While most phone makers work hard to ensure their products don’t start fires, Oukitel made a phone that starts fires on purpose. This week on The Vergecast, Dominic Preston joins Editor-in-Chief Nilay Patel to wrap up all the weird and wonderful phones he and the team saw at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. Then, Sean Hollister takes us through Google and Epic’s enemies-to-lovers saga: A secret $800 million deal, a non-disparagement agreement, and something about the metaverse for some reason. Plus: Nilay just had the best home movie experience of his life thanks to the Kaleidescape 8TB solid-state server, Dom’s charging his smart phone on a mini racecar, and Sean delivers some disappointing news about the Lego smart brick we were all rooting for. And Brendan Carr is still being a dummy.

Further reading:

• ⁠Nothing is finally covering up with the slim, metal Phone 4A Pro⁠

• ⁠Nothing couldn’t wait to show off the Phone 4A⁠

• ⁠Nothing’s Headphone A are something worth considering⁠⁠

• Honor’s Robot Phone is a bad robot, an interesting camera, and maybe your friend⁠

• ⁠Honor claims its Robot Phone will launch later this year⁠

• ⁠Honor’s Magic V6 is the first foldable with an IP69 rating⁠

• ⁠Xiaomi’s Leica Leitzphone mostly earns the name⁠

• ⁠Xiaomi, unlike Google and Samsung, thinks camera hardware comes first⁠

• ⁠Xiaomi 17 is a small(ish) phone with a big(ish) battery⁠

• ⁠Here’s the upgrade to my favorite phone camera of last year⁠

• ⁠Tecno is doing a modular phone (again)⁠

• ⁠Lenovo made a Framework-like laptop with modular ports — and a second screen⁠ ⁠

• Google isn’t waiting for a settlement — the 30 percent Android app store fee is dead⁠

• ⁠Here’s how Google describes its fee-reducing Apps Experience and Games Level Up programs⁠

• ⁠Epic and Google have signed a special deal for a new class of ‘metaverse’ apps⁠

• ⁠Tim Sweeney signed away his right to criticize Google until 2032⁠

• ⁠Fortnite is returning to Google Play globally⁠

• ⁠FCC Chair Brendan Carr is pushing for US-based call centers⁠

• I’m not ashamed to admit the Kobo Remote is the best gadget I’ve bought this year⁠

• Did Live Nation punish a venue by taking Billie Eilish away?⁠

• I charge my phone on a racing car. Do you? ⁠

• ⁠Investigating the 61-pound machine that eats plastic and spits out bricks

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Apple released a bunch of new iPhones, iPads, Macs, and Studio Displays this week. The Verge’s Nilay Patel and David Pierce tried them all this morning, and are back to share their thoughts live.

Further reading:

• All the news about Apple’s MacBook Neo, iPhone 17E, and more

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Most mainstream phone options are kind of the same, year in and year out — but that doesn’t mean there’s no innovation to be found. The Verge’s Allison Johnson is at Mobile World Congress, and joins the show to report on all the modular phones, robot phones, small phones, big phones, and (alas) 6G phones set to hit the market this year. After that, The Verge’s Jess Weatherbed explains the phenomenon of the gadget strap, and makes the case that they’re an increasingly useful accessory as our phones become even more important to our daily lives. (Yes, even if you have pockets.) Finally, The Verge’s Jay Peters helps David answer a question from the Vergecast Hotline (call 866-VERGE11 or email [email protected]!) about whether the metaverse, however you want to define it, is ever going to be realized.

Further reading:

• Oh great, here comes 6G 

• Honor claims its Robot Phone will launch later this year 

• Lenovo made a Franken-laptop with modular ports and a second screen 

• Vivo’s next phone will launch with a professional camera rig 

• Tecno’s latest concept phone is lit by neon 

• Honor’s Magic V6 is the first foldable with an IP69 rating 

• The Motorola Razr Fold is shaping up to be pure flagship

• Xiaomi’s super-slim power bank costs extra in orange. 

• Honor’s thinnest tablet doesn’t come cheap. 

