Investigations reveal Pixel 2's rapid charging depends on battery temperature

Are you a Pixel 2/2 XL user? Have you been experiencing charging issues where-in your unit charges slowly despite the phone showing the "Charging rapidly" notification? Well, if your answer is yes, you are not alone. A lot of other users are also facing the same problem, evident from discussions on Google's official forums. A few of those affected did some experimenting and found that this behavior isn't consistent, cropping up only when the handset is being charged at below certain temperatures. Folks over at Android Police did some detailed testing, and found that's indeed the...

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Week 7 in review: Xiaomi Redmi Note 5 duo goes official

Week 7 was dominated by a pair of smartphones - the Xiaomi Redmi Note 5 and Redmi Note 5 Pro, with last minute leaks and coverage of the announcement dominating our best read story list. We also got a bunch of leaks as is typical for this part of the year. The Nokia 7 Plus and Nokia 9 proved more popular than the Galaxy S9, while the Xiaomi Mi Mix 2s also gained a lot of interest. It wasn't all unofficial stuff either - Samsung released a bunch of teaser videos for its upcoming flagship pair and sent some of its official accessories to its retail partners. In other news the...

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Top 10 trending phones of week 7

There's a surprise - after leading our trending chart for five weeks as a rumored phone the Xiaomi Redmi 5 couldn't retain the lead once it became official. The reason being its Pro version, which debuted alongside it and shot straight to the top of our popularity contest. And to make this an even better week for the Chinese manufacturer, the Xiaomi Mi A1 takes third. A trio of Samsung phones follows - the current Galaxy S8 flagship, its upcoming Galaxy S9 successor and the mid-ranger Galaxy Galaxy J7 Pro. Huawei Honor 9 Lite slides behind another Xiaomi - the Redmi 5A, while the...

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Sunday Debate: Custom ROM vs. Stock Android

In our sixth Sunday Debate we are arguing stock Android against custom ROM. What do you prefer - neat and clean OS or as many features out of the box as possible? Yordan: Custom ROMs mean you value your time 2012 was a marvelous year - we had the London Olympics, the viral "Kony 2012" video and for a brief time, the world was going to end until it didn't. It was also the time when Google launched its first tablet Nexus 7 with Android 4.1 Jelly Bean that was my first pure Android experience. I loved the simplicity of the OS for a brief time until I started missing some...

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Weekly poll: what's the ideal weight for a phone?

We often argue about ergonomics at the office - hard to grip screens with curved sides are the usual talking point, especially when it comes to one-handed use. But recently we started thinking about weight. Have phones become too heavy? Typing is the biggest problem - the keyboard is at the bottom of the screen and you need to reach from the left side to the right side. This means you hold the lower half of the phone and you don't grip the phone securely (because then you can't reach the farther edge of the screen). There are plenty of phones that weigh 200g - iPhone 8 Plus, Galaxy...

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Counterclockwise: the evolution of smartphone cameras in the dark

This week we'll do something more visual instead of the usual wordy Counterclockwise article. We remember some old phones as having great cameras, but did they, really? Or is this a case of remembering only the good things? So, we picked out flagship lines known for their cameras - it's not a comprehensive list by any measure - and cropped out a part of a low light photo, the one you'll find in our Photo Quality Comparison tool. Note that we're not comparing iPhone vs. Galaxy, Xperia vs. Huawei. Instead, we wanted to see how much each maker improved its own cameras through the years....

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Weekly poll results: most people change phones every two years

Most people upgrade their phones every two years - half the voters in our poll do just that. It makes sense, most carriers lock you into a 2-year contract. And even if you buy a phone SIM-free, most phone makers are on a tick-tock upgrade cycle. You know how it goes - iPhone 6, iPhone 6s, iPhone 7... well, the iPhone 8 is 7s in all but name. Then there's the Galaxy S6 - new design but with issues, which the S7 fixed. The Galaxy S8 brought a new design and in a couple of weeks, the S9 will refine it. Then there's a nearly even split between people who change phones every year and those...

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