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Maybe you don’t think you and your favorite airline agree on anything: on how much room an adult human requires, on what counts as food, or on how much it should cost for a soothing, tiny bottle of wine. But surely you agree on at least one point: People take way too long getting to their seats. For passengers, the cumbersome boarding process—watching people insist that yes, this bag will fit in t...

For the last few years, every major U.S. wireless carrier has begun letting you buy any phone for $0 down with two years of monthly payments. It’s a tempting offer, but a bad habit you should try to kick. Paying for your phone over two years makes it easy to overspend, dulling the pain you should feel when you buy a $800+ phone. It also probably means you bought your phone from a wireless carrier...

Serious typists deserve a responsive keyboard. Here are three steps to tactile heaven. 1. GOOD: Aukey KM-G3 RGB Add some tappy feedback to your strokes and sharpen your email routine with Aukey’s nicely priced keyboard. Even with its garish, multicolored LED backlights and springy key switches that click loudly enough to be heard five cubicles away, it’s miles ahead of that freebie you’re typing o...

As certain ­forward-thinking magazines predicted last year (ahem), VR’s first mass-culture moment has arrived not as a device but as a destination. There’s far more immersive potential in a dedicated VR facility—with its stagecraft and high-end components—than what’s currently possible in your living room. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We've all had smartphones for the better part of a decade, yet their prices just seem to keep climbing. High-end phones seem to cost $800+ now. Don't let a monthly payment plan fool you, that's a ton of money for a device that likely won't last you more than two years. There are some Android phones under $500 that do the trick, but performance gets mucky when you wade into the $200 - $300 price—wh...

Luge looks silly. It looks easy, too: lie down on a sled, let gravity do the work, climb the podium. In reality, of course, luge is fascinatingly complex. And, as American Emily Sweeney’s brutal crash this week made clear, it's dangerous too. A good start is crucial (that’s where the gloves with little spikes on the fingertips come in). The rule of thumb says every 1/100th of a second you lose up...

The world of smart speakers is beginning to fan out. A year or two ago, Google Home and Amazon’s Echo were your only choices. Now, there are more than a dozen competitors, and they're growing more diverse all the time. Every major voice assistant has a speaker now. Even Siri has the HomePod and Cortana has the Invoke. Amazon is still the alpha of this pack, though, inside more devices than any oth...

For years, Medela has ruled, undisputed, over Breast Pump Land. If you have to pump in the hospital, the nurses will likely wheel in a Medela pump. When you call in your free pump from your insurer, it will probably be a Medela pump. I know, because I’ve had two kids in three years and every single time I’ve needed a breast pump, a Medela one has appeared. But that’s changing. In lactation rooms a...

Most of my friends are musicians or audio nerds. (Lord help me.) Ever since Apple loaned me a HomePod to test a week ago, I've been bragging to my peers that I have the new, highly anticipated Wi-Fi speaker at the house. All of them quickly ask me the same thing: Does it sound good? I think that question is incomplete. Sure, the HomePod sounds really terrific, and it's a good purchase if you want...

When I was growing up, watching TV was something even my grandparents had figured out. You picked up the TV remote, and surfed to the channel you wanted to watch. But, times have changed. If you’re like me, you watch most of your TV through Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime Video, and a dozen other video apps, and probably have another box, maybe a Roku or Apple TV, with yet another remote control—maybe...

For some folks, President’s Day is a time to honor U.S. presidents of old, like George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. For others it’s a much-needed extra day off work. But for tech companies and online retailers, it’s another opportunity to lay out some discounts and rake in some sales. We hope you’re able to enjoy the weekend. If you happen to be in the mood to peruse, we’ve hand-picked some of...

When it comes to work bags, I am a ride-or-die backpack person. With a backpack, the weight is carried evenly across your shoulders. Backpacks have a more boxy main compartment, which is useful for carrying oddly-shaped items, like running shoes and my lunch. And they’re usually (but not always!) more affordable. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

On May 3, 2008, a sunny Saturday in Copenhagen, a crowd gathered along a dock to watch a 58-foot submarine be lowered into the water. Part art project, part engineering feat, the submarine weighed 40 tons and had been built by volunteers at minimal cost from donated iron and other parts. The onlookers cheered as the submarine floated for the first time. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podc...