• Peak Design has wearable gadget straps for people who hate bags 

• Apple’s misunderstood crossbody iPhone strap might be the best I’ve seen 

• Meta confirms Reality Labs layoffs and shifts to invest more in wearables

• Meta’s VR metaverse is ditching VR

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Samsung just launched its newest phones, the Galaxy S26 lineup, and wow is it full of Vergecast stories. There’s the very cool new Privacy Display, which seems genuinely useful; there’s the AI-powered camera, which seems like a disaster waiting to happen; and there’s the new agentic AI in Android, which Google and Samsung might be positioned to actually pull off. After talking through all the new stuff, Nilay and David discuss the recent executive shakeup at Xbox, and try to figure out why Microsoft just can’t win in games. Finally, in the lightning round, it’s time for Brendan Carr is a dummy, some truly remarkable charts, and much more.

Further reading:

• ⁠Samsung Unpacked 2026: live updates from the Galaxy S26 ⁠⁠announcement event ⁠

• ⁠Samsung Galaxy S26 and Galaxy S26 Plus hands-on: More of the same ⁠

• ⁠Samsung AI photos⁠

• ⁠Google Gemini can book an Uber or order food for you with new agentic AI features ⁠⁠Google and Samsung just launched the AI features Apple couldn’t with Siri⁠

• ⁠I’m super impressed with the Galaxy S26 Ultra’s new Privacy Display ⁠

• ⁠Samsung announces Galaxy Buds 4 and Buds 4 Pro at Unpacked 2026⁠

• ⁠Xbox shakeup: Phil Spencer and Sarah Bond are leaving Microsoft ⁠

• ⁠Xbox chief Phil Spencer is leaving Microsoft ⁠

• ⁠Read Xbox chief Phil Spencer’s memo about leaving Microsoft ⁠

• ⁠Sarah Bond is leaving Xbox ⁠

• ⁠Read Xbox president Sarah Bond’s memo about leaving Microsoft. ⁠

• ⁠Inside Microsoft’s big Xbox leadership shake-up ⁠

• ⁠Read Microsoft gaming CEO Asha Sharma’s first memo on the future of Xbox ⁠

• ⁠New Microsoft gaming CEO Asha Sharma says “hear you” to complaints about a lack of Xbox exclusives.⁠

• ⁠New Xbox CEO: ‘The plan’s the plan until it’s not the plan.’ ⁠

• ⁠Microsoft says today’s Xbox shake-up doesn’t mean game studio layoffs ⁠

• ⁠Billions of dollars later and still nobody knows what an Xbox is ⁠

• ⁠Chairman Carr Announces Pledge America Campaign⁠

• ⁠Does Anthropic think Claude is alive? Define ‘alive’⁠

• ⁠Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas AI Scenarios chart⁠

• ⁠Youtube Chair Drama⁠

• ⁠OpenAI’s Stargate struggles. ⁠

• ⁠OpenAI’s first ChatGPT gadget could be a smart speaker with a camera ⁠

⁠Subscribe to The Verge⁠ for unlimited access to ⁠theverge.com⁠, subscriber-exclusive newsletters, and our ⁠ad-free podcast feed⁠.We love hearing from you! Email your questions and thoughts to ⁠[email protected]⁠ or call us at 866-VERGE11.

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Few AI products have found the kind of product-market fit we’ve seen from Claude Code. On the eve of the product’s first anniversary, Anthropic’s Boris Cherny explains why Claude Code is so powerful, all the work left to do, and why he no longer writes any code himself. After that, The Verge’s Hayden Field joins the show to talk about how we should think about giving our data (and our computers) to AI, even when it seems useful. Finally, The Verge’s Allison Johnson helps David answer a question from the Vergecast Hotline (866-VERGE11) about whether you should go buy a phone, like, right now.

Further reading:

• Claude Code is suddenly everywhere inside Microsoft

• Claude has been having a moment — can it keep it up?

