I try to play as broad a swathe of games as I can, including as many of the major releases as I am able to get to. Baldur's Gate 3 garnered near-universal praise when it arrived in 2023, and I was interested in trying it. But when I watched gameplay videos, the user interface seemed distressingly busy. There were far too many icons at the bottom of the screen and my brain crumbled at the sight of them. I am yet to try Baldur's Gate 3.

Two years later, I had similar feelings ahead of checking out Overwatch 2's Stadium, a major new mode for a game I play nearly every single day. Blizzard gave members of the press a spreadsheet that detailed all of the possible upgrades and powers for each hero, as well as a list of modifiers that any character can use. With two dozen or so unlockables for each of the 17 heroes that will be in Stadium at the jump and about 70 general upgrades, that's hundreds of different options Blizzard is adding to the game all at once.

As I scrolled through the list, I was surprised that a feeling of dismay washed over me. I started to worry that Stadium might not be for me.

Figuring out how to combine the items and powers in effective ways for so many different characters seemed completely daunting. It doesn't help that I'm growing tired of more and more major games having RPG elements with deeper character customization. Taking some of the decision making out of my hands by giving a character a defined set of abilities and weapons with no stat or gear upgrades to worry about is more my speed.

Thankfully, Blizzard has some good ideas on how to welcome players into this new mode. And, as it turns out, once I actually started playing Stadium, my anxious feelings swiftly melted away and I had a great time with it.

Blizzard bills Stadium, which will go live for all players as part of season 16 on April 22, as the third pillar of Overwatch 2. It will nestle alongside the Competitive and Unranked modes and only be available in a ranked format.

Stadium is a very different take on Overwatch 2. For instance, it has a more sports-like presentation. Thanks to some tweaks to maps that seem a little out of the Apex Legends playbook and a new, looser announcer, it feels a bit more like a spectator sport than the lore-infused Competitive and Unranked formats. The maps in Stadium are either new stages or condensed versions of existing ones, with rounds typically lasting just a few minutes each.

On paper, Stadium is a more tactical spin on Overwatch 2, though with a vastly different approach than the likes of Valorant or CS:GO. Neither of those games really landed for me (I retired from Valorant with a very modest undefeated record), adding to my concern that I wouldn’t gel with Stadium.

This is a best-of-seven, 5v5 format built around customizing your hero during a match with various upgrades. What's more, this is the first time players can opt for a third-person view at all times. The first-person view is still there if you prefer it.

It's a little redundant to think of Stadium as Blizzard's answer to Marvel Rivals. It's been in development for over two years — it was conceived before Overwatch 2 even debuted and long before Marvel Rivals siphoned away a chunk of the player base. Still, it's hard not to make the comparison.

Blizzard Entertainment

There's a lot to drink in here. Ahead of my hands-on time with Stadium, I asked game director Aaron Keller how the Overwatch 2 team designed the mode to avoid making it feel too overwhelming and how the developers hoped to ease players into Stadium.

The team has done a few things with the aim of making the transition "a little less intimidating" for both long-time players and newcomers to the game, such as having a tab with example builds in the Armory, the pre-round shop where you select your upgrades. "If you want to, when you're playing a hero for the first time, you can just click through a custom, designer-built set of powers and items that you can unlock over the course of that match," Keller said. "It takes a little bit of what can be an overwhelming decision-making process out of your first-time experience, but you'll still be able to feel yourself grow in power."

Restricting the initial roster of heroes to 17 out of 43 can help players get to grips with Stadium, Keller suggested, though Blizzard will add more characters to the mode each season (newcomer Freja will join Stadium after the midseason update). The lack of hero swapping could also be a boon here. "All you're really gonna have to focus on is what your hero, your team's heroes and the enemy team can do over the course of that match," Keller said.

The lack of hero swaps did seem odd at first. One of the things that initially drew me to Overwatch was that each character had a defined set of abilities. The idea of being able to switch to a different hero to counter a particular menace on the enemy team was such a core part of the Overwatch experience for so long, but that faded over time. The switch to role locks (which restricts each player to only picking a hero in a certain class) and the new perks system, which incentivizes sticking with one character over the course of a match to unlock useful upgrades, have diminished the freedom of swapping to any other hero at any time.

In Stadium, rather than hero swaps, the answer to countering a pesky opponent is optimizing your build. "A lot of Stadium takes place during combat, but it's just as important to be able to put a strategy together around what you're unlocking in the Armory," Keller said. "It becomes much, much harder to do that if you can't predict what the heroes are going to be on the enemy team from round to round."

