The name Google is synonymous with online searches, but over the years the company has grown beyond search and now builds multiple consumer products, including software like Gmail, Chrome, Maps, Android, and hardware like the Pixel smartphones, Google Home, and Chromebooks. Its name can also be found on internet services such as Google Fi, Flights, Checkout, and Google Fiber. Here is all of the latest news about one of the most influential tech companies in the world.
Google now lets you track price drops of your favorite hotel and receive email alerts if rates drop during your chosen dates:
To get started on desktop, head to Search and look up a specific hotel by name, then tap the new price tracking toggle. On mobile, you’ll find the price tracking option under the Prices tab after you search.
Google just released the fourth beta for Android 17 today, and now, 9to5Google and Android Authority point out that it contains mentions of a new lighting feature that we might see on the next round of Pixel phones.
The Pixel Glow details say it “uses subtle light and color on the back of your device to inform you of important activity when it’s face down,” when interacting with Gemini, or when favorite contacts are calling.
Along with an upgraded Android CLI, Google is launching a new Android skills GitHub repository and an Android Knowledge base, which can provide AI agents with the information and resources they need to perform coding tasks.
The company is apparently reversing course in its approach to military dealings. Google currently has a contract that allows the DOD to use Gemini for “all lawful purposes,” but only in unclassified settings. According to The Information:
Google’s proposed contract language appears to mirror the terms OpenAI secured in an agreement it struck with the Pentagon over the use of its AI earlier this year… However, lawyers also said at the time that language in OpenAI’s contract that seemed to preclude the use of its AI for fully autonomous lethal weapons and mass domestic surveillance wouldn’t necessarily prevent those applications because OpenAI also agreed that its technology could be used for “all lawful purposes.”
Google said Gemini Robotics-ER 1.6 is “our safest robotics model to date,” enabling robots to reason and understand their environments with “unprecedented precision.” That includes reading instruments like pressure gauges, which Boston Dynamics demonstrates with its dog-like robot, Spot.
An update to Google’s spam policies includes a new “malicious practice” that could get websites demoted: “Back button hijacking,” which is when a website stops users from leaving with their browser’s back button.
“Pages that are engaging in back button hijacking may be subject to manual spam actions or automated demotions, which can impact the site’s performance in Google Search results. To give site owners time to make any needed changes, we’re publishing this policy two months in advance of enforcement on June 15, 2026.”
The feature, which allows Gemini to pull information from your Gmail, Google Photos, Search, and YouTube watch history, is now available globally — except in the UK, Switzerland, and the European Economic Area, according to Google spokesperson Elijah Lawal.
Personal Intelligence is coming to Google AI Plus, Pro, and Ultra subscribers in these areas first before launching for free users.
OpenAI, Google, and Anthropic are eating the software world alive.
Starting this week, enterprise users will be able to send encrypted messages from Gmail’s Android and iOS apps if their organization has the feature enabled. Gmail’s version of E2EE, which uses client-side encryption, has been available since last year, but is still limited to users with enterprise accounts.
[Google Workspace Updates Blog]
Last month Android Authority reported Google is developing an NFC-based way to share contact info, files, links, and more, and now it’s got the interface running. Unlike Apple’s NameDrop, users have to hold the two phones above one another, perhaps to account for how varied NFC chip placement can be on Android devices.
This feature, which came to Google Meet on the web in January, translates speech into your preferred language in real-time. Now it’s coming to subscribers on mobile with select Google AI and Workspace subscriptions, with support for translations between English and Spanish, French, German, Portuguese, and Italian.
[Workspace Updates Blog]
After launching across the US and India, Google is bringing its revamped Finance app to more than 100 countries, including Australia, Brazil, Canada, Indonesia, Japan, and Mexico. Users in these countries can now interact with the app in their local language, as well as access a built-in Gemini chatbot, new charting tools, and an upgraded news feed.
Google’s latest affordable phone launched in Japan today, more than a month after its release elsewhere. The wait might have been worth it though, since Japanese buyers can get the phone in an exclusive isai blue finish, designed in partnership with Heralbony, a creative company that works with artists with disabilities.
Android users can now watch videos as slowly as 0.25x or as fast as 2x, though Google hasn’t said when the option will roll out to iOS or the web. Tap the three dot menu on a video to find the new speed options.
[Google Photos Community]
The “multiple gigawatts of next-generation TPU capacity” are expected to come online beginning in 2027 to “power our frontier Claude models.” The company also says that its run-rate revenue has surpassed $30 billion.
Google AI Edge Eloquent is a new live AI transcription app that requires no subscription and has no usage limits. When you finish speaking, it will also filter out filler words like “um.” It’s currently only on iOS, but Google plans to bring the app to Android and macOS.
The channel, La7, reportedly used the DLSS 5 footage in a segment about the upscaling tech. It seemingly issued takedown requests for videos using the same clips, including the original trailer from Nvidia and videos from creators covering DLSS 5’s launch.
The explosion of AI search has created a gold rush for firms claiming they can change what gets cited.
It never once told me to walk into a river.
A fascinating profile on litigator Jay Edelson, a longtime tech adversary who’s been filing cases against OpenAI and Google over their LLMs. “Courts are fed up with these companies, and juries are kind of sick of big tech for doing a lot of damage to society,” Edelson says. Sam Altman has called him a “leech tarted up as a freedom fighter,” and Edelson says Altman is “Lex Luthor.”
A proposed class action lawsuit claims Perplexity “effectively planted a bug” on users’ computers by embedding trackers from Meta and Google inside its AI search engine, as reported earlier by Ars Technica. It also alleges that Perplexity’s incognito mode “does nothing” to protect user privacy:
Even paid users who turned on the “Incognito” feature still had their conversations shared with Meta and Google, along with their email addresses and other identifiers that allowed Meta and Google to personally identify them.
Previous versions used a custom license that has been criticized as too restrictive. With Gemma 4, Google is moving to the Apache 2.0 license, which is much more permissive and widely used by developers, including for other Google products like Android. The new model also offers performance improvements, as detailed in the video below.
