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Verdict: Xiaomi 15S Pro

The Xiaomi 15S Pro offers a similarly strong overall package as the Pro model. This is hardly surprising, as everything apart from the chipset remains the same. In its effort to become more independent and to offer all components in-house, Xiaomi is on a very promising path with its XRing O1. Considering Google's work with its Tensor series, Xiaomi's SoC debut is genuinely remarkable. While the 15S Pro with the XRing O1 is slightly less powerful than the 15 Pro with the Snapdragon 8 Elite, it offers more consistent performance overall.Anyone willing to accept compromises in update support and availability will get a great smartphone with solid hardware. However, we see no clear reason to choose the 15S Pro over the Xiaomi 15 Pro.

Anyone willing to accept compromises in update support and availability will get a great smartphone with solid hardware. However, we see no clear reason to choose the 15S Pro over the Xiaomi 15 Pro.

Price and availability

Xiaomi 15S Pro is currently available exclusively on the Chinese market. The standard configuration, which includes 16 GB of LPDDR5T RAM and 512 GB of UFS 4.1 storage, is priced at ¥5,499 (approximately €680 or $765 USD)

Japan is an important market for Google. According to data from StatCounter, Google currently ranks second with a market share of 5.81%, far behind the Apple iPhone with a gigantic 62.46%, but just ahead of Samsung and Xiaomi. However, smartphones from the Pixel 7 series have been banned from retail sales there due to a patent dispute with South Korean mobile phone company Pantech.

As MLex reports, a district court in Tokyo has ruled that Google has infringed a standards essential patent relating to the LTE modem in Pixel smartphones. Such patents are required for manufacturing products, which is why they must be licensed under fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory conditions. According to Pantech, Google has been using the exact method described in the patent to handle communication between Pixel smartphones and cell towers, but did not license the patent.

The court stressed that preliminary injunctions for standard essential patents (SEP) are only possible if the defendant has not attempted to obtain a license for the respective patent. Google had delayed negotiations and insisted on conditions such as a confidentiality clause, which Pantech argued was completely unnecessary. Google also refused to propose a "reasonable" royalty rate during the proceedings, claiming that calculating it would be "too complex".

After Google refused to provide the court with data on the sales figures of Pixel smartphones in Japan, the sales ban on the Pixel 7 series was imposed. Pantech has already filed a lawsuit to halt sales of the Pixel 8 and Pixel 9 as well as the corresponding Pro models. If Google is unable to reach an agreement with Pantech, the company may be forced to withdraw from the Japanese market

TL;DR

• PS3 emulator aPS3e is now available on the Google Play Store.
• From the mysterious Chinese developer aenu, it’s based on the RPCS3 source code.
• The project now claims to be open-source, but may not meet all requirements.

The successor to the Fairphone 5 will be officially unveiled on June 25, 2025, as NieuweMobiel has learned. WinFuture has already published an initial image showing the mid-range smartphone in Horizon Black.

Alternatively, the Fairphone 6 will also be available in Cloud White and Forest Green. At least one variant is reportedly equipped with 8 GB of RAM and 256 GB of flash storage. The design has been greatly modernized, with the screen bezels being significantly narrower than on the Fairphone 5, while the frame will be flat. One of the buttons is designed in a contrasting color, which could be the slider that detaches the back from the body.

The back is said to consist of two halves in different colors. Cameras include a main camera and an ultra-wide-angle camera, but no telephoto camera. The focus of the Fairphone 6 is said to be on making repairs as easy as possible. Components such as the two rear cameras, the selfie camera, the speakers, the USB-C port, the display and the battery are reportedly modular, making replacement by end users relatively straightforward. Spare parts will be sold directly to consumers.

The modular, split back allows users to get creative with color combinations. WinFuture speculates that the frame of the Fairphone 6 will be made of plastic instead of metal, as no antenna bands are visible. The base model of the Fairphone 6 is expected to launch for a suggested retail price of €549.

Sharp has introduced the Aquos R10, a new mid-range smartphone featuring a flat display, frame and back panel. The circular camera module barely sticks out from the 0.35-inch chassis, while the phone weighs 6.9 oz. Moreover, this mid-range device is IP68 certified for water resistance, and its MIL-STD-810G certification means that it’s protected against drop damage.

Interestingly, Sharp opted for the durable Gorilla Glass Victus 2 on the back, but the display is only covered by the more price-conscious Gorilla Glass 5. The 6.5-inch display utilizes Sharp's proprietary Pro IGZO OLED panel with a resolution of 2340 x 1080 pixels, a full-screen brightness of 1,500 nits and a peak HDR brightness of 3,000 nits. The refresh rate automatically adjusts between 1Hz and 240Hz, making the display faster than most other flagship panels. The fingerprint sensor is integrated into the power button on the right side of the phone.

