Google Lens makes its way to the Xperia XZ2/XZ2 Compact’s camera app

• Sony announced Google Lens integration in the Xperia XZ2 and XZ2 Compact's default camera app.
• The Xperia XZ2 Premium will also feature Lens in the camera app.
• During Google I/O 2018, Google announced that itself and other companies will integrate feature Lens in their smartphones' default camera apps.

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Available within Google Photos for most Android smartphones, Google Lens is available in the Sony Xperia XZ2 and XZ2 Compact's default camera app.

According to Sony, all you have to do is update the Google app in the Play Store and Lens should show up as a new mode in the camera app. Sony also mentioned that the upcoming XZ2 Premium will also feature Lens in its camera app out of the box, with no update required.

Once you select Lens on the Xperia XZ2 or XZ2 Compact, you should see the redesigned UI that showed up in the most recent update. Along with the refreshed visuals, Lens now features real-time search that automatically loads results as you pan to different objects, copies and pastes text from real-world objects, and identifies articles of clothing and furniture.

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Those slick, new Google Lens features are rolling out now — here's how they work

The new Google Lens features made for quite an impression at Google I/O 2018, as the company demonstrated a variety of machine vision features. Now, it looks like Google is quietly delivering a new UI …

The good news is that you do not have to own one of Sony's latest smartphones for easier access to Lens. During its developer conference, Google announced that itself, LG, Motorola, Xiaomi, HMD Global/Nokia, OnePlus, Asus, and other manufacturers will eventually get Lens in the default camera app.

Lens in the camera app works as it does in Google Assistant. You can use it to identify landmarks, products, animals, plants, and text, copy and paste text from real-world objects, add events to your calendar, add contact information, and more.

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MapleStory M pre-registration now open after soft launching earlier this week

• MapleStory M, a remake of the original MapleStory for PC, is now available for pre-registration on the Play Store.
• The game soft launched earlier this week in several countries, so the official launch shouldn't be too far off.
• At launch, MapleStory M will feature five classes, as well as an auto button like other modern mobile MMOs.

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More than 15 years after it was first released, MapleStory is finally coming to mobile devices as MapleStory M. The game is a faithful remake of Nexon's 2D MMO release, and pre-registration is available now on Google Play. Pre-registration will reward players with a number of exclusive rewards, as well as a notification when the game is released.

This generally signals that the game is due for release soon, although it's been available in certain countries since the beginning of the week. The title has already soft launched in Canada, Australia, Philippines, Indonesia, and New Zealand, so if you're in one of those countries you can download the game right away.

MapleStory M

MapleStory is a free-to-play 2D platforming game where players kill monsters to collect weapons and items. Although its popularity has died down in recent years, Nexon continued to release updates to the game more than 10 years after its release. MapleStory M represents a continuation of the series, and will likely gain hundreds of thousands of players on nostalgia alone.

At release, MapleStory M will feature five classes: Dark Knight, Bow Master, Night Lord, Bishop, and Corsair. The visuals are virtually identical to the original release (MapleStory 2 still hasn't seen a global release), and gameplay has been adapted to touch screen devices, with an auto button to speed things up like in other mobile MMOs.

You can pre-register now by clicking on the button below. As more people around the world pre-register, the rewards increase, so go tell your friends! If you've already downloaded the game, let us hear your first impressions in the comments.

Play Store: Pre-register for MapleStory M

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Google’s Neighbourly looks to get you answers from local community members

• Google launched a hyperlocal-focused app called Neighbourly.
• As the name suggests, Neighbourly lets you ask and answer questions in your neighborhood.
• The app is only available on Android for Mumbai residents for the time being.

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What is likely Google's millionth attempt at social apps, the search giant launched Neighbourly, designed to get you as many answers about your neighborhood from local residents as possible.

Currently available in beta, you can either type out your questions or use your voice. As you wait for answers, you can swipe through other questions and answers and give answers of your own either through text or with your voice. You can also share questions to get answers from those who do not use Neighbourly.

Keep in mind that Neighbourly is only open to residents of Mumbai, though Google will presumably expand the app to other neighborhoods and cities. As a result, the app currently supports English and eight Indian languages.

Also, Neighbourly is only available on Android. Google did not say whether it will launch the app on iOS, though that might wait until the app launches in other locations.

Finally, personal details like your phone number, full name, and other contact information are kept private. Other people can see your profile picture and first name, however.

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Google has seven messaging apps – Here's all of them and what they do

Since the launch of Google Talk in 2005, Google has emphasized the importance of people using the company's services to communicate with one another. In fact, Google thinks it's so important, that it made more …

If any of this rings a bell, that is because Nextdoor offers similar functionality. Seeing the presence that the service already has in the U.S., the Netherlands, and France, it makes sense for Google to soft-launch Neighbourly in India rather than in the U.S.

Then again, Google's focus on India is well documented. In 2017 alone, Google launched two services in the country: Areo and Tez. Whereas Areo aggregates home maintenance, beauty, and food delivery services, Tez uses India's UPI platform for instant bank transfers.

If you live in Mumbai and have an Android device, you can download the Neighbourly app at the link below.

Neighbourly

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Arm Mali-G76 GPU deep dive

In the pursuit of ever greater graphics performance, Arm made some significant changes with the third entry in the high-performance tier of its Bifrost architecture, the Mali-G76. A number of these important tweaks already made their way to the mid-tier Mali-G52, but the G76 aims to push performance up by another 50 percent in just a single iteration.

To see how Arm is pushing its chips' graphics performance, let's take a closer look inside the Mali-G76.

More execution lanes, more performance

As we touched on in the announcement, the key to the performance improvement lies in doubling up the number of execution engines inside each Mali-G76 core. In the Mali-G7X architecture, each core contains three execution engines, represented as a multiple of an MP1 on the product naming scheme — An MP2 has two cores and six total execution engines and an MP4 has four cores for 12 execution engines. In the Mali-G52, IP partners have the option of either two or three execution engines for more flexible low-mid range performance.

