If those reports were wrong, it would protect investors far more than just a single product launch.

Nvidia's rapid growth is partly a function of its ability to roll out ever more powerful devices before customers finish adopting the previous generation. That quick cadence pushes cloud providers to spend, keeps competitors from catching up, and provides consumers a reason to stay within Nvidia’s hardware and software ecosystem.

Next, we have Vera Rubin. Nvidia claims Rubin-based products will go to partners in the second half of 2026, Bloomberg notes. Any major delay may disrupt customer plans, just as the corporation is trying to turn the excitement around AI agents and robotics into another big source of demand.

Huang said in Tokyo on July 15 that Rubin hardware was already in production and headed toward “giant” volumes, according to Bloomberg, rejecting reports of manufacturing difficulties involving a specialized circuit board.

His assurance is significant because Rubin is not merely a more rapid successor to Blackwell.

It is the technology Nvidia hopes will power the next generation of AI factories and serve as a bridge into physical AI when artificial intelligence moves beyond chatbots and begins managing robots, factories, and autonomous machinery.

“Vera Rubin is already in production. Giant amounts of production incoming,” Huang said, as Tom's Hardware confirmed.

Nvidia’s growth depends on keeping Rubin on schedule

Nvidia enters the Rubin transition in a position of tremendous financial strength.

The corporation reported record first-quarter revenue of $81.6 billion, up 85% from a year ago. Data-center revenue surged 92% to $75.2 billion, while Nvidia forecast revenue of around $91 billion for the next quarter, using its fiscal 2027 first-quarter statistics.

Those data indicate that customers continue to consume Blackwell systems at massive volume.

They also create expectations.

Once a firm reaches the size of Nvidia, it takes more and bigger additions of income to keep growing fast. A delayed architecture might postpone data center construction, upset orders with suppliers, and offer customers more time to explore alternatives.

Nvidia first unveiled Rubin in January as a six-chip architecture built on graphics processing units, central processing units, networking, and storage. Rubin has started full production, with partner availability expected in the second half of 2026, the company stated.

By March, Nvidia had extended the platform to seven chips and pitched it as infrastructure for agentic artificial intelligence that can handle multistep tasks with little human input. The whole Vera Rubin platform is now in production.

Related: Nvidia’s China opening could unlock surprise earnings upside

That message was bolstered by Nvidia in May, when it said server makers and supply-chain partners were ramping up Rubin systems.

Huang’s current comments are obviously more than a typical denial. They are a defense of Nvidia’s core pledge to investors: that it can migrate from one major platform to another without a long product gap stifling its growth.

It's not just individual chips contributing to the company's recent edge. Now it creates full systems that incorporate CPUs, networking, software, and racks.

That method can boost performance but can also raise execution risk. More components need to function together, and manufacturers need to construct ever denser and more sophisticated systems.

This integration is on the magnitude of Vera, the platform’s central processing unit. Nvidia says the Vera CPU is in full production and can do specific AI-agent tasks 1.8x quicker than standard x86 CPUs.

Rubin’s success will depend on Nvidia and its partners turning those individual technologies into full systems customers can reliably install.

That makes manufacturing timing a direct investment issue, not just an engineering detail.

Japan shows why Rubin is bigger than another data-center chip

Huang’s choice to reach out to Rubin in Japan also alludes to the greater possibility for the platform.

Japan has world-class manufacturers, factory automation businesses, and robotics experts. It also has a dwindling workforce, which provides companies a strong economic incentive to automate more physical tasks.

Japan’s preliminary census estimates showed a population of 123.05 million in October 2025, down 3.1 million from 2020. More than 90% of Japan's municipalities suffered population reduction, according to the Statistics Bureau.

More Nvidia:

• Nvidia’s workplace culture sends Big Tech a warning
• Nvidia’s $25B bond deal sends investors a clear signal
• Bank of America resets Nvidia stock forecast after CFO meeting

This demographic pressure makes robotics more than a speculative technical trend.

To sustain output, Japanese firms may need to use machines that can learn, adapt, and execute a greater variety of activities if the labor pool declines.

Japan’s administration is on the right track. In June, the Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry updated its AI Robotics Strategy, keeping the target of deploying about 10 million robots by 2040 in 18 key sectors, according to NHK World Japan. The plan comprises labor-intensive businesses such as manufacturing, health care, and food services.

And that's where Nvidia wants to be the computational layer behind that transformation.

In its review of the Japanese AI and robotics ecosystem on July 15, it mentioned work with cloud providers, manufacturers, universities, and robotics developers using Nvidia technology. That might help diversify Nvidia's AI narrative.

The company is currently focusing its data-center growth on a relatively small number of big cloud providers and technology enterprises. Robotics may boost demand from manufacturers, logistics companies, hospitals, and industrial firms.

They also relate to workload.

Developers are able to train robot models in data centers, test them in simulations, and then run them on processors within physical machines. Nvidia can potentially sell technology at each step.

Its Isaac robotics platform offers models, simulation tools, data pipelines, and computer systems for building and deploying AI-powered robots.

This full-stack strategy resembles the approach that made Nvidia dominant in data centers.

The corporation doesn’t want to sell the processor inside a robot. It wants developers to train the model using software from Nvidia, test it using simulation tools from Nvidia, refine it using servers from Nvidia, and manage it using edge computers from Nvidia.

Rubin may shore up the data center side of the chain by backing the big AI factories required to train ever-more-sophisticated physical AI models.

That's the greater gamble Huang's production comments are defending.

What Nvidia investors should watch next

The first question is whether Rubin systems will start to reach customers in the back half of 2026 as predicted.

Producing is not the same as mass-deploying to customers. Nvidia and its manufacturing partners need to build, test, and ship full racks in sufficient numbers. Then, customers require power, cooling, and networking infrastructure to install them.

Investors should be listening for signs of Rubin revenue, fixed delivery timelines, and client deployments during upcoming earnings calls from Nvidia.

The second question is whether Blackwell demand holds during the transition.

Demand for AI computing is outstripping supply, so customers may continue buying Blackwell. But some purchasers may choose not to order if Rubin adds enough extra performance to make waiting worthwhile.

Nvidia has to deal with that shift without generating a revenue lull or developing a bunch of old gear consumers don’t want.

The third development to watch is whether physical AI begins to produce measurable business.

Japan is a really interesting demonstration market with both modern manufacturing and very strong demographic pressure. Successful deployments there could drive uptake in other aging economies and labor-constrained industries.

Key takeaways for Nvidia investors

• Huang says Vera Rubin is already in production, despite reported manufacturing concerns.
• Nvidia expects partners to offer Rubin-based products during the second half of 2026.
• Rubin’s timing matters because Nvidia must sustain rapid growth from an increasingly large revenue base.
• The platform is designed for AI agents and the data centers that train physical-AI systems.
• Japan’s shrinking population creates a strong economic incentive for factory and service-sector automation.
• Robotics could broaden Nvidia’s customer base beyond large cloud providers.

Another variable is China. Huang said Nvidia only started selling H200 chips to the U.S. while the government was starting to assess permits on a case-by-case basis.

The Commerce Department’s H200 export policy provides for case-by-case licenses if exporters and buyers meet security conditions, Reuters reported. But those sales would still be subject to decisions made in Washington and Beijing, and they may boost the bottom line.

Rubin is something that Nvidia can influence more directly: execution. The corporation has to show that more complex technologies can move from announcement to production to client data centers without a harmful delay.

Huang’s denial eases some worries, but investors still need to see shipments and revenue.

And that is why the Rubin argument is important. Nvidia is no longer being evaluated just as the top supplier of AI chips. Investors expect it to continue an aggressive product cadence while moving its platform into AI agents, autonomous machines, and robotics.

Keeping Rubin on track maintains that bigger thesis.

A successful launch would demonstrate that Nvidia can continue to feed the data center expansion and provide the computing infrastructure for a new industrial market.
A delay, however, would threaten both assumptions at once.

Related: Nvidia stock remains Morgan Stanley's top pick despite headwinds

Why we love this deal

Laptops, tablets, and phones have a pretty standard design across the board, but quality is determined and differentiated by brand, manufacturing materials, technological features, and other key attributes that distinguish the good models from the great. It's a well-known expensive shopping category, and you certainly pay more for the top-of-the-line options, but while we're happy to pay those extra dollars to get something valuable among a sea of options, there's always a way to score some savings if you know where to look for sales. For eager electronic enthusiasts looking to add a new device to their ever-growing collection, the latest deal comes on a Golzer Android 15 2-in-1 Tablet.

Walmart is selling the multi-functional device for 50% off, taking the $599 tablet and making it available for purchase for just $300. Sure, it's still expensive, but when you consider the fact that you're saving almost $300 and getting a great product during this limited-time Flash deal, it certainly seems worth it to add to cart, don't you think?

Golzer Android 15 Tablet, $300 (was $599) at Walmart

Why do shoppers love it?

Not only is this tablet 50% wider than standard 10-inch tablet thanks to its 15.4 inch super larger screen, but the 1920x1080 in-plane switching (IPS) screen provides superior color accuracy, vibrant images, and wide viewing angles, allowing you to see things more clearly, vividly, and consistently. This means that streaming is taken to a whole new level, and working is far easier, especially with the blue-light filter that lessens screen strain on your eyes.

As a 2-in-1 device, this tablet comes with a detachable magnetic keyboard, allowing you to use the tablet as either laptop or a touchscreen tablet. This is very helpful for folks who like to use their devices on the go because it allows you to adjust between the two models so that you're able to use it effectively wherever you are. 

With the 2.2 GHz MTK G99-Octa-Core processor, you have access to a 40% faster central processing unit (CPU), which overall allows you a faster performance speed with enhanced graphics processing unit (GPU) for smoother multitasking, gaming, and video playback. The tablet has 8 gigabytes of random access memory (GB RAM) and 256 GB of storage — which is expandable up to 512 GB via TransFlash (TF) card. This provides ample space for storing documents, files, photos, and more while ensuring that whether you're enjoying an e-book, writing up a report, or watching the latest show you don't deal with lagging or buffering. The Android 15 operating system provides split-screen multitasking and ensures the utmost security when dealing with private data. 

Related: Walmart's back-to-school laptop deals slash prices up to 54% off

The long-lasting battery provides up to 25 hours of continuous video watching, 35 hours of music listening, or 1,000 hours of use on standby. The tablet has a 13 megapixel (MP) rear camera with flash as well as a 5 MP front camera for meetings and video calls. With the purchase of the tablet, you get the magnetic keyboard and protective case. 

What to expect from a $300 2-in-1 tablet: Pros and cons

Pros

• Multi-functional: The detachable magnetic keyboard allows you to transform the tablet into a laptop. It includes a protective case and built-in 135-degree adjustable stand for hands-free use and enjoyment while working, exercising, or cooking.
• Powerful battery: The battery provides up to 25 hours of continuous video watching, 35 hours of music listening, or 1,000 hours of use on standby. 
• Efficient speeds and vast storage: The 2.2 GHz MTK G99-Octa-Core processor, 8 GB RAM, and 256 GB of storage allows for quick processing speeds and ample storage space. 

Cons

• Unreliable charging: Some shoppers feel that the device doesn't fully charge each time.

Shoppers love the large screen this device has, which makes it great for use as a tablet or laptop. "Excellent for media and multitasking," one shopper said. The screen offers clear, vibrant images, it runs smoothly and quickly, and the battery life is impressive. "This is like having a laptop, but it's more portable and has better battery life. I've never had it die on me, and I only charge it at night," another shopper said. 

Shop more deals 

• Veat00l 10.1-Inch Android 13 Tablet, $110 (was $219) at Walmart
• Apple Pencil Pro, $99 (was $129) at Walmart
• Aeezo 10.1-Inch Tablet, $83 (was $120) at Walmart

With this Walmart Flash deal, you can get the Golzer Android 15 2-in-1 Tablet — an incredible value — for a fraction of the cost. Plus, you're getting two products for the price of one.

TL;DR:

Vanity metrics don't win budgets: registrations and badge scans look good in recaps but rarely lead to more budget. Measure how events move revenue forward.

Use a three-layer framework: Reach (right accounts), Engagement (meaningful action), Revenue Impact (pipeline opened, deals accelerated, revenue influenced).

Connect data to prove it: CRM sync, CAPI, and revenue attribution turn event data into boardroom-ready proof and earn events a permanent budget line.

Pipeline beats attendance: measuring your event success

Here’s a question every event marketer eventually faces: your CFO looks at the recap and asks, “How much pipeline did this actually create?” If you’re pointing to registrations and badge scans, that doesn’t tell the whole story. 

Vanity metrics are easy to count and hard to defend. They tell you people showed up. They don’t tell you whether your event nudged a deal forward, influenced a decision-maker, or generated a single dollar of revenue. If you want your event budget to grow, or even hold, you need a measurement approach that connects your events directly to the outcomes your business actually cares about.

That shift starts with knowing what to measure and how.

The problem with defaulting to vanity metrics

For years, event success has been measured by headcount: how many people registered, how many badges were scanned, what percentage logged in. Those numbers are easy to pull and look impressive in a slide deck. But they don’t answer the question that matters: did this event drive real business results?

A webinar is meaningless if the attendees aren’t in your buying group. A spreadsheet full of badge scans from a conference booth is a collection of data points, not a pipeline. When you optimize for volume, you end up chasing the wrong signals, and that’s how event budgets get cut.

The most effective B2B event marketers solve this by replacing vanity metrics with a three-layer framework built around quality reach, meaningful engagement, and revenue impact.

The three-layer measurement framework

Think of this as measuring your events the same way you'd measure any demand gen program, by what moves buyers through your funnel and into your pipeline. LinkedIn's Events Measurement Solutions framework maps every stage to concrete KPIs and the tools to track them, so you aren’t left guessing at impact.

