the sort of feeling you’re not really conscious of until you are, if that makes sense. They have a big band that swoops behind your neck, too, which can get caught on a collar.
I also don’t like that they use a proprietary charger, which I am guaranteed to lose.
AfterShokz Aeropex
Then there’s sound quality, which I’d place somewhere just above the original pack-in Apple wired earbuds and below every decent pair of Bluetooth headphones. The Aeropex headphones sound okay, but mainly that’s relative to other open headphone options.
But again: those priorities are inverted. The Aeropex do look a little silly, but they never interfere with my helmet strap or my glasses (sometimes they’ll get caught up in a mask strap, though). It turns out that the most complicated part of open-ear headphones is the method they use for physically placing the sound next to your ear — and the Aeropex do a great job of it.
You can get loud-ish stereo sound out of them, letting you make sense of podcasts in moderate traffic. Bone conduction isn’t magic, though: when your environment gets truly loud, they’ll be drowned out just like anything else.
If you want to save a little money, AfterShokz makes a few less expensive models (which I haven’t tested). They come in multiple sizes as well, so you may need to try and return one to get a proper fit.
Galaxy Buds PlusPhoto by Chris Welch / The Verge
Use the buds you already have in just one ear: Samsung Galaxy Buds Plus
If you aren’t biking a ton or just don’t feel the need to spend the extra money, there’s a decent chance the wireless earbuds you already own could be a good option for you.
Correction: earbud. It’s really not that safe to wear both earbuds while biking in the city, especially when they either seal up your ear or have some sort of noise cancellation. I personally wouldn’t even recommend using two headphones with a passthrough mode — those features have gone wonky on me too many times.
Your state may even have a law against using two headphones (or headphones at all) while on your bike.
In any case, the move is to just put one earbud into the ear that faces away from where traffic will be — in the US, that’d be your right ear. It leaves your left ear open to hear (and react to) the world around you.
There are lots of pros to this method. You don’t have to spend more money. You can just keep using the buds you already have. And if it’s an ear-sealing style of bud, it should mean that you don’t need to turn the volume up super loud to be able to hear it.
The cons should be obvious: when it comes to sound quality, you’re getting half of stereo (or, if your phone is smart enough to realize it’s connected to only one bud, proper mono). That’s good enough for podcasts, but might be frustrating for music. There’s also the fact that you’re using one earbud much more than the other, which could mean it has a shorter overall life span.
If you’re wondering which earbud is best for this method, my advice is to go for the Galaxy Buds Plus. They secure into your ear with a solid seal and they have a long battery life. Most importantly, though: no stem. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had an AirPod go skittering across the pavement because I wasn’t careful enough with my helmet strap. The Buds Plus offer the best balance of price, sound quality, battery life, a secure fit, and most importantly: not sticking out of your ear, ready to be knocked out.
There are lots of other earbuds you could use, but again the most important thing here is that they fit securely to your ear even when there’s other stuff taking up space behind it: mask straps, helmet straps, or glasses.
Bose Sport Open Earbuds
Custom open-ear headphones: Bose Sport Open Earbuds
The headphones that actually inspired me to go find something I could use while riding were the recently announced $199.95 Bose Sport Open Earbuds. In theory, these would have been perfect. In practice, they were a big disappointment.
Good stuff first: the Bose Open Earbuds sound great. Bose, it turns out, appears to know a thing or two about acoustics. These work differently than bone conduction headsets or traditional earbuds. There’s a large ear hook that floats the speaker module directly above your ear hole, pointing sound waves right at it.
The combination of the speaker’s proximity and its relative size means that Bose can get great sound despite leaving your ears open to the world. They do a very good job of overcoming ambient traffic noise, too.
Unfortunately, they did an absolutely awful job of staying on my ear. I admit that everybody’s ears are different so they might work for you — but for me they were hard to fit on and went flying off all the time.
Bose Sport Open Earbuds
They also suffer from a problem I’ve mentioned before: we’ve got more stuff hitting our ears now than ever. Eyeglass or sunglass temples and these earbuds do not mix. Neither do mask straps or bike helmet straps.
Even so, I hung on to the Bose Open Earbuds with the idea that I might use them at home or in the office. I really do like wearing open earbuds around the house. It’s much less fatiguing that sticking an earbud into your ear canal or wearing a heavy set of cans. It’s also easier to just pause it and talk to people.
Alas, the Bose Open Earbuds are terrible for office or working from home because they utterly fail to support multiple devices. They do the thing where if they’re connected to your computer and you want to switch them to your phone, you have to manually disconnect them from the computer first.
There may be people who don’t care about any of those problems and who have the right ear shape for these headphones — and I will admit I am jealous of them. These sound better than they have any right to, but when I’m on a bike, sound quality simply isn’t at the top of the priority list.
Headphones in your glasses: Bose Frames Tempo
When I reviewed the Echo Frames from Amazon, I realized that simply having little always-available and unobtrusive Bluetooth headphones is great. It sounds dumb, but not having to put in or take out headphones changes your relationship to audio — it’s just always available, always there when you want it.
Unfortunately, I’ve yet to find a set of glasses with Bluetooth speakers that don’t have some kind of significant compromise. With the Echo Frames, it was battery life (and, well, looks).
With the Bose Frames, it’s a much simpler problem: I’d like to use headphones in situations where sunglasses don’t make sense.
I’m not against “single-tasker” tech solutions to problems, but the $249.95 Bose Frames take it too far. You can get different lenses for them, but they’re really not the sort of thing you’ll want to use outside of some specific contexts. Bose has other styles, but all of them are very much techie speaker eyeglasses instead of subtle.
Sena R1 Evo bike helmet
Speakers in your bike helmet: Sena R1 Evo
The $159 Sena R1 Evo smart helmet is one of the gadgetiest gadgets you can gadget on your bike. It’s a bike helmet that includes:
A local, nine-channel mesh intercom system
Bluetooth “headphones”
An FM Radio
A blinky tail light
A voice-driven interface (for some reason)
A companion smartphone app
I own and use the Sena R1 Evo as my bike helmet and I’m here to tell you that the first feature I mentioned, the mesh intercom, is great. The rest? Not so much.