These execution engines contain the execution lanes handling scalar threads for math. These all run in parallel, so a core with more threads can do more math at any one time. However, increasing the number of lanes also increases bandwidth, texture support, and power and silicon area requirements.

The Mali-G76 increases the number of lanes in each execution unit to eight, up from four with the Mali-G72. In a single Mali-G76 core there are now 24 execution lanes, up from 12 in the G72. This doubles the compute capability of a single core, resulting in a reasonably small 28 percent increase in area size. G76 cores will be slightly larger than previous G72 and G71 cores, but they are more powerful, so we can certainly expect the graphics core count to fall in upcoming smartphone SoCs compared with the current generation.

The maximum number of cores when using a Mali-G76 also now caps out at 20. That's a decrease from the maximum of 32 cores with the G72, though we never really saw smartphone designs venture further than the high teens anyway. Despite the lower core count, the maximum number of execution lanes in the largest configurations increases. A 20-core Mali-G76 offers 480 execution lanes versus just 384 lanes in a 32 core Mali-G72 setup. Therefore peak performance in the biggest configuration can be increased by up to 25 percent.

The second major benefit of increasing the number of lanes in each execution engine is a relative decrease in power consumption — each core is more power efficient for the same workload than a previous generation core. This is because the power draw of the other GPU components remains mostly constant when scaling up the number of execution lanes.

Arm's graphic above demonstrates that although the relative energy cost of the arithmetic datapath and register files remains the same, there are major efficiency savings made in the data path control, cache, and quad control parts of the GPU. This allows the G76 to boast a 30 percent improvement in energy efficiency compared to the G72 on the same process node.

These execution lanes also now support INT8 dot product math support via a new instruction. Each lane supports four multiply-accumulate operations per cycle to greatly improve the throughput. We've already seen this implementation in the mid-range Mali-G52. Arm says this can improve the efficiency of machine learning applications using INT8 dot product by around 270 percent compared to the previous generation.

Balancing the design

Along with the increase in compute power per core, the Mali-G72 boasts a number of other improvements to ensure the change in design doesn't produce any unwanted bottlenecks.

There's a new dual texture mapper, which as the name suggests handles texture sampling, resizing, and placement onto 3D models. It's capable of two texels per cycle, doubling the rendering throughput over the G72. The Quad manager has been optimized to keep the eight lane execution engines and the dual texture mapping parts of the GPU well fed with data.

Arm's latest graphics part features a number of other smaller optimizations, including out of order polygon list writeback to prevent stalls during cache misses, varying pre-loads to improve efficiency and depth pre-loads for better multi-render performance, and TLS Address interleaving to improve the speed of cache fetching by better organizing the memory space.

This results in not only a number of performance optimizations, but also more linear performance scaling as the core count increases. Arm now expects essentially linear boosts to performance with core counts up into the high teens and only a minimal loss when capping out at 20. Previously there had been some more noticeable curtailing in the performance gains when scaling up closer to the maximum core count.

What to expect from Mali-G76 GPUs

As we've come to expect from Arm's generational graphics improvements, both performance and energy efficiency are set for a notable uplift. Actual implementations in smartphones could see graphics performance improve by as much as 50 percent.

The Mali-G76 presents a bit of a naming problem when gauging performance though. Mali-G76 designs with lower core counts will provide comparable and better performance to existing G71 and G72 GPUs with high core counts. The G71 and G72 saw high-performance smartphones offer core counts in the high teens, but Arm expects this to fall to the low teens with the G76, even though performance will climb. For example, a Mali-G76 MP14 will offer better performance than a Mali-G72 MP18.

Each Mali-G76 core can be up to twice as powerful as in the G72.

Just like with the new Cortex-A76, the Mali-G76 is a flexible component designed to scale all the way from mid-tier performance mobile devices up to higher performance laptops, as well as potential AR and VR products.

The Mali-G76 is available for Arm's partners to license now, meaning we could see devices using it on the market by the end of the year.

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Get up to 75% off these Oddworld games right now on Google Play Store

If you still haven't picked up Oddworld: New 'n' Tasty on mobile then now is the time! Just Add Water's remake of the classic 2D platformer Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee is on sale on the Google Play Store (and Apple's App Store), along with two other titles in the Oddworld series.

Oddworld: New 'n' Tasty is currently available for just $1.99 down from $7.99 on the Play Store. That's a whopping 75 percent off the titular Mudokon's first adventure, and even if you played through Oddysee back in the day it's absolutely worth experiencing it again in high definition and with new 3D assets.

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A lot of Android games depend on a mobile data connection. Whether it's downloading stuff from the server like Clash of Clans, or using it for DRM protection like most Final Fantasy games, it seems …

That's not all, though, as Oddworld: Munch's Oddysee and Oddworld: Stranger's Wrath are also both reduced to $0.99 down from $2.99. The former transitioned the Oddworld series to 3D, while the latter is a quirky first-person shooter/third-person adventure hybrid in a Western-style setting. 

All three games on offer are one-time purchase affairs, so you won't have to worry about any pesky microtransactions or paywalls impeding your progress. They also all support controllers, just in case you're not a fan of touchscreen controls for platformers (I feel you).

You can grab each game via the buttons below, just make sure you do so before the sale ends in 7 days time!

Download Oddworld New 'n' Tasty

Download Oddworld: Munch's Oddysee

Download Oddworld: Stranger's Wrath

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Snapdragon 850 could power foldable Windows phone/laptop hybrids

• Qualcomm will release a Snapdragon 850 chipset: a beefed-up version of the Snapdragon 845.
• Unlike the 845, the 850 will primarily run laptops, tablets, and hybrid PC devices.
• Reportedly, both Microsoft and Dell are working on foldable mobile devices running the newest chipset.