Upper Funnel: Drive event visibility and awareness

At the top of the funnel, success means maximizing reach across the accounts and decision-makers that matter to your business. The question isn't just how many people registered, it's whether the right people did.

Your events strategy is working when you're expanding reach and event awareness across target accounts and key decision-makers. 

That means measuring:

• Unique Reach: how many distinct individuals in your ICP (ideal customer profile) saw your event
• Brand Lift: measurable change in brand perception among your target audience
• On-target impressions and account coverage: if your sales team is pursuing 100 companies this quarter, the goal is to see as many of them as possible show up in your registration data.

LinkedIn's in-platform campaign reporting in Campaign Manager and Brand Lift Testing (available both natively and via third-party measurement) let you validate your campaign’s impact on awareness before and after the event, so you're not guessing.

Middle Funnel: Generate qualified engagement and drive event registrations

Engagement tells you whether the audience you attracted actually invested in your event, and where in the experience they were most active. It's the signal between "showed up" and "moved forward." Success here means converting awareness into registrations and sustaining meaningful activity post-event.

What to measure:

• Engagement Rate: the quality of interaction, not just volume
• High-value website actions taken before and after the event
• Event Registrations, Attendance, and View Rates:who stayed through to the end versus dropped off early
• Offline actions — demo requests, trial activations, meeting bookings that trace back to event touchpoints

The right solution stack for this stage includes Campaign Manager reporting, Event Analytics, Insight Tag with Website Actions, and Conversions API (CAPI) — together giving you a complete picture of both online and offline engagement signals.

Bottom Funnel: Connect event engagement to business outcomes and closed revenue

This is the layer that changes budget decisions. Revenue attribution connects your event directly to the outcomes your CFO is tracking: pipeline opened, deals accelerated, revenue influenced. Success means measuring events' impact on lead pipeline, revenue, and demonstrating full return on ad spend.

What to measure:

• Open Pipeline — new pipeline created within a defined attribution window post-event
• Revenue — deals influenced or accelerated by event touchpoints
• Return on Ad Spend (ROAS) — the full picture of event investment versus return

The solution set here goes deeper and gives you the connective tissue between event data and your CRM; so pipeline acceleration, deal velocity, and downstream conversion lift aren't just hypotheses.

And while these tools make the work faster and more precise, you don't need a fully integrated tech stack to start connecting the dots. Even without advanced attribution software, teams can manually cross-reference event registration lists against CRM records, track which attendees later converted, and surface patterns in deal timelines. The signal is there — these tools just help you find it faster.

The tools that make measurement possible

Understanding the framework is the first step. The second is having the right systems in place to actually capture the data and measure success. These tools are the foundation.

Harness the Power of Data

CRM sync

Your CRM is where event data becomes actionable. When your event platform syncs directly with your CRM, every attendee’s journey, which sessions they joined, what they engaged with, where they dropped off, gets logged automatically against their contact and account record.

This gives your sales team a personalized map for every follow-up conversation. And for your marketing ops team, it means you can trace closed-won deals back to event touchpoints, quarter over quarter, and show exactly which moments moved buyers forward.

Conversions API (CAPI)

Browser pixels are increasingly unreliable. Privacy updates and ad blockers break the tracking trail before you can follow it. CAPI builds a direct, server-side connection between your marketing systems and your ad platforms, so you can track the full conversion journey without depending on third-party cookies.

With CAPI, you can see not just who registered, but which ad drove them to act, even if they switched devices along the way. That lets you optimize budget toward the campaigns that are actually delivering registrations, not just the ones that look like they are.

Tie Event Ads Impact to Business Outcomes 

Attribution 

Attribution connects the dots between your event ad spend and revenue outcomes. In B2B, a multi-touch model gives you visibility into how various touchpoints in the buyer journey impact When you walk into a budget meeting with a clear attribution report in hand, the conversation changes. You’re not defending registrations, you’re showing pipeline sourced, deals accelerated, and revenue influenced. That’s the story that earns your event a permanent budget line.

Your event success scorecard

Before your next event, build a simple scorecard that defines 3–5 success metrics across reach, engagement, and revenue. Align your team on targets upfront so you’re not scrambling to define success after the fact.

Use this template as a starting point:

Measurement is where your event strategy either earns a permanent budget line or gets cut next year. The good news: if you’ve been building your events as an integrated before, during, and after motion, you’re already halfway there. This framework gives you the other half.

Stop measuring events as standalone moments. Start measuring how they move revenue forward.

Ready to put your event measurement strategy into action? Download the full guide here.

     

Their goal? Spreading out the traffic and maintaining the luxury perception of a service envisioned as a perk for spending.

American Airlines is currently building a new Admirals Club location in Austin International, while JetBlue Airways opened its first lounge at JFK in New York in December 2025.

At the start of June, Delta Air Lines unveiled plans to build a second Delta One Lounge at LAX. Differing from the regular SkyClub lounges in many smaller airports, Delta One is the airline's most premium tier of airport lounge, known for offering more fine dining and more luxurious spa amenities.

New Chase Sapphire Lounge at DFW opens to visitors

About a year after the bank and credit card issuer confirmed the construction of a new lounge at Dallas Fort Worth International Airport (DFW), the Chase Sapphire Lounge by The Club officially opened to visitors on July 16.

The new location by Gate D25 in the airport's Terminal D is the ninth Chase lounge across the country, and at 18,000 square feet, it is the third largest, just slightly smaller than the ones that New York LaGuardia (LGA) and Philadelphia (PHL) opened in the last two years.

Related: We got a peek inside the fancy new Capital One airport lounge

The latest Chase Sapphire lounge offers features unique to Dallas, including a separate whiskey lounge where guests with more time to kill before their flight can get a guided tasting of local Texas whiskeys, available exclusively in the lounge.

Food is another area where lounge operators can impress guests and highlight the local touch. The new Chase Sapphire location has both cross-network specialties such as the Sapphire Burger, along with a rotating selection of Tex-Mex dishes, including Mexican shrimp cocktail and slab bacon with cheesy grits, developed by the chef from Dallas Bishop Arts District restaurant Encina.

The signature restaurant dishes are made to order, while the buffet also features tasty finds like chicken gumbo rojo and a chorizo sweet potato hash for breakfast.

How to gain access to the Chase Sapphire airport lounges

While three other Chase Sapphire locations also offer showers, the newest location goes above and beyond with a mini Face Haus spa, in which guests can either catch a nap in a resting pod or request a 30-minute facial.

The other Chase Sapphire lounges equipped with showers are located at JFK, Boston Logan (BOS), Philadelphia (PHL), and Washington Dulles (IAD). At New York's LaGuardia Airport (LGA), Chase Sapphire guests can purchase shower access through a paid Reserve Suite.

More Travel News:

• Airline to launch unusual new flight to Cayman Islands from the U.S.
• There is a very cool Irish version of swimming pigs in the Bahamas
• Unexpected country is most luxurious travel destination for 2026
• Low-cost airline launches easier way to get to Sri Lanka

"As Chase continues to deepen its commitment to North Texas, we're proud to bring Sapphire Reserve cardmembers an elevated travel experience that reflects the scale and energy of the region, while celebrating its pioneering spirit, local flavor and rich cultural identity," Dana Pouwels, head of airport lounge benefits at Chase, said in a press release on the opening.

Access to the Chase Sapphire lounge is available exclusively to holders of the Chase Sapphire Reserve, Chase Sapphire Reserve for Business, and Ritz-Carlton Rewards Credit Card. The latter credit card has been grandfathered and is no longer open to new applicants, while the other two cards cost $795 per year.

The other two ways to get one-time access are purchasing a $27 guest pass, or, once a year, through the Priority Pass program that opens up a network of different airport lounges at tier levels going up to $469 per year.

Related: 105-year-old historic hotel by national park files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy

Anthropic has built its entire brand on being the responsible, safety-first alternative to other aggressive AI labs. However, the company’s latest attempt to highlight its ethical standards has backfired spectacularly. A new Anthropic ad titled “There’s hope in hard questions” is creeping out viewers with a bleak, doomer-ist tone that feels more like a trailer for a psychological thriller than a tech commercial for Claude AI models.

Burning houses and graveyards as marketing

The ad opens with a shot of a burning house, quickly turning into a slideshow of disturbing still images. There are shots of a crowd of citizens being scanned by facial recognition surveillance, a homeless person sleeping on a city sidewalk, workers toiling in a dark mine and rows and rows of tombstones in a cemetery. To these grim visuals, a heavy voice-over poses some heavy questions: “Can AI be trusted?” and “Who’s gonna hit the brakes if we need to?”

Anthropic intended to show that it is mature enough to confront the dark side of technology. However, the internet’s reaction has been swift, highly critical, and filled with mockery.

You can watch the full ad below:

The internet—and Sam Altman—react

The most high-profile critic of the campaign was Sam Altman. OpenAI CEO took a direct jab at his chief rival on social media platform X. Altman joked that he genuinely thought the commercial was a parody, searching the handle to see if it was spelled “c1audeai” or some other satirical account.

Other observers in the tech and marketing industries piled on, questioning why a company trying to build trust would lead with a dystopian hellscape. Critics pointed out that using an image that closely resembles Arlington National Cemetery alongside a warning about “hitting the brakes” on AI felt incredibly tone-deaf and disrespectful.

On the other side of the debate, some viewers defended the creative direction. Anthropic is pursuing a sophisticated “trust-building” strategy by directly addressing public concerns over jobs, surveillance and safety. So, defenders of the ad argue that it is a necessary contrast to the hype-driven campaigns of its competitors.

The post Anthropic Accidentally Creates the Best Anti-AI Ad Ever appeared first on Android Headlines.

I eventually find a seat in the auditorium, just as a video of Mr Margaritaville himself, Jimmy Buffett, crackles onto the wall-mounted televisions. He launches into a rendition of Fins, featuring a quartet of smiling and costumed Weeki Wachee mermaids being wheeled on stage to backing-dance from their seats. Around me are grandparents in visors, sunburnt dads in fishing shirts, and little girls in glittering mermaid tails clutching plush dolphins.

The lights dim and a syrupy-voiced MC asks us if we’re ready for the mermaids. Inevitably, we are not quite ready enough, and are encouraged to express our excitement a little more vocally.

The dusty blue satin curtain slowly winches itself open, to reveal a thick wall of glass, behind which lies the famous spring itself. A water so clear and turquoise it hardly looks like water at all. Schools of tiny fish drift lazily across the scene. A turtle paddles past with supreme indifference.

And then, rising out of some deeper part of the spring, comes a mermaid.

Design is always a subjective topic, which might be pleasing to some and not so much to others. Like it or not, YouTube Music seems to be gearing up for a major redesign of the Now Playing screen with a new fullscreen cover art. This follows the split-view redesign from earlier this year. Before you get excited, it’s currently in the testing phase and is not publicly available yet.

YouTube Music is reportedly testing fullscreen album art for Now Playing

Currently, the artwork in the YouTube Music Now Playing screen appears between the audio/video switcher and the title, with rounded corners. The redesign, as shared by a Reddit user, takes up the entire screen, including the system navigation bars and status. As immersive as the new screen appears to be, it might significantly crop out the artwork compared to the previous square shape.

This new design also applies when watching music videos as well. This suggests how portrait/short form like videos have taken over the internet. It seems like something that users are comfortable watching.

Not widely available yet

The pill-shaped action buttons now have transparent backgrounds, and YouTube Music appears to be no longer using artwork-based colors on this screen. The design sort of resembles the Now Playing interface from Google Play Music. This isn’t an entirely new design idea, but definitely a step up if you were bored with the tiny artwork.

As said, Google looks to be testing this new Now Playing redesign with a select few users. It isn’t widely available yet, even if you have the latest version of the YouTube Music app on your device. Since it’s in the testing stage, there are chances the company might abandon this entirely and revert back to the current design. Things could go either way. We will share an update when we hear more.

The post A Cleaner Look: YouTube Music Tests Stunning Fullscreen Album Art on Now Playing appeared first on Android Headlines.

Google will have to share more of its Search data with rivals according to two new EU regulations set in place this week, potentially changing the future of Google’s offerings like Gemini, Search, and Android, as regulators set out to make competition more fair for Google’s rivals within the region. This announcement comes at the same time as Google’s agreement with Epic Games to withdraw their settlement and simply move ahead with allowing rival marketplaces on the Play Store. These changes pave the way for some potentially big shifts within Google’s businesses and ecosystems.

With regard to the new decisions made by the European Commission this week, Google will be required to share more Search data with rivals, as there is certain data that only Google Search “can collect at scale,” the Commission says. Additionally, Google will also be required to give equal access to features on its Android devices to rival AI systems, so that they can enjoy the same feature access that Gemini has.

Google will need to start sharing Search data with rivals in January, says EU

Not only has the European Commission ruled that Google will have to share Search data with competitors, but it has set the time limit to do so for January 2027. Giving Google about six months to begin this process. Since January 2027 is the cutoff date, Google is allowed to start sharing data before then.

As for opening access to features on Android for rival AI tools, Google mus comply with this change by July 2027, which is when the Commission says that uses will begin to benefit. For the latter, once Google begins sharing great feature access with other AI assistants, users could end up being able to choose which assistant they want as a deeply integrated tool. Instead of being forced to use Gemini. Google, of course, has argued that the EU’s decision “undercuts security and privacy for Europeans.”

The post Android users benefit considerably from the EU's new Google rules appeared first on Android Headlines.

I eventually find a seat in the auditorium, just as a video of Mr Margaritaville himself, Jimmy Buffett, crackles onto the wall-mounted televisions. He launches into a rendition of Fins, featuring a quartet of smiling and costumed Weeki Wachee mermaids being wheeled on stage to backing-dance from their seats. Around me are grandparents in visors, sunburnt dads in fishing shirts, and little girls in glittering mermaid tails clutching plush dolphins.

The lights dim and a syrupy-voiced MC asks us if we’re ready for the mermaids. Inevitably, we are not quite ready enough, and are encouraged to express our excitement a little more vocally.

The dusty blue satin curtain slowly winches itself open, to reveal a thick wall of glass, behind which lies the famous spring itself. A water so clear and turquoise it hardly looks like water at all. Schools of tiny fish drift lazily across the scene. A turtle paddles past with supreme indifference.

And then, rising out of some deeper part of the spring, comes a mermaid.

Today, OnePlus made it official. It’s exiting the US and Europe. Making it a sad day for those of us in the US. So, today I wanted to take a look back at OnePlus over the years. As someone who has been following OnePlus since the very beginning, I have some pretty fond memories of the “Never Settle” company.

It all started in December 2013, when the company first formed. It was originally supposed to be OPPO’s online brand, while OPPO was focusing more on offline sales. Carl Pei and Pete Lau started this company and launched the OnePlus One in April 2014.

The OnePlus One was a pretty interesting phone. For the time, it was definitely a flagship killer. This phone launched for $299, which severely undercut all the other options from Samsung, Google, Motorola, LG, and even Apple, here in the US. While still offering flagship specs, Cyanogen was included. This was before OnePlus moved over to OxygenOS.

It was a great phone, with some questionable decisions, like the invite system. To buy this phone meant you needed to have an invite to spend your money on it. This was because, as OnePlus said at the time, they didn’t have space to store thousands of units. So essentially, once a unit rolled off the production line, it was sold.

This was also around the time that many people figured out OnePlus was owned by BBK, not the startup they wanted to be. But instead, part of a larger tech conglomerate which included OPPO and vivo.

The few of us here at Android Headlines that were able to buy a OnePlus One, loved it. And that continued into the OnePlus 2 and X. The OnePlus 2 was a pretty minor update to the OnePlus One, while the OnePlus X was a “mini” flagship. It sported a 5″ display, while most other phones were 5.5″ or larger at the time. Which, today, that feels tiny.

After the OnePlus 2, the company decided to do away with the invite system. But had some other questionable marketing tactics.

OnePlus’ questionable marketing decisions

Like with any company, OnePlus did make some bad decisions. The one that really sticks out over the past 12 years was its “Ladies First” campaign back in 2014. It invited women to “draw a OnePlus logo on a piece of paper or your hand/face/wherever” and post it on the OnePlus website. Then the OnePlus Community would vote; it’s worth mentioning that most of that community was (and still is) men. Leading to many calling this a sexist campaign; it only lasted a few hours before it got pulled.

There was also OnePlus’ “Smash the Past” promo for the OnePlus One, where you could smash your phone and buy the OnePlus One for just $1. But there was some confusion on the site, leading to many people smashing their phone before being selected. All in all, it was still a pretty effective campaign, with over 140,000 entrants for 100 spots.

After the early days, OnePlus got a lot more boring with their promotions. Some of the more recent ones allowed you to trade in any phone (broken or not) for $200 off your new OnePlus phone. This could even be an old Nokia from 2002.

OnePlus’ stumbles with US Carriers

In 2018, OnePlus started selling its phones through T-Mobile with the OnePlus 6T. This was great news, even if it was only one carrier, it meant more people would be able to buy these phones. In the US, if you aren’t available on carriers, you really have no chance of selling a decent amount of phones.

Things started to unravel with the OnePlus 7 Pro, however. It was available from OnePlus for $669, while T-Mobile was selling the exact same model for $699. And it only got worse with the 7T and later the 8. This made OnePlus pull out of retail stores and only sell unlocked, through Amazon, Best Buy, and OnePlus.com.

To OnePlus’ credit, however, it still did the work and spent the money to get their devices compatible with all three networks. This is important, especially for Verizon, as most unlocked phones did not work fully on Verizon’s network at the time.

However, not being in carrier stores meant that OnePlus was never going to make it in the US.

Carl Pei leaves OnePlus

In October of 2020, shortly after launching the Nord series, co-founder Carl Pei left OnePlus. And this had a ripple effect across the company. The old OnePlus essentially died when Pei left. OPPO decided to “merge” OnePlus back inside OPPO, and changed up OxygenOS to look more like OPPO’s ColorOS, which did not go over well. This was when the writing was on the wall for OnePlus, however.

After Pei left, you could really see some big changes at OnePlus. The company went from launching phones that were actually unique, while still being very similar to their OPPO counterparts; they were still unique in a lot of ways.

OnePlus became more streamlined when they merged with OPPO. Particularly here in the US, they were launching their flagship and then the R series, with a tablet and a watch later on in the year. Nothing really stood out, other than OnePlus’ speed and value. But even that value was going away, as the last flagship now costs $899.

OnePlus’ other co-founder, Pete Lau, returned to OPPO and is currently the SVP and CPO of OPPO while also running OnePlus. There are a lot of theories going around about Pete Lau and how OPPO was his baby, and he didn’t really care about OnePlus that much, but we’ll likely never know if that’s true.

Our Favorite OnePlus phones from the last 12 years

Over the years, I’ve used and reviewed a number of OnePlus phones, tablets, and smartwatches, though I’m going to stick to smartphones here. There are three that I really felt like were the best of OnePlus. Starting with the OnePlus 7 Pro.

The OnePlus 7 Pro was one of my favorite phones ever. A big part of that was actually the color. This is still the best color blue I’ve ever seen on a phone. But that’s not the whole story. This was also the first phone OnePlus put out with a pop-up selfie camera. Think of the OPPO FInd X, but a smaller pop-up. It was really cool having that whole display uninterrupted, and it was a pretty massive display too.

With the OnePlus 7 Pro, we also had a 4,000mAh capacity battery, which was quite large for that time.

Next up is the OnePlus Open. I still believe, to this day, that this is the best foldable ever made. And yet, OnePlus never followed up on this.

Back in 2023, OnePlus launched its first folding phone, which was also the OPPO Find N3. It got high praise from me, as well as many of my colleagues, because it seemingly cut zero corners. It had one of the biggest batteries in a foldable at the time, it had a massive inner display with a very narrow crease, and it had some of the best cameras on a foldable at the time. It was kind of thick, especially by today’s standards, at 5.8mm unfolded, but the faux leather back made it worthwhile.

The OnePlus Open is still the foldable that I carried around the longest. Essentially, until the OPPO Find N5 launched.

Finally, the OnePlus 13. This is perhaps my favorite phone of all-time, right now. It did everything right. While not perfect, it did have impressive cameras, amazing battery life, fast charging, a brilliant-looking display, but best of all, that blue faux leather backing. This was another phone that I carried for a long time after the review period ended.

The OnePlus 13 was so good that I told OnePlus’ PR when we were on Allure of the Seas with them that this needed to be sold in carrier stores. It was coming in much, much cheaper than the Galaxy S25 Ultra, with basically all the same features. But that wasn’t going to happen.

The End

OnePlus made some great phones; it also had some stumbles along the way as any smartphone OEM has had. They pioneered a lot of features that other phones later adopted, like high refresh rates, fast charging, UFS 3.0 storage, faster and cleaner software updates, and more. While OnePlus never achieved 1% market share globally, they did have a major impact on the market as a whole.

Here in the US, we’re really going to be suffering from OnePlus leaving. We’re now down to Google, Samsung, Motorola, and Apple for smartphones. With LG and HTC having already closed up shop. The good news is, OnePlus isn’t leaving globally yet. They are still going to remain in China and India (though rumors are saying they’ll leave India next year). Perhaps OPPO could change its mind and revive OnePlus, but I wouldn’t hold out hope.

The one thing I do hope happens is that OPPO brings their own devices to more markets. They barely have a presence in Europe, and no presence in North America outside of Mexico. Surprisingly, OPPO does very well in Mexico. OPPO, if you’re reading this, please make your phones available to buy in the US. They are some of my favorite phones, like the Find N6 and Find X9 Pro.

OnePlus’ exit means the smartphone industry is going to get even more boring.

The post The End of OnePlus in the US & Europe Is the End of Something Special appeared first on Android Headlines.

Google is finally fixing the most awkward name in its entire artificial intelligence lineup. NotebookLM—the incredibly popular research companion that took the internet by storm with its viral AI-generated podcasts—is officially becoming Gemini Notebook.

The branding shakeup, which Google announced today, is a welcome change. The “LM” in the old name stood for “language model,” a redundant bit of tech jargon that made a consumer-friendly app sound like a dry computer science project. The firm also updated the app’s logo with the familiar blue-and-purple Gemini gradient.

But this update is about much more than just a fresh coat of paint. Along with the new name, Google is introducing deep ecosystem integrations and rolling out highly anticipated premium features.

Coding sandboxes and search integration

For power users, the biggest news is the arrival of the Gemini 3.5 and Antigravity engine upgrade. Initially reserved for top-tier AI Ultra subscribers last month, this powerful backend upgrade is officially making its way to Google AI Pro subscribers on the web over the coming weeks.

With this engine upgrade, every project folder inside Gemini Notebook will connect to its own secure, isolated cloud computer. This allows the AI to natively write and execute code in real time, making it significantly easier to perform complex data analysis grounded entirely in your uploaded source documents.

Additionally, Google is working on breaking the tool out of its standalone silo. While you can already access your research folders directly inside the standard Gemini app, Google announced that your active notebooks will soon be accessible directly within Google Search’s AI Mode. This integration will allow you to pull up your curated study guides and research notes without ever leaving your active search queries.

A runaway hit

Google originally unveiled the project back at I/O 2023 under the codename “Project Tailwind” before launching it to the public. Since then, the tool has gained a massive following, primarily thanks to its ability to turn messy PDFs, slides, and web links into polished audio overviews, slideshows, and quick summaries. Google shared that the platform now boasts over 30 million active users. Plus, more than 600,000 organizations worldwide actively use it.

The post Google Finally Kills the Most Awkward Name in Tech: NotebookLM Is Now Gemini Notebook appeared first on Android Headlines.

For 15 years, the American auto industry quietly retired the cheap sedan, the hatchback, and the humble wagon, then acted surprised when shoppers drifted toward the taller, pricier crossovers that were the only things left on the lot.

Preference followed availability, not the other way around. Four utility and pickup segments now account for more than half of every new vehicle sold in the United States, according to S&P Global Mobility, and traditional passenger cars have been squeezed into a thin slice of the market.

Volvo (VLVOF) read that room early. The Swedish brand, controlled by China's Geely (GELYF), leaned into crossovers like the XC60 and stopped fussing over the boxy wagons that once defined its image.

So it was worth a second look this week when Volvo hinted it may double back. The automaker is considering a midsize electric sedan and a matching wagon for U.S. showrooms around 2028, both likely starting in the low $50,000s, according to Automotive News.

Why Volvo is rethinking its all-crossover lineup

Not long ago, Volvo was moving the other way. Its leadership signaled it might drop its slow-selling wagons entirely and pour that money into the crossovers American buyers actually wanted, as TheStreet highlighted.

That reversal is the tell. A sedan and a wagon riding on the same electric platform let Volvo squeeze extra models out of engineering it has already paid for, without standing up a whole new production line.

It is cheap volume, and cheap volume is exactly what a midsize luxury brand craves when it is fighting for showroom space against a dozen near-identical crossovers.

More Automotive:

• BMW's new SUV is built for an uncertain future
• The U.S. may never sell 17.6 million cars again
• BofA sees Ford chasing a market far bigger than EVs

There is also the matter of identity. Volvo built its name on square, sturdy estate cars, and a small but stubborn group of buyers still wants these. In my analysis, this is less a forecast about where the whole market is heading and more a wager that a brand can win a sliver of business by selling the thing almost nobody else bothers to build.

The company also has room to move. Its lineup already runs on a shared electric architecture, so adding a low sedan and a long wagon is closer to a trim decision than a moonshot. When the tooling is mostly sunk, a few extra shapes are close to free.

For now, Volvo's U.S. showroom is all crossovers, from the small EX30 up to the three-row EX90. A sedan and a wagon would be the first vehicles in the lineup that do not pretend to be trucks, and the first real nod to the estate-car buyers the brand spent years quietly showing the door.

What the sedan and wagon bet actually signals

Here is the part that reframes the story. Volvo expects the sedan and wagon together to add only about 10,000 U.S. sales a year, according to Automotive News.

That is not a market shift; that is a rounding error.

When I ran that figure against the rest of the market, what came into focus was the strength of the SUV's grip, not any crack in it.

• Volvo projects the sedan and wagon will add roughly 10,000 combined U.S. sales a year, according to Automotive News.
• That is under 5% of the 216,399 new EVs Americans bought in just the first quarter of 2026, Kelley Blue Book confirmed.
• Utility vehicles and pickups made up more than half of all new U.S. vehicle sales in early 2025, S&P Global Mobility noted.
• The $7,500 federal EV tax credit that once supported those sales expired on Sept. 30, 2025, according to Kelley Blue Book.

Volvo is not alone in reaching back for the sedan. General Motors (GM) is planning new sedans for Buick and Chevrolet, even as it trims some of its electric targets, according to Automotive News.

Read together, these moves are not signs that the crossover is dying. They are signs that a few automakers see money still sitting in the segments everyone else abandoned.

There is a defensive logic to it, too. When a dozen luxury crossovers blur together on the same dealer row, a sharp-looking wagon is one of the few ways left to look different without cutting the price.

That is the unglamorous reason legacy brands keep circling back to cars. Crossovers made everyone look the same, and sameness is quiet death in a luxury aisle where the whole pitch is that you are paying for something the neighbors do not have.

How a challenging EV market shapes the math

The timing is the hard part. Volvo would be launching these cars into the weakest U.S. electric market in years.

U.S. drivers bought 216,399 new electric vehicles in the first quarter of 2026, down 27% from a year earlier, and battery-electric cars slipped to about 5.8% of new sales, according to Kelley Blue Book. The $7,500 federal tax credit that had propped up EV pricing expired on Sept. 30, 2025, and no federal incentive has replaced it.

That is why the low-$50,000s price tag matters more than it might at first appear. Without the credit, every EV now has to justify its sticker on its own merits, and a $50,000 Volvo must feel like the $57,500 car it effectively replaces.

Related: Volvo loses key executive before major product push

The competition has shifted underneath it, too. As new EV prices climbed, plenty of shoppers moved to gas-electric hybrids or to cheaper used electric cars, according to Kelley Blue Book. A fresh $50,000 Volvo sedan has to pull those buyers back before it ever gets to fight the crossover parked next to it.

What struck me is the discipline in aiming for just 10,000 sales. Volvo is not betting the company on a sedan comeback. It is running a low-cost experiment to see whether a different silhouette can still move metal now that the incentive making EVs easy to sell is gone.

For anyone holding auto stocks, that is the real question. The winners of the next few years will be the automakers that learn to make electric cars pay without Washington's help, and small, cheap bets like this one are how they run the test before committing real capital.

What Volvo's small bet means for the road ahead

The reflex is to read a sedan revival as the SUV finally cracking. It is not.

The sharper signal is buried in that 10,000 figure. The fact that even a heritage wagon brand now treats the body style it helped make famous as a niche side project shows how thoroughly the crossover has taken over.

Watch whether the niche grows. If Volvo's sedan and wagon quietly beat their modest targets, expect rivals to follow with their own low-risk hedges, and expect the industry to admit that not everyone wanted to sit up high after all.

If the two cars land with a thud, it confirms the harder truth. In America, the tall crossover is not a passing phase. It is the default setting, and the road back to the sedan runs uphill the whole way.

Related: Toyota's global dominance faces new test

Here's what investors need to know about Meta's history of share repurchases, why the program is on pause, and whether additional buybacks are likely in the company's future.

What are stock buybacks?

Along with dividends, share buybacks are a way for a company to return excess cash to shareholders.

That’s because every time a company repurchases shares, it reduces the number of shares outstanding, giving shareholders a slightly larger ownership stake.

And because earnings are divided among fewer shares, buybacks can increase earnings per share (EPS), as long as the company’s earnings continue to grow. Higher earnings per share often drive a company's stock price higher, rewarding shareholders with capital gains.

How much stock has Meta repurchased?

In the past 5 years, Meta Platforms (META) has returned an impressive $156 billion to shareholders through stock buybacks and dividends. The bulk of this —$145 billion—was through share repurchases.

This makes Meta one of the top 10 companies of all time in terms of capital returned to shareholders.

Top 10 stocks by total shareholder return

Source: Trefis

Meta's massive buybacks reflected the company's ability to generate enormous amounts of cash through its highly profitable advertising business. It also signaled the company’s overall financial strength as well as management's confidence in the future.

Meta's stock buyback history

Meta didn't become one of Wall Street's biggest stock repurchasers overnight, but thanks to those cash flows from its ad business, the company routinely returned billions of dollars to shareholders through share buybacks.

The table below illustrates how this strategy evolved:

Source: TipRanks.com

Why did Meta pause its stock buybacks?

But according to SEC filings, Meta reported zero share repurchases during the first quarter of 2026. Although it paused its buybacks, Meta actually increased its capital expenditure guidance for artificial intelligence initiatives. The timing raises questions as to why the company is shifting more of its cash to fund AI infrastructure instead of rewarding shareholders.

At least for now, Meta seems to be making a tough capital allocation decision.

Related: How many employees does Meta have in 2026? Its workforce, locations, & layoffs explained

In fact, CNBC reported that Meta was even considering a stock sale to raise additional capital for its AI ambitions, after Alphabet (GOOG) announced it was increasing its equity offering to $85 billion.

While a Meta spokesperson called the report "pure speculation," it does reflect the issue at hand. Every dollar the company spends on share repurchases is a dollar it can't invest in AI infrastructure — and vice versa.

Can Meta afford its AI plans?

When Meta posted its first quarter earnings, it announced plans to increase its 2026 capital expenditure budget to between $125 billion to $145 billion. Shares dropped roughly 10% on the news.

Meta increased this guidance due to rising costs for its AI data centers and component pricing, but Wall Street viewed the spending as another case of “slow ROI.”

However, Meta’s first-quarter earnings reflected a company with a “fortress-like” balance sheet — and not a business in distress.

Related: Has Meta conducted a stock split? What sets this ‘Mag 7’ stock apart

Meta’s total revenue rose 33% to $56.3 billion, thanks to more hefty increases in its advertising business. It also reported a robust 41% operating margin, which will help it absorb the costs of its AI infrastructure buildout. In addition, it posted $81 billion in cash, cash equivalents, and marketable securities, and $12.4 billion in free cash flow.

Meta’s investing big bucks so it can dominate artificial intelligence, and with the successful launch of Muse Spark 1.1 on July 9, 2026, the company is already beginning to demonstrate that not only can it afford its agentic AI — it can monetize it as well.

Will Meta resume its stock buybacks in the future?

Investors will be watching closely to see when — orif — Meta resumes its share repurchase program.

More on tech stocks:

• Nvidia’s stock split history: Everything you need to know
• AMD’s stock buybacks explained: History, balance & outlook
• Does Intel pay dividends? History & future prospects explained

But the bigger question is whether the company's massive AI investments can ultimately generate greater long-term value than its buybacks.

For more insights on how management plans to balance its AI spending with future shareholder returns, investors should tune into Meta’s second quarter earnings call on July 29, 2026. 

Related: Does Meta pay dividends? Its yield & payouts explained

But the companies actually building the models at the center of it all have stayed private, leaving most investors on the outside looking in.

Anthropic, the company behind Claude, is about to change that. Bankers are now lining up investor meetings ahead of a potential October IPO, and the process is far enough along that this is no longer a rumor.

The company behind one of the most widely used AI models in the world is preparing to go public, and the numbers it's bringing to market are striking.

What Anthropic's IPO preparation actually looks like right now

Anthropic filed its draft registration statement with the SEC on June 1, 2026. The filing was confidential, meaning the prospectus isn't public yet.

Since then, Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, and JPMorgan Chase have been brought in as lead underwriters, according to CNBC. Those are Wall Street's three largest banks by revenue. The fact that all three are on the deal signals this is being treated as a major market event.

Bankers are now setting up meetings between Anthropic executives and prospective institutional investors. Think of it as the AI company going on a listening tour before it actually asks anyone to write a check.

The banks want to know what price range the market will support, what questions investors have, and whether demand is sufficient to pull off a deal this big. October is the target date, though that could change, depending on what they hear and how the SEC review of the confidential filing goes.

Wilson Sonsini, the law firm that managed Google's 2004 IPO, is handling Anthropic's public market readiness. That's not a random choice. It's a signal about ambition.

The numbers behind Anthropic's near-trillion dollar valuation

Anthropic closed a $65 billion Series H funding round in May 2026 at a post-money valuation of $965 billion, according to Investing.com.

That pushed it above OpenAI's valuation for the first time. It also put the company within range of becoming the first AI model developer to cross a trillion dollars in value before going public.

More AI:

• The new Chinese AI model rattling U.S. tech investors
• Anthropic restores access to Mythos 5 for select organizations
• SoftBank CEO offers stinging critique of Musk’s AI bet

The revenue numbers are hard to wrap your head around. Anthropic's annualized revenue was around $9 billion at the end of 2025. By April it was $30 billion. By late May, the company said it had crossed $47 billion.

That's the same company, six months later, with five times the revenue run rate. The growth came from enterprises piling into Claude and from Claude Code, the company's agentic coding tool, which had already hit $2.5 billion in its own annualized revenue by February.

Why Anthropic is racing to beat OpenAI to the public markets

OpenAI also filed a confidential S-1 in late May 2026. It has Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, Citigroup, and JPMorgan working on its deal. But OpenAI has since pushed its IPO target from fall 2026 to 2027, according to CNBC. That gives Anthropic a window to be first.

Being first matters for two reasons. The company that goes public first sets the valuation benchmark for the sector. And if AI enthusiasm fades later in the cycle, being first means accessing institutional capital before sentiment shifts. Kalshi prediction markets put Anthropic's probability of listing before OpenAI at 72%.

SpaceX's June IPO is the comparison point everyone is watching. It was the first blockbuster AI-adjacent listing of the year. If Anthropic prices well and the stock holds, it could open the window for the biggest wave of AI IPOs since the technology emerged into mainstream consciousness.

The risks that will face Anthropic as a public company

The story isn't clean. Anthropic is spending $1.25 billion per month on computing capacity through a deal with SpaceX, which runs through May 2029, according to The Next Web.

That's an annualized infrastructure commitment of $15 billion from a single supplier. Total compute spending in 2026 is estimated at roughly $19 billion. At $47 billion in annualized revenue with gross margins around 40%, the path to sustained profitability is real but not immediate. The company doesn't expect to be profitable until 2028.

There's also a revenue accounting question. Analysts have flagged that the $47 billion annualized figure may include committed contract value that hasn't been recognized as revenue yet, the Under the Market Lens Substack noted.

That distinction matters to public market investors, who will be valuing the company on actual revenue, not on what contracts say could come in.

The Pentagon designated Anthropic as a supply-chain risk earlier this year, the BBC reported. That hasn't killed its enterprise momentum, but it's an overhang that public investors will want management to address directly in the prospectus and on roadshow calls.

What Anthropic's IPO means for AI investors and the broader market

The IPO market has already had its strongest year since 2021. Companies have raised $227.5 billion globally through listings this year, excluding SPACs, according to CNBC. Anthropic at $60 billion would be one of the largest raises in history.

For investors who have wanted direct exposure to the AI model layer, this is the first real opportunity at scale.

Nvidia gives you the chips. Microsoft and Google give you the platforms. Anthropic would give you the model company itself, the one building the AI that enterprise clients are increasingly choosing over the alternatives.

Whether the market will pay a premium valuation for a company still burning cash at scale is the central question. The investor meetings happening right now are the first real test.

What institutional buyers tell those bankers over the next few weeks will determine whether October becomes a milestone for AI investing, or a story about what the public market wasn't quite ready for.

Related: Elon Musk says he was wrong about Anthropic

The PlayStation Store on PS6 will reportedly block access for an absolutely massive number of players around the world, as many countries don’t have access to PSN, which poses a real problem for players in those countries. Sony recently announced that it would be stopping physical disc production of games after 2028. Which means that the PS6 is going to be an all-digital console with no option to buy or play physical games on it.

Players haven’t been happy about this announcement, and have taken to social media to voice their frustrations over this decision. Many in the gaming community have called for Sony to reverse its decision, with some even going so far as to call on regulators to lean on Sony for this future practice. In a recent survey, thousands of PlayStation gamers have said they’re heavily considering switching to PC with the loss of physical games. In other words, PlayStation fans are pretty upset about the removal of physical games as an option. Of course, none are probably more upset than the players in countries will essentially lose access to PlayStation games entirely once 2028 rolls around.

The PS6 will block access to PlayStation games for around 122 countries

According to new reports, the PS6, which is suspected to be all-digital given Sony’s recent announcement, will likely block access to games once this decision goes into effect. That’s because digital games will have to be purchased from the PlayStation Store, and there are around 122 countries that don’t have access to that. This would basically lock out players in those countries from ever buying new games, which would make the PS6 a useless console in those regions.

There are still plenty of unknowns here. The PS6 may actually feature a disc drive to allow for playing older physical copies of games. But any new all-digital titles would more or less be a no-go. As pointed out by a user on Reddit, PSN is not available in countries like Georgia. This has led players in those countries to get around the lack of the PS Store by creating accounts from other countries where it’s available. Still, some fear that their accounts and their entire game libraries may be at risk if Sony ever decides to crack down on this practice.

The post Sony is basically cutting off gamers in 122 countries with PS6 appeared first on Android Headlines.

Smartphone screens have spent the last decade growing taller and narrower. This resulted in the remote-control-like aspect ratios we carry today. When manufacturers wanted to give us wider screens, they turned to complex, fragile folding displays. Now, another major Chinese brand is looking to challenge that trend. A fresh leak claims that OPPO has kicked off development on a non-foldable, wide-screen phone.

A wide device that is not a foldable

According to the reliable tipster Digital Chat Station, OPPO’s upcoming device is explicitly not a foldable, nor is it a traditional tablet. Instead, it is a standard slate phone that simply embraces a much wider display footprint, likely adopting a boxier 16:10 aspect ratio. This move makes OPPO the second major Android brand to explore this experimental form factor in recent times. Huawei was ahead of everyone in the industry when it launched the giant Pura X Max to the commercial market.

The leak notes that the project is still in its earliest development stages. So, specific hardware specifications and internal features remain a mystery.

The benefits of a wider, rigid canvas

Building a wider, non-folding phone offers some key advantages over both traditional tall flagships and current foldables. First and foremost is structural durability. Foldable phones are engineering marvels, but they still require fragile plastic-composite screens, complex hinges, and a noticeable center crease. A rigid, wide-screen phone delivers a big canvas with a traditional, highly durable glass screen that will not crease, tear, or struggle with dust ingress.

The 16:10 aspect ratio is also superior for current mobile productivity. Tall 19.5:9 or 20:9 screens cram virtual keyboards, crush spreadsheets, and split-screen multitasking results in two tiny, unreadable windows. On the other hand, a wider screen allows you to comfortably run two apps side-by-side, read documents without constant horizontal scrolling and enjoy a much better layout for mobile gaming and video editing.

The post OPPO is Reportedly Building a Giant, Non-Foldable Wide-Screen Phone appeared first on Android Headlines.

Inside a nearby laboratory, where two full-time sensory scientists make their assessments. 210 raspberry varieties were laid out in a grid of plastic pints. Some had been bred for visual appeal, with more shapely shoulders, uniform drupelets and less “hair” (the thin red styles that sprout where the berry is pollinated). Others were developed to maximize yield, with fewer thorns and better “plant architecture” — tall, fluffy stalks that make the berries easy to pick. Each cultivar is tested for qualities like P.S.I., the interior pressure that determines whether a berry will yield to the teeth with an explosive, juicy pop. Out of those 210 strains, said Kyle Rak, the company’s chief raspberry scientist, perhaps two will make it to market.

Inside a nearby laboratory, where two full-time sensory scientists make their assessments. 210 raspberry varieties were laid out in a grid of plastic pints. Some had been bred for visual appeal, with more shapely shoulders, uniform drupelets and less “hair” (the thin red styles that sprout where the berry is pollinated). Others were developed to maximize yield, with fewer thorns and better “plant architecture” — tall, fluffy stalks that make the berries easy to pick. Each cultivar is tested for qualities like P.S.I., the interior pressure that determines whether a berry will yield to the teeth with an explosive, juicy pop. Out of those 210 strains, said Kyle Rak, the company’s chief raspberry scientist, perhaps two will make it to market.

“Don’t tell your kids.”

“Your phone might be hacked. Don’t call anyone about this.”

“This has to stay between us.”

“The bank told me not to discuss this with family.”

If you’ve heard any version of those lines — or a parent or older relative has repeated one back to you without quite explaining why — it’s a red flag. These statements are the mechanism scammers use to steal. Money’s the goal, and isolation helps scammers get it. Once someone stops checking in with the people who’d normally catch inconsistencies, like a spouse, adult child, or banker, the scammer becomes the only remaining source of information. There’s no one else who could say, “Wait, that doesn’t sound right.”

Read:FTC Survey: Older Americans getting hammered by scams

This isn’t an article about gullibility. It’s a story about a deliberate tactic built to create trust. Recognizing it is the first step to catching it before it goes too far.

Why this strategy works well on older adults

Not everyone reacts the same way to a request for secrecy. For those already quietly worried about being seen as less capable or a family member deciding it’s time to step in, that request taps into an existing fear.

Darius Kingsley, Head of Consumer Fraud and Scam Prevention at J.P. Morgan Chase, said scammers lean hard on urgency. They make a situation feel time-sensitive, like a legal emergency or a compromised account, so people act before they pause to think or call someone they trust.

Elizabeth Huppert, a behavioral scientist at J.P. Morgan Chase, points to the mechanism driving that strategy. Once someone stops checking in with people they trust, the scammer becomes their only source of information, and it becomes almost impossible to fact-check the story as it shifts. The situation gradually (or quickly) feels more urgent and real, not because the victim is careless, but because the scammers have quietly removed every alternative source of truth.

These scams rarely sound like a threat — more like help. Kingsley describes scammers posing as bank security or law enforcement, with lines like “this is part of an investigation” or “your account will be frozen if you disclose this.” Some claim bank employees are involved in the fraud, leading the victim to distrust those who could actually help. Kingsley has seen scammers stay on the phone with a victim inside a bank branch, coaching them in real time on what to say and do, even as a teller is standing right there (and likely suspects something is wrong, because they’re trained to spot these scams).

According to Huppert, it isn’t always fear doing the work, either. Some scams create a crisis, whether a threat or a legal emergency, that makes someone scared of what might happen if they don’t act immediately. Others lean into excitement. They might dangle an investment or opportunity that feels too good to slow down and question.

Fear and excitement push toward making a decision quickly, alone, and before anyone else weighs in. Every version replaces “tell someone” with “trust only me.”

Shame arrives, too, but later in the process, after fear or excitement has had its effect. Once someone starts to suspect that something is wrong, Huppert notes, embarrassment about being judged can make it harder to speak up. That shame doesn’t necessarily end when the scam does, either. People who realize afterward that they were scammed sometimes isolate further instead of seeking support precisely because they’re worried about how it will look.

So if a parent or relative falls for one of these scams, don’t take it as a sign that they’ve lost their judgment. The criminal behind the scam knew exactly which fear or hope to manipulate and did so skillfully enough that calling for help felt like the riskier option.

Related: Beware of this scam targeting seniors’ bank accounts

The red flags families miss — and why

Here’s the part that catches most families off guard. The early signs rarely look like fraud and a lot more like aging.

• A parent suddenly is more private about mail.
• Someone more anxious before answering the phone.
• A relative who’s become quieter about money.
• An older relative in a new online relationship who becomes vague or elusive when asked about the person

None of these scenarios screams “SCAM!” so it’s easy to explain away. Dad’s always been cautious. Mom’s just private about finances. She’s lonely — of course, she should date.

That explanation is much more comfortable than the alternative, which is why families tend to accept it. Kingsley said there’s no timeline to sussing out a scam. Some families catch on within hours or days, and others not for weeks or months.

A few patterns worth a closer look, even before anyone reports a problem, include:

• Large transfers to unfamiliar accounts or crypto wallets
• A first-time wire or payments to the same recipient that increase over time
• Money that’s moved between accounts, followed by an immediate outbound payment
• Unexpected or sudden, secretive changes to a will or power of attorney
• A new interest in an unfamiliar investment
• Rapid ATM withdrawals or multiple cashier’s checks that differ from past habits
• New payees appearing on a bank account

None of these alone proves anything, but together — especially if they’re new and out of character — are worth a conversation.

Kingsley suggests establishing regular check-ins about finances, which makes it easier to catch changes early. A family cool-off rule, pausing 24 hours before sending any payment above a set amount, also gives someone room to step back and consult a trusted person before a decision becomes irreversible. This small delay may be the only thing standing between a moment of pressure and a wire transfer you can’t reverse.

How to start the conversation without shutting the door

A direct, worried question — “Are you giving money to someone you don’t know?” — is more likely to put the other person on the defensive. It sounds like an accusation, not a concern about a potential scam.

Huppert said that scammers typically coach victims to distrust those around them. They see loved ones as obstacles. Jumping to questions can backfire before the conversation starts.

Prioritize trust-building, making it clear you’re on their side. Help them feel supported (not judged) by not questioning their decision-making. Give them the space to pause, step back, and recognize something’s not right.

Try this approach instead:

“There’s a scam going around that targets people by asking them to keep it secret. Has anything like that come up for you?” or “I’m not checking up on you, I just want to make sure no one’s targeting you because criminals design these scams to be super convincing.”

If shame has already entered the room, name it directly — these scams happen to smart, careful people every day, and it’s not a reflection of anyone’s judgment. Normalizing the experience, rather than reacting to it, helps keep people in the conversation and not retreat.

Remember: your goal is not to elicit a confession but to make it safe for them to say, “Actually, yeah. Something has felt off.”

Setting up a safety net before you need one

One of the most useful tools isn’t a conversation but a structure you put in place before anything looks wrong.

A trusted contact person (TCP) is a feature some banks, including Chase, offer that allows someone to designate a person the bank can contact if it notices unusual account activity. Note that a TCP can’t view balances, access funds, or make transactions. They’re a point of contact, not a co-owner, which is different from a Power of Attorney (POA). A POA grants legal authority to act on someone’s behalf, or a joint bank owner, who has direct transaction access. A TCP adds awareness. The bank flags a concern, and the contact checks in. That’s it.

Resistance to setting up a TCP often stems from the same place that scams exploit — fear of losing independence. Framing a TCP as something added for your loved one’s independence, rather than a vote against their judgment, tends to land better. 

If your loved one is adamant that nothing’s wrong but you’re still worried, Kingsley recommends taking an empathetic rather than a confrontational approach. Aggressive questioning can unintentionally push someone further into isolation or make them defensive.

Take your cue from your relationship dynamic. You might:

• Keep communication open with regular check-ins
• Look for natural opportunities to involve a trusted third party, like a banker, attorney, or financial advisor, who can ask questions without the emotional weight a family relationship carries
• Watch for gradual behavioral or financial changes over time
• Add a safeguard, like a trusted contact person

If you’re worried about a parent or relative now, or just want to be prepared:

1. Have the conversation before it becomes critical — in fact, have several conversations. Mention scam tactics in general, not as an accusation.
2. Introduce the idea of setting up a TCP, framing this suggestion as an extra layer of protection, not a step toward giving up independence.
3. Keep an eye out for a change in patterns, like a change in mail habits, calls, or money handling. It might not be personality-related, but it’s worth noting even if the explanation checks out.
4. If you suspect something, lead with empathy — not confrontation. Regular, low-pressure check-ins are generally easier on everyone than one big, overwhelming conversation.
5. Loop in a third party when you can. A banker, attorney, or advisor can ask questions without the emotion of family dynamics.

Secrecy is a scammer’s main tactic. These criminals count on isolation working. The best way to counter a potential scam? A family that talks about money, has a plan, and doesn’t see check-ins as an accusation. That strategy is hard for any script to counteract.

This story written for TheStreet by Nifty 50+

Why we love this deal

From skincare essentials and tubes of toothpaste to hair brushes and cotton swabs, the bathroom counters can quickly overflow with products. A lavatory with a medicine cabinet behind the mirror or a few cabinets and drawers under the sink will offer more storage to work with, but after arranging the toilet paper, cleaning supplies, and medicine bottles, you still might be short on space. If you want to clear the clutter from your bathroom counters, a countertop organizer is one of the most efficient hacks for keeping things nice and tidy. 

In our opinion, the best storage solutions have a fashion-forward design that will upgrade the overall style of the room, which is why we love the Delamu 2-Tier 2-Drawer Bathroom Countertop Organizer at Walmart. Highly rated, this organizer is a popular pick for its lavish look that can instantly transform your bathroom, while also providing multiple tiers and drawers of storage for your cosmetics and toiletries. Best of all, the regular retail price of $40 has been slashed by 53% with a Walmart Flash deal, bringing the total cost down to just $19.

Delamu 2-Tier 2-Drawer Bathroom Countertop Organizer, $19 (was $40) at Walmart

Why do shoppers love it?

Perfectly sized to fit onto the countertops, this organizer measures 12.4 inches long, 7.9 inches wide, and 15.3 inches high. The unit is made with high-quality and durable thermoplastic polymer, so if your lotions or creams ever leak, you can easily wash them off. While the compact footprint of this organizer won't take up too much room, it maximizes unused or wasted space with a vertical design, equipped with two drawers and shelves stacked together. You can even use the upper drawer as a secondary storage tray if you want, giving you more flexibility in organizing. 

The drawers and upper-tier shelf are made with a clear amber-hued finish, which gives the organizer an Old Hollywood glam look paired with the golden hardware. If you don't love the vintage style, there are also white and blue colorways discounted to $20 or less as part of the sale. "Love these for extra storage!" raved one shopper. They also remarked that the "amber-colored drawers and top tray were just what I was looking for."

Related: Walmart has a storage cabinet with drawers and a cupboard for just $67

Of the nearly 200 reviewers who have rated this bathroom organizer, over 80% have given it a perfect five-star rating. One shopper who called it "inexpensive elegance" explained that it "elevated my bathroom to a much more elegant level."

Details to know 

• Dimensions: 12.4 inches long, 7.9 inches wide, and 15.3 inches high.
• Color options: All seven colors are discounted to $24 or less. 
• Material: ABS (Acrylonitrile Butadiene Styrene).
• Average shopper rating: 4.7 out of five stars.

This organizer isn't limited to being used on the countertop or in the bathroom. It would also look great on the kitchen counter or next to a coffee bar, with room for syrups, tea bags, and beans. You could also use it under the sink or on a desk in the home office if you're lacking counter space. With a little creativity, your organizing options are endless. 

Shop more deals

• Jdnrxo 2-Tier Corner Bathroom Counter Organizer, $21 (was $24) at Walmart
• Xeenso Dresser Shelf Organizer, $22 (was $38) at Walmart
• Kisportee Rotating Makeup Organizer, $19 (was $40) at Walmart

Streamline your home on a budget while the Delamu 2-Tier 2-Drawer Bathroom Countertop Organizer is on sale for as low as $19 at Walmart. We've seen the best Flash deals sell out before the week ends, so don't wait to add this one to your cart.

The settlement between Google and Epic is over, but not because the two companies have decided to go back at it in court, rather they have both decided that the battle is done and Google will simply abide by Epic’s requests to open up Google Play to rivals. On July 14, 2026, both Google and Epic agreed to withdraw their joint attempt for the lawsuit settlement, and Google will now be required to open up Google Play to rival app stores.

Google’s settlement with Epic came after years of fighting in court over Google’s anti-competitive practices and what was determined to be Google’s monopoly with the Play Store. It was a big win for Epic with that judgement, but even after the win, it would still take years more to get to the point where it would finally get what it was fighting for. As of now, Google is opening up the Play Store rivals starting next week.

With the Epic settlement over, Google will open up the Play Store to rivals on July 22

It won’t be long before Google opens up the Play Store to rivals. In fact, Google says it’ll be doing just that on July 22. That’s next week Wednesday, which means users are very close to getting stores like the Epic Games Store, and perhaps the Xbox Store from Microsoft, inside of Google Play as alternate store options. The agreement to end the settlement does not mention any stores in particular.