To help players from feeling like they're unable to deal with a certain enemy (such as having a D.Va that couldn't normally block a Zarya's beam), players will be able to put together counter builds in the Armory.

"We've got anti-barrier builds you can use. We've even got anti-beam builds that are available to different heroes," Keller said. "If you're going up against a Zarya, there are some things that you, or people on your team, are going to be able to do to counter that."

Through the Armory, you can unlock up to four powers. These are powerful and/or ridiculous abilities that you can pick from every other round. These are locked in for the duration of a match.

One power sees Ashe's ultimate cost slashed in half, but when she deploys B.O.B., he's just a little guy with lower attack speed and durability. Mini B.O.B. is just far too adorable for words. Another power lets Kiriko players spawn an AI-controlled clone of the support for a few seconds after she teleports.

Along with powers, there are items. These are purchased with earnable currency and can be swapped out before each round. You get some currency at the beginning of a match and earn more by playing well — dealing damage, scoring eliminations, healing allies, collecting a bounty by taking out an enemy who's crushing it and so on. Common and rare items boost your stats, but epic items are the ones you want. These are the more expensive upgrades that you unlock more of the longer a Stadium match goes.

Mei has some really great tweaks, such as the ability to move faster if on ground that she freezes, being able to remove a burn effect with her chilling primary fire and turning into a rolling ice ball that damages opponents. One enemy I faced used a combo of Mei's ice ball and ice wall to trap me, with both abilities damaging my hero at the same time. I'm stealing that strategy.

Blizzard Entertainment

Orisa, meanwhile, can use her javelin spin to fly a short distance. Ana (the best hero in the game) can cast her powerful Nano Boost through walls and to multiple allies. Soldier: 76 can get a short burst of his auto-aiming ultimate after damaging an enemy with his Helix Rockets. This is just scratching the surface of the items on offer, and the options can compound on each other to make abilities wildly powerful.

"I mostly just want to present a space for players where they feel like they can take the elements they really love about the other core modes that we have and just push them. Find that character that speaks to them and just push it as far as they can," senior game designer Dylan Snyder said when asked what would make the team's work on Stadium feel like it paid off.

"If we start seeing people sharing builds around and saying 'guys, I found this, this is the answer in this scenario, check this out.' They do write-ups on that, to me that's a win. Any numbers or metrics aside, to me, that's the mark of something that has landed with people."

Overwatch 2's practice range is there for a reason

I'm glad I took some time to play around with all of the heroes in the Stadium version of the practice range before hopping into a match. I started to get a feel for what each hero could do with maxed-out example builds. Certain abilities can quickly become very powerful if you pick powers and items that complement each other. When I hopped into matches, I made a conscious choice to stop worrying about understanding everything and to embrace the side of Overwatch 2 that I love the most: full-blown chaos.

Relying on the example builds was a big help at the outset. By focusing on those — and selecting the items that I felt would be the most effective at any given time — I didn't have to overthink anything. Just quickly pick a power and some items and try to enjoy myself, before switching to more powerful items as soon as I had a chance. That was my strategy.

Because of that, I've been having an absolute blast with Stadium so far. Playing around with all the new stuff you can do as all of the heroes is far more engaging than I've expected. Piling every resource into survivability as a tank or weapon upgrades as a damage hero makes sense, but each hero has a ton of flexibility.

For instance, I could have gone all in on upgrading Ashe's Dynamite. But having a second Coach Gun charge to simultaneously blow up a trio of additional sticky explosives that can spawn when Ashe's Dynamite detonates was very impactful. I picked up quite a few kills with that trick.

Blizzard Entertainment

My favorite upgraded ability so far is being able to fly while using Reinhardt's charge. He can soar across nearly half a map in a few seconds. It's absurd. Not even flying heroes are safe from Reinhardt barreling them into a wall.

I'm a bit more mixed on the third-person view. It does have a lot of advantages, such as a wider field of view and peeking around walls. Until now, I've often had to use a dance emote to secretly peer around a corner. A lot of players will also appreciate being able to get a better look at the skins they've worked so hard (or spent so much) to unlock.

But I think some of the game's tactility is lost in third-person mode. In that perspective, Reinhardt feels a little slower and the satisfying smack of his hammer when it clatters an enemy feels less impactful. It's also a little jarring to switch from a third-person view to aiming down a rifle's sights with Ashe or Ana. So, although the third-person perspective works well for heroes like D.Va, Kiriko and Lucio, I'm glad the first-person mode is still an option.

