Spider-Man is easily one of the most recognizable fictional characters of the last 50-plus years, appearing in countless iterations across comics, movies, cartoons, video games and other media I am surely forgetting. Fans will argue about the best iteration — but for my money, the Spider-universe Insomniac Games introduced in 2018 on the PS4 with Marvel’s Spider-Man is an all-time great. It spent no time rehashing Peter Parker’s origins, throwing the player into a vibrant and massive rendering of Manhattan. The city felt alive, with tons to do investigate and a horde of Spider-Man’s most famous villains to contend with. It also skillfully introduced a world in which Parker would eventually fight side-by-side with a second Spider-Man, Miles Morales.

But, most importantly, Marvel’s Spider-Man was an absolute delight to play. Insomniac nailed the mechanics of swinging around the city and fighting bad guys to such a degree that I think web-slinging around Manhattan is up there with my all-time favorite game mechanics.

As I’ve contemplated with other single-player, story-drive masterpieces from Sony like The Last of Us,Horizon Zero Dawn and God of War: What the helldo you dofor an encore? I played about two hours of Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 at a press event earlier this week, and it seems the answer is “go bigger.” That’s the same tactic used for the sequels to those three games I mentioned earlier, and the results were always impressive, if not a bit overstuffed. Of course, it’s too early to say whether Insomniac got the balance right, because we’ve seen plenty of open-world games that simply try and do too much. But based on Insomniac’s history and the excellent ingredients it has to work with, I have high hopes for the latest spider-adventure.

Insomniac Games

My demo started well into the game’s narrative — which I won’t spend too much time on, as I didn’t get the whole picture of what was going on. I do know that classic villain Kraven is hunting another iconic Spider-Man bad guy, Dr. Curt Connors (better known as the Lizard), and Peter and Miles are both trying to defend the city from Kraven’s hunters while also finding a cure to turn the Lizard back into his mild-mannered human form.

In a demo like this, getting a feel for the gameplay is a lot more important than digging into story beats, and Spider-Man 2 had plenty to show me. Because the world in this game is almost twice as big as the original, with the addition of Brooklyn and Queens, finding new ways for players to get around was a major focus for Insomniac. Enter the web wings, a tool that allows you to glide around the city, catching wind tunnels and updrafts that sling you around at high speed. It’s not meant to replace the core web-slinging mechanic, but augment it. Given how amazing swinging around Manhattan felt in the original games (and still feels here), that’s a tall order. But it didn’t take me long to get the hang of gliding through long stretches of the city, and mixing in web-swings to regain height.

Insomniac Games

The web wings are also particularly useful in places like Central Park or Queens, where there aren’t nearly as many tall buildings to swing from. Getting around Central Park always felt a little awkward in the first game, so this is a welcome addition that makes traversing different terrain much easier. It’s also great for getting across rivers — or doing battle on them. Gameplay footage revealed earlier this year showed both Spider-Men chasing the Lizard down a river while also being chased by Kraven’s hunters (both on the river and in the sky), and the web wings were crucial for catching up and dispatching the massive crew of baddies.

Another side mission saw me controlling Miles as he chased down one of Kraven’s drones — to keep up with it, you had to use the web wings to draft behind it while downloading data from it. Once you got all the data downloaded, you could take it down, but getting all that data takes a while. So you need to stay right on its tail, twisting and turning throughout the city. There’s definitely a learning curve to making tight turns and quick ascensions with the web wings, and I bounced off numerous buildings that slowed me down enough that the drone made its escape.

I got the hang of it after a few tries, but even then I was on the edge of my seat trying to keep pace – it almost had the feeling of a racing game. Challenges like this are a smart way of introducing these new mechanics and schooling players on how to best use them, though.

Unsurprisingly, combat has also gotten a few tweaks, though anyone who played the previous Insomniac games can jump right in here and start beating up the countless goons roaming New York City. Both Parker and Morales have four special moves that correspond to the four face buttons on the controller – holding L1 and pressing one of those buttons activates a special attack. When I was playing as Peter, they all involved the symbiote suit going wild, while Miles had variations on the electrical attacks introduced in his game. They charge up as you fight, and you have to wait for them to replenish; I assume you can also learn and slot new ones as the game progresses.

Insomniac Games

In the first games, mashing the circle button to dodge was a big part of combat, but Insomniac mixed things up here. Now, there are some enemies whose attacks you have to parry by pressing the block button at just the right moment – dodging won’t keep you safe. Other attacks require a dodge, as they can break through any parry or block you try. These different attacks are represented by a color flash above the enemy, indicating when it’s the right time to throw up a block or dodge away. Dealing with these attacks threw a wrench into the familiar gameplay, as it took me a while to remember that my old habits from prior games weren’t going to be enough to keep me alive here.

The gadgets both Spider-Men carry got a big improvement over the older games, too. Before, you could hold down R1 and switch from your standard web-shooters to various other hardware to help you in battle. But now, R1 defaults to web-shooters, always, a change I appreciated. From there, you can hold R1 and select a face button to activate a specific gadget.

This gives you immediate access to as many as four gadgets at once, plus your web shooter. Truth be told, I didn’t dive into the menus to find out much about the tools at my disposal, but they’re things like web bombs that wrap up multiple enemies or shock traps that zap everyone around you. Naturally, all these abilities can be leveled up with skill points you accumulate through the game, and there are the expected skill trees here as well.