• The AI security nightmare is here and it looks suspiciously like lobster 

• OpenClaw’s AI ‘skill’ extensions are a security nightmare 

• Humans are infiltrating the social network for AI bots 

• Anthropic connects Claude to Microsoft Teams, Outlook, and OneDrive 

• MCP extension unites Claude with apps like Slack, Canva, and Figma 

• The RAM shortage is coming for everything you care about 

Subscribe to The Verge for unlimited access to theverge.com, subscriber-exclusive newsletters, and our ad-free podcast feed.We love hearing from you! Email your questions and thoughts to [email protected] or call us at 866-VERGE11.

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Once again, FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr and his bad ideas about free speech have rankled a late night host. And once again, Nilay and David talk through what the equal-time rule actually means, why organizations keep caving, and why it's apparently up to people like Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Kimmel to fight back. After that, the hosts discuss the facial recognition feature Meta hopes to launch for its smart glasses, plus the gadgets we're likely to see Apple launch in the couple of weeks. In the lightning round, we get some bleak news on Tesla's self-driving skills, a robovac security disaster, and the future of Warner Bros.

Further reading:

• Why CBS Didn't Broadcast Stephen Colbert's Interview With James Talarico

• Stephen Colbert says CBS banned him from airing this James Talarico interview 

• Why Everyone's Talking About Stephen Colbert, CBS, The FCC And James Talarico

• Meta reportedly wants to add face recognition to smart glasses while privacy advocates are distracted

• From the NYT: Meta Plans to Add Facial Recognition Technology to Its Smart Glasses

• Apple’s doing something on March 4th 

• Apple is reportedly planning to launch AI-powered glasses, a pendant, and AirPods 

• Apple starts testing end-to-end encrypted RCS messages on iPhone 

• Apple’s Podcasts app will let you ‘seamlessly’ switch between audio and video shows 

• Looks like we can expect more AI from the Galaxy S26 camera. | The Verge

• Google announces dates for I/O 2026 

• Western Digital says it’s “pretty much soldout” for 2026. 

• Valve’s Steam Deck OLED will be ‘intermittently’ out of stock because of the RAM crisis 

• Switch 2 pricing and next PlayStation release could be impacted by memory shortage 

• Tesla’s robotaxis have crashed 14 times in 9 months. 

• Tesla won’t use the term ‘Autopilot’ in California anymore

• Why are Epstein’s emails full of equals signs?

• 4chan’s creator says ‘Epstein had nothing to do’ with creating infamous far-right board /pol/

• DJI’s first robovac is an autonomous cleaning drone you can’t trust

• The DJI Romo robovac had security so poor, this man remotely accessed thousands of them

• DJI says yes, it will fix its other Romo robovac security hole within weeks

• Samsung ad confirms rumors of a useful S26 ‘privacy display’ 

• Warner Bros. Discovery gives Paramount one week to present its ‘best and final’ offer 

• WordPress’ new AI assistant will let users edit their sites with prompts 

Subscribe to The Verge for unlimited access to theverge.com, subscriber-exclusive newsletters, and our ad-free podcast feed.We love hearing from you! Email your questions and thoughts to [email protected] or call us at 866-VERGE11.

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The Verge's Allison Johnson has recently been doing the unthinkable: she's been leaving her laptop at home. Allison joins the show to explain how she turned her Samsung foldable into a useful computer, and why it feels so good to do so. Then, Sportico's Jacob Feldman joins the show to talk about the Winter Olympics, the Super Bowl, and the overall state of sports streaming in 2026. (Unfortunately, it's all still very complicated.) Finally, David answers a question on the Vergecast Hotline (call 866-VERGE11 or email [email protected]!) about whether flip phones might have a future in an AI world.

Further reading:

• YouTube TV reveals pricing for its sports, news, and entertainment packages

• From Sportico: 2026 Sports Tech: Amazon vs. Youtube vs. ESPN vs. Netflix vs. Tiktok
  

• Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 7 review: stunning, bendy, and spendy

• Motorola Razr Ultra (2025) review: looking sharp

• Logitech’s Keys-To-Go 2

Subscribe to The Verge for unlimited access to theverge.com, subscriber-exclusive newsletters, and our ad-free podcast feed.We love hearing from you! Email your questions and thoughts to [email protected] or call us at 866-VERGE11.