Meanwhile, Soldier: 76 feels completely overpowered as things stand. He's been an ever-present in my matches and those playing as him usually ended up with the most currency out of everyone in the lobby. But that's the kind of thing the developers will be keeping a close eye on. It'll be even tougher to balance Stadium than the other modes, and doing so will be an ongoing process.

When I first started playing Overwatch in 2016, it took me several weeks to get my head around all of the heroes' abilities and how they could be combined or countered. It's going to take me a while to fully understand all of the new stuff here given the multiple layers of complexity, but I'm happy to just relax and have fun, and passively absorb all of the information instead of poring over it like I'm studying for a test.

Despite my initial reservations, I can see myself sticking with Stadium for a while. I've seen some wild stuff already, and things are going to get more bananas in the coming months as Blizzard folds more heroes into the mode. Plus, the Overwatch 2 I know and love is still there. If I ever feel too overwhelmed in Stadium, I can always retreat to the comfort of my beloved Mystery Heroes.

Earlier this year, right as TikTok and other ByteDance apps were temporarily pulled from Apple and Google’s app stores, Meta announced that it was working on a new video editing app tailored to Instagram creators. That app, called Edits, is now finally rolling out as Meta continues to try to leverage the uncertainty surrounding TikTok’s future to draw more creators to its apps.

As previewed in its earlier app store listings, Edits promises much more advanced editing tools than what’s been available in Meta’s apps. The in-app camera allows creators to capture up to 10 minutes of video and publish to Instagram in “enhanced quality.” It also features popular editing effects like green screen and Instagram’s extensive music catalog.

In keeping with Meta’s current focus on AI, Edits comes with a couple AI-powered features as well. The “animate” feature allows users to create a video from a static image, while “cutouts” enables video makers to “isolate specific people or objects with precision tracking.” And unlike ByteDance’s popular editor CapCut, Edits doesn’t export videos with a watermark of any kind (Instagram downranks videos with visible watermarks).

While Edits is launching months after CapCut came back online in the US, Meta is adding some Instagram-specific features to lure Reels creators. This includes in-app post analytics, as well as the ability to import audio tracks they’ve previously saved in the app. And it sounds like Instagram creators can look forward to more specialized features in the future. In a blog post, the company notes that the current version of the app is merely “the first step” for Edits, and that it plans to collaborate with creators on more functionality going forward.

Edits is out now in the App Store and Google Play.

Engadget's pick for the best security camera for newbies is on sale for 30 percent off. The Google Nest Security Cam has an easy setup, wide-ranging compatibility and 1080p HD video. It also doesn't hurt that it's pretty dang cute. Typically ringing up for $100, you can get the camera today on Amazon for $69.98.

We found the wired security camera to have the most true-to-life video of the models we tested. Its colors hit a Goldilocks zone — neither too cold nor too warm — with subtle, accurate hues. It also supports night vision, with smoother and less grainy results than competing cams.

The camera covers about a 90-degree vertical range and 360 degrees horizontally. Its recordings' 135-degree diagonal field of view isn't the widest, but it should be plenty for anything you need to see.

Part of what makes it accessible to smart home security newcomers is the Google Home app. First, the odds are high that you already have an account with the company, making signing in a breeze. In addition, adding your device to the app is an easy process with clear labels and easy-to-follow instructions. It also offers full functionality for iPhones, not just Android handsets.

The Nest Cam has a friendly-looking design composed of two half orbs connected by a little arm. The device has a matte finish and is available in several colors: white, foggy gray and charming "linen."

Although the camera's subscription plan is optional, using it without one severely limits your options, with only three hours of recent event history and people, animal and vehicle detection. Otherwise, you'll need to plunk down $8 monthly for a Nest Aware subscription that saves the past 30 days of activity. Or, if you want to go all in, a $15 monthly Plus plan lets you rewind up to 90 days of history and supports up to 10 days of 24/7 recording. Unfortunately, the camera doesn't have a local storage option. So, you'll want to consider the (nearly mandatory) subscription cost before pulling the trigger.

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One of the worst-kept secrets in games is now completely out in the open. It's true, Bethesda has been shepherding along a remaster of The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion with the help of external developer Virtuos. The publisher formally revealed the remaster on Tuesday. Never mind that screenshots leaked on Virtuous' website last week.