The mesh intercom just uses local radio to keep an open channel with other, compatible Sena systems. When you’re riding along, you can simply talk and hear other people you’re riding with as long as you’re relatively close (I’d say less than a third of a mile with line of sight, less without line of sight). It’s so much more convenient than needing to get within talking or shouting distance to have a conversation.
The rest of the features are less impressive. The problem with the Sena system is that the speakers are simply too far away from your ears and too quiet to be audible when there’s ambient noise. Out on a quiet trail: awesome. In a city: nope.
The smartphone app doesn’t look very modern, but it does the job of configuring the helmet with your FM stations and preferred mesh intercom channels. The built-in smart assistant (“Hey Sena”) is sadly a mess. I triggered it accidentally more often than intentionally and when I did want it to work, it had a difficult time recognizing my voice commands.
I can’t speak to its safety specs, but it’s not MIPS if that matters to you. The taillight on the helmet is also fairly dim, I wouldn’t consider it a replacement for a proper taillight on your bike or back. I should also note that you can’t have music and the mesh intercom on at the same time, you have to switch modes manually.
Despite all that, I like this helmet and will keep using it — especially since my partner and I often go riding together.
Open-ear headphone options
Using a Bluetooth speaker strapped to your bike
I mean if you want to annoy everybody else around on you, it’s a choice.
AMD has announced its new Ryzen Pro 5000 series mobile processors, its competitor to Intel’s vPro platform. The company claims the chips, based on the same Zen 3 architecture as most of its consumer-focused Ryzen 5000 series, will provide “uncompromised performance and battery life” for thin-and-light business laptops. They’ll appear in a slate of business notebooks including Elitebooks, ProBooks, ThinkPads, and ThinkBooks throughout this year.
On paper, the chips look pretty similar to their Ryzen 5000 counterparts. The headliner is the Ryzen 7 Pro 5850U, with eight cores, 16 threads, 20MB cache, and base frequency of 1.9 GHz with boost up to 4.4 GHz. AMD’s Ryzen line currently contains the only processors for thin-and-light laptops that use “eight high-performing cores.” Intel’s Tiger Lake vPro line is all quad-core at the moment (though its H-series has an eight-core chip on the way, and that line does appear in ultraportables from time to time) and Apple’s M1 chip uses a combination of high-power and high-efficiency cores.
The line also includes the Ryzen 5 Pro 5650U (six cores, 12 threads) and the Ryzen 3 Pro 5450U (four cores, eight threads). The three chips are identical in specs to the Ryzen 7 5800U, Ryzen 5 5600U, and the Ryzen 3 5400U, respectively; all have 15W TDP. We’ll be testing a 5800U system shortly and will have a better sense of how these chips will perform after that.
Image: AMD
What the new chips have to offer businesses specifically are some new security features. They include a new Shadow Stack (here’s an explainer if you’re curious) designed to protect against malware attacks. AMD says the chips also include “deep integration with Microsoft and OEMs” for better security, and that PCs will have FIPS encryption certification.
The chips also include AMD’s Pro Manageability platform, which is AMD’s competitor to Intel’s Active Management Technology, and include “full spectrum manageability features.” As the Ryzen Pro 4000 series did, the 5000 line supports Microsoft’s Endpoint Manager, a platform for IT workers to manage PCs, servers, and other devices in their organization.
BMW is pulling the curtain back on its next iteration of iDrive, the software and infotainment platform that has served as the centerpiece of the automaker’s in-car experience for the last 20 years.
The eighth version of iDrive will mostly live on a new “curved” display that starts behind the steering wheel and extends halfway across the dashboard. This involves merging the 12.3-inch instrument cluster and the central 14.9-inch infotainment screen into a single unit angled toward the driver. The size of the screen will vary, depending on the vehicle, but the screen will have the appearance of “floating,” the automaker said. The new iDrive will make its debut later this year in BMW’s new iX electric SUV, as well as the BMW i4 electric sedan.
The brain of this car will also be a significant improvement over past models, BMW says. The onboard computer will be able to process 20 to 30 times the data volume of previous models, or around double the amount of data that was previously possible. This will enable a greater fusion of the vehicle’s sensors, which will help enable higher levels of autonomous driving.
According to BMW chief technology officer Frank Weber, iDrive is a “major step” toward fully autonomous vehicles. He explained that iDrive is designed to support both Level 2 and Level 3 autonomous driving systems.
“It is not an evolutionary step from what we had in the [previous] generation,” Weber said. “It’s an all new, all new system when it comes to sensors, computing, [and] the way it was developed.”
Advanced driver assistance systems, defined as Level 2 by the Society of Automotive Engineers, include lane keeping, blind-spot detection, automatic emergency braking, and adaptive cruise control. Most major automakers include some version of advanced driver assistance in their vehicles today. Level 3 refers to highly automated driving, also called conditional automation, where the driver still needs to be able to take over the vehicle upon request.
Other automakers have been tripped up by the promise of Level 3 driving. Audi, for example, said its A8 sedan would come with a feature called Traffic Jam Pilot that, when active, would relieve human drivers of the need to pay attention during stop-and-go traffic. But the feature was contingent on approval from local authorities, and Traffic Jam Pilot remains dormant in most markets around the world. Audi has no plans to activate the feature, and Level 3 automation remains a morass of legal, regulatory, and business-related challenges.
Weber wouldn’t say when BMW would introduce Level 3 automation and hinted it was conditional on racking up more test miles in vehicles equipped with the new version of iDrive.
“Nobody currently can offer at start of production Level 3 capabilities, because you need so many test miles,” he said. “And so you need a production vehicle, and then you run all your validation tests for Level 3.”
iDrive can be controlled with touch, voice activation, or gesture control. There are three main layouts: Drive, in which drivers can use a “dynamically changing area in the center of the information display to show individually selectable information”; Focus, “designed for extremely dynamic driving situations”; and Gallery, which minimizes the driving content “to clear as much space as possible for widget content.”