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Windows Phone is dead, but that doesn't mean you'll never see the Windows operating system on a mobile device again. According to information on WinFuture, both Microsoft and Dell have plans to release a foldable smartphone/laptop hybrid running on the upcoming Qualcomm Snapdragon 850 chipset.

Of course, the latest-and-greatest mobile chipset is the Snapdragon 845, which powers flagship devices like the Samsung Galaxy S9, the OnePlus 6, and the HTC U12 Plus. The Snapdragon 850 is reportedly just a Snapdragon 845 chip that's been beefed up a bit to run at faster speeds.

As such, the new chip could run the device design that Microsoft recently patented: an all-screen, foldable mobile device running Windows 10 that looks like someone mashed together a Surface Book and a Samsung Galaxy Note. Check out the unofficial renders below:

Along with this mysterious Microsoft device, Dell is working on a project codenamed "Januss" that will allegedly be similar in that it will be a foldable mobile device running the Windows 10 operating system.

Whether or not we see these hypothetical devices any time soon (or ever), we undoubtedly will see devices running the Snapdragon 850 chipset before the end of 2018. Asus, Dell, and Lenovo (among others), all have traditional laptop/tablet hybrid devices in the works running on Qualcomm's newest chip.

Editor's Pick

Huawei, Chinese display maker teaming up for 8-inch foldable smartphone?

We've heard reports of Huawei's foldable smartphone before, but now it seems the company is working with Chinese display manufacturer BOE to make it a reality. According to Korea's ET News outlet (translated version), the two …

According to WinFuture, Qualcomm's intention is to continue to push the Snapdragon 845 for traditional smartphone products, while simultaneously pushing the Snapdragon 850 for use in ARM-based PC's. Since the 845 and 850 chipsets are essentially the same product, just tweaked a bit, we can expect more devices in the future that blur the lines between laptop, tablet, and smartphone.

What do you think? Is a laptop/smartphone hybrid device as depicted in the renders above interest you? Let us know in the comments!

NEXT: What we know so far about Samsung's foldable phone

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Weekly Plan Spotlight: Pre-Order Deals on the LG G7 ThinQ

Welcome back to the Weekly Plan Spotlight! We've been taking a bit of a break recently, but with the shiny new LG G7 ThinQ smartphone set for release on June 1 in the U.S. we wanted to let you know the best plans which let you get it first.

Has this exciting news passed you by? Check out our very own glowing review of this top device

Now, listen up because we've got two possible deals for you. They aren't as complicated as we might make them sound.

What's the ThinQ Sprint Deal?

You'll probably want to team up with a buddy for this one. When you pre-order the LG G7 ThinQ on Flex Lease on Sprint, you'll get another LG G7 ThinQ Flex Lease free. That's two lease-to-buy ThinQ devices for the price of one.

You have to pair up your Flex Lease with a plan of course, and the Unlimited Freedom Plan with Sprint costs $60/month with Sprint. The Unlimited Freedom Plan comes with 1080p HD video, 10GB of 4G mobile hotspot, Hulu, and of course unlimited talk, text and data.

Fortunately, since you need a second line for your second device anyway, you can take advantage of the fact that a second line on that plan is only $40/month.

Still following? So that's a two-for-one phone lease and $50 each per month for the two unlimited plans. In fact if you can use more plans, it's worth noting that lines 3-5 on the Unlimited Freedom Plan are free too.

So how do the numbers look for two of us?

Here's how it would pan out for you and your buddy:

• Retail value of the ThinQ: $792
• What you would jointly pay monthly for two flex leases: $33
• Joint monthly total including two lines on the plan above: $133
• What you and your friend would pay each per month: $66.50

So that's less than $70 per month each for a top flagship phone and an unlimited data plan.

Not bad at all. Any fine print with that?

Naturally. Here's what you should bear in mind:

• This deal requires a new line of service activation for each device and an 18-month lease. Well-qualified customers are eligible.
• At the end of the 18-month lease, you have the option to buy your devices. You'll pay the balance between the full price and what you've paid so far.
• There are taxes on any device you go with and you'll have to pay that up front regardless.
• If you cancel your service, the remaining device balance will become due.
• On the Unlimited Freedom Plan once you've reached 23GB of data, your speeds may temporarily slow down during times of high network congestion.

If you like the sound of this deal then buddy up and check out the widget and button below.

Get the LG G7 ThinQ with Sprint

So what's the Verizon Deal?

No need to find a teammate who just happens to be in need of a new phone/plan combo for this one.

Here it is: If you pre-order the LG G7 ThinQ with Verizon you can get $100 off the retail value of the handset by making monthly payments.

Even better, you can get a further 50% off the retail value ($375) with a trade in of an eligible smartphone. You might have assumed the trade-in phone would have to be an iPhone X or similar to get the full half-price discount. Fortunately this isn't the case. We won't go into the full list, but even trading in Galaxy S7 would do the job.

Both these discounts are applied over 24 monthly credits, so you've got to commit two years to Verizon for these big savings. This could be worse; it's the U.S. top ranked network.

Interesting. What's the fine print on this one?

There are a few things. In Verizon's own words:

• Purchase of new phone must be on an installment plan.
• Deal credit is applied via 24 monthly bill credits and starts within 2 bills.To get the full value, you will need to stay on your installment payment plan for the full 24 months.
• Activation fee of $25/line applies.
• Requires a new line of service to qualify.
• If you cancel service, full balance is due.
• This deal excludes device's sales taxes.

I can live with that. What are my monthly totals going to be?

Verizon's Go Unlimited Freedom Plan costs $75/month with autopay (not include monthly taxes and surcharges). You can select a cheaper plan, but let's use this one for sake of comparing the figures:

• Full retail price of the ThinQ: $750
• Monthly installments with the discount: $27.08
• Monthly total for the device and the Unlimited Freedom Plan: $102.08
• Monthly discount if you traded in an eligible device: $15.62
• Monthly total for the device and plan and a traded-in device: $86.46

So there you have it. very competitive value for a spanking new top-end flagship and unlimited everything. Granted you need to sacrifice last year's model, but at least you don't need a reliable friend.

If the Verizon offering is more your style, have a play with the button and widget below.

Get the LG G7 ThinQ with Verizon

The AAPicks team writes about things we think you'll like, and we may see a share of revenue from any purchases made through affiliate links.

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Compare Phones and Plans with the Android Authority Plan Tool:

Is this plan not quite right for you? Head over to our Compare Phones & Plans tool to fully customize your mobile experience and painlessly transition from one carrier to another!

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Arm Cortex-A76 CPU deep dive

Despite the minor change in digits to Arm's latest CPU moniker, the latest processor design is a significant release for the company powering Android smartphones everywhere. The Cortex-A76 is a ground-up microarchitecture redesign which emphasizes improving peak performance and, perhaps more importantly, sustaining it in compact form factors. According to Arm this is just the first in a series of CPUs that will build off the A76 to push performance to new heights.

Arm's Cortex-A76 is still compatible with existing processors, as well as the company's DynamIQ CPU cluster technology. However, the micro-architecture redesign provides a 35 percent performance improvement over the Cortex-A75 on average, along with 40 percent improved power efficiency. The biggest wins are for floating point and machine learning math tasks, so let's dive deeper into the new design to see what's been changed.

Keep the core well fed

If there's a general theme to understanding the changes with the Cortex-A76 it's to "go wider," boosting the CPU's throughput to keep the more powerful execution core well fed with things to do.

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In the execution core, the Cortex-A76 boasts two simple arithmetic locus units (ALUs) for basic math and bit-shifting, one branch, and one multi-cycle integer and simple combined ALU to perform multiplication. The Cortex-A75 just had one basic ALU and one ALU/MAC, which helps explain the integer performance boost in Arm's benchmarks.

This is paired up with two SIMD NEON execution pipelines, only one of which can handle floating-point divide and multiply-accumulate instructions. Both of these dual 128-bit pipes offer twice the bandwidth of Arm's prior CPUs for its single instruction multiple data extensions. Half-precision FP16 support remains from the A75, and this also has big benefits for boosting low precision INT8 dot product extensions, which are becoming increasingly popular in machine learning applications.

Another major change in the A76 is the new branch predictor, which is now decoupled from the instruction fetch. The branch predictor runs at twice the speed of the fetch at 32 versus 16 bytes per cycle. The main reason to do this is to expose lots of memory level parallelism — in other words, the potential to handle multiple memory operations seemingly at once. This is particularly handy for dealing with cache and TLB misses and helps to remove cycles where nothing happens from the pipeline.

The Cortex-A76 also moves over to a 4-instruction/cycle decode path rising to eight 16-bit instructions, up from three with the A75 and 2 with the A73. This means that the CPU core can now dispatch up to eight µops/cycle, instead of six with the A75 and four with the A73. Combined with eight issue queues, one of each of the execution units, and a 128-entry instruction window, Arm is further enhancing the processor's ability to execute instructions out of order to boost the instructions per cycle (IPC) performance.

Going wider early in the design ensures high instruction throughput, which will keep the high-performance math units further down the pipe well fed, even during a cache miss. This is what's helping Arm boost the IPC and math performance metrics, but it comes with a hit to area and energy.

Lower latency to memory

None of these fetch and execution improvements would be much good if the processor was bottlenecked by memory reads and writes, so Arm's made improvements here too.

There's the same 64KB, 4-way set associative L1 cache and 256-512KB private L2 as before, but the decoupled address generation and cache-lookup pipelines have received double the bandwidth. Memory level parallelism is a key target here as well, as the memory management unit can handle 68 in-flight loads, 72 in-flight stores, and 20 outstanding non-prefetch misses. The whole cache hierarchy has been optimized for latency too. It only takes four cycles to access the L1 cache, nine cycles to L2, and 31 cycles to go out to the L3 cache. The bottom line is memory access is faster, which will help to speed up execution.

The Cortex-A76 offers improved single core throughput, lower latency memory access, and sustained performance.

Speaking of the L3 cache, there's support for up to 4MB of memory in the second generation DynamIQ shared unit. This huge memory pool will most likely be reserved for laptop class products through, as doubling the cache only produces roughly a 5 percent performance uplift. Smartphone products will likely cap out at a maximum of 2MB, owing to the lower performance point and tighter restrictions on silicon area and cost.

Achieving laptop-class performance (TLDR)

The Cortex-A76 is also the first CPU starting to transition away from 32-bit support. The A76 still supports Aarch32 but just at the lowest privilege application level (EL0). Meanwhile, Aarch64 is supported throughout, up to EL3 — from the OS through to low-level firmware. At some point in the future, it's possible that Arm will transition over to solely 64-bit, but this will depend heavily on the ecosystem in question.

If all that seems like gobbledygook, here are the key things to understand. Generally speaking, a processor's speed is dictated by how much it can do in a clock cycle. Being able to do two additions instead of one is better, so Arm added an extra math unit and increased the performance of its floating point (complex) math units.

The problem with this approach is you need to keep the execution units doing something or they waste power and silicon space, so you have to be able to issue more instructions to the units and faster than before. This produces further problems, such as increasing the likelihood that data isn't where the processor thought it would be (cache miss), which stalls the whole system. Therefore you need to focus on better branch prediction and prefetching, as well as faster access to cache memory. Finally, all of this costs more silicon and power, so you have to optimize to keep those aspects under control, too.

Arm has focused on all of these aspects with the Cortex-A76, which is why there's been such a big redesign, rather than just a small tweak to the A75. Combine all these IPC performance improvements with the expected move down to 7nm, and we're looking at a notable 35 percent typical performance improvement over the already impressive Cortex-A75. The A76 does all this using only around half the power too, by running at a lower frequency to hit the same performance target.