You can play it right now as the game has landed on PC (via Steam and the Xbox App for Windows PC), Xbox Series X/S and PS5. Since this is a project from Microsoft-owned Bethesda, Oblivion Remastered is on Game Pass. The base Oblivion Remastered game includes the the Knights of the Nine and Shivering Isles expansions. There are extras available, such as bonus quests, of course, horse armor DLC (that was a whole thing, trust me). A deluxe edition has these, and other gear, bundled in.

As you might expect, Bethesda and Virtuos (a long-time partner of the publisher) have given the 2006 original a huge visual overhaul, updating the look of the RPG for modern systems. The remaster, which was built using Unreal Engine 5, has 4K Ultra HD graphics and it can run at framerates of 60 fps. Virtuos says it used the same base mesh system for for every race of characters. As such, the developers say they were able to make the lip-sync system more effective regardless of the characters' facial features. There's plenty of new dialogue too, including unique voice lines for all races.

The user interface, lighting effects, landscapes, audio and, of course, gameplay have all been refined here. The levelling system has been given an overhaul too, with the developers taking cues from both the original game and Skyrim. Fans of third-person adventuring will be please to learn that perspective has been upgraded too — there's now a crosshair, for one thing. Bethesda is also promising additional autosaves, enhanced accessibility features and improvements to enemy scaling.

Bethesda is currently working on The Elder Scrolls 6, but that doesn't mean the studio has left the past behind entirely. Bethesda Game Studios head Todd Howard said in the announcement video that each chapter of The Elder Scrolls "tried to define role-playing games and open-world games for their generation." Oblivion, in particular, "was a real defining moment in the series and for how we make games as a studio," he added. "Every time we think about Oblivion, it's 'what if we could give that moment to everybody again?'"

Google has been paying Samsung tons of cash every month to pre-install the AI app Gemini on its smartphones, according to a report by Bloomberg. This information comes to us as part of a pre-existing antitrust case against Google.

Peter Fitzgerald, Google’s VP of platforms and device partnerships, testified in federal court that it began paying Samsung for this service back in January. The pair of companies have a contract that’s set to run at least two years.

Fitzgerald told Judge Amit Metha, who is overseeing the case, that Google provides Samsung with a monthly payout. The monetary figures are unknown, but DOJ lawyer David Dahlquist called it an "enormous sum of money in a fixed monthly payment."

This antitrust case started with an accusation that Google had been illegally abusing a monopoly over the search engine industry. Part of the testimony surrounding that case involved Google paying Apple, Samsung and other companies to ensure it was the default search engine on its devices.

Judge Mehta agreed and found that this practice constitutes a violation of antitrust law. He’s currently hearing additional testimony to decide what measures Google must take to remedy the illegal behavior, which is where this Gemini reveal comes from.

Testimony from another case involving Epic Games indicated that Google handed over $8 billion from 2020 to 2023 to ensure that Google Search, the Play Store and Google Assistant were used by default on Samsung mobile devices. A California federal judge later ruled that the company must lift restrictions that prevent rival marketplaces and billing systems. Google is in the process of appealing that ruling.

As an aside, if Google is hellbent on handing out Scrooge McDuck-sized bags of money to increase adoption rates of its generative AI app, why not give the regular people who have to actually use the bloatware some of that cash? Just saying.

Update, April 22 2025, 10:15AM ET: This story has been updated to reflect today's testimony that noted that Gemini doesn't offer advertising. 

Looking for a good VPN service? ExpressVPN is offering one heck of a deal right now. You can snag a 28-month subscription, which is well over two years, for 61 percent off the typical price. This boils down to $5 per month, but there’s one catch. You have to pay up front, which comes out to $140.

That’s a hefty initial payout, but having access to a good VPN service into late 2027 sounds pretty dang nice. To that end, ExpressVPN is one of the more reputable companies out there and it easily made our list of the best VPN providers. We appreciated the speedy connections offered by the service. This isn’t always the case with VPNs. We also didn’t encounter too much lag during our testing.

It works on a variety of devices, so this isn’t just for the living room desktop. ExpressVPN integrates with mobile gadgets, smart TVs and game consoles, among other items. It’s really the best solution for gamers who travel a lot. It also comes with an in-house password manager, which would eliminate the need for a standalone subscription.

Truly the only real downside of this service is the price. The regular cost is $13 per month, which is mighty steep. This sale alleviates this concern, at least for 28 months. Spending $5 per month for a VPN of this caliber is something of a no-brainer.