Introducing WIRED articles in an entirely new format: AMP Stories. Read the story This incredible—and terrifying—snowboarding trick has only ever been pulled off by five people. Read the story Get lost in the cosmos with these space photos. Read the story Even the greatest Mount Everest climbers didn't reach the summit by themselves. Meet the unsung heroes of the highest mountain in the world. Rea...

I’ve taken a lot of heavy fire and commanded starships in the last couple of months, and Razer’s flagship Thresher headsets have been my ears and voice throughout it all. Razer has a few different versions of the its best headset. There are $150 wireless versions of Thresher for PS4 and Xbox and Ultimate versions for PS4 and Xbox that come with a special base and stand. Learn more about your ad ch...

Most of the time, it doesn’t pay to try and make something look more expensive than it actually is. Squeak around for the day in a pair of pleather leggings and try to tell me that I’m wrong. But I’m happy when a company can work it, and the RHA MA650s are a great example. From the minute you open the box, the RHA MA650s look, feel, and most importantly, sound like a much more expensive set of hea...

The first time I watched an Olympic curling match on television, I entertained a thought that is surely shared by everyone who sees the sport for the first time: What the hell am I looking at? It was during the 2002 Games in Salt Lake City, Utah, and I tuned in to the live feed at the very beginning of a women's medal match. I was intrigued by the grace of the players and how they could effortless...

February is the cruelest month, as the poem goes. Oh, no, wait. That's April. February is a great month to be born in if you want to become famous, but the rest of us might find the cold, gray days to be a bit of a bummer. In sum, this is a great time of year to curl up with a hot cocoa in front of a new smart TV. We've rounded up the best weekend deals with the help of our friends at TechBargains...

With robot vacuums, as with everything else in life, you get what you pay for. It boggles the mind, and the wallet, to say that $700 is a reasonable price to pay for great cleaning capabilities and a heretofore unprecedented level of control. And yet, here we are. Cheaper botvacs don’t always have the necessary engineering for a thorough, automated clean. But paying a higher price for a robot that...

Some audiophiles dislike Bose with a passion, and noise cancelling in general. The hate is unwarranted. Here at WIRED, we love these headphones, and it's hard to top Bose QuietComfort series. Bose's noise cancelling technology has come a long way, making the QC series among best headphones for travel or to wear during a noisy commute. Usually, you have to pay about $300 for a set of QuietComfort 2...

The scratch was small, maybe half an inch long. Hard to even see unless you knew where to look. But once you knew, it was the only thing you could see. It was all I could see, anyway. I had only had the car for two weeks when the scratch appeared. I'd gassed up just once by the time I saw it, right there on the hood. How could it have happened? A mishap at the car wash? A passerby I'd wronged? Som...

Just 27 hours after launching a Tesla Roadster into orbit around the sun, Elon Musk has turned his gaze from the red planet to the blue one, where he's trying to get a different sort of project off the ground. “If we can send a Roadster to the asteroid belt, we can probably solve Model 3 production," Musk said on an investors call today. "It’s just a matter of timing. Learn more about your ad choi...

In all their infinite wisdom, the Romans decided to celebrate Valentine's Day in the dead of winter. Even if that wasn't their original intention, the holiday is a good excuse to stave off the cold, gray doldrums with a new gaming computer. Or maybe a smart home assistant to help you check the forecast? With the help of our friends at TechBargains, we've pulled together a few deals to indulge your...

What a game, right? Those Patriots. Those Eagles! TRICK PLAYS! That's a Super Bowl for you. And the action continued during the commercial breaks, especially if you were interested in what various companies thought was worth paying upwards of $5 million to parade in front of 110 million people. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

As a WIRED product reviewer, I am surrounded by at least a dozen backpacks at any given time. Most of them are astonishingly beautiful (to someone who likes bags, anyway), made from upcycled materials in eye-catching colors, or with Japanese-inspired architectural lines, or studded with gleaming buckles that parajumpers use on their harnesses. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices...