Apps
The app economy continues to grow, having produced a record number of downloads and consumer spending across both the iOS and Google Play stores. Keep up with this fast-moving industry in one place, with the latest from the world of apps, including news, updates, startup fundings, mergers and acquisitions, and much more.
As Google described during the I/O session, the new on-device surface would organize what’s most relevant to users, inviting them to jump back into their apps.
Google’s trying to make waves with Gemini, its flagship suite of generative AI models, apps and services. So what’s Google Gemini, exactly? How can you use it? And how does…
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced on Thursday that the company will begin to surface AI characters made by creators through Meta AI studio on Instagram. The tests will begin in…
Just in time for the debates, Meta fixes bug impacting users’ political content settings on Instagram and Threads
Meta has fixed the bug that caused people to believe the company had adjusted their selections in a political content settings tool without their consent. The issue had impacted users…
YouTube is adding several new features for Premium users, including smart downloads and support for picture-in-picture mode for Shorts, as well as a wider rollout of its “Jump Ahead” feature…
a16z-backed Character.AI said today that it is now allowing users to talk to AI characters over calls. The feature currently supports multiple languages, including English, Spanish, Portuguese, Russian, Korean, Japanese…
TikTok is gearing up to challenge Amazon’s Prime Day event in July. The social network announced on Thursday that TikTok Shop is holding a “Deals For You Days” sales event…
Social network Bluesky has added a new feature for users to create a curated list of people and custom feeds to follow. This feature, called “Starter Pack,” is intended to…
Google said today that it is adding support for 110 languages to its translation service. The company has used its PaLM 2 AI model to power translations.
Facing new competition from startups like Arc, Google announced on Wednesday that it’s bringing five new features to the Chrome browser on mobile devices, each designed to enhance the search…
Like Instagram, Whee also supports the use of photo filters and includes messaging. However, the company’s plans for Whee aren’t clear.
Video editing app Captions releases AI edit feature that automatically adds effects to your video
Video editing app Captions, which is backed by a16z, Kleiner Perkins and Sequoia Capital, has launched a new feature that takes an existing unedited video and adds custom graphics, zooms,…
Activity tracking platform and community Strava is shutting down Fatmap, the Europe-based 3D mapping platform it had acquired last January.
Indian e-commerce giant Flipkart has quietly started rolling out a payments app, dubbed Super.money, as it broadens its fintech ambitions.
Opera said today it is releasing Opera One’s second version in developer beta with features such as new multimedia controls, split tabs, and new AI capabilities. The company is introducing…
Apple has finally added support for Rich Communication Services (RCS) to its Messages app.
You can now more easily use ChatGPT on your Mac computer. OpenAI’s popular AI chatbot is available to all macOS users, the company announced on Tuesday. The app was first…
Reddit says the update shouldn’t affect the majority of users or good faith actors, like researchers and organizations, such as the Internet Archive.
Instagram’s Twitter/X rival Threads is furthering its expansion into the fediverse — the interconnected social network that includes apps like Mastodon, PeerTube and others running the ActivityPub protocol. On Tuesday,…
As browsers continue to add AI features into their products, Mozilla is looking to give users some choice in the matter. The company announced on Tuesday that it’s launching an…
Inspired by Gen Z, Pinterest users can now turn boards into videos for sharing on Instagram and TikTok
The new addition was inspired by the video-sharing activity that was already taking place on apps like TikTok.
Popular productivity tool Notion has long allowed its users to make any of their pages public. Now, the company is expanding on this with the launch of Notion Sites, which…
Patreon, the paid membership platform for creators, announced Tuesday the release of new features designed to help creators monetize their non-paying followers and tap into new revenue streams. This includes…
Google is rolling out a new Gemini AI side panel in Gmail that can help you write emails and summarize email threads. The company is also adding the Gemini side…
iPhone Mirroring, one of the more notable features arriving in Apple’s upcoming operating systems, is now available to developers testing the beta versions of iOS 18 and macOS Sequoia. The…
Smashing, from Goodreads’ co-founder, curates the best of the web using AI and human recommendations
Smashing is an AI and community-powered content recommendation app, now launching into an invite-only beta.
Gen Z photos app Swipewipe sells to French publisher MWM in its largest acquisition to date
The acquisition allows Swipewipe’s founder to take some money off the table while also continuing to benefit financially from his work via an ongoing revenue-sharing agreement with MWM.
The European Union accused Microsoft of breaching competition rules Tuesday. In a formal statement of objections, the bloc said it suspects the software giant of abusing antitrust rules by bundling…
Yelp updates app with AI-powered alt text for images and new accessibility identifiers for businesses
Yelp is rolling out an app update to include more accessibility identifiers for businesses, improved screen-reader experiences, and AI-powered alt text for images. The company said that from 2020 to…
Snapchat on Tuesday announced a new suite of safety features, including updates to its account blocking functionality and enhanced friending safeguards, making it difficult for strangers to contact users on…