It’s going to take more than just a few hours of playing to see just how well these new additions fit into the core game, but one thing was undeniable from the start: Spider-Man 2 is a visual feast. It’s the first game of the series developed exclusively for the PS5, and it shows in everything from the sunsets and water on the river to the details of the different spider-suits I tried on. Character models also look impressive, perhaps none more so than the Lizard himself, with glistening fangs and incredibly textured green skin. The amount of detail in that model was stunning, but Peter’s symbiote suit is a close second. When it gets hurt, it writhes in pain and truly feels like a living creature. Even when it’s just serving as a Spider-Man suit, the variety of textures and details is impressive – it’s a lot more than just a black outfit.

Insomniac Games

Perhaps the most exciting thing about this sequel, though, is the fact that you can control both Peter Parker and Miles Morales. When you’re in the open world and not directly in a main story quest, you can swap between the two Spider-Men at will by going to your communicator and holding down a button, GTA V style. Each character has their own main quests, and the game will move you back and forth between the two depending on what’s next on the docket, but there’s plenty of freedom to pick your character and explore NYC.

There are also parts of the story that’ll bounce you between both characters as things progress. We saw a look at this in the aforementioned gameplay preview a few months ago, but I got to play it out this time. The battle started with me playing as Peter, beating up some thugs in a Queens neighborhood, but then it switches to Miles across the city so you can get the jump on more hunters before they track the Lizard down. Peter eventually joins you, all hell breaks loose, and then you’re flying down the river taking out hunters on jet skis as Miles and bringing down a massive chopper as Peter.

All these changes were fluid and natural (but also very scripted) and the basic experience of controlling both Spiders-Man is similar enough that it didn’t throw me off. I am hoping that there are missions where you can decide which character you want to use, or flip between both depending on what play style you’re feeling at the moment. Regardless, having missions where you play as both significantly expanded the scope of this epic set piece.

Insomniac Games

The preview ended with Peter uncharacteristically going off on his own to track the Lizard down after he escapes into the sewers — he’s clearly showing some symbiote-inspired darkness that Miles says is totally out of character for him. But the demo didn’t stop, and I instead was treated to the only true “boss battle” of the demo, with Peter squaring off against Connors. This was a positively huge, multi-stage showdown that required me to use all the skills I picked up over the prior two hours, including a lot of well-timed dodging and all the special attacks I had at my disposal.

As with the big battles in prior Spider-Man games, there were multiple tricks I needed to figure out to make the Lizard vulnerable – just trying my standard set of attacks wasn’t going to be enough. I died a handful of times trying to get the hang of it, but fortunately these deaths didn’t feel cheap. Usually, it was a case of me not recognizing the need to dodge rather than block, or some other variation on me not executing a skill the game had taught me. Once I got the hang of things, I made semi-quick work of the Lizard. At least, I thought I did, until the demo ended on a big old cliffhanger that made me think Peter might pay a bit of a price for going rogue.

Fortunately, I won’t have to wait long to find out how things turn out – Spider-Man 2 will be out on the PS5 on October 20. We’ll have to wait to do a full review before we can give it a full recommendation, but I think anyone who enjoyed the first games will want to check this one out. And if you haven’t tried them before, you should be able to jump right into this new one without much trouble. While I enjoy the stories Insomniac has crafted for the two Spider-Men, the delight of swinging and fighting around NYC is still one of my favorite gaming experiences out there, and it’s one that doesn’t require an encyclopedic knowledge of Spider-Man’s history.

Spider-Man is easily one of the most recognizable fictional characters of the last 50-plus years, appearing in countless iterations across comics, movies, cartoons, video games and other media I am surely forgetting. Fans will argue about the best iteration — but for my money, the Spider-universe Insomniac Games introduced in 2018 on the PS4 with Marvel’s Spider-Man is an all-time great. It spent no time rehashing Peter Parker’s origins, throwing the player into a vibrant and massive rendering of Manhattan. The city felt alive, with tons to do investigate and a horde of Spider-Man’s most famous villains to contend with. It also skillfully introduced a world in which Parker would eventually fight side-by-side with a second Spider-Man, Miles Morales.

But, most importantly, Marvel’s Spider-Man was an absolute delight to play. Insomniac nailed the mechanics of swinging around the city and fighting bad guys to such a degree that I think web-slinging around Manhattan is up there with my all-time favorite game mechanics.

As I’ve contemplated with other single-player, story-drive masterpieces from Sony like The Last of Us,Horizon Zero Dawn and God of War: What the helldo you dofor an encore? I played about two hours of Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 at a press event earlier this week, and it seems the answer is “go bigger.” That’s the same tactic used for the sequels to those three games I mentioned earlier, and the results were always impressive, if not a bit overstuffed. Of course, it’s too early to say whether Insomniac got the balance right, because we’ve seen plenty of open-world games that simply try and do too much. But based on Insomniac’s history and the excellent ingredients it has to work with, I have high hopes for the latest spider-adventure.

Insomniac Games

My demo started well into the game’s narrative — which I won’t spend too much time on, as I didn’t get the whole picture of what was going on. I do know that classic villain Kraven is hunting another iconic Spider-Man bad guy, Dr. Curt Conners (better known as the Lizard), and Peter and Miles are both trying to defend the city from Kraven’s hunters while also finding a cure to turn the Lizard back into his mild-mannered human form.

In a demo like this, getting a feel for the gameplay is a lot more important than digging into story beats, and Spider-Man 2 had plenty to show me. Because the world in this game is almost twice as big as the original, with the addition of Brooklyn and Queens, finding new ways for players to get around was a major focus for Insomniac. Enter the web wings, a tool that allows you to glide around the city, catching wind tunnels and updrafts that sling you around at high speed. It’s not meant to replace the core web-slinging mechanic, but augment it. Given how amazing swinging around Manhattan felt in the original games (and still feels here), that’s a tall order. But it didn’t take me long to get the hang of gliding through long stretches of the city, and mixing in web-swings to regain height.

Insomniac Games

The web wings are also particularly useful in places like Central Park or Queens, where there aren’t nearly as many tall buildings to swing from. Getting around Central Park always felt a little awkward in the first game, so this is a welcome addition that makes traversing different terrain much easier. It’s also great for getting across rivers — or doing battle on them. Gameplay footage revealed earlier this year showed both Spider-Men chasing the Lizard down a river while also being chased by Kraven’s hunters (both on the river and in the sky), and the web wings were crucial for catching up and dispatching the massive crew of baddies.

Another side mission saw me controlling Miles as he chased down one of Kraven’s drones — to keep up with it, you had to use the web wings to draft behind it while downloading data from it. Once you got all the data downloaded, you could take it down, but getting all that data takes a while. So you need to stay right on its tail, twisting and turning throughout the city. There’s definitely a learning curve to making tight turns and quick ascensions with the web wings, and I bounced off numerous buildings that slowed me down enough that the drone made its escape.

I got the hang of it after a few tries, but even then I was on the edge of my seat trying to keep pace – it almost had the feeling of a racing game. Challenges like this are a smart way of introducing these new mechanics and schooling players on how to best use them, though.

Unsurprisingly, combat has also gotten a few tweaks, though anyone who played the previous Insomniac games can jump right in here and start beating up the countless goons roaming New York City. Both Parker and Morales have four special moves that correspond to the four face buttons on the controller – holding L1 and pressing one of those buttons activates a special attack. When I was playing as Peter, they all involved the symbiote suit going wild, while Miles had variations on the electrical attacks introduced in his game. They charge up as you fight, and you have to wait for them to replenish; I assume you can also learn and slot new ones as the game progresses.

Insomniac Games

In the first games, mashing the circle button to dodge was a big part of combat, but Insomniac mixed things up here. Now, there are some enemies whose attacks you have to parry by pressing the block button at just the right moment – dodging won’t keep you safe. Other attacks require a dodge, as they can break through any parry or block you try. These different attacks are represented by a color flash above the enemy, indicating when it’s the right time to throw up a block or dodge away. Dealing with these attacks threw a wrench into the familiar gameplay, as it took me a while to remember that my old habits from prior games weren’t going to be enough to keep me alive here.

The gadgets both Spider-Men carry got a big improvement over the older games, too. Before, you could hold down R1 and switch from your standard web-shooters to various other hardware to help you in battle. But now, R1 defaults to web-shooters, always, a change I appreciated. From there, you can hold R1 and select a face button to activate a specific gadget.

This gives you immediate access to as many as four gadgets at once, plus your web shooter. Truth be told, I didn’t dive into the menus to find out much about the tools at my disposal, but they’re things like web bombs that wrap up multiple enemies or shock traps that zap everyone around you. Naturally, all these abilities can be leveled up with skill points you accumulate through the game, and there are the expected skill trees here as well.

It’s going to take more than just a few hours of playing to see just how well these new additions fit into the core game, but one thing was undeniable from the start: Spider-Man 2 is a visual feast. It’s the first game of the series developed exclusively for the PS5, and it shows in everything from the sunsets and water on the river to the details of the different spider-suits I tried on. Character models also look impressive, perhaps none more so than the Lizard himself, with glistening fangs and incredibly textured green skin. The amount of detail in that model was stunning, but Peter’s symbiote suit is a close second. When it gets hurt, it writhes in pain and truly feels like a living creature. Even when it’s just serving as a Spider-Man suit, the variety of textures and details is impressive – it’s a lot more than just a black outfit.

Insomniac Games

Perhaps the most exciting thing about this sequel, though, is the fact that you can control both Peter Parker and Miles Morales. When you’re in the open world and not directly in a main story quest, you can swap between the two Spider-Men at will by going to your communicator and holding down a button, GTA V style. Each character has their own main quests, and the game will move you back and forth between the two depending on what’s next on the docket, but there’s plenty of freedom to pick your character and explore NYC.

There are also parts of the story that’ll bounce you between both characters as things progress. We saw a look at this in the aforementioned gameplay preview a few months ago, but I got to play it out this time. The battle started with me playing as Peter, beating up some thugs in a Queens neighborhood, but then it switches to Miles across the city so you can get the jump on more hunters before they track the Lizard down. Peter eventually joins you, all hell breaks loose, and then you’re flying down the river taking out hunters on jet skis as Miles and bringing down a massive chopper as Peter.

All these changes were fluid and natural (but also very scripted) and the basic experience of controlling both Spiders-Man is similar enough that it didn’t throw me off. I am hoping that there are missions where you can decide which character you want to use, or flip between both depending on what play style you’re feeling at the moment. Regardless, having missions where you play as both significantly expanded the scope of this epic set piece.