Sharp further offers a 50MP f/2.2 selfie camera, a 50MP f/1.9 main camera with a 1/1.55-inch sensor and a 50MP f/2.2 ultrawide camera. Notably, these cameras were developed in collaboration with Leica, as the main camera sports a Leica Hektor lens and a spectral sensor to capture accurate colors. Additionally, videos can be recorded in Dolby Vision HDR.

Furthermore, the mid-range Sharp smartphone is powered by the fast Qualcomm Snapdragon 7+ Gen 3, which is paired with 12GB RAM and 256GB or 512GB of UFS 4.0 internal storage. The latter can be expanded via a microSD card. The 5,000mAh battery supports USB-C fast charging with up to 36 watts, and the Sharp Aquos R10 ships with Android 15. Three major Android updates and five years of security patches are promised.

TL;DR

• Google is expanding its “Ask someone to pay” feature for the Play Store.
• Users in the US, Japan, Mexico, and Indonesia will now have access to the feature.
• This option allows you to ask someone outside of your Google family group to pay for a transaction.

TL;DR

• Google announced Intrusion Logging, a new Android 16 feature to help high-risk users detect if their device has been compromised by hackers.
• It securely backs up encrypted activity logs (like network info and app installs) to the cloud, accessible only to the user for forensic analysis.
• The feature uses the new Intrusion Detection API, isn’t enabled by default, and requires activating Advanced Protection mode to use.

Notifications in Chrome are a useful feature to keep up with updates from your favorite sites. However, we know that some notifications may be spammy or even deceptive. We’ve received reports of notifications diverting you to download suspicious software, tricking you into sharing personal information or asking you to make purchases on potentially fraudulent online store fronts.

To defend against these threats, Chrome is launching warnings of unwanted notifications on Android. This new feature uses on-device machine learning to detect and warn you about potentially deceptive or spammy notifications, giving you an extra level of control over the information displayed on your device.

When a notification is flagged by Chrome, you’ll see the name of the site sending the notification, a message warning that the contents of the notification are potentially deceptive or spammy, and the option to either unsubscribe from the site or see the flagged content..

TL;DR

• Android’s long-awaited Battery Health menu has arrived in Android 16 Beta 3, but only for the Pixel 9 series and the Pixel 8a.
• Google has confirmed that older Pixels, including the not-so-old Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro, will not receive this feature.
• The decision is due to unspecified “product limitations,” leaving aging device users without means for native battery diagnostics.

The zero-day, tracked as CVE-2025-27363, resides in the System component and stems from a memory handling bug in FreeType — an open-source library widely used for font rendering. The flaw allows for local code execution without requiring additional privileges or user interaction. According to Facebook’s security team, which first disclosed details about the vulnerability in March 2025, attackers can exploit the issue through malformed TrueType GX or variable font files, leading to heap buffer overflows and potentially arbitrary code execution. While the vulnerability was fixed in FreeType 2.13.0 over two years ago, older versions remain embedded in many Android builds and third-party software, making the risk of exploitation significant.

Google has acknowledged signs of limited, targeted exploitation of CVE-2025-27363 in the wild, reinforcing the urgency for users and OEMs to apply the update. Devices patched with the 2025-05-05 security level will receive a fix for this vulnerability, along with all other patches from earlier levels.

Beyond the zero-day, the May 2025 bulletin addresses over 40 high-severity vulnerabilities affecting Android components such as the Framework, System, kernel, and key third-party hardware modules from Arm, MediaTek, Qualcomm, and Imagination Technologies.

Android device manufacturers are expected to incorporate these fixes into their firmware. Devices running Android 10 and later will receive some of these patches through Google Play system updates, covering components like the Wi-Fi stack, Permission Controller, and Documents UI. However, it is recommended that users of older models move to a newer device running Android version 13 or later. For some models, third-party Android distributions like GrapheneOS and LineageOS exist, which might provide security in aging devices.

Summary

• Google Messages is rolling out an Unsubscribe button to combat spam.
• Pressing the button sends a 'STOP' message from the user to the sender, blocking non-essential texts.
• The Unsubscribe button is available for RCS for business messages and texts from short codes.

I do not know the reason for this. But, Voyager minimizes once a while like my keyboard is on when its not. I use Futo keyboard and have experienced this bug for a long time across voyager versions. My android version is 15 but I also used to experience this in android 14.

At the time of the screenshot I was using Niagara launcher which could perhaps be related.