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Did you see Ring's Super Bowl ad and see happy puppies reunited with their owners? Or did you see the seeds of a complete, always-on surveillance nightmare coming for us all? David and Nilay discuss which is the right answer, why so many people don't want to trust tech companies, and why Ring might not care much about the difference. After that, the hosts discuss the ads coming to ChatGPT, the surprising number of AI executives quitting their jobs and issuing dire warnings on the way out, and the fake ad for OpenAI gadgets. In the lightning round, it's time for an extra long Brendan Carr is a Dummy, the latest Ferrari EV, the future of Siri, and more.

Further reading:

• Jeffrey Epstein’s digital cleanup crew 

• Jeffrey Epstein might not have created /pol/, but he helped carry out its mission

• Amazon Ring’s lost dog ad sparks backlash amid fears of mass surveillance 

• Wyze is sticking it to Ring

• Sen. Markey calls on Amazon to “discontinue” Ring monitoring features

• Ring’s new Search Party feature is on by default; should you opt out?

• Ring launches upgraded cameras with Retinal Vision 4K recording

• What the Guthrie case reveals about your ‘deleted’ doorbell footage 

• FBI releases recovered footage from Nancy Guthrie’s Nest cam 

• OpenAI’s first hardware slips to 2027

• OpenAI’s supposedly ‘leaked’ Super Bowl ad with ear buds and a shiny orb was a hoax 

• Two more xAI co-founders are among those leaving after the SpaceX merger 

• OpenAI reportedly disbanded its Mission Alignment team

• OpenAI fired exec who opposed ‘adult mode’ 

• Read an Anthropic AI safety lead's exit letter: 'The world is in peril'

• Opinion | I Left My Job at OpenAI. Putting Ads on ChatGPT Was the Last Straw.

•  What Is Claude? Anthropic Doesn’t Know, Either

• ChatGPT’s cheapest options now show you ads 

• Here are the brands bringing ads to ChatGPT 

• Claude gets more free features to capitalize on ChatGPT ads

• Ex-OpenAI researcher has “deep reservations” about its approach to ads

• Brendan Carr is a Dummy theme submitted by Michiel Vanhoudt on BlueSky

• FTC says it’s ‘not the speech police’ in letter warning Apple News about its alleged promotion of left-leaning outlets

• Ferrari’s first EV will have an interior designed by Jony Ive 

• Here’s what the Ferrari Luce’s buttons, switches, and knobs sound like.

• The early reviews of the Rivian R2 are starting to roll in

• Live Nation’s monopoly trial is reportedly fracturing Trump’s Justice Department 

• YouTube is coming to the Apple Vision Pro

• Apple keeps hitting bumps with its overhauled Siri 

• The iPhone 17e could launch soon with MagSafe and an A19 chip 

• Apple might let you use ChatGPT from CarPlay 

• Paramount ups its offer for Warner Bros. Discovery, again

Subscribe to The Verge for unlimited access to theverge.com, subscriber-exclusive newsletters, and our ad-free podcast feed.We love hearing from you! Email your questions and thoughts to [email protected] or call us at 866-VERGE11.

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The Trump Phone is real! Ish! The Verge’s Dom Preston has seen a T1 on a video call, that we can say for sure. Dom joins the show to explain what’s new about the phone, whether it has a chance to be a decent device, and why it’s taken so long for Trump Mobile to ship the thing. After that, The Verge’s Hayden Field explains the excitement around OpenClaw and Moltbook, and whether either one is a big moment for the AI industry. Finally, The Verge’s Andy Hawkins helps us answer a question on the Vergecast Hotline (866-VERGE11) about whether, and when, Tesla might get out of the car business altogether.

Further reading:

• This is the Trump Phone⁠

• ⁠The Trump Phone no longer promises it’s made in America⁠

• ⁠600,000 Trump Mobile phones sold? There’s no proof.⁠

• ⁠OpenClaw: all the news about the trending AI agent ⁠

• ⁠OpenClaw’s AI ‘skill’ extensions are a security nightmare

• ⁠There’s a social network for AI agents, and it’s getting weird

• ⁠Humans are infiltrating the social network for AI bots

• ⁠Tesla discontinuing Model S and Model X to make room for robots⁠

Subscribe to The Verge for unlimited access to theverge.com, subscriber-exclusive newsletters, and our ad-free podcast feed.We love hearing from you! Email your questions and thoughts to [email protected] or call us at 866-VERGE11.

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A new tranche of Jeffrey Epstein’s emails makes one thing painfully clear: Epstein was a central figure in the lives of a lot of big names in tech, and had influence on a surprising number of companies and executives. David and Nilay talk through what we’ve learned from the new emails so far. Then they turn to Anthropic’s spicy new Super Bowl ads about... ads, which caused a big reaction from OpenAI (which is betting big on ads). They also discuss this week’s antitrust hearing about Netflix’s purchase of Warner Bros., the latest in Brendan Carr is a Dummy, Google Home’s big buttons upgrade, and much more.

Further reading:

• Here's how Epstein broke the internet

• Former Windows 8 boss recruited Epstein to help negotiate his messy Microsoft exit

• Jeffrey Epstein arranged a meeting with Tim Cook for the former head of Windows

• The Epstein files 

• Google co-founder Sergey Brin visited Epstein’s private island and traded emails with Ghislaine Maxwell.

• It turns out Elon Musk didn’t exactly ‘refuse’ the invite to Jeffrey Epstein’s island. 

• Will Elon Musk’s emails with Jeffrey Epstein derail his very important year? 

• Bill Gates says accusations contained in Epstein files are ‘absolutely absurd'

• Jeffrey Epstein was permanently banned from Xbox Live 

• ‘We’ve basically funded an elite global pedophile ring since 2015.’ 

• Anthropic says ‘Claude will remain ad-free,’ unlike an unnamed rival

• Anthropic’s blog post: Claude is a space to think

• Sam Altman responds to Anthropic’s ‘funny’ Super Bowl ads 

• OpenAI’s CMO on X

• Nvidia CEO denies he’s ‘unhappy’ with OpenAI

• Netflix lands in the middle of a culture war during Senate hearing
  

• Everyone is stealing TV 

• Disney says Josh D’Amaro will replace Bob Iger as CEO 

• FCC aims to ensure “only living and lawful Americans” get Lifeline benefits

• Elon Musk is merging SpaceX and xAI to build data centers in space — or so he says 

• Peloton’s gamble on expensive new hardware has yet to pay off

• Google Home finally adds support for buttons 

• Raspberry Pi is raising prices again as memory shortages continue 

• Valve’s Steam Machine has been delayed, and the RAM crisis will impact pricing 

• Aluminium: Why Google’s Android for PC launch may be messy and controversial

Subscribe to The Verge for unlimited access to theverge.com, subscriber-exclusive newsletters, and our ad-free podcast feed.We love hearing from you! Email your questions and thoughts to [email protected] or call us at 866-VERGE11. 

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AI companies want all the data, everywhere, to make their models bigger and better. That means a lot of questions about piracy and copyright, and at least in one case it means Anthropic systematically destroying countless books just to feed them to the model. The Washington Post's Will Oremus joins the show to explain how that worked, why Anthropic, Meta, OpenAI and others are doing it, and what the law has to say. Then, Puck's Julia Alexander helps David figure out whether Netflix is serious about showing movies in theaters, and what theaters need to do to survive in the entertainment business going forward.

Further reading:

• From The Washington Post: Anthropic ‘destructively’ scanned millions of books to build Claude

• Anthropic wins a major fair use victory for AI — but it’s still in trouble for stealing books

• Meta’s AI copyright win comes with a warning about fair use

• Did AI companies win a fight with authors? Technically

• From Puck: Why Netflix Needs Warner Bros.

• Welcome to the big leagues, Netflix

Subscribe to The Verge for unlimited access to theverge.com, subscriber-exclusive newsletters, and our ad-free podcast feed.We love hearing from you! Email your questions and thoughts to [email protected] or call us at 866-VERGE11.

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