There is a theme of personalization that runs through the automaker’s new software update. BMW’s Personal Intelligent Assistant, built on top of Microsoft’s Azure cloud system, will “adjust to the driver’s individual needs and routines,” the company says, making it “a central operating channel of human-machine interaction.”
The virtual assistant, which has been available in BMW’s cars for a number of years, will play the role of a “digital character which can engage in natural dialogue with the driver and front passenger – similarly to a relationship between humans.” Expect some similarities to Mercedes-Benz’s MBUX system or Volvo’s Android-powered Google Assistant.
Using ultra-wideband (UWB) technology, iDrive will be able to load a driver’s personal settings as soon as they start approaching the vehicle by sensing their key fob or smartphone. BMW describes this as a “great entrance moment,” which includes geometric projections, lighted door handles, and other lighting effects.
There will be three driving modes: sport, personal, and efficient. These control driving functions like engine throttle, steering characteristics, regenerative braking, and chassis settings, as well as internal and external sounds. New modes may be added via over-the-air software updates in the future.
Information about navigation, parking, and EV charging will be fully integrated into iDrive. BMW extends its theme of personalization to its mapping capabilities with a new feature called “learning navigation,” in which the vehicle will learn and anticipate the destination the driver is likely to head for next, based on the driver’s personal ID. This is meant to be a time saver, as well as a way to identify possible road hazards that may delay the journey.
iDrive will support both Apple CarPlay and Android Auto wirelessly, the company said. For several years, BMW had the dubious distinction of being one of the few automakers to charge its customers an annual fee to mirror their smartphone’s display on their car’s infotainment screen. BMW reversed that decision in 2019, and since then offers both CarPlay and Android Auto to its customers for free.
(Pocket-lint) – The MacBook Air receives an annual upgrade, with the 2020 model doubling the base storage and introducing a newer keyboard mechanism compared to the 2019 model. But is anything else different? Here’s a quick-glance comparison between 2020 and 2019 MacBook Air models.
If you’re otherwise interested in the newer M1 MacBook then check out our M1-powered MacBook Pro vs MacBook Air feature instead. We also have a breakdown of all Mac options in our Which MacBook is best for you? feature.
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Design & Display
Both models: 13.3-inch ‘Retina display’ (2560 x 1600 resolution)
2020 model: 40g heavier than 2019 version, at 1.29kgs
Both models: Gold, Silver, Space Grey finish options
Both models: 15.6mm thickness, same design
Both models: 1x 3.5mm headphone jack
Both models: 2x Thunderbolt 3 ports
At a glance both 2020 and 2019 MacBook Air models look identical. The same scale, same colour options, same screen – it’s all the same. Indeed, even the 2021 models are identical in appearance.
There’s some subtle differences though. The 2020 model is 40g heavier, plus can support an external monitor to 6K (6016 x 3384) rather than the 5K support from the 2019 model.
In terms of ports, the 2020 Air sticks to its guns: that means the usual two Thunderbolt 3 ports, no additions this time around. The headphone jack is still in place, too.
That also means no improvement to the FaceTime camera: it’s still only 720p capable. Oh how we wish Apple would update this dated feature for a Full HD one!
Keyboard & Trackpad
2020 model: Magic Keyboard with redesigned scissor mechanism
This is where the biggest change can be seen. The 2020 Air utilises a Magic Keyboard, the same kind you’ll find in the 16-inch MacBook from the tail-end of 2019. That’s also now the standard in the 2021 M1 MacBooks, too, if you’re looking for a newer model.
Apple MacBook Pro 13-inch (M1 processor) review: The start of something new
It’s an important change, as the redesigned scissor mechanism here we found far superior than the butterfly mechanism of the earlier Air keyboards, which should mean less phantom typing. That said, we thought the 2019 Air’s keyboard was much improved over the 2018 model.
Elsewhere both 2019 and 2020 models have the same large trackpad design with Force Touch dual-layer control, plus Touch ID fingerprint login. There’s still no Face ID facial recognition login however – it seems Apple is holding its laptops away from such a sign-in system for now.
The 2020 Air also ramps up the base specification a little, by doubling the storage from 128GB to 256GB. It’s also possible to upgrade to 2TB, rather than 1.5TB, if you want to spend the extra cash.
On the processor front, these models are pre-M1, so that’s not an option. But the standard Intel Core i5 processor of the 2019 Air became an Intel Core i3 – which also brought with it a £100/$100/€100 saving, meaning the 2020 MacBook Air wasn’t quite as expensive, despite having more storage on board.
Battery life is one area that we’re unsure how these models will compare: the 2020 Air should last longer thanks to newer and more efficient processor hardware, unless, of course, you pick the more powerful processor upgrade. Some suggest that the newer model will deliver a slight downturn in battery performance though. But, really, if you want longevity then go for a 2021 M1 model – as it’ll last yonks longer.
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Conclusion
2020 MacBook Air: From £999/$999/€999
2019 MacBook Air: From £1,099/$1,099/€1,099
The 2020 Air didn’t bring with it an ultimate redesign, nor more ports to bolster the experience. What it savvily did, however, was bring all the goodness of before, plus more storage, and a better keyboard, but for less cash. That was a sensible move, as a stepping-stone year before the M1 MacBook models started to roll out.
(Pocket-lint) – The Garmin Lily is pitched as a smartwatch for women. Garmin says it’s the smartwatch we’ve been waiting for: “classic enough to make a statement and modern enough to keep you connected”.
With a patterned lens over a greyscale touchscreen and a super small and compact design, is the Garmin Lily really the smartwatch women would want – or is the non-targeted wider market a far better place to pick from?
Compact design
Dimensions: 34.5 x 34.5 x 10.15mm / Weight: 24g
Classic and Sport models
Six colour options
14mm bands
The Garmin Lily is small – very small in fact – which is probably why Garmin has specifically pitched this device at women. It would get completely lost on a larger wrist. With a 34mm casing, it’s 6mm smaller than the 40mm Apple Watch, but its strap is much slimmer too, making for a very feminine device overall.
Pocket-lint
Some will love its simplicity and elegance, while others will find it just too little. Compare the Lily to the likes of the Garmin Vivomove or Vivoactive ranges and you’re looking at a device that’s a fraction of the size.
In terms of finish though, the Lily is stylish and the design is versatile – it looks good with sportswear as well as dressier outfits. We aren’t quite sold on the patterned lens, though, which sits over the touchscreen – which, by the way, only appears when you flick your wrist – but the polished bezel, lugs and detail on the buckle are all nice touches.
Pocket-lint
Flip the Lily over and you’ll find the heart rate monitor (HRM) on the underside of the lightweight casing, along with the charging pins. We had the Sport model so our review unit has a silicone strap, which is soft and comfortable to wear. There’s also a Classic model, with a more classic strap.
Interesting display
16-level greyscale TFT LCD display
1 x 0.84-inch, 240 x 201 pixels
Patterned lens coating
The Garmin Lily has a 1-inch touchscreen display that sits behind a patterned lens. It’s a clever design, though as we mentioned previously, we aren’t huge fans of the actual pattern that Garmin has chosen.
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The touchscreen is greyscale so there are no rich and vibrant colours like you would get on the Apple Watch or Fitbit Versa, making it a little less exciting than other smartwatches available. The touchscreen is nice and bright, however, so we had no issues seeing it in brighter conditions.
The screen is responsive too, when it’s actually on and you are navigating through the various options. The flick-of-the-wrist action or pushing the touch button at the bottom of the screen to get it on is less responsive though.
There were multiple occasions where we had to flick our wrist several times to wake the display up. The touch-sensitive button works fine, but you have to hit it in exactly the right spot – and the size of the device can make this fiddly.
Pocket-lint
There’s also no always-on display option within the settings. This feature would of course drain the battery – which isn’t great anyway, more on that later – but it means the patterned lens is very prominent when the touchscreen isn’t on, which is most of the time. Many of the clock faces available are simple and perfect for having on all the time so we’d have liked this as an option.
The Garmin Lily is packed with features – some of which are excellent – but it misses out on a couple of important ones. Let’s start with what it does have though.
Pocket-lint
There’s heart rate monitoring, respiration rate tracking, blood oxygen monitoring (VO2 max), stress tracking, advanced sleep tracking, and Garmin’s Body Battery monitoring, along with menstrual cycle tracking and hydration tracking – the latter two of which are manual (and, just to make note, available on many other Garmin products too).
You’ll also find the standard activity tracking features you’d expect, such as step counting, elevation, reminders to move, calories burned, distance, and intensity minutes.
Other features include 5ATM water resistance (which is down to 50m depth) and basic swim tracking, smartphone notifications, weather notifications, the ability to control your smartphone music, text response and call reject functionality (for Android users) and running cadence.
Pocket-lint
Sounds like a lot, we know. And it is. But you’ll get those on other Garmin products, by and large. And the Lily misses out built-in GPS – which seems like a major omission for Garmin – and especially at this price point. It’s a bit baffling really.
The Lily does offer Connected GPS, but that of course requires you to take your phone with you when you run or walk. It also doesn’t offer Garmin Pay and there aren’t as many specific workout options available compared to the likes of Apple Watch.
Performance and battery
The Garmin Lily’s battery life is claimed to last for up to five days, but we struggled to get three out of it. On a couple of occasions we got less than two. Turning off blood oxygen monitoring helped to extend the life – as this cuts into the battery life significantly – but it definitely wasn’t a five-day device in our experience.
Pocket-lint
In terms of other features though, the Lily performs well. Though we would really like to see more activities to select, like Hiit, the Lily was on par with the Apple Watch Series 6 for the way it measured any runs or high intensity workouts we did.
The heart rate monitor responds quickly during Hiit – something we didn’t find happened with the Fitbit Sense – and our runs were almost identical in terms of statistics to the Apple Watch.
Sleep tracking is also great on the Lily – if you want to go to bed wearing a watch – and we love the idea of Garmin’s Body Battery feature, although we wish it didn’t always tell us we were basically running on fumes.
Pocket-lint
Smartphone notifications, however, are disappointing. Garmin calls the Lily a smartwatch, but it isn’t really – or at least not compared to the likes of the Apple Watch.
Best smartwatch 2021: Top smartwatches available to buy today
By Britta O’Boyle
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For those on Android, you can reply to texts and reject calls on the Lily. But for iOS users, you can only clear notifications, making it a little pointless and pretty much just a battery drain.
Garmin Connect app
Android and iOS compatible
The Garmin Connect app offers a number of extra features on top of those found on the Lily itself. It’s also where you’ll find all the collected data, allowing you to delve a little deeper.
The Connect app is easy to use once you know how – much like the Lily itself. It’s not as clear as the Fitbit app, but there’s heaps of data to go through if you want. There is also no paywall on Garmin for some features, like Fitbit has done with its Fitbit Premium subscription.
At the bottom of the Connect app, you’ll find five tabs: My Day, Challenges, Calendar, News Feed and More. The first is likely the one you’ll use most, giving you a summary of your activity, including heart rate, Body Battery, stress, steps, calories. Tapping on each category will give you further breakdowns.
To see a summary of all the activities you have specifically tracked using the Lily, you can tap on your profile at the top of the Garmin Connect app. You can also see a summary of your statistics here too, like personal records.
To change settings – such as selecting which activity options appear on the watch – tap on the circle at the top of the Connect app with the Lily in it. From here, there are alert settings, general settings, appearance and activity tracking settings to go through, among others.
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On the Lily itself, tapping on the touch-sensitive button at the bottom of the display will take you to the main menu, which includes Watch Face, Activities, Settings and Clocks.
Swiping down from the top of the main screen will take you to a quick setting menu with options like Do Not Disturb and Notifications. Tapping on the Notifications icon is the only way to see past notifications that have come through on Lily from your smartphone.
Swiping right to left or left to right on the main screen of Lily will take you to My Day, with further swipes detailing health stats, calendar appointments, weather, menstrual tracking, hydration, Body Battery, and intensity minutes.
Verdict
The Garmin Lily is a small, lightweight, elegant device that is comfortable to wear, and has an interesting design. That’s the summary of its good features.
But there’s just too much lacking – the most prominent of which is no built-in GPS. Even without this feature available the battery life is poor compared to what’s promised, smartphone notifications are pretty pointless – in that you can’t do anything with them – and we aren’t especially keen on the patterned lens design either.
If you’re after a watch that offers good activity tracking in a very small and dainty package – and don’t mind taking your phone with you when exercising – then the Lily has its share of positives. But Garmin’s own range offers more features at similar prices, so we’d look there – accepting the result will be a physically larger product – to get more of the features that matter.
Also consider
Garmin
Garmin Vivoactive 4s
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The Garmin Vivoactive 4s has all the features the Lily offers, but it offers built-in GPS, more sports apps, Garmin Coach, Music and Garmin Pay. It comes in a 40mm option so while it is bigger than the Lily, it offers a lot more in that extra size.
Best Garmin watch compared
Pocket-lint
Apple Watch SE
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The Apple Watch SE isn’t too much more expensive than the Garmin Lily – especially not if you’re looking at the Classic model – but it offers a lot more in the smartwatch department for Apple iOS users, and it has plenty of great fitness tracking features too.
Spectre continues to go bump in the night. The vulnerability was revealed in 2018, but even though it’s largely faded from public consciousness, it’s still a threat. Case in point: Google has published a proof-of-concept website called Leaky.Page that shows how attackers can use JavaScript to exploit Spectre via popular web browsers.
Let’s turn back the clock. Spectre was disclosed with another vulnerability, Meltdown, that vendors were quick to address despite their fixes causing slight performance drops. Responding to Spectre has proven more difficult because it requires Intel, AMD, Arm, and Nvidia to change their processor architectures.
In the meantime, it’s up to other companies to limit their customers’ exposure to the vulnerability, which is where this proof-of-concept comes in. Google said in a blog post that it wanted to “give web application owners a better understanding of the impact Spectre vulnerabilities can have on the security of their users’ data.”
The result is Leaky.Page, which offers a summary of Google’s intent before giving people the chance to see how JavaScript-based Spectre exploits could affect their systems. Google published a video of a successful test that you can watch right here:
Leaky.Page was originally configured for Chrome 88 running on an unidentified version of Linux and an Intel Core i7-6500U. Google said that its proof-of-concept could “function across a variety of operating systems, processor architectures, and hardware generations,” however, “without any major changes” to the code.
The company only named one additional processor susceptible to this exploit: the M1 chip Apple introduced in November 2020. That doesn’t come as a surprise—we already knew that Arm’s designs were affected by Spectre—but it’s a worthwhile reminder that Apple silicon can be affected by three-year-old vulnerabilities.
Google said its tests on Chrome 88, Linux, and an Intel Skylake processor leaked data at speeds up to 1kB/s. Results will vary based on the system tested, however, which is why Leaky.Page could prove useful. A list of recommendations to web developers looking to protect their users can be found in Google’s blog post.
Even they aren’t enough. Google noted that “while all of the mechanisms described in this article are important and powerful security primitives, they don’t guarantee complete protection against Spectre; they require a considered deployment approach which takes behaviors specific to the given application into account.”
Caviar transforms the iPhone 12 Pro (Max) into a 1 kilogram 24-karat gold bar. These unique Limited Edition smartphones will retain their value over time.
The Russian company Caviar is known for enriching and decorating high-end Apple and Samsung smartphones with rare materials, including precious metals. This time Caviar takes a slightly different approach. The iPhone 12 Pro (Max) was used as the basis for the new Goldphone. In Caviar’s jewelry workshop, the smartphone is decorated with a kilogram of 24-karat gold, making it an investment object for investors.
Normally, Caviar uses 18 karat gold for its luxurious creations, which is more practical in everyday life and also more affordable. This time, however, Caviar only uses 24 karat gold, making it a worthwhile investment for the long term.
iPhone 12 Pro Goldphone as an investment
Caviar’s iPhone 12 Pro Goldphone looks like a bar of gold, while retaining all the smart features the iPhone has to offer. Most functions, at least, because to create this golden design Caviar decided to eliminate the camera system.
The Caviar logo is processed on the back of the smartphone. Directly below, the letters “Fine Gold 999.9” are engraved, including the weight of 1000 grams. The Goldphone comes in a limited edition of only 7 pieces, on the back of the device the unique number is engraved.
This golden Limited Edition smartphone comes in a luxurious white case-safe with a combination lock. Caviar ships all over the world, every phone is delivered by a private courier. Delivery is included in the price, regardless of where you live.
This golden iPhone retains all functions that can also be found in the regular iPhone 12 Pro (Max) – except for the rear-camera. Customers can choose from the Pro or Pro Max model. Both devices are available in three memory variants: 128GB, 256GB and 512GB.
The suggested retail price of the Caviar Goldphone is set at $ 159,000 USD, for which you will receive the 128GB iPhone 12 Pro. Do you prefer a Samsung phone? Alternatively, Caviar offers the same design based on the Samsung Galaxy S21.
Ilse is a Dutch journalist and joined LetsGoDigital more than 15 years ago. She is highly educated and speaks four languages. Ilse is a true tech-girl and loves to write about the future of consumer electronics. She has a special interest for smartphones, digital cameras, gaming and VR.
According to TechCrunch, Apple has discontinued the original HomePod. The website quotes an unnamed Apple representative as stating that the company is “focusing our efforts on HomePod Mini”.
Not only is this a disappointing development – the HomePod is one of the very best-sounding wireless speakers you can buy, after all – it also seems a little bit peculiar. Does a company as resource-rich as Apple really need to discontinue one product in order to focus on another? Surely not. Similarly, a single smart speaker surely isn’t adequate for a company the size of Apple when so many rivals are producing whole families of similar devices.
We’d be tempted to guess that the four year-old HomePod is really making way for a new model (Apple is strongly rumoured to be hosting a launch event of some kind at the end of this month), but Apple doesn’t usually discontinue a product before its replacement is announced.
Perhaps the intention was to replace the HomePod in March and Apple has wound-down production, but the replacement has had to be pushed back to later in the year. Whatever the full story is, we can’t help but think that something’s in the works.
According to the TechCrunch story, Apple will continue to sell the original HomePod until stock runs dry and is promising to offer support for the HomePods already sold. Whether that includes new feature updates and the like remains to be seen.
It wasn’t long ago that Apple added its Intercom feature to the original HomePod and gave it the ability to handle Dolby Atmos sound from the Apple TV 4K, making today’s news even more surprising.
If we were the betting sort, we’d bet that this is just the start of a hiatus for the HomePod, and that it will rise again in a new form at a later date. As soon as we hear anything on that front, we’ll report back.
MORE:
Read our Apple HomePod review
Should you consider the Mini? Check out our HomePod Mini review
How HomePod was made: a tale of obsession from inside Apple’s audio labs
Looking for an alternative? Here are the best wireless speakers
Apple is discontinuing the original, full-size HomePod and will now focus its speaker efforts on the HomePod mini, the company told TechCrunch on Friday evening.
Here is what Apple said in a statement to TechCrunch:
HomePod mini has been a hit since its debut last fall, offering customers amazing sound, an intelligent assistant, and smart home control all for just $99. We are focusing our efforts on HomePod mini. We are discontinuing the original HomePod, it will continue to be available while supplies last through the Apple Online Store, Apple Retail Stores, and Apple Authorized Resellers. Apple will provide HomePod customers with software updates and service and support through Apple Care.
The Space Grey model of the full-size HomePod is already sold out on Apple’s online store.
The full-size HomePod had great sound quality, but it was criticized for its high $349 price tag at launch. Apple eventually dropped the price to $299 in April 2019, and came out with the $99 HomePod mini last year.
The move isn’t altogether surprising; sales of the HomePod have reportedly been low, and in our review, we felt that the HomePod mini offered good sound for its size.
A star engineer, Raja Koduri is one of the Intel executives who tends to reveal development progress of upcoming products via social media. A couple of months ago, he announced that the first GPU based on Intel’s Intel’s Xe HPG architecture had powered on, and this week, he seemingly teased the bring-up process of Intel’s upcoming entrant into the best gaming graphics card race.
From 2012 to 2021 – same Intel Folsom lab, many of the same engineers with more grey hair , I was at Apple back then, getting hands on with pre-production crystalwell, 9 years later playing with a GPU that’s >20x faster! pic.twitter.com/RgmRJuhOXwMarch 12, 2021
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“From 2012 to 2021 — same Intel Folsom lab, many of the same engineers with more grey hair,” Raja Koduri, general manager of Architecture, Graphics, and Software at Intel, wrote in a Twitter post Thursday. “I was at Apple back then, getting hands on with pre-production Crystalwell, nine years later playing with a GPU that is >20x faster!”
The two pictures Koduri included show him running some tests on two development systems: one based on Intel’s Haswell with Iris Pro 5200 graphics equipped, a 64MB eDRAM package (Crystalwell) from 2012 and another powered by an upcoming Intel Xe. He didn’t specify the GPU as Xe HPG specifically, but the running of 3DMark, as well as the video outputs point toward the gaming-focused GPU.
The second image partly reveals the Xe bring-up board. Such boards are designed to provide maximum flexibility in terms of GPU configuration and power delivery, so while they have display outputs, they do not look like graphics cards at all. That said, it’s not surprising to see the Xe HPG development board come with a cooling system that looks like it belongs with a server CPU.
Koduri’s photo zoomed in (Image credit: Raja Koduri/Twitter)
It’s also interesting to see Koduri says that the Xe GPU was over 20 times faster than Intel’s Iris Pro 5200 from 2013. Of course, an upcoming discrete graphics processor should be an order of magnitude faster than an eight-year-old integrated GPU. And “>20x faster” could mean a range of things (not that we would expect Koduri to share performance numbers at this stage).
For some comparison, Intel’s Iris Pro 5200 with 40 execution units (EUs) and 128MB of eDRAM scores 1,426 graphics points in 3DMark FireStrike. By contrast, the latest Intel Iris Xe G7 integrated GPU with 96 EUs scores between 5,800 and 5,900 graphics points, making it over four times faster than its ancestor in said benchmark.
Modern discrete graphics cards, such as Nvidia’s GeForce RTX 3060 Ti, score around 31,000 graphics points in 3DMark FireStrike, so they are, indeed, over 20 times faster than Intel’s Iris Pro 5200. Meanwhile, Nvidia’s top-of-the-range GeForce RTX 3090 scores between 52,000 and 53,000 graphics points in 3DMark Firestrike (37 times faster than the Iris Pro 5200).
We can’t draw any firm conclusions on Intel Xe HPG’s performance based on Koduri’s tweet. But if by over 20 times faster, the exec meant something close to 20 times faster, then we can expect the GPU to compete against products like the GeForce RTX 3060 Ti. We’ll have to wait for much more information to see.
In 2013, Walt Disney World resort offered the MagicBands — a plastic bracelet that made it easy to perform numerous services such as park tickets. And now, almost a decade later, the company is finally making your trip to the most magical place on Earth a little more modern with MagicMobile, a digital pass accessible through your iPhone and Apple Watch starting later this year.
As an alternative to spending money on a plastic NFC wristband, the MagicMobile pass will be added to your Apple Wallet. Guests can then use their iPhone or Apple Watch to gain entry into the park. Disney has not said exactly when MagicMobile will officially be available but confirmed Apple devices would get access to the service and features first.
Disney confirmed in a blog post that the MagicBands will still be an option, and guests can choose which option is more convenient for them or even use both and alternate between the MagicBand and MagicMobile pass. (Disney says it’s introducing new MagicBand colors and designs featuring Disney characters.) The company also notes that MagicMobile will not replace the My Disney Experience app, which serves as a digital room key for guests staying at a Disney Resort hotel.
Every Friday, The Verge publishes our flagship podcast The Vergecast, our chat show discussing the week in tech news featuring our reporters and editors.
This week, co-hosts Nilay Patel and Dieter Bohn talk to Verge deputy editor Elizabeth Lopatto about the rise in interest of NFTs. Elizabeth explains the basics of how NFTs work and what someone actually owns when a transaction takes place.
In the second half of the show, Verge deputy editor Dan Seifert stops by for a gadget roundup — there’s a review for the wild Asus ROG Phone 5, some rumors of OnePlus’ new flagship device, and the announcement of Sonos’ first fully mobile Bluetooth speaker.
Listen here or in your preferred podcast player to hear the full discussion.
Stories mentioned in this week’s episode:
COVID-19 took disease tests out of the lab — and may keep them there
People who are vaccinated can socialize together without masks, CDC says
COVID-19 vaccine supplies are on the rise in the US
Single-shot COVID-19 vaccine is popular at vaccination sites
Artifacts from the first COVID-19 vaccination in the US are headed to the Smithsonian
Meet Dr. B, the startup connecting people to leftover vaccines
Beeple sold an NFT for $69 million
NFTs, explained
Of course John Legere bought an $888,888.88 NFT from Steve Aoki
Jack Dorsey’s first tweet may fetch $2.5 million, and he’ll donate the NFTy proceeds to charity
Sonos Roam officially announced for $169, preorders start now
Sonos partners with Audi to bring its audio tech to cars
Asus ROG phone 5 review
Leaked OnePlus 9 Pro and OnePlus 9 renders leave little to the imagination
OnePlus’ next phones will come out on March 23rd
Samsung will host another Unpacked event on March 17th
Apple reportedly overestimated iPhone 12 mini demand, by a lot
Insta360’s Go 2 is a $299 action camera with a surprisingly powerful case
The most powerful Wear OS watches are held back by Wear OS
Asus ROG Zephyrus G15 review: AMD and Nvidia at their best
It is true to say that 2020 wasn’t a great year, period. There have been both CPU and GPU shortages in the electronics world, but a recent drought in Taiwan could affect all sectors, including the many single board computers (SBC) such as the Raspberry Pi. TSMC has been asked to reduce its water use by 7%, which should help keep the island’s reserves at sufficient levels until the rainy season ends in May. Could this impact the Raspberry Pi range of boards, including the Pico?
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) makes chips for many different customers such as Apple and Intel, so the drought in Taiwan may impact chip production for many different types of consumer electronics. The latest to be affected are the many makers of SBC. In a post on ameriDroid, an unnamed manufacturer states.
“Just wanted to give you a heads up that there are severe component shortages happening globally now; this certainly is affecting all SBC manufacturers such as PINE64, ODROID, and also Raspberry Pi. We are trying to navigate this difficulty and minimize the impact. It looks like this shortage can last a long time, possibly into 2022.” If this turns out to be true, then we could be in for a lean year.
We asked Raspberry Pi creator and Chief Executive of Raspberry Pi Trading, Eben Upton, to comment on this issue. “We’re not expecting any impact from this (or the other factors causing tightness in global supply chains) at present: we’re getting great support from our component vendor partners.”
The impact on some SBC is starting to be felt, and Pine64, makers of cellphones, laptops, and RISC-V powered soldering irons, announced via a tweet that “Due to component shortages, component price-increases & related issues, we will only open orders/pre-orders when production is securely underway. ”
(1/2) [PSA] Re. availability of #PinePhone, #PinebookPro, #PineTab, etc., Due to component shortages, component price-increases & related issues, we will only open orders/pre-orders when production is securely underway. We are more cautious than usual, also for your sake (…) pic.twitter.com/0cJA2dQNpCMarch 11, 2021
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Pine64 isn’t the only company to have announced that there could be an impact. In an ODROID forum post, we read that there could be a four to five month delay in chips for the company’s H2+ board. It seems that 2021 could be another year of shortages, but this time on a much larger scale, affecting sectors such as consumer electronics and the automobile industry.
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The true wireless earbuds market has never been more crowded than it is in 2021. With so many to choose from, finding the best earbuds can seem daunting. But the vast selection is actually a good thing: not only are there excellent picks for everyday buds to carry in your pocket, but you’ve also got a slew of options that prioritize things like noise cancellation, fitness, lengthy battery life, and comfort.
Even if you don’t consider yourself any kind of audiophile, it’s important to find a set of earbuds that sound good to you. This means different things depending on the person: do you want head-rattling bass or something more balanced with an immersive soundstage? You’ll want to find a pair with a good, reliable Bluetooth connection — all of the below picks check off that box — and enough battery life to last you through a normal day of intermittent listening.
Remember that getting the most out of earbuds requires a good seal in your ear. Always try the various ear tip sizes that come with whichever buds you purchase — and don’t be afraid to experiment with different sizes in each ear. Ears are funny like that. Many of these earbuds have apps you can install on your phone to further personalize their sound and controls the way you want.
If you’re looking for the overall best noise-canceling earbuds, you’ll be very happy with Bose’s QuietComfort Earbuds. They have best-in-class noise cancellation and sound great.
But if you’ve got other priorities, there is a range of great options from Apple, Beats, Jabra, Sennheiser, and Ultimate Ears that won’t disappoint. This guide covers higher-end wireless earbuds. If you’re on the hunt for more affordable options, check out the best cheap wireless earbuds to buy.