The Cortex-A76 is Arm's major play for higher performance computing with scalable use cases, ranging from mobile all the way up to laptops (and beyond) — all while supporting the power efficiency targets that have made the company so successful thus far. We'll likely see the first chipsets sporting the A76 make their way into products in early 2019.

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Samsung unveils 18 new AR Emojis that are just as creepy as the first 18

• Samsung just released 18 new AR Emoji expressions to go with the original 18.
• The company promises to release 18 more "in the coming months."
• To get the new AR Emojis, you'll need to update your camera app.

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We've already examined how much Samsung's AR Emoji suck when compared to competitor product Apple's Animoji. But the thing that really gets to me about AR Emoji is that they're just creepy. Things that are lifelike – but not quite – always creep me out.

But Samsung is literally doubling down on its AR Emoji options by adding 18 new expressive stickers to the original 18 that shipped with the Samsung Galaxy S9 and Samsung Galaxy S9 Plus.

Eventually, Samsung will triple its AR Emoji offerings with an additional 18 stickers. That new batch is slated to launch "in the coming months."

You can see some examples of the new AR Emojis in the GIF below:

If you own a Galaxy S9 or S9 Plus and want to get these new AR Emojis for yourself, simply update your camera app to the latest version through the Galaxy Apps store. You'll find the update under the "My apps" section.

Once updated, you can share your creepy animated stickers directly from your Samsung keyboard or copy-and-paste them from the Gallery app.

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Why do Samsung's AR Emoji suck compared to Apple's Animoji?

When Samsung revealed that the Samsung Galaxy S9 would feature animated Emoji characters, the world groaned. Not only is the idea pretty trite in comparison to the other innovations Samsung could have focused on with …

In our article examining AR Emoji as compared to Apple's Animoji, we reveal that AR Emoji are capable of being much more distinct and lifelike already – but Samsung didn't activate the advanced features. It's an interesting deep dive into a novelty feature.

You can probably look forward to more animated Emoji offerings from smartphone manufacturers now that Xiaomoji are seeing the light of day.

NEXT: Samsung may bring AR Emojis to video calls and it may not be a gimmick

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New Arm Cortex-A76 and Mali-G76 target laptop-class performance

You probably haven't complained about high-end smartphone performance for a while now, but processors can always be a bit faster and, more importantly, power efficient. To that end, Arm just announced its latest products destined for future smartphone SoCs. These announcements are aimed squarely at the high performance end of the market, ranging from smartphones up to laptop-class capabilities.

Read more

Everything you need to know about ARM's DynamIQ

ARM unveiled the nature of its new DynamIQ technology back in March, but with the announcement of the company's new Cortex-A75 and A55 CPU cores, we now have a much clearer picture about the capabilities …

The latest additions to Arm's portfolio are its Cortex-A76 CPU, Mali-G76 GPU, and Mali-V76 video processor for ultra-high resolution displays. As the names suggest, the Cortex-A76 is a replacement for the high-performance Cortex-A75 core unveiled last year, the new Mali-G76 takes over from the G72, and the Mali-V76 is the new high-end option, replacing the V52 and V61. There's no new LITTLE CPU core announcement this year, so we'll be sticking with the Cortex-A55 for a while longer.

A ground-up CPU redesign

Despite the seemingly minor change to Arm's CPU nomenclature, the Cortex-A76 is very different from the A75. It's a completely new high-performance microarchitecture design made from scratch by Arm to target higher performance points than ever before. Laptop-class was the term used during our briefing with Arm, but the flexible nature of the design means there's plenty of performance gains up for grabs in a smartphone form factor too.

The headline figure is up to a 200 percent performance gain compared to the current crop of laptop form factor products powered by the Cortex-A73. Compared to the last generation A75 the gains are a little smaller, but still notable. The biggest improvements are for machine learning applications, with up to a 400-percent boost thanks to optimized dot product instructions. A 7nm A76 running at 3GHz improves performance by around 35 percent over a 10nm A75 running at 2.8GHz.

On top of that, Arm is boasting a 40-percent improvement in energy efficiency. Some of that obviously comes from the smaller target process node, but the microarchitecture changes are making a difference too. The Cortex-A76 has also been designed so a single core can run flat out indefinitely, while frequency throttling should only kick in for 3 or 4 core cluster configurations in thermal and power constrained products like smartphones. That means more consistent high-end performance for demanding workloads.

The Cortex-A76 is still based on Arm's DynamIQ cluster technology, meaning you'll see it paired up with the smaller power-efficient Cortex-A55 inside heterogeneous CPU clusters. A 4+4 design is still the likely layout for high-performance products, while 2+6 and 1+7 offer the best performance-to-cost benefits for cheaper SoCs.

Next-generation graphics and video

The Arm Mali-G76 has next-gen SoCs covered for improved graphics performance. It's based on the same Bifrost architecture as the G72 and G52, offering a major 1.5x performance boost with this generation at 7nm.

Arm has achieved much of this performance boost by doubling up the number of execution pipelines within each core's engine, which offers roughly double the FP32 and FMA throughput with only a 28-percent increase in area. This means each G76 graphics core is now roughly twice as powerful as in the G72, so chip designers won't need to include so many to achieve the same performance level as before. This is the same optimization the company made inside its Mali-G52 earlier this year, and the same Int8 dot product support for machine learning applications makes its way across to the high-end processor now as well.

Each Mali-G76 core can be up to twice as powerful as in the G72, so a new MP8 configuration will be roughly as powerful as an old MP16.

On top of the performance gains, the G76 boasts a 30 percent improvement to energy and area efficiency when built on the same process node. Moving down to 7nm will see further performance gains. This can be used to extend battery life for the same performance as the last generation or be put towards a higher core count for additional graphics grunt.