Google does confirm that while alternative app stores will be available, apps downloaded from those stores will not be exempt from fees, nor will the stores themselves. The alternative marketplaces will have to pay Google a $5,000 fee on an annual basis, for starters. Apps downloaded from those marketplaces will also still use Google Play’s system for payments, and will be subjected to fees for purchases made.

The post Google's Epic settlement is no more, but it's actually a good thing appeared first on Android Headlines.

The bad news for T-Mobile customers just keeps coming. With the push to force legacy customers onto new plans, T-Mobile is also causing some customers to lose their long-standing free line promotions, which is resulting in unexpected charges.

As we’ve reported already, T-Mobile has been moving users off of legacy plans like Magenta, ONE, and Simple Choice onto newer plans. With this change, T-Mobile has promised existing perks would stay, and that includes free lines. But that assurance looks to be just talk, after several customers have reported that their first bill post-migration is lacking the promotional credits.

Some customers are reportedly paying more than $300 per month for plans that included multiple free lines. And that’s up from around $50. To say this is a small change is understating it, entirely. While others are just losing them entirely.

T-Mobile’s migration has been nothing but a headache

Since T-Mobile announced the migration for older plans to these newer plans, there have been a ton of headaches, not only for T-Mobile but its customers as well. T-Mobile has walked back its “Price Lock Guarantee,” which said they wouldn’t raise prices, and then raised prices. This has forced a lot of customers, many of whom have been with T-Mobile for a decade or more, to switch carriers.

Now seeing that all of these “free” lines that were given out over the years are disappearing, or no longer getting their credits, makes this even worse.

And this is on top of charging over 8 million customers around $6 more per month, per line. Which really adds up.

T-Mobile is truly ripping out its “Uncarrier” motto with every move it makes. And it won’t be surprising to see a huge churn when T-Mobile reports its earnings next quarter. The carrier is really giving customers no reason to stick with T-Mobile, especially when AT&T and Verizon are better, according to Ookla’s latest report.

The post T-Mobile Is Now Removing Free Lines Promised to Long-Time Customers appeared first on Android Headlines.

Google is turning its search engine into a much more active assistant. Rolling out this week for users in the United States, a new update lets you securely connect and interact with some of your favorite third-party services right inside Google Search’s AI Mode. Instead of pointing you to a list of blue links, Google’s AI can now pass your instructions to other platforms. This way, you can get tasks done without you needing to jump between different tabs.

We have been able to connect various Google services to the standalone Gemini app for a while. However, the tech giant is now bringing that same connected magic directly into standard Search.

Getting things done without leaving the page

This integration aims to take the friction out of daily digital chores. For instance, if you use AI Mode to brainstorm a backyard barbecue menu, you can connect your Instacart account to instantly transfer those recipe ingredients straight into your shopping cart, leaving you just a couple of taps away from a final checkout on their app.

The same seamless handoff applies to creative and entertainment tasks. If you are designing a promotional flyer and ask the AI for concept ideas, it can pull matching template options directly from Canva. Similarly, if you want to set the mood for a gathering, you can ask AI Mode to build a customized party soundtrack, automatically save it to your library in YouTube Music, and start playing it immediately.

Google is starting with a select group of launch partners, including Instacart, Canva, and YouTube Music. However, the company says it is actively collaborating with other developers to bring more applications into the search experience soon.

The post Google’s AI Mode Can Now Talk Directly to Your Favorite Apps Inside Search appeared first on Android Headlines.

Trying to sleep during a hot summer night can be brutal. The higher temperatures can lead to restlessness and waking up in the middle of the night. And the next day? You're left groggy, tired, and in desperate need of a strong cup of coffee to get you through the morning. 

While air conditioning units and fans can certainly help, using the right bedding can make a major difference. Cooling comforters are a great option; however, some might find them too bulky and, despite their cooling properties, still too warm. Quilts, on the other hand, are highly popular during the summer months, as their lightweight design makes them a perfect match for the heat. And luckily, there are sales on lightweight summer quilts with discounts of up to nearly 50% off.

Ntcoco 3-Piece Quilt

Why are quilts beneficial for summer bedding?

A quilt is a thin type of bedding that's made of multiple layers, typically two or three. The layers are pieced and stitched together by hand or by machine, with patchwork and intricate patterns being common design features. 

Quilts are a top choice for warm summer nights, as they're lightweight and breathable. Many swap out bulky comforters as early as spring, as fall and winter bedding are geared toward cooler weather and can make you overheat. With heat domes occurring more frequently than previous years and temperatures reaching well into the 90s in many parts of the country, shoppers are desperately trying to find ways to stay cool. With that said, lightweight quilts are skyrocketing in popularity, but the good news is there are plenty of sizes, designs, and brands to choose from, so it shouldn't be too difficult to get your hands on one. And it's something you can use beyond the summer season, making it an even more worthwhile investment. 

Even though quilts are ideal for summer, you can use them year-round. Quilts make fantastic bedcovers and layers throughout the seasons, adding extra warmth when needed, as well as a decorative touch.

Amazon's stocked with lightweight summer quilts

If you're looking for affordable quilts to change up your summer bedding, Amazon is loaded with options. You can find three-piece sets that come with a quilt and two matching pillow shams on sale for as low as $22, with discounts of up to 48% off. There are Amazon quilts for every style preference, too, with everything from solid hues to farmhouse-style patchwork designs.

Amazon quilt sets are also available in a range of materials. Pricier options include quilt sets made of 100% cotton. They tend to be the most breathable and moisture-wicking, which is exactly what you want during the summertime. More budget-friendly quilt sets tend to be made of polyester. While polyester may not be as breathable as cotton, the thin design makes polyester quilts solid, affordable summer bedding picks that are extra soft and durable.

Akkialla 3-Piece Quilt Set

Love's Cabin 3-Piece Quilt Set

Bedsure 3-Piece Quilt Set

Casaagusto 3-Piece Patchwork Quilt Set

Wdcozy 3-Piece Quilt Set

More lightweight quilt sets

Amazon isn't the only place you can find lightweight quilts. Walmart, Target, Macy's, and Wayfair are also great places to shop for summer bedding, with quilt set deals up to 75% off original prices.

Cleva 3-Piece Quilt Set

Charter Club Seaside Patchwork 3-Piece Quilt Set

Becky Cameron 3-Piece Reversible Quilt Set

Barefoot Bungalow Topanga 3-Piece Floral Boho Reversible Quilt Set

TheStreet Shopping is your guide for shopping insights and advice. We look beyond the price tag to find the best value in home, tech, and wellness gear based on product features and real-world use. Read more about our Editorial Standards and How We Choose Our Shopping Deals.

Samsung is preparing for its next Unpacked event on July 22. There, we expect to see the debut of the Galaxy Z Flip 8, Z Fold 8, and the high-end Z Fold 8 Ultra. However, behind the scenes, the future of the clamshell lineup is shrouded in mystery. With a recent rumor suggesting the Flip 8 “might be the last Flip” as Samsung re-evaluates its foldable strategy, a new patent suggests the company might not be planning to kill the form factor—it might just completely reinvent it.

The recently uncovered patent was shared by Fixyflow in collaboration with leaker @xleaks7. The filing reveals that Samsung is actively experimenting with a foldable screen that bends both ways. Current Galaxy Z Flip devices only fold shut like a book. However, this patent features a highly advanced 360-degree hinge that allows the phone to fold completely inward to protect the main screen or fully outward so the display wraps around the exterior of the device.

The engineering workaround

Making a screen fold in two completely opposite directions is an engineering nightmare. This is especially true when you throw curved edges into the mix. Samsung has to prevent the curved glass sections on the outer sides of the chassis from smashing into each other when you close the device. So, the patent outlines a design that leaves tiny, deliberate gaps near the hinge.

Of course, leaving physical gaps means breaking some of the microscopic wiring that carries image signals across the folding display panel. To bypass this, Samsung’s engineers designed a clever workaround. They basically rerouted the display’s electrical wiring on different internal layers, building a detour around the gaps to keep the screen working perfectly. Plus, the main folding area is separated from the curved side. This helps to distribute the bending pressure and significantly lowers the risk of screen cracks over time.

A versatile tool for multitasking

When you close the phone, you’ll see a curved secondary screen on the upper exterior half. This screen acts as a handy dashboard for quick interactions. For busy professionals, this means you could easily glance at incoming notifications, check task alerts, control music, or preview a quick camera shot without ever opening the phone. When you need to dive into detailed work, you simply unfold the device to reveal the massive, full-size inner screen.

The post Samsung Might Not Kill the Galaxy Z Flip but Reinvent It as a Dual-Folder, Patent Suggest appeared first on Android Headlines.

However, on July 14, the market decided otherwise in a single session. IBM shares closed at $217.07, falling 25.21% that day alone. 

This came after the company pre-announced a second-quarter miss that nobody saw coming. That was its worst drop since 1968, even worse than Black Monday in October 1987.

Roughly$68 billion in market value vanished, and Big Blue is now worth about $204 billion.

Here's the part that should interest investors more: Micron Technology (MU) went up the same day, on the same news.

Why IBM's earnings warning erased $68 billion in one session

IBM told investors its preliminary second-quarter revenue came in at $17.2 billion, against the $17.86 billion Wall Street expected.

The company also reported adjusted earnings of $2.93 a share versus the $3.01 consensus, according to Forbes.

The miss itself was small. But the reason behind it was not.

More AI Stocks:

• Micron stock jumps as investors look beyond GPUs in AI chip trade
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CEO Arvind Krishna wrote to investors that clients redirected budgets toward servers, storage, and memory in the final weeks of June to lock down supply before prices climbed. 

IBM misjudged how much money would move. 

The CEO admitted the company "did not anticipate the magnitude of the capex reprioritization" and conceded that "this quarter we faltered," Axios reported.

Krishna also said numerous large deals failed to close on the timelines IBM expected. This failure drove most of the shortfall, International Business Times reported.

What "capex reprioritization" means for your portfolio

A company has a fixed technology budget, and when one line item gets more expensive, another line item dies.

Chief information officers did not get bigger budgets in June. They got scarier hardware prices.

So CIOs bought the servers and the memory first, because you cannot run an AI workload on a purchase order. 

Then, they pushed the software renewals and the consulting engagements into the next quarter or out of the plan entirely.

Even with this, IBM's software segment still grew 5%, with Red Hat up 11%. Although consulting was roughly flat, infrastructure fell 7%, The Motley Fool reported. 

The damage was concentrated, not universal. That distinction matters because IBM did not lose to a competitor; it lost to a spreadsheet.

Why IBM's fall is the validation Micron has been waiting for

Micron makes high-bandwidth memory, or HBM. 

HBM is a stacked version of DRAM that sits directly beside an AI processor and feeds it data fast enough to keep the chip busy. Every serious AI server needs it.

For most of its history, Micron was a stock that ate its own gains every few years. Prices boomed, capacity flooded in, margins collapsed, repeat.

Related: Veteran analyst drops massive Micron valuation prediction

IBM just handed the company evidence that this cycle is different.

When enterprises let software deals that are nearly closed die rather than risk missing a memory allocation, that is not elastic demand. That is a customer base with no substitute and no patience.

Micron shares reflected it immediately. The stock traded around $980.55 midday on July 14, up 4.7% from the prior close. 

This was after KeyBanc analyst John Vinhraised his target to $1,750, Barron's reported.

The supply math behind Micron's pricing power

The reason CIOs panicked in June is that the memory capacity they need was already spoken for.

Samsung, SK Hynix (SKHY), and Micron control more than 95%of global DRAM production.

All three companies prioritized converting capacity to HBM because it earns three to five times the revenue per wafer of conventional memory, Stocks Down Under noted.

Three facts investors should hold onto

• The order book is closed. Micron's memory capacity is sold out well into 2027, and the company has secured about $100 billion in long-term customer agreements.
• The shortage has a stated end date, and it's far away. On the June 24 earnings call, CEO Sanjay Mehrotra said market tightness is "locked in to persist beyond calendar 2027."
• Prices are still climbing. KeyBanc forecasts DRAM up 15% to 20% in the third quarter and another 15% in the fourth, with HBM prices potentially more than doubling next year.

That combination is why Micron's last quarter looked the way it did. Fiscal third-quarter revenue hit $41.46 billion, up about 346% from a year earlier, with gross margin at a record 84.9%.

The software stocks that fell with IBM, and why

When IBM warned of its business's struggles, investors did not think it was a problem unique to IBM. Instead, they realized that other software companies would soon face the exact same troubles.

Microsoft (MSFT) closed at a 1.55% drop, Oracle (ORCL) fell 2.74%, and Accenture (ACN) dropped 2.86% on July 14, according to Bloomberg. 

Salesforce (CRM) dropped about 4% in early trading before recovering, while Microngained 5% in the afternoon and SanDisk (SNDK) rose nearly 6%.

The pattern is the trade. Money left the application layer and showed up in the hardware layer within the same session.

HSBCdowngraded IBMto reduce from hold with a $191 price target, which was the sharpest bear call of the day, The Motley Fool noted.

What has to stay true for the memory trade to keep working

Zero-sum budgets are good for Micron only while the shortage lasts, and shortages have a well-documented habit of ending.

Four things need to hold:

• Supply stays behind demand. New fabs in Idaho, New York, and Virginia are being built precisely to fix this, and when they ramp, the pricing argument weakens.
• Contract prices stick. Micron's strategic customer agreements are take-or-pay, so customers can walk away but forfeit what they've committed.
• AI capex keeps growing. If hyperscalers pause, memory has no second buyer of that size.
• The legal overhang stays quiet. A June 25 class action lawsuit accuses Micron, Samsung, and SK Hynix of restricting supply to inflate prices by as much as 700% since 2022.

Not everyone believes the cycle broke. 