Bose’s QuietComfort Earbuds are the best noise-canceling wireless earbuds you can get.Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge
1. Bose QuietComfort Earbuds
Best noise-canceling earbuds
The QuietComfort Earbuds offer very powerful active noise cancellation, but what’s equally nice about them is how customizable the ANC is. You can choose between 11 different levels of noise cancellation (based on how much of the outside world you want mixed in) and set three favorites to cycle between when you double-tap the left earbud.
Bose’s premium earbuds put out fantastic audio with punchy bass. Their transparency / ambient mode is second only to Apple in how natural it sounds. And even the voice mics work well, so you really get the whole package — as you should for this kind of money.
The AirPods Pro remain the best wireless earbuds for iPhone owners because some of their best features only work with other Apple products.Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge
2. Apple AirPods Pro
Best wireless earbuds for the iPhone
There’s no beating the interplay between AirPods and Apple’s other devices like the iPhone, iPad, and Mac. The AirPods Pro don’t offer the best sound quality of our top picks, but it’s perfectly satisfactory to many people. And the active noise cancellation is right up there with Bose.
But it really all comes together if you’re in Apple’s ecosystem and also own a Mac or iPad. The AirPods Pro can automatically hop between devices based on which one you’re using, and on iPhone or iPad, spatial audio delivers immersive surround sound when watching streaming video apps. They’re fantastic for making calls with, and Apple continues to pull ahead of competitors when it comes to ease of use.
Here’s a tip: if none of the included ear tips get you a perfect seal, I recommend a set of memory foam tips like those from Comply or Dekoni.
The Jabra Elite 75t are the best wireless earbuds if you want to pair with two devices simultaneously.Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge
3. Jabra Elite 75t
Best wireless earbuds for multitasking
Jabra is pretty much the only company making true wireless earbuds that support “multipoint” for two simultaneous Bluetooth connections. So you can pair them up with a phone and your laptop or tablet at the same time. Jabra’s mobile app offers a ton of customization over the controls, EQ, and even includes bonuses like white noise or nature sounds if you’ve got situations where they’d be handy.
Jabra Elite 75t
$130
$150
14% off
Prices taken at time of publishing.
Jabra’s Elite 75t earbuds offer pleasing bass-heavy sound, reliable performance, and can connect with two devices — like a phone and laptop — at the same time.
$130
at Amazon
$130
at Best Buy
The newer Elite 85t earbuds add more effective noise cancellation to the mix, but the 75ts are on sale so frequently that they’re still the go-to pick if multitasking is important to you. They pack a wallop when it comes to bass — but not to the point where it overwhelms the rest of the mix.
Jabra backs them with a two-year warranty in the event you experience any hardware issues. (I’ve had a 75t bud stop taking a charge out of nowhere, so it can happen.)
The Powerbeats Pro have been around for some time now, but they still rank as the best wireless earbuds for fitness.Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge
4. Beats Powerbeats Pro
Best wireless earbuds for fitness
Nothing has managed to unseat the Powerbeats Pro as the best fitness earbuds since their release in 2019. Their ear hook design keeps them planted on your ears during intense exercise, they can endure your sweatiest workouts, and the nine hours of continuous battery life should get you through just about any marathon. And the sound quality is killer, with plenty of bass to keep you motivated and moving.
And since Beats is owned by Apple, the Powerbeats Pro can also take advantage of features like audio sharing, auto device switching (like the AirPods Pro), and a dead-simple pairing process.
The Samsung Galaxy Buds Plus can last for up to 11 hours on a single charge, which blows away many competitors.Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge
5. Samsung Galaxy Buds Plus
Best wireless earbuds for battery life
They can last 11 hours on a single charge. That’s what I consider marathon battery life for true wireless earbuds, and few other companies have managed to keep up with the longevity of Samsung’s Galaxy Buds Plus. They lack active noise cancellation, so that helps them keep playing for longer, but even then, 11 hours is quite a feat. Like the Jabras, these are often on sale and easy to grab at a discount.
Sennheiser’s Momentum True Wireless 2 are the best wireless earbuds in terms of sound quality.Photo by Jon Porter / The Verge
6. Sennheiser Momentum True Wireless 2
Best wireless earbuds for sound quality
Sennheiser’s second swing at true wireless earbuds improve on the original Momentums with a more comfortable fit and the addition of active noise cancellation. But everything about these earbuds is second fiddle to their sound quality: the Momentum True Wireless 2 earbuds put out dynamic, expressive, and wonderfully detailed audio. They’re the sort of buds that will bring out things in your favorite music you haven’t noticed before.
But that upgraded sound quality comes for a hefty $300 price. If you want arguably the best sound that true wireless earbuds can deliver, these are it. But all of these other picks sound plenty good in their own right.
You’re not going to find any silicone ear tips that can match the UE Fits and their custom tips, which mold to match your ear shape in seconds.Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge
7. UE Fits
Best wireless earbuds if comfort is everything
If you often have difficulty finding ear tips that fit your ears comfortably, it doesn’t really get better than the UE Fits. These earbuds include special tips that mold to the shape of your ear during a 60-second fitting process that you activate with UE’s app. They get warm during molding (but not uncomfortably so) and you can feel them adapting to the contours of your ear canal.
Once the process is done, you’re left with custom earbuds with a fit that’s as close to perfect as you’ll ever find — unless you visit your local audiologist for a professional mold, and that gets expensive fast. Ultimate Ears has a fit “guarantee” and will send you a second set of tips should your first molding attempt go awry. The UE Fits are quite good, last for up to eight hours of continuous playback, and they’re rated IPX4 for water resistance.
UE Fits
$249
Prices taken at time of publishing.
The UE Fits come with unique ear tips that permanently mold to the unique shape of your ears in just 60 seconds. This allows for a much better fit that you can comfortably wear for hours.
$249
at Ultimate Ears
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