The Mali-G76 can be configured for between four and 20 cores, down from the 32 maximum core count with the G72. Arm expects that we'll see smartphones core counts in the low teens, with higher numbers reserved for products with larger battery capacities and where thermal constraints are less of a factor, such as laptops. The Mali-G52 fills in the gap for lower end products with smaller core counts between one and four.

The last announcement is a new vision processor, the Mali-V76, designed for high-resolution displays. The design caters for up to 8k60 decode and 8k30 encode, as well as multiple 4K and 1080p streams for video walls. It essentially doubles up the performance and capabilities of the Mali-V61. This is certainly overkill for smartphone display resolutions, but will likely find a home in future high-end TVs and higher resolution AR & VR headsets.

Wrap up

Editor's Pick

A closer look at Arm's machine learning hardware

Back at the start of 2017, Arm announced its first batch of dedicated machine learning (ML) hardware. Under the name Project Trillium, the company unveiled a dedicated ML processor for products like smartphones, along with a …

Arm latest CPU, GPU, and VPU designs will offer some serious next-generation performance and energy improvements for mobile devices. Don't forget, it's got new machine learning hardware heading our way under the Project Trillium banner too.

We'll have to wait for Arm's partners to pick up these latest components before they hit consumer products. The Mali-G76 is available for sampling already and could appear in SoCs before the end of the year. We'll have to wait a little longer for our first Cortex-A76 devices — they'll probably be announced in chipsets this year but likely won't ship in products until 2019.

We'll dive deeper into the CPU and GPU architectural changes heading our way and what they mean for performance gains in more detail this week, so stay tuned.

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Hello Neighbor now in beta on Android and iOS (Updated)

 

Update, May 31: A few short weeks after it was first announced, the Hello Neighbor mobile beta program has begun on Android and iOS. This should offer a sneak peak into how well the stealth horror PC title translates onto mobile devices ahead of its July 27 release date.

If you were one of the lucky few chosen randomly to participate, you'll need to have a device with a Snapdragon 435 or 445 chipset. A full list of supported devices can be found on the game's official forum.

For those left out, not all is lost. There is no embargo on video footage taken from the beta, so you can expect lots of reaction videos from your favorite YouTubers in the near future.

Original post, May 11: Put on your running shoes and don't look back, because Hello Neighbor is coming to Android and iOS on July 27.

For those unfamiliar with Hello Neighbor, it's a stealth horror game with Pixar-style graphics. It takes place over three acts, and in the first the player is a child investigating his mysterious neighbor's house. The neighbor exhibits all kinds of suspicious behavior, and has something locked in the basement of his enormous labyrinth of a house.

You have to sneak through the house and try to figure out what your creepy neighbor is up to. If he catches you, you'll end up back in your house and have to start over. And he will catch you. Over and over.

Editor's Pick

15 best free Android games of 2018!

We all know that free Android games aren't always free these days, but many of them are very close if you have a little patience. Most Freemium bottlenecks occur when players get impatient and waiting …

Hello Neighbor also features procedural AI, so your potentially criminal neighbor will set up cameras and bear traps where you last entered the house. He also analyzes your movements and finds shortcuts to bear down on you even faster. This keeps gameplay exciting and tense, even as you attempt to break in for the thousandth time.

The mobile version of Hello Neighbor will have all three acts with the same graphics and gameplay optimized for mobile devices. The first act is free, with the remaining two available as in-app purchases.

HelloNeighborGame

Producer Alex Nichiporchik also revealed the controls, which are still a work in progress. They are similar to any other first-person mobile game, with a virtual control pad and action buttons. Doors and other objects can be interacted with by simply tapping on them.

It's going to be tough to adapt the hectic movement for the mobile version of Hello Neighbor, so developer Dynamic Pixels has its work cut out for it.

A limited beta for Hello Neighbor on Android and iOS is starting soon, which you can sign up for here.

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Love Meets Digital in New Cryptocurrency eDiamond

The world of love and technology is about to take another step forward into the future with blockchain. When dating apps and cryptocurrency meet, you get a brand new virtual gift system, the eDiamond, which is the future of online relationships and commitment. This intersection of technology and relationships comes to you from someone who is a guru in both – Yan Mu.

Yan Mu is the perfect person to bring love and the blockchain together in this way

Yan Mu is the mastermind behind the innovation that is eDiamonds. He is announcing the beta app to the United States. Mu's impressive resume demonstrates why he is the perfect person to merge love and technology together in this new way. Mu has degrees in computer science and business and has won awards for his innovations.

Mu has been at the forefront of technology and relationships for years, as he co-founded Baihe.com, China's largest dating website. The company went public in 2015 and soon acquired it competitor Jiayuan.com, resulting in domination of the Chinese dating app market and community with a value of $1.2 billion. Building on his relationship expertise, Mu co-authored China's teaching standards for marriage and family counselors.

Right team for the job

Basically, Mu has spent years nurturing the relationship between love and technology and has turned it into gold several times over. Now he's back with eDiamonds, the world's first monogamous cryptocurrency. And he's not alone.

Yan Mu's advisors are also experts in the field and include Facebook's Global VP of Engineering, David Wei and Li Mingyuan who is known as the prince of China's tech community. Ryan Xu of Hcash, founder of Qtum Patrick Dai and blockchain investors Li Xiaolai and Xue Manzi. There are some impressive people backing eDiamonds and the beta app is available today!

eDiamonds are the future of love

You just need to visit eDiamond.love or download the eDiamond app from your Android device. The eDiamonds can be purchased and exchanged between two people exclusively until your relationship ends. It's a great way to show your love, affection, and most importantly you commitment to each other.

So put traditional gifts aside. Flowers die, and even chocolates expire. eDiamonds are the new form of cryptocurrency that expresses that same love and affection in the digital world. Android Authority readers can be the first to try this out, so go get it today!

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The Huawei Watch 2 gets a refresh for the Chinese market

9to5Google

• The Huawei Watch 2 (2018) is a slightly upgraded version of the original Watch 2.
• It now comes with an eSIM variant as well as a new color scheme.
• Other than these two changes, the watch is identical to the previous version.

---

The Huawei Watch 2 is one of the best Android wearables on the market. In fact, it is the only watch that Google uses for testing of Android upgrades within the Wear OS ecosystem.

Now, via 9to5Google, the Huawei Watch 2 is getting a slight refresh for the Chinese market. Before you get incredibly excited about getting your hands on a new Huawei watch, you should note that there are very few upgrades to this new version. In fact, Huawei isn't even changing the name; it's merely the Huawei Watch 2 (2018).

The most significant update to the Huawei Watch 2 (2018) is the addition of an eSIM variant. This version of the watch enables you to connect the wearable to cellular data without the hassle of having to put a nano SIM into a slot on the watch.

The new eSIM variant comes exclusively in a new color: "Carbon Black." Pictured above, the watch is mostly black with bright yellow accents on the watch band.

Editor's Pick

Best smartwatches (May 2018)

Smartwatches are still a very new thing to a lot of people, and for good reason. You don't absolutely need one to get through the day, and some of the best smartwatches are much too expensive …

Other than the eSIM option and the new color scheme, everything else about the Huawei Watch 2 is the same as its predecessor. It still comes with a Snapdragon Wear 2100 chipset, 768MB of RAM, and 4GB of storage.

Even the pricing remains the same, with the two connected models going for 2,000 Chinese yuan (~$310) and the Bluetooth-only option going for 1,540 Chinese yuan (~$240).

Since the watch is a Chinese exclusive, the NFC chip inside is connected with Chinese payment systems rather than Google Pay. Keep this in mind if you intend to import this to a different country.

You can buy the Huawei Watch 2 (2018) from Vmall.

buy Huawei watch 2 (2018)

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The US will get its first taste of Android Go next week with the Alcatel 1X

• The Alcatel 1X will be available sometime next week through Amazon, with other retailers to follow.
• Alcatel announced the 1X during MWC 2018 as the company's first Android Go smartphone.
• The 1X will sell for $100 unlocked and work on GSM networks.

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With ZTE's Android Go smartphone on the back-burner due to the company's ongoing issues with the U.S. government, Alcatel looks to fill the void and launch its Android Go-powered 1X smartphone in the U.S. sometime next week.

The 1X will first be available through Amazon, though the phone will also be available through Best Buy and Walmart in the coming weeks. Regardless of where it is sold, the 1X will go for $100 unlocked and work on GSM networks.

As a refresher, the 1X features a 5.3-inch, 960 x 480 resolution display with an 18:9 aspect ratio, 8MP main camera, 5MP selfie sensor, quad-core MediaTek MT6739 chipset, 1GB of RAM, 16GB of expandable storage, and a 2,460mAh battery. The phone features no fingerprint sensor or face unlock, so you must rely on a pattern, PIN, or password to get in.

Editor's Pick

What is Android Go?

Android Go, also known as Android Oreo (Go edition), is a stripped-down version of Android designed to run on entry-level smartphones. It's comprised of three optimized areas — the operating system, Google Play Store, and Google apps — …

The specifications might not be exciting, but keep in mind that the 1X runs the Android Oreo version of Android Go. Apart from a slimmed-down operating system, the Android Go platform also features a set of slimmed-down Go apps. These apps include Assistant Go, YouTube Go, Files Go, and several more, with every Go app taking up very little space and using relatively less data than their regular versions.

Even with the slimmed-down software, we encountered quite a bit of jank when we used the 1X during MWC 2018. Also of concern is the update situation, with Alcatel saying that the 1X will receive "regular Android security updates, on a minimum quarterly basis."

Even so, the 1X is an enticing option for those wanting their first smartphone or an option for the younger and older folks among us.

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California Senate defies FCC ruling, passes its own Net Neutrality bill

Wikimedia Commons

• The California Senate just voted to pass a bill that would put Net Neutrality laws back for Californians.
• The bill will likely also pass the State Assembly and become law.
• If it becomes law, it will be in direct defiance of the FCC statutes that will begin in June.

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Yesterday evening, the California Senate passed a Net Neutrality bill that not only would put the Obama-era rules back in place but would also put an even tighter leash on how ISPs can control citizens' access to the internet.

The bill passed through the Senate by a vote of 23 – 12, via ARSTechnica. As expected, the 23 ayes came from Democrats and the 12 noes came from Republicans.

To become California law, the bill will now head to the Democrat-controlled State Assembly and finally to Governor Jerry Brown, also a Democrat. As such, it is very likely the bill will become law in California, the third-largest state in the U.S.

Editor's Pick

US Senate will force too-little-too-late vote to save Net Neutrality

Wikimedia Today, United States Senators Edward J. Markey (D-MA), Bill Nelson (D-FL), and Brian Schatz (D-HI), in partnership with Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), announced that the U.S. Senate would vote on May …

Net Neutrality is the notion that the internet should remain free and open, and treated more like a public utility than a strictly commercial enterprise. The Obama-era Net Neutrality laws were voted down by the FCC in December last year and will cease to be a federal law in June.

The FCC board is comprised of people who are not voted to their positions and do not have to take public interest into account with their decisions. The leader of the FCC — Ajit Pai, pictured above — was appointed to the position by President Trump with the specific intent of removing Net Neutrality laws.

If this California state law does get voted in, Net Neutrality proponents are worried that the ISPs will argue that the FCC's federal statutes supersede those of individual states. However, the FCC just restricted its own powers over broadband internet, which could make the argument moot.

Will individual states be able to right the Net Neutrality ship, defying the FCC?

If that is the case, then each state could enact its own Net Neutrality legislation, and ISPs would have to tailor their products to meet the rules of each individual state.