Michael Burry shorted Micron at $1,051.87 on July 1, noting the stock has suffered 34 drawdowns of more than 30% over the past 42 years. 

Related: Wall Street flees software plays for triple-digit chipmaker boom

What investors should watch between now and July 22

IBM's full results and conference call land on July 22, and that is the next real decider event for both sides of this trade.

For IBM holders, the question is simple: Did those deals slip, or did they die? Krishna needs to put a number on it on July 22, and a vague answer suggests the software drought isn't over.

For Micron holders, every delayed software deal is good news. The July 22 call will show whether June was a one-month thing or the new normal.

Practical framing for both:

• Position size matters more than conviction here, since a 25% single-day move in a 115-year-old blue chip is a reminder that nothing is too big to reprice.
• Watch software peers into the July 22 results to see whether this was a one-day repricing or the start of a broader derating.
• Micron already trades on an assumption of extended tightness, so the risk is not that demand disappoints; it's that supply arrives early.

IBM lost $68 billion because it sold the wrong half of the AI stack. 

Micron sells the half that got paid first, and until new capacity shows up, that is unlikely to change.

More on IBM & Micron

• History of IBM: Company timeline, milestones & facts
• Is IBM a good investment in 2026? Its buy-and-hold prospects explained
• IBM’s stock split history: Why Big Blue stopped splitting shares
• Does Micron pay dividends? Its yield and payouts explained
• Micron Technology’s stock buybacks explained
• Is Micron Technology a good long-term investment? What buy-and-hold investors should know

Two resorts in Miami Beach filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy within a few weeks of each other in March 2026 while, even with the power of a major hotel brand behind them, the Fairmont Breakers hotel in California's Long Beach and the Fairmont Château Montebello in the Canadian province of Québec are also among the names to file for protection in the past year.

The latest Chapter 11 petition filed in the Eastern District of California on July 15 was made by the owners of the 105-year-old Hotel Charlotte.

Hotel Charlotte near Yosemite National Park seeks bankruptcy protection in California

Built by Italian immigrant Charlotte DeFerrari in 1921 as a local inn and restaurant meant to call back to the area's earlier Gold Rush period with its wooden frame, the hotel was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1994 and in the modern period serves for many travelers as an entryway to the nearby Yosemite National Park — the property in Groveland, California is located 24 miles or approximately a 30-minute drive from the park's Big Oak Flat entrance.

In the petition, Hotel Charlotte declares between $1 and $10 million in assets and the same amount in liabilities owed to fewer than 50 creditors.

Related: Australia will make it easier for everyone to visit

The Chapter 11 filing indicates that the historic hotel aims to continue operating as it restructures its finances while the declaration also states that repeated power outages in its part of northern California in 2024 and 2025 resulted in loss of revenue from the restaurant that ultimately ended up leading it to its current financial position.

With NPS numbers showing that more than 75% of visitors to Yosemite National Park coming in the summer, the hotel is highly dependent on the seasonal influx to make up for the dry spell in what is a fairly rural mountain community otherwise.

"Lodging just 24 miles from the entrance to Yosemite National Park": Hotel Charlotte continues to operate amid bankruptcy filing

Hotel Charlotte representatives could not be immediately reached for comment on the petition that first surfaced online but its website shows that the hotel is still accepting reservations and welcoming guests to its 13 guest rooms and suites.

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"Step into the Old West at the historic Hotel Charlotte, located in the heart of downtown Groveland, California — offering lodging just 24 miles from the entrance to Yosemite National Park," the hotel writes in advertising the property. "Our family-owned and operated hotel offers a cozy, affordable basecamp to launch your day's adventure — or to rest and recover when it's done."

Haddix Law Firm in Modesto is representing owners Finn and Brennen Horsley who purchased Hotel Charlotte from the previous owners in 2019. The property has been operating without interruption since it was built in 1921.

Related: Major airline makes it easier to get refunds for Middle East flights

Why we love this deal

When you have a bad day, a good night's sleep can refresh and help you reframe your mind, but with the right bedding, sometimes crawling into bed and under the covers can make a difference in your mood before you even fall asleep. We spend so much time in bed and yet, we sometimes forget to invest in the right bedding so that each night's sleep feels as blissful and enjoyable as the last. Although bedding can cost a pretty penny, there are tons of great options for all budgets, like the Regency Heights Ribbed Comforter Set, that can help you achieve that feeling. Right now, it's on sale for 61% off.

The 3-piece set with its fluffy, ribbed texture, is unique among other bedding, and although it's originally $140, you can save $86 and get it for $54 if you act fast. The bestseller is popular for a reason, so if you're in need of a sleep sanctuary refresh, there's no better time to add this set to your cart. 

Regency Heights Ribbed Comforter Set, $54 (was $140) at Walmart

Why do shoppers love it?

Basic bedding will help you sleep at night, but textures, colors, and fabrics certainly can make all the difference in a decent night of sleep and a wonderful night of sleep. This set has a unique and fun fluffy texture that's ribbed and almost resembles fur. The 300 grams per square meter (GSM) fabric envelops you in a cuddly, cozy warmth, and its striped design provides texture and a stylish design. 

The Oeko-Tex-certified fabric is not just tested and verified to be free from harmful chemicals and substances, making it perfect for folks with even the most sensitive of sins, but the 100% polyester is highly durable and resistant to wrinkling, shrinking, and fading better than any natural fibers. It is less breathable, so it can be a bit warm for hot sleepers, but it's perfect during chilly air-conditioned nights during the summer and freezing temperatures outdoors during the winter.

Not only is polyester incredibly warm but it's also machine washable, making cleaning and overall care for this set very low maintenance. Always wash the set with cold water to further preserve color and quality, and let tumble on low heat to dry.

Related: Walmart's bestselling 7-piece comforter and sheet set is now just $37 in all 20+ colors

Available in six colors, the set includes a comforter and two matching pillows shams. It comes in twin/twin XL, full/queen, and king sizes. 

Details to know

• Material: Polyester.
• Colors: Six.
• Includes: A comforter and two matching pillow shams. 
• Sizes: Twin/twin XL, full/queen, and king
• Care: Machine wash.

The comforter is "incredibly soft and lightweight, making it perfect for all seasons," one shopper said. It keeps you warm without being overly heavy or bulky and the fabric feels very smooth against the skin. The ribbed design is fun but still gives the bedding a sleek, clean look and it's very comfortable. 

Shop more deals 

• Fundaze Down Alternative Comforter, $24 (was $48) at Walmart
• U by Bedsure 3-Piece Sage Comforter Set, $29 (was $49) at Walmart
• Yalamila 3-Piece Comforter Set, $32 (was $58) at Walmart

There's no better time to swap out the old with the new than right now with the Regency Heights Ribbed Comforter Set on sale for just $54.

Frontier Airlines will add SpaceX’s Starlink internet service starting in early 2027, according to CNBC. On the surface, it looks like Frontier is catching up to rivals that added Wi-Fi years ago.

Look closer at the announcement and a different story appears. Frontier isn’t signing this deal alone. Four other budget carriers on three continents are signing it at the same time, and all five share the same controlling shareholder.

Frontier was also one of the last U.S. carriers holding out on Wi-Fi, with former CEO Barry Biffle citing the weight that equipment would add to planes, according to CNBC.

The fact that five airlines moved together, and moved now, points to a decision made well above any single airline’s management team.

Frontier, Hungary’s Wizz Air, Mexico’s Volaris, Chile’s JetSmart, and the Philippines’ Cebu Pacific are installing Starlink across more than 1,000 aircraft combined, according to FlightGlobal.

Every one of those airlines sits inside the portfolio of Indigo Partners, the private equity firm run by Bill Franke. Frontier’s entire 183-plane Airbus fleet will be equipped, a company spokesperson confirmed to FlightGlobal.

One buyer negotiated Starlink deals for Frontier, 4 other airlines

Indigo Partners still holds a significant stake in Frontier and controls its board, with founder Franke serving as chairman, according to a company press release.

Franke and other Indigo-linked investors, including George Roberts, remain among Frontier’s largest individual shareholders, the same release shows.

Related: Frontier Airlines stands to benefit from Spirit's bankruptcy

That structure explains why five airlines moved together instead of negotiating separately, giving Indigo more leverage with SpaceX than any single carrier could get alone.

That matters for investors because it signals how Indigo runs its airlines as a connected system, insread of five independent bets.

Aviation trade outlet PaxEx.Aero reported that Indigo Partners itself appears to have driven the selection process, negotiating across its entire airline portfolio rather than leaving each carrier to strike its own terms.

Scale, not brand loyalty, is the strategy.

Starlink’s free plane Wi-Fi era is ending

The more overlooked detail sits in how SpaceX is structuring the deal. PaxEx.Aero reported that Wizz Air’s own Starlink announcement in June made no mention of complimentary access, a break from SpaceX’s earlier insistence that in-flight Wi-Fi should always be free to passengers.

That shift means most Frontier passengers will likely pay for connectivity once it launches, even though a Frontier spokeswoman declined to confirm pricing to CNBC.

For SpaceX, it marks a pivot toward treating in-flight internet as a stand-alone revenue product rather than a loss-leading perk. The shift has implications for every airline still negotiating its own Starlink contract.

Frontier shows that Wi-Fi fits larger budget airline turnaround bet

Frontier is layering Wi-Fi onto a broader pivot away from its no-frills roots. The carrier is also rolling out its first true first-class cabin, and new CEO Jimmy Dempsey has tied both moves to a strategy of pairing premium features with Frontier’s low base fares, according to a company statement.

Wall Street is starting to notice. Susquehanna raised its price target on Frontier Group Holdings (ULCC) to $7 from $4.50 on July 7, while maintaining a neutral rating, according to Yahoo Finance.

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• BofA sees Delta, United entering a rare airline sweet spot
• Raymond James makes surprising call on Delta Air Lines
• After the Chapter 11 shutdown, Spirit Airlines may make a comeback

Shares of Frontier, which trades as ULCC, closed near $6.48 on July 14, up sharply from a 52-week low of $3.02, according to data from TheStreet.

The stock remains unprofitable, posting a trailing 12-month net loss of roughly $137 million even as revenue climbed, underscoring that investors are pricing in a turnaround that hasn’t shown up in earnings yet.

Indigo model built on partnership, not just planes

Indigo Partners’ approach offers a preview of where budget aviation is headed globally. Rather than each ultra-low-cost carrier fighting its own procurement battles, Franke’s firm is using shared ownership to negotiate as a bloc on everything from aircraft orders to satellite internet.

That model gives smaller airlines the buying power of a major carrier without merging. As more private equity firms build multi-airline portfolios, Frontier’s Wi-Fi news may be remembered less for the internet it brings aboard than for the ownership structure that made the deal possible.

Related: Alaska Airlines exits one entire international market

Apple is reportedly ramping up orders for the vapor chamber cooling components that are said to be used in the upcoming foldable iPhone as well as its 20th anniversary iPhone models, according to Fixed Focus Digital over on Weibo.

Apple has asked suppliers to produce about 10 million foldable iPhones in 2026, which is up from the earlier forecast of around 7 to 8 million units. The foldable iPhone, which we believe will be called ‘iPhone Ultra’, is said to feature an “impressive” vapor chamber cooling, with tipsters claiming that the company is “going all out” with the device’s thermal engineering.

The iPhone 17 Pro series was the first iPhone to use vapor cooling, which was much needed after how hot the iPhone 16 Pro series was getting. The system was able to move heat away from the A19 Pro chip and distribute it through the device’s aluminum unibody frame, which is also why Apple moved away from Titanium.

Apple’s 20th Anniversary iPhone is coming next year, with a vapor chamber too

Next year, Apple is also set to introduce the 20th anniversary iPhone, which has been leaked to have an edge-to-edge display with glass that curves around all four sides. This is something we’ve seen from some Chinese manufacturers before, though most have gotten away from curved displays now.

There are expected to be two anniversary models next year, in sizes similar to the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max, so think of a 6.3-inch and a 6.9-inch option.

This same leaker also said that Apple’s “preferred approach” for the iPhone 20 is a return to glass, and that the relevant manufacturing facilities have been renovated to advance this project already. Seeing as Apple is likely most of the way done with preparing the 20th anniversary iPhone, this makes sense.

The post Apple Is Going All Out on Cooling Technology for the iPhone Ultra appeared first on Android Headlines.

The rally has fueled aggressive marketing by precious metals dealers, with retirement investors responding in record numbers.

Gold exchange-traded fund holdings grew 801 tons in 2025, the second-strongest year on record, while bar and coin buying accelerated to a 12-year high, the World Gold Council reported in its Gold Demand Trends: Q4 and Full Year 2025 report.

For retirement savers considering a gold individual retirement account (IRA), the case for holding physical metal in a tax-advantaged account may seem straightforward at first glance.

First-year gold IRA costs can quietly erase double-digit returns

A gold IRA requires three service providers that a standard brokerage account does not: a custodian, a precious metals dealer, and an IRS-approved depository vault, the U.S. Money Reserve stated.

Each provider charges its own fee, with account setup running $50 to $150, annual custodian maintenance adding $75 to $300, and depository storage costing another $100 to $300.

Those recurring charges, however, represent only part of the total drag on returns. The highest upfront cost is the dealer markup, the premium a dealer charges above gold's spot price, which on standard bullion typically runs 2% to 5%, IRA Financial reported.

Investors face acquisition markups ranging from 40% to 200% above spot for numismatic coins, according to a CFTC customer advisory, and one 2024 SEC enforcement action against Red Rock Secured found the firm had charged markups as high as 130% while advertising 1% to 5%.

Physical gold produces zero income, while annual fees compound

Unlike dividend-paying stocks or interest-bearing bonds, gold bars and coins produce no cash flow while stored in a depository vault. Every fee charged against the account creates a direct headwind, because returns depend entirely on price appreciation over time.

Annual custodian fees commonly run $75 to $300, and storage costs another $100 to $300 for flat-fee accounts, the U.S. Money Reserve confirmed. 

More Retirement:

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• Vanguard warns workers losing thousands in 401(k)s
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Those recurring charges compound over a multi-decade holding period, working out to roughly 0.4% to 1.2% of a $50,000 balance each year before any dealer markup or transaction cost.

Selling a gold IRA is often more cumbersome than many investors expect. Selling physical metal requires coordination among the custodian, dealer, and depository, a process that takes days rather than seconds.

Required minimum distributions further complicate matters for traditional gold IRA holders starting at age 73, because the custodian must appraise each metal holding before calculating the required annual withdrawal amount, according to the IRS.

Gold IRA withdrawals face ordinary income tax rates up to 37%

Geoff Schmidt, a certified public accountant and founder of Holy Schmidt, told Moneywise that gold ETFs and gold IRAs operate under entirely separate tax frameworks despite holding the same underlying asset.

"The common assumption is that a gold ETF behaves like a stock fund at tax time, with that nice 15% or 20% long-term rate. For the large physically backed funds, GLD and SLV being the obvious examples, it doesn't," Schmidt said.

Gold ETFs backed by physical bullion fall under IRS collectibles rules, which cap long-term capital gains at 28% rather than the standard 15%-20%, according to IRS Publication 550.

That ceiling, however, may still be lower than what a traditional gold IRA holder pays when taking distributions. 

Withdrawals from a traditional gold IRA are taxed as ordinary income, Achim von Bodman, a CFP and senior tax manager at Watter CPA, told Moneywise. Under the current federal income tax brackets, that rate can reach 37%.

A Roth IRA structure is one important exception, since qualified Roth withdrawals are generally tax-free and can eliminate both the collectibles rate and ordinary income exposure altogether, Schmidt noted.

Gold ETFs offer retirement exposure at a fraction of the cost

For investors who want gold in a retirement portfolio without the complexity of physical custody, gold exchange-traded funds held in a traditional or Roth IRA offer a streamlined, less expensive alternative.

Tanza Loudenback, a Certified Financial Planner (CFP), told SmartAsset that the layered cost structure of a gold IRA rarely justifies the exposure it delivers and that investors seeking an inflation hedge can achieve the same portfolio outcome.

The fees associated with maintaining a gold IRA are usually not worth the potential benefits. There are other ways to get exposure to precious metals that can help counterbalance inflation, if you're worried about that, and are generally more investor-friendly, like gold ETFs

The SPDR Gold MiniShares ETF has an annual expense ratio of 0.10%, and the iShares Gold Trust charges 0.25%, both far below the combined fee load of a typical gold IRA arrangement.

Weighing gold IRA costs before committing retirement savings

Gold's record-setting performance has earned its place in the retirement conversation, and a well-structured allocation can serve a legitimate diversification role for long-term investors.

Financial planners commonly cap precious metals exposure in a well-diversified portfolio at around 5%, a level that matches UBS Wealth Management's mid-single-digit gold guidance and the 5% gold sleeve used in Morningstar's 2026 Diversification Landscape test portfolio.

Financial planners, including Loudenback, say gold ETFs in standard retirement accounts provide similar price exposure at much lower ongoing costs.

Some retirement savers continue to choose self-directed gold IRAs because they allow direct ownership of physical gold, despite the added expense.

Related: Gold IRAs conceal risks most investors never see

Vanguard's charitable giving guidance, authored by Taylor Turner, CFP, a senior financial advisor with Vanguard Personal Advisor Services, notes that retirees who continue giving under the pre-2026 rules may see a smaller tax benefit than if they adjusted their approach.

The guidance also highlights one IRA distribution method that sidesteps both limits: the qualified charitable distribution.

For 2026, that tool lets eligible IRA owners route up to $111,000 directly to a qualified charity without adding a dollar to their taxable income.

How the One Big Beautiful Bill Act changed charitable deductions

Retirees who itemize now face a 0.5% of adjusted gross income floor before any charitable deduction applies, a provision that did not exist under the prior tax code, the Tax Foundation confirmed.

A retiree with $200,000 in adjusted gross income who donates $10,000 in cash can now deduct only $9,000 of that gift because the first $1,000 falls below the new threshold.

High earners face a second restriction. For taxpayers in the 37% federal bracket, the tax benefit of all itemized deductions is capped at 35 cents per dollar, effectively shrinking the value of large charitable gifts.

Standard-deduction filers gained a new above-the-line write-off, but it applies only to $1,000 for single filers and $2,000 for married couples filing jointly.

Vanguard's qualified charitable distribution bypasses both new limits

A qualified charitable distribution works differently from every other charitable giving method because it is an income exclusion, not a deduction, according to Vanguard's charitable giving guidance.

Turner noted that a qualified charitable distribution "is excluded from your adjusted gross income, which may affect things like Social Security taxability, IRMAA, NIIT, and eligibility for other deductions and credits."

Garrett Harbron, head of advised wealth management strategies at Vanguard, says planned giving benefits both donors and charities.

Charitable gifting starts with generosity, but strategy is important…. By working with a financial advisor to best align your financial and philanthropic goals, donors can maximize the impacts of their gifts for their preferred charities and themselves.

Because the donated dollars never appear as income on a tax return, they are not subject to the 0.5% floor, the 35-cent cap, or any itemization requirement.

IRA owners aged 70-and-a-half or older can direct up to $111,000 per person to qualifying 501(c)(3) organizations in 2026, and married couples with separate accounts can each use the full limit for a combined $222,000.

How the strategy interacts with required minimum distributions

Every dollar transferred to charity through a qualified charitable distribution counts toward the year's required minimum distribution on a dollar-for-dollar basis, the firm confirmed.

Hayden Adams, director of tax planning and wealth management research at the Schwab Center for Financial Research, illustrated the difference in Schwab's QCD analysis.

A 75-year-old single filer with $75,000 in other income and a $150,000 required distribution who donates $25,000 in cash would face taxable income of $201,125 after applying the itemized deduction and the new adjusted gross income floor, Adams indicated.

Routing that same $25,000 through a qualified charitable distribution instead, and claiming the $18,150 standard deduction available to a single filer age 65 or older, dropped taxable income to $181,850, a reduction of roughly $19,275.

The Medicare premium benefit retirees often miss

The savings extend beyond the income tax return because Medicare Part B and Part D premiums are tied to modified adjusted gross income through the Income-Related Monthly Adjustment Amount, or IRMAA.

Surcharges kick in once a single filer's income exceeds $109,000, or $218,000 for joint filers, according to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services' 2026 premium announcement.

Cash donations reduce taxable income through a deduction, but they do not lower modified adjusted gross income, which is the figure Medicare's premium formula uses.

More Vanguard:

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A qualified charitable distribution keeps the donated amount entirely out of the income calculation, potentially holding a retiree below a surcharge threshold that a cash gift would not affect.

Garrett Harbron reinforced this point in the firm's charitable gifting research. He added that one-size-fits-all approaches to charitable giving often fall short.

What charitable retirees need to weigh before year-end

Congress trimmed the value of traditional charitable deductions with new floors and caps, but left the qualified charitable distribution intact and raised its annual limit.

Richard Fox, a tax attorney specializing in philanthropic planning and founder of the Law Offices of Richard L. Fox in Gladwyne, Pennsylvania, told CNBC that "the point of the charitable IRA rollover [has been] to get the money out into the charitable community.”

IRA owners who give to charity regularly and take the standard deduction of $16,100 for single filers or $32,200 for joint filers stand to benefit most because their cash-gift deduction is capped at $1,000 or $2,000 above the line, while a qualified charitable distribution is fully excluded from income, Adams indicated.

Retirees weighing whether to pair a qualified charitable distribution with their required distribution schedule before the Dec. 31 cutoff can consult a tax or financial advisor.

Related: Vanguard flags IRA rule with overlooked tax advantage

When I raised the subject with Robby and Michael, they readily agreed that Ethel could have saved herself, had she wanted to. “She did have names,” Robby said. “In fact, if she’d given the names of Sarant and Barr”—Alfred Sarant and Joel Barr, members of the spy ring who had already defected to the Soviet Union—“nothing would have happened.”

“So should she have?” I asked.

Both brothers replied immediately and emphatically. “Oh no,” Michael said. “I don’t see why,” Robby added. Making any choice other than the one she ultimately made, they argued, would have left Ethel with a permanent sense of guilt over turning on her husband and reversing her steadfast commitment to “see this thing through”—the battle she’d been waging, and the story of innocence she’d been telling her sons and the world for three years.

The Google Pixel 11 is one of four smartphones Google will announce in 2026 as part of its flagship smartphone series. The Pixel 11 is actually the most affordable out of the four, the vanilla model, if you will. Based on everything we’ve seen thus far, the design won’t change all that much, but Google looks set to add some flair to it, at least. The internals will see some changes, of course, but not monumental ones.

As we usually do, we will separate this article in a number of sections. We’ll talk about the phone’s design, specifications, launch timeframe, price, and much more. We’ll focus solely on the Google Pixel 11 here. The other phones will be covered in separate articles.

This article will be regularly updated with new information on the Google Pixel 11 (this is a preview article) — both official teasers and credible leaks, rumors, and insider claims — as it becomes available in the run-up to the release of the upcoming Android smartphone. This is the original posting of this article.

When will the Google Pixel 11 be released?

The Google Pixel 11’s launch date is not exactly a secret at this point. The entire smartphone series will become official on August 12 in New York, and that’s where you’ll be able to pre-order a unit for yourself as well. Google confirmed as much. We’re not sure when will the devices go on sale, but that will likely happen around two weeks post-launch. They’ll likely all go on sale at the same time, but we cannot guarantee that. The foldable Pixel was late in the past, so who knows, maybe the same thing will happen yet again.

What models are coming?

Google will announce the Pixel 11, Pixel 11 Pro, Pixel 11 Pro XL, and Pixel 11 Pro Fold during the New York event. Considering that we’re focusing on the Pixel 11 here, let’s see what you’ll be able to buy. This phone will come with 12GB of RAM, while you’ll be able to choose between two storage options. 128GB storage model will not be on offer, but you’ll be able to choose between 256GB and 512GB storage options.

How much will the Google Pixel 11 cost?

What about the price? Well, the Google Pixel 11 is coming in two storage options, as mentioned in the previous section. The 256GB variant of the phone will cost $899, allegedly, while the 512GB option will set you back $1,019. Those prices have been taken from Google’s accidental listing on Amazon, so they’re probably accurate. Yes, the phone’s base model will get a $100 price bump, but keep in mind it now includes more storage than the Pixel 10 offered.

What will the Google Pixel 11 look like?

We were first to show you the Google Pixel 11’s design, thanks to CAD-based renders. Since then, the phone did surface in seemingly official renders. The design won’t change much compared to last year. You’ll still get a flat display, with a flat backplate and a flat frame as well. Google is sticking with its physical key setup. The power/lock button will sit above the volume up and down keys on the right side. Nothing will be included on the left.

The display will have thin, uniform bezels and a centered display camera hole up top. On the back, a horizontal camera visor will sit, with three cameras on the inside. An LED flash will also sit on the inside, and thus the module itself will be quite wide. It will spread almost all the way to the right and left sides of the phone. That camera visor will also protrude on the back, but it won’t cause the phone to wobble on flat surfaces.

Its backplate will probably be made out of glass, while the frame will be made out of aluminum. Pixel Glow light has been teased as well by Google, as it will be rear-facing. We do expect to see this feature on all three Pixel 11 handsets, the Pixel 11 included. Pixel Glow is essentially a circular light ring built into the rear camera bar, along with a flashlight. The Pixel 11 will also be quite compact, thanks to a 6.3-inch display. It will measure roughly 152.8 x 72 x 8.5mm.

CAD-based renders:

Official renders:

What specs will the Google Pixel 11 have?

The Google Pixel 11 is said to include a 6.3-inch OLED display. That panel will have a resolution of 2856 x 1280, and it will offer a 120Hz refresh rate. We’re not sure if it will be an LTPO panel or not. That panel will be flat, by the way. The phone is said to include 12GB of RAM and arrive in 256GB and 512GB storage options. The storage will not be expandable, by the way, in case you were wondering.

A 4,985mAh battery was also mentioned, while a 13-megapixel camera will sit on the front of the phone. Bluetooth 6 will be a part of the package, while the Pixel 11 will weigh 204 grams. All of that information surfaced in a recent listing on Amazon, which was made by Google, by accident. We can also guess some other spec details, though, make an educated guess, if you will.

Android 17 will come pre-installed on the device, that much is a given. Google officially pushed out Android 17 not long ago. The phone will arrive in Obsidian, Hibiscus, and Pistachio colors. The device will be IP68 certified for water and dust resistance. Stereo speakers will also be a part of the package, while Google’s new Tensor G6 processor will fuel the device. MediaTek’s modem was spotted in an FCC listing. The Pixel 11 It will measure roughly 152.8 x 72 x 8.5mm.

Should you wait to buy the Google Pixel 11?

The Google Pixel 11 will be the most affordable member of the Pixel 11 series, and yet it won’t be cheap. If you’re looking to get a new Pixel phone and you don’t need the ‘Pro’ features, this could be a solid option. Do note that it won’t bring ground-breaking changes compared to the Pixel 11, though. A new SoC will be here, along with Pixel Glow and several more improvements. We, of course, don’t have the entire picture yet, so Google may yet surprise us.

The post Google Pixel 11: Ultimate Preview Guide appeared first on Android Headlines.