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If you've been waiting to pick up Apple's latest MacBook Air M4 then your patience has paid off. Right now, the 13-inch model is down to $939 from $999 — a six percent discount. It's an all-time low price for the 13-inch MacBook Air M4, dropping to $10 less than it cost during Amazon's Spring Sale. The deal is available for the laptop in Starlight, Midnight and Sky Blue, so just not Silver. 

Apple only released the MacBook Air M4 in Mid-March and it's already our pick for 2025's best MacBook overall. We gave it in a 92 in our review thanks to features like its 13.6-inch liquid retina display and slim build — it weighs 2.7 pounds and is 0.44 inches thick. But, it's the M4 chip that really gives this MacBook Air a boost. The 13-inch model has a 10-core CPU, 8-core GPU and 16-core Neural Engine. Plus, it lasted over 18 hours while playing HD video. 

If you're looking for something a little bigger and with more RAM, then it might be worth getting the 15-inch MacBook Air M4. It's currently down to $1,499 from $1,599 and offers 24GB of RAM, compared to the 13-inch's 16GB. The only catch: This deal is just for the Starlight model (though the Midnight version is only $20 more at $1,519). 

Check out our coverage of the best Apple deals for more discounts, and follow @EngadgetDeals on X for the latest tech deals and buying advice.

The Washington Post is partnering with OpenAI to bring its reporting to ChatGPT. The two organizations did not disclose the financial terms of the agreement, but the deal will see ChatGPT display summaries, quotes and links to articles from The Post when users prompt the chatbot to search the web.

"We're all in on meeting our audiences where they are," said Peter Elkins-Williams, head of global partnerships at The Post. "Ensuring ChatGPT users have our impactful reporting at their fingertips builds on our commitment to provide access where, how and when our audiences want it."

The Post is no stranger to generative AI. In November, the publisher began using the technology to offer article summaries. Since the start of February, ChatGPT Search has been available to everyone, with no account or sign-in necessary. 

Later that same month, Jeff Bezos, the owner of The Washington Post, announced a "significant shift" in the publisher's editorial strategy. As part of the overhaul, the paper has been publishing daily opinion stories "in defense of two pillars," personal liberties and free markets. Given that focus and Amazon's own investments in artificial intelligence, it's not surprising to see The Washington Post and OpenAI sign a strategic partnership.

More broadly, today's announcement sees yet another publisher partnering with OpenAI, following an early but brief period of resistance from some players in the news media industry — most notably The New York Times. According to OpenAI, it has signed similar agreements with more than 20 news publishers globally.

The Insta360 X5 ($550) is the company’s latest 8K 360 action camera and, while it remains a different proposition to traditional action cams, it is more powerful, more reliable and easier to use.

The X5 has a larger 1/1.28-inch sensor compared to the X4's 1/2-inch sensor, ensuring more detail and a notable boost to low-light performance. The issue with wide-angle camera capture is that detail gets lost, especially in low-lit settings. The specification upgrades this time around reduce that substantially, including up to 13.5 stops of dynamic range.

Over the years, I’ve tried to incorporate 360-degree cameras into my workflow, using them both on vacation or at events. However, a lot of the content I capture is either during the evening or in a dark venue, literally the main weakness of these kinds of cameras. In a bid to address those shooting conditions, Insta360 introduced a new PureVideo mode that with AI noise reduction and dynamic range optimization for clearer, brighter footage in low-light conditions. It’s not perfect, but it moves dim video from unusable to decent, if not outright good. With a 5nm AI chip and two imaging chips, the X5 can also now capture Active HDR on footage at up to 5.7K 60 fps.

Image by Mat Smith for Engadget

This chip array also reduces processing time. Insta360 doesn’t specify how much faster, but anecdotally, on-device processing and file transfers to my smartphone were noticeably faster. Videos are saved almost instantly onto the camera, while saving several short clips to my phone took around 30 seconds, compared to minutes on previous devices.

While the X5 doesn’t offer higher resolution video than its predecessor, it packs in even more shooting options, like InstaFrame, which is fast becoming my go-to shooting mode. InstaFrame can record a typical “flat” video and a 360-degree video at the same time. The notion is that this gives an “instantly shareable” flat video, with no reframing or heavy editing needed.

But when you do have to, Insta360’s companion smartphone app has been further improved, with some incredibly useful editing tools. You can re-edit 360-degree video to focus on the user, or force a single view. It’s all quite intuitive too, which is a trait that shouldn’t be ignored.

Image by Mat Smith for Engadget

The X5 an incredibly versatile tool, and there’s something to be said for a camera that can capture everything. However, in less favorable conditions (or when you’re not the camera person), you might prefer the simpler settings and shooting methods of a traditional action camera.

The X5 does perform better in lower light, but it doesn’t quite match the improvements we’ve seen in low-light smartphone photography in recent years. Despite my cautiously walking around in the late evening to capture low-light footage, there was a vibration after-effect as the camera struggled to stabilize the footage. This can be reduced by staying still, but even with PureVideo (which can also be a little too aggressive addressing noise), it’s not quite there yet. I will continue to test the camera and provide further impressions. Insta360 pushed a firmware update to the X5 hours before I published this story, adding 4K60fps recording in single-lens mode, and several resolution bumps across other recording modes.

Design-wise, you have to get up real close to tell the difference between the X5 and the X4. They’re largely the same size, although Insta360 has switched to a polygon effect on the front, with a panel for the mic (and a new mesh wind guard).

The battery compartment and microSD slot are secured with a double latch where the microSD slot lives, and are protected by solid covers with sliding locks. Both sides of the camera have a grippy texture, with record and mode buttons nestled under the screen.

With the same threaded mount, Insta360’s existing selfie sticks will work with its latest camera, although fast-chargers and cases won’t, due to hardware changes. The most important thing: Insta360’s bullet time effect is still here – if you have the right peripheral.

Most of the settings adjustments, like its predecessors, are found in pull-down menus from, well, pretty much every side of the screen. Swiping right will take you to the gallery, while manual camera options are a left swipe away. Toggles and lock settings are located in the dropdown menu. There’s a lot, but if you’ve used a smartphone, you should find the basic navigation familiar.

Image by Mat Smith for Engadget

There’s a whole list of smaller notable hardware improvements on the X5 compared to the predecessor, too:

• Scratch-resistant glass lenses —- which are replaceable

• Larger capacity battery that lasts up to 180 minutes

• Faster-charging battery (0 to 80 percent in 20 minutes)

• New built-in steel mesh wind guard

• IP68 waterproofing up to 49 feet

• Magnetic mounting system

• ‘Twist to shoot’ record feature, to initiate recording by twisting a connected selfie stick

The Insta360 X5 is now on sale, priced at $550, with an Essentials Bundle also available for $660. The bundle includes an extra battery, fast-charge case, “invisible” selfie stick, lens guards and a carry case. That’s $50 more than the Insta360 X4 was at launch. The improvements to both low-light performance and new shooting modes may be worth the price increase, but don’t expect crisp 4K (or 8K) video if light is an issue.

Competition in this category remains relatively limited. Ricoh continues its Theta series, with a similar camera form factor, but seems to focus on stills more than video, while GoPro’s Max 360 camera lacks features like traditional 4K video capture, let alone 8K recording. The best alternatives are arguably Insta360’s other 360 cameras, like last year’s X4.

While there are less major spec and design changes compared to last year, the Insta360 X5 is another step forward for this type of camera, both in terms of imaging and in simplifying how you share what you capture.

Google Messages has started rolling out sensitive content warnings for nudity after first unveiling the feature late last year. The new feature will perform two key actions if the AI-based system detects message containing a nude image: it will blur any of those photo and trigger a warning if your child tries to open, send or forward them. Finally, it will provide resources for you and your child to get help. All detection happens on the device to ensure images and data remain private. 

Sensitive content warnings are enabled by default for supervised users and signed-in unsupervised teens, the company notes. Parents control the feature for supervised users via the Family Link app, but unsupervised teens aged 13 to 17 can turn it off in Google Messages settings. The feature is off by default for everyone else. 

With sensitive content warnings enabled, images are blurred and a "speed bump" prompt opens allowing the user to block the sender, while offering a link to a resource page detailing why nudes can be harmful. Next, it asks the user if they still want to open the message with "No, don't view," and "Yes, view" options. If an attempt is made to send an image, it provides similar options. So, it doesn't completely block children from sending nudes, but merely provides a warning. 

The feature is powered by Google's SafetyCore system which allows AI-powered on-device content classification without sending "identifiable data or any of the classified content or results to Google servers," according to the company. It only just started arriving on Android devices and is not yet widely available, 9to5Google wrote.