Insomniac Games

The preview ended with Peter uncharacteristically going off on his own to track the Lizard down after he escapes into the sewers — he’s clearly showing some symbiote-inspired darkness that Miles says is totally out of character for him. But the demo didn’t stop, and I instead was treated to the only true “boss battle” of the demo, with Peter squaring off against Conners. This was a positively huge, multi-stage showdown that required me to use all the skills I picked up over the prior two hours, including a lot of well-timed dodging and all the special attacks I had at my disposal.

As with the big battles in prior Spider-Man games, there were multiple tricks I needed to figure out to make the Lizard vulnerable – just trying my standard set of attacks wasn’t going to be enough. I died a handful of times trying to get the hang of it, but fortunately these deaths didn’t feel cheap. Usually, it was a case of me not recognizing the need to dodge rather than block, or some other variation on me not executing a skill the game had taught me. Once I got the hang of things, I made semi-quick work of the Lizard. At least, I thought I did, until the demo ended on a big old cliffhanger that made me think Peter might pay a bit of a price for going rogue.

Fortunately, I won’t have to wait long to find out how things turn out – Spider-Man 2 will be out on the PS5 on October 20. We’ll have to wait to do a full review before we can give it a full recommendation, but I think anyone who enjoyed the first games will want to check this one out. And if you haven’t tried them before, you should be able to jump right into this new one without much trouble. While I enjoy the stories Insomniac has crafted for the two Spider-Men, the delight of swinging and fighting around NYC is still one of my favorite gaming experiences out there, and it’s one that doesn’t require an encyclopedic knowledge of Spider-Man’s history.

One of the main benefits of Apple's "pro" iPhones is the camera rig, which somehow gets pretty significant improvements every year. The iPhone 15 Pro and 15 Pro Max are no exception. As they've done for several years now, both phones sport three-lens arrays, but there are a handful of noteworthy details this year, particularly for the iPhone 15 Pro Max. 

For the first time, the iPhone 15 Pro Max has a "5X" optical zoom, with a 120mm focal length equivalent. That's significantly longer than the 3X 77mm focal length that you find on the standard iPhone 15 Pro (as well as both of last year's 14 Pro phones). It has a 25 percent larger sensor than the 3X camera in the 14 Pro Max while keeping an f/2.8 aperture, which Apple says is the largest of any smartphone in this optical range. 

Usually, longer telephoto lenses are literally longer in physical space, as well. To get around this, Apple is using what it calls a "tetraprism" design. Light rays are reflected four times through the glass which lets the light travel for longer without needing a physically larger design. There's a more advanced image stabilization system on board as well, something necessary when shooting at longer focal lengths. Of course, we're going to want to try this camera out to see how it performs, but it sounds like an impressive upgrade for anyone buying the iPhone 15 Pro Max — if you're an avid smartphone photographer, these changes alone might make the Max worth buying over the smaller model.

A number of other updates are coming to both Pro-level iPhones. The "main" camera is 48 megapixels again, but advances in using that resolution will allow you to shoot with that main lens at your choice of three effective focal lengths: 24mm, 28mm and 35mm. You can choose your preferred setting and set it as your default. You won't typically output photos at the full 48-megapixel resolution — Apple combines pixels to improve low-light performances and the default output will be 24 megapixels. But if you'd rather use the full resolution, you can shoot in 48-megapixel ProRAW format, or in HEIF for a file that's smaller and more easily shareable. 

As with last year's cameras, the "main" shooter can also use the center of that 48-megapixel sensor to give you effective 2X zoom photos at 12 megapixels. And the smaller iPhone 13 Pro retains the 3X optical lens. 

Naturally, there are software improvements all throughout the iPhone's photo processing system, which Apple calls the Photonic Engine. That includes things like better low-light performance, improved HDR, continuous zoom when shooting portraits, the ability adjust portrait focus after the photo has been shot, improved dynamic range and more. But one of the ones that'll be immediately obvious is the iPhone automatically switches into Portrait mode when focusing on a human or pet, saving you the step of having to decide to activate it. 

While most of the camera improvements this year focused on photos, there is a big video change directly tied to a future Apple device. Later this year, the iPhone 15 Pro lineup will be able to shoot spatial video that can be viewed on the upcoming Vision Pro headset. These are essentially 3D videos shot using both the ultra-wide and main camera sensors to give a more immersive experience when using Apple's headset. Obviously, very few of us have had the chance to see how this works, but it's a smart way for Apple to get people shooting videos that'll presumably look compelling on the Vision Pro. 

While the standard iPhone 15 received a more modest set of upgrades, there's still a few things worth noting. The main camera sensor has been upgraded to 48 megapixels. This means that you can get a 2X zoom on the standard iPhone 15 for the first time, as it can crop into the center of the sensor and produce a 12-megapixel image without the degradation you get from digital zoom. You'll also get 24-megapixel images that combine pixels to improve low light and detail while still offering manageable file sizes. These are good improvements for people who don't want to think too much about the finer points of iPhone photography — but if you want more control over your images, the Pro models remain the best choice.

The writing was on the wall for the iPhone mini series last year, when Apple went to a bigger Plus size of the iPhone 14 instead of the mini model it offered for the iPhone 12 and 13. But now, Apple has discontinued the iPhone 13 mini entirely, a tough blow for those of us who like smaller phones. 

First introduced in the fall of 2020, the iPhone 12 mini had the same specs as the bigger iPhone 12 but with a smaller battery and smaller 5.4-inch screen. People who love small phones rejoiced, as it's been increasingly difficult to buy a phone with a screen less than 6 inches — but analysts were quickly stating that iPhone 12 mini sales were not up to par. Apple still released an iPhone 13 mini in 2021, but last year decided that a bigger phone made more sense. 

The iPhone 13 mini stuck around for another year, but now has been stricken from the portfolio. The iPhone SE remains as a relatively compact device, but with a much smaller and lower-quality display than the mini offered. Maybe tastes will shift and we'll come back around to a time when a smaller phone is in demand, but my guess is it won't happen any time soon. 

Follow all of the news live from Apple's 'Wonderlust' event right here.

Apple has pulled the cover off the iPhone 15 and 15 Plus and, as expected, it’s mostly another iterative update — but with a few nice new features nonetheless. That said, the biggest change will undoubtedly impact lots of potential buyers, as Apple is saying goodbye to the Lightning port it introduced in 2012 with the iPhone 5. In its place, as expected, is USB-C.

As you'd expect, USB-C will carry power, audio and video, and a USB-C Apple Watch charger cable will let you power up your Watch via your iPhone's battery. 

Like last year, the iPhone 15 and 15 Plus include 6.1- and 6.7-inch displays, respectively. The big change this year is that the notch is gone, replaced by the so-called Dynamic Island that Apple first brought to the iPhone 14 Pro lineup last year. Almost everyone will likely appreciate a less obtrusive front camera cutout, though the notification utility of the Dynamic Island isn’t exactly the game-changer that Apple positioned it to be last year.

Another big change to the display this year is that it is brighter than ever before — the peak brightness in sunlight reaches 2,000 nits, while HDR video playback goes up to 1,600 nits.

The camera is getting some notable upgrades, as well. While there are still only two distinct camera lenses, the phone now has the same 48-megapixel sensor that Apple first introduced in last year's iPhone 14 Pro. It groups the pixels and makes a 24-megapixel output, but you can also crop in closer and use the middle 12 megapixels for a 2x telephoto option. Naturally, it still also has a wide-angle lens as well. There's also a new portrait mode that is enabled automatically when it sees you focusing on a person or pet.

Unsurprisingly, the iPhone 15 is using the A16 Bionic chip that Apple put in the iPhone 15 Pro last year. That’s not a big surprise, given that the A15 chip is now two years old — even though it’s still plenty powerful, it would have been surprising to see Apple try and stretch it for another year.

There's a new ultra-wideband chip in the iPhone 15, same as the one found in the Apple Watch Series 9. This makes it easier to find friends or devices when you're near them. You'll get an indicator showing you which direction to head and about how far away you are. Apple's existing SOS service is being extended to work with AAA roadside service, as well. 

Like Apple is doing with the Apple Watch, new iPhone cases will not use leather; instead they are using Apple's own FineWoven fabric. As usual, the iPhone 15 comes in five colors: Black, light blue, mint green, light yellow and pink. (These are my interpretations of these colors; I'm sure Apple will have their own names for them.) Pricing is unchanged from last year — the iPhone 15 will cost $799 and the 15 Plus will cost $899, both with 128GB of storage.

Follow all of the news live from Apple's 'Wonderlust' event right here.

Apple has spent a significant amount of its keynote today talking about its environmental bonafides, and part of that is the fact that it will no longer sell leather accessories, including things like iPhone cases and Apple Watch bands. The company noted that while leather is popular for things like watch straps, it has a serious impact on the environment, particularly at Apple's scale. 

Instead, Apple is introducing a new product called FineWoven that'll replace its leather straps. Visually, they do look quite similar to the leather bands it used to sell — the leather loop and "modern buckle" styles will still be available, just in this new FineWoven material. We haven't gotten to the iPhone yet, but presumably we'll hear about FineWoven cases for that device as well. 

Apple has long had a partnership for the Apple Watch with Hermès, a company known for high-end fashion products including a wide variety of leather products. The collaboration will continue, but Hermès straps won't be leather going forward either. It looks like they'll be made of custom Hermès canvas, rubber and other textiles. 

Developing...

Follow all of the news live from Apple's 'Wonderlust' event right here.

For Samsung, bigger is often better. The company led the way in popularizing the gigantic smartphones most of us now use, so it’s no surprise that it’s also made some shockingly large tablets recently. In this year's Galaxy Tab S9 series, there are 11- and 12.4-inch models that line up well with Apple's two iPad Pros. And then there's the $1,200 Galaxy Tab S9 Ultra, a 14.6-inch behemoth that's nonetheless thin and light for its size.

Android tablets have long been a tough sell, thanks to the fact that relatively few developers bother to optimize their apps for larger screens. And tablets this big are not exactly easy to hold, either. Those facts have been top of mind as I tried to figure out who, if anyone, should buy the S9 Ultra. Despite my skepticism, Samsung's mammoth of a tablet did manage to surprise me with its utility in a few specific cases.

Hardware

When I pulled the S9 Ultra out of its box, I was immediately struck by its svelte footprint – it’s only 0.21 inches thick and weighs 1.6 pounds. In usual Samsung fashion, the tablet feels impeccably solid and well-made. Sure, it's just a big slab of glass and metal, but what can Samsung reasonably be expected to do to innovate here? The tablet form factor is pretty settled at this point. What's most important is that Samsung made the device so thin without it feeling fragile.

That's backed up by the S9 Ultra's IP68 water- and dust-resistance certification; Samsung says this is its first Galaxy S tablet with that rating. It was a pretty big deal when companies started making water-resistant phones, but it feels a lot less necessary here. That said, if you want to watch movies in your bathtub, you can feel secure that you won't immediately destroy your tablet if it takes a dip in the water with you.

The S9 Ultra is dominated by its huge 14.6-inch AMOLED touchscreen. With a 2,960 x 1,848 resolution and a 16:10 aspect ratio, it’s great for watching movies but far too tall to comfortably use in portrait mode. That quibble aside, it looks outstanding, with extremely bright, vibrant colors and a refresh rate of up to 120Hz. It also supports HDR10+, which can make watching movies even more stunning. Samsung is well known for its mobile displays, and the one on the S9 Ultra is another exceptional offering.

Samsung managed to fit excellent speakers into the S9 Ultra as well, making it a great overall option for watching movies and shows while you're, for example, sitting in isolation with Covid. I don’t know how companies are able to make such solid speakers in super-thin devices, but I’m glad it’s becoming commonplace on higher-end tablets like this and the iPad Pro.

There are a few other minor things to note about the S9 Ultra. You’ll find a pair of front-facing cameras on the long edge of the display: one standard and one ultrawide, both with 12-megapixel sensors. There’s a tiny notch in the screen to make room for them – it’s small, and I mostly forgot about it, but it’s there. On the back are a 13-megapixel standard camera and an 8-megapixel ultrawide option. The front cameras worked well for a handful of Google Meet calls I took on the device, and the back ones are serviceable as well. But tablet photography is ridiculous, even more so with a device this large. As I always say, just use the phone in your pocket.

Also on the back is a magnetic strip that holds and charges the included S Pen stylus. It’s not the most intuitive place to store the S Pen, and it’s not the easiest target to find when you’re retrieving the pen or putting it back. But I got used to it pretty quickly and the stylus reliably stayed attached to the back of the S9 Ultra.

Tablet mode

Photo by Nathan Ingraham / Engadget

Since the S9 Ultra doesn’t come with a keyboard case, I first set out to use the massive device as a pure tablet. This… was not my favorite experience. But first, some positives: the S9 Ultra’s screen is outstanding, as are the speakers, which made a great portable movie theater. And the S9 Ultra’s aspect ratio meant most content I watched filled almost the entire display.

The S9 Ultra is well-equipped for more intense tasks than watching movies. its Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 processor (paired with 12GB of RAM on the model I tested) is powerful enough for basically everything I tried. Running Adobe Lightroom was a pretty great experience, as there’s plenty of room for the various tools on one side and a huge, detailed preview of everything you’re doing on the other. Samsung doesn’t offer any battery life estimates, but I got well over 11 hours of use in tablet mode, and the device lasted days on standby. Unless you’re using it for hours every single day, you won’t have to charge it too often.

Another use case for the S9 Ultra is as an artist's canvas. The S Pen is an excellent stylus, and Samsung has years of experience tuning its performance. The S Pen is incredibly responsive – the company says latency has been reduced to 2.8 milliseconds, and I certainly felt no lag while testing it. I’m no visual artist, so I haven’t been able to really push the limits of what the S Pen and various Android software can do, but the combo of a low-lag pen and the S9 Ultra’s massive screen make it a powerful tool for visual artists, provided you can find the right software.

Unfortunately, the sheer size and width of the S9 Ultra means it wasn’t the best for other content consumption. First off, the tablet clearly wasn’t designed to be used in portrait mode – it’s just too tall. This is a problem I’ve found with other Android tablets that use similar aspect ratios, but most of those had smaller screens that are a little more manageable. That’s not the case here, and it just feels downright odd to use – elements at the top are too far away to comfortably interact with.

Things are marginally better in landscape mode, but the main issue with the S9 Ultra is the fact that there still aren’t a lot of Android apps suited to such large screens. Some apps (like Instagram) would only open in portrait orientation, while others like Slack simply have too much wasted white space. Google has done a great job of making its own apps look pretty great on tablets, and a handful of other key apps I use like Spotify and Todoist are also well adapted. But the S9 Ultra just isn’t designed for things most people use tablets for like browsing, messaging, sending emails, playing games and so forth. If that’s what you’re interested in, the 11-inch Galaxy Tab S9 will be a more comfortable device to use that also costs less. The S9 Ultra is proudly a niche device and you’ll want to know exactly how to use it before buying one.

Dex mode

My experience with the S9 Ultra changed once I paired it with Samsung’s $200 “Book Cover Keyboard Slim” and a Bluetooth mouse and started running the tablet in Dex mode. This completely changes the interface from the touch-focused Android UI to something more like Windows or Chrome OS.

Dex mode reminded me a lot of using a Chromebook. There’s a navigation bar at the bottom that shows any open app, and you can pin things there to get back to them quickly. As this is an Android tablet, all the apps you have access to here come from the Google Play Store or Samsung’s own app store. Historically, the main issue with Android tablets is how few Android apps are built to take advantage of bigger screens, and that’s still the case now.

But, since Dex lets you resize any app, you can make things fit properly in windows without wasting space. For example, the Slack app still doesn’t have a left-hand sidebar on Android, unlike on desktop or iPadOS. That’s annoying, but at least I can make Slack narrower, like a phone-sized app that doesn’t have a ton of wasted white space. And apps that do have multi-column interfaces, like basically all of Google’s first-party software, are downright pleasant to use.

Photo by Nathan Ingraham / Engadget

My main complaint with the S9 Ultra in Dex mode is the fact that Chrome for Android isn't quite as capable as the desktop version. That lets you use extensions, has more features and more reliably renders sites the way you’d expect. Most things render well, but you may also end up getting tossed into a version of the site designed for mobile phones, not huge tablets. But one unexpected bright spot was discovering that I could run the full web version of Slack in Chrome, an experience that's a lot better than using the Android app.

Battery life is a bit worse in Dex mode, which wasn’t a huge surprise given how many apps I was quickly jumping between. The tablet lasted for around six hours when I was using it as my full-time work device – not terrible, but worse than a lot of similarly-priced laptops.

Photo by Nathan Ingraham / Engadget

Wrap-up

Despite the number of intriguing use cases I found for the S9 Ultra, it’s a niche device that won’t make sense for most people, largely because of the price. That’s not a bad thing; niche devices exist for a reason, and some people will be well-served by this massive tablet. But $1,200 for the S9 Ultra (plus $200 for the keyboard case, or $350 if you want an integrated trackpad) is a ton of money to spend unless you have very specific ideas on how you’ll use this tablet. It doesn’t make sense for me, as I prefer a smaller tablet that I can easily use handheld and then drop into a keyboard case for getting work done. Still, for some, the combo of Dex mode, a keyboard and the S9 Ultra’s big, beautiful screen might make sense.

Most people would be better off spending their money on a different device, though. As impressed as I am with Dex, you can easily get a laptop that can run far more software for less money. And while I think the iPad is a better choice for most people looking for a tablet, those who prefer Android should consider Samsung’s own 11- and 12.4-inch Galaxy Tab S9 and S9+, as they offer basically the same specs, high-quality design and excellent screens for less cash. But if you’re interested in having a massive tablet with a great stylus and solid productivity chops, the S9 Ultra might be worth opening your wallet for.

It's been almost exactly four years since Sonos first introduce the Move, the company's first portable speaker. The Move was a solid speaker when it was first introduced, but in the years that have passed, things like its lower-than-average battery life have made it harder to recommend. But even with the summer quickly fading, Sonos has a new portable speaker for powering autumn days outside, the Move 2. On the surface, the Move offers the same formula as the original. It's a relatively large, loud speaker that you can lug around with you; it's also quite durable, able to withstand drops, bumps, extreme temperatures, rain and snow. 

But unsurprisingly, Sonos has taken some inspiration from the recent Era 100 and Era 300 speakers here for some improvements. The new top panel touch controls are the same as you'll find on those speakers. There's a volume slider as well as dedicated forward and back buttons. It also has a USB-C line-in jack, so you can connect the Move 2 to a turntable or other audio equipment. 

Perhaps most importantly, its internal speaker design is similar to that of the Era 100, with two angled tweeters providing stereo sound, unlike the mono, single-tweeter design of the original Move. In my testing of the Era 100, I didn't find that the two tweeters really give you a stereo experience like you'll get with multiple speakers, but it's still a definite improvement. 

Sonos

The other most significant change is that Sonos has more than doubled the quoted battery life on the Move 2, from about 11 hours to more than 24 hours. That's a huge jump and should be enough to silence those who were unhappy with the original Move's rather pedestrian longevity. 

Oh, and there's a new color this time, olive green. I wish that it also came in the lovely blue and orange shades you can get the smaller Sonos Roam in, but alas. 

Like the original Move, this new speaker supports audio over Bluetooth as well as Wi-Fi for when you're away from your network. It's also a quick way to let friends play music over the speaker, and there's a Bluetooth sharing feature that pipes audio the Move receives over Bluetooth to the rest of your Sonos speakers. Of course, you can also group and share audio across other Sonos devices using the traditional multi-room audio controls, as well. 

The Move 2 has microphones built in for automatic speaker tuning using the company's Trueplay software — this adjusts the sound quality based on where you place the speaker. The microphones also work with the Sonos voice assistant as well as Amazon Alexa, and there's a physical mute switch on the back that disconnects power to the mics entirely. And if you get two Move 2 speakers, you can pair them together in stereo. That should make for a potent audio setup, though you'll need to re-pair the speakers if you take one on the go and remove it from your Wi-Fi network. 

Unfortunately, Sonos is bumping up the price of its gear again — the Move 2 costs $449, up from the $399 it asked for the original model. For that price, Sonos is also including the handy ring-shaped wireless charger that lets you easily pick up the Move 2 and get going. Yes, there are a number of improvements here, but Sonos can't go on raising the prices of its products every time it releases a new model, can it? We haven't had a chance to hear the Move 2 yet, so it's too soon to say whether it'll be worth the cash, but hopefully the improvements here merit the price premium. The Move 2 goes on sale on September 20. 

In the last few years, basically every platform of consequence has made its own take on TikTok's signature scrolling feed of vertical videos. YouTube Music is the latest. Today, the app will get a vertical video feed called Samples that YouTube describes as a one-tap way to quickly sample and find new music. 

Samples lives in a new tab at the bottom of the app, alongside the home feed, your library and the explore section. Tapping Samples automatically starts a short vertical video clip of a song that YouTube Music thinks you'll like. Naturally, it's pulling songs based on your taste profile, with an emphasis on artists that you like, and related ones who you might not have heard before. 

The app already has multiple playlists that are tuned to your listening habits, including a Supermix that pulls songs and artists together across all your listening habits. There's also a Discover playlist that, naturally, focuses on things you're not familiar with but might enjoy based on your history. YouTube Music product manager Gregor Dodson told Engadget that the algorithm for the Samples feed is a little different from both of those — it's trying to site in between the two playlists, highlighting artists that you may be familiar with but pulling clips you haven't watched before.

The clips you'll see in Samples are only 30 seconds long, but that's about enough to give you a sense of the song. If it's not what you're looking for, just swipe up and you'll jump to another song, and you can do this as much as you want. Spotify added its own vertical video feed recently, but that's less for discovery and more to offer a way to quickly scroll through previews of songs in its playlists. But with both Spotify and YouTube Music implementing such a new, it seems likely that we'll see more apps do the same soon.

I got to try Samples for a few days before it launched, and the thing I found most interesting was to use it as a jumping off point for a longer listening session, something Dodson confirmed was by design. "Short form video [and] the infinite scroll have really interesting applications in music discovery," he said. "It's a simple way to discover new music, but it's not the end of the journey — it's just the start of finding a new artist or song." 

YouTube

To that end, the Samples video view is overlaid with a number of controls. From any Sample, you can tap the thumbs-up to save the song to your "liked songs" playlist. You can also save the song to any playlist you've created. Between these two options, it's pretty easy to quickly scan through Samples and save a bunch of songs to check out further. And if you hear something you want to immediately play in full, just tap the big old play button in the corner of the screen.

Since this is YouTube we're talking about, there's also a "Shorts" button that pops you into the main YouTube app. It'll show you other Shorts clips created with the audio you picked and let you jump into making your own clip with the song. Finally, the share button does just what you'd think — you get a link that can drop into a host of other apps like Messages, Reddit, Facebook and whatever else you might have installed. 

In the overflow menu, you can find a lot of other options, like starting a continuous radio station from the song, jumping into the artist's page to find more music, saving the track to your library and so forth. I with the "start radio" button was featured more prominently in the Samples video, because I found that to be a great way to jump into a auto-generated set of tunes with the same vibe as the Sample that initially caught my eye (and ear). 

My main issue with Samples is one of UI. Specifically, it's not always clear where exactly you'll end up in the app when you switch views. Tapping the Samples tab starts the video scroll, and to exit it you can tap one of the other bottom navigation tabs; tapping the "play" button opens up the familiar YouTube Music player controls. Finally, swiping back down to hide the player interface returns you to Samples. Seems pretty clear. But at one point, I had hit the play button to hear a song and then rotated my phone to landscape to see the video in full screen. When the next song started, I rotated my phone back to landscape, and the app threw me immediately back into the Samples view, with the clip of the song I had already heard still playing.

Another time, I started playing a song, and the hit the toggle at the top of the Now Playing screen to switch the video off and just hear the song. I listened to a few more songs from the auto-generated station of similar music, and then swiped down to hide the Now Playing UI and browse around the app. I was again tossed back into the Samples view. That does make some logical sense, as that's where the whole listening experience started. But I'm to used to being able to hide the Now Playing screen and browse around the app while still playing music that it was a bit jarring. That said, I could then hit the "Home" tab at the bottom and resume what I was playing. It works, but the addition of Samples does change a few of the app's expected behaviors.

These quibbles aside, Samples seems like a pretty handy addition to the YouTube Music app. In the few days I had to test it, it consistently served up music from artists I liked, and the song selections were indeed things I was usually less familiar with. The video clip aspect of it doesn't really matter to me, but given how many artists are making excellent videos these days, it's fun to remember that these visuals are worth checking out sometimes. (Thanks, YouTube Music, for surfacing the wild video for "I Know the End" by Phoebe Bridgers.) More importantly, it did work well as a jumping-off point for digging into some artists I had forgotten about or finding a tune to set the mood for a playlist or station.

YouTube says that the Samples feature is rolling out globally starting today for both Android and iOS users. As with most new features, it might not hit your app immediately, so you might need to be a little patient.

Apple's financials continue to be in an ever-so-slight slump. Just as we saw the last two quarters, the company suffered minor declines in revenue in its fiscal Q3 2023 — but these are minor blips for a company that is still raking in absurd amounts of money every quarter. 

As has often been the case, revenue that Apple made from its Services segment (things like paid iCloud plans, Apple Music, AppleCare, the App Store and numerous other offerings) hit an all-time high of $21.2 billion. That's the company's second-largest product category behind the iPhone, and it grew eight percent year-over-year. But iPhone, Mac and iPad revenue all declined compared to a year ago, the same as it did last quarter.

In the case of the iPhone, that decline was slight: revenue of $39.7 billion in the quarter was down about two percent compared to a year ago. iPad (down 19.8 percent) and Mac (down 7.3 percent) sales declined more significantly. But given the fact that Apple hasn't refreshed any iPad hardware since last fall, it's not too surprising to see a drop there. Wearables (like the Apple Watch and AirPods) and accessories were another bright spot, as revenues grew a little over two percent, the only product category besides Services to do so. 

Overall, revenues of $81.8 billion represented a less than two percent drop year over year, while profits actually increased about two percent to $19.9 billion. 

As usual, Apple is holding a call with CEO Tim Cook at 5PM ET, and there's more to discuss this quarter than usual. Beyond Apple's normal product categories, this is the first earnings since the ambitious Vision Pro headset was announced, so it's likely investors may want to hear about how that new product is progressing. And there's the ever-present talk of potential AI-related projects hanging out in the background, too. We'll be updating this post with any details Cook shares on the call.