While the federal rules that the FCC just voted down prohibited ISPs from blocking or throttling certain websites or charging extra for "fast lane" internet, this California bill goes even further: it also places a ban on paid data-cap exemptions. This would prohibit ISPs from capping broadband data flow and then charging to release the cap; in other words, it would force ISPs to only offer unlimited broadband data.

Other states in the U.S. – including New York and Oregon – have similar bills in the works.

NEXT: As Net Neutrality nears its end, Verizon shows some customers data caps

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Android Oreo rolling out now to NVIDIA Shield TV (Update: On hold due to software issues)

Update (05/31): NVIDIA has halted the Oreo rollout for Shield TV devices after stumbling upon a few issues. Writing on the official GeForce forums (via Android Police), an NVIDIA support representative noted that the update, which is confusingly called the Shield TV Experience Upgrade 7.0, will be temporarily suspended as the company looks to "resolve the issues that have been encountered."

It's unclear how long it will take for the problems to be fixed, but NVIDIA is optimistic that it will be able to "restart the rollout shortly."

Original post (05/24): The NVIDIA Shield TV is Android Authority's favorite media streamer (yes, even better than Roku), and now it's about to get even better. Starting now, NVIDIA is pushing out Android 8.0 Oreo to all NVIDIA Shield TV boxes.

The new Android 8.0 features are wrapped in NVIDIA's skin for the streamer called Shield Experience Upgrade 7.0. We realize that's confusing, but we wanted to make sure you understand that if you get an update that says Shield Experience 7.0, that's not Android 7.0 Nougat, but rather Android 8.0 Oreo.

The update is rolling out today, but it could be a few days before you see it.

Editor's Pick

And the best media streaming device you can buy is…

.... Nvidia Shield, hands down. Unless it isn't. Confused? The reality is that different media players make sense for different people. Our sister site DGIT pitted the Nvidia Shield TV against the Apple TV, Chromecast, Roku …

So what's new in Shield Experience Upgrade 7.0? For starters, NVIDIA revamped the entire UI. Now, when you fire up your Shield TV, you'll be presented with a fully-customizable interface featuring all your apps, media channels, and games on one page.

NVIDIA

You can choose your favorite apps to appear at the top of the queue, and you can move around the subsections to your liking. You'll also see movies and TV shows that you've started but haven't finished, and see suggestions from channels and apps of media you might enjoy.

You can also organize your apps in a new way where your favorite shows on each app are put first in line. Once again, this is totally customizable; you can move these around as much as you like.

Only specific apps can use this feature, but it looks like all the major ones are there: Amazon Prime Video, Plex, Netflix, HBO Go, Hulu, etc.

NVIDIA

Along with these new features, there are also some more general Android security updates, some firmware upgrades for accessories (like the Shield controllers), and general stability fixes.

You can see the changelog as well as a more in-depth overview of the new features here.

NEXT: You'll soon be able to stream your entire (probably illegal) movie library on Chromecast

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Google has seven messaging apps – Here’s all of them and what they do

Since the launch of Google Talk in 2005, Google has emphasized the importance of people using the company's services to communicate with one another. In fact, Google thinks it's so important, that it made more Google-branded messaging platforms than it knows what to do with, each one offering similar functions with minor tweaks.

All the different Google messaging apps can be confusing, and it doesn't help that Google continually disables services, re-brands them, or integrates features from one app into another. But, according to Google (via Computer World), it will not wrap all the messaging services under one roof:

We've designed specific products for distinct use cases, so we don't intend to have one app that does everything for everyone. We think we can better serve our users by creating products that function really well, and users can choose the product that best suits their needs.

While this sounds good on paper, it also makes things bewildering for the user when it comes to sticking with one app for one function. For example, a user could use Google Duo, Google Voice, or Hangouts to make a phone call. Which one should they use? Why is one of them better than any other? Before we take a look at all the current Google messaging apps, let's look back Google's messaging history.

History

Google's first attempt at a messaging application was arguably its best. It was called Google Talk (sometimes colloquially referred to as Google Chat or Gchat) and you could use it to chat with anyone on any platform, even if they didn't have a Google account. The Gmail web portal had a browser-based chat box, so you didn't have to install any software. There was an Android app, a Windows app, and even a BlackBerry app.

However, Google Talk was based on an open-source protocol called XMPP. Google decided to drop support for XMPP and instead use its own proprietary platform for its new Google Plus social network, which launched in 2011. Both Huddle and Hangouts were born from that change.

Google then killed Huddle and spun Hangouts off into its own, standalone app. Google hoped Hangouts would be the better, all-encompassing solution to communication by giving users the ability to text chat, video chat, and make calls all within one app.

But Hangouts didn't take, and soon Google started to splinter aspects of Hangouts out into separate apps, which created the messaging app mess we have now.

Google messaging apps – seven choices still exist

Now, there are many apps on the Google Play Store that do messaging functions better than Google's apps, which is crazy considering Google Talk and Gmail were the default messaging services for millions until Google killed off Talk. The seven Google messaging apps below are what we have now.

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Gmail

Price: Free

DOWNLOAD ON GOOGLE PLAY

Most everyone is aware of Gmail at this point. It's a free, advertising-based service that allows you to send and receive email. You can use the Gmail app on your phone, the web portal at mail.google.com, or you can integrate your Gmail account into a third-party client, like Microsoft Outlook or Blue Mail.

The web client supports instant messaging through an integrated Hangouts (more on that later). Google Voice is also integrated within the Gmail web portal. This makes the web portal a robust center for you to control multiple messaging experiences, especially with the recent redesign.

However, the standalone Gmail mobile app only supports the email functions of Gmail.

Best use: Use the Gmail app for your email, especially if you like having lots of control over your workflow.

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Inbox by Gmail

Price: Free

DOWNLOAD ON GOOGLE PLAY

Google introduced Inbox by Gmail in 2014 as an alternative to the Gmail app. The design and workflow of Inbox are different than Gmail, with Google's AI program taking more control over the organization of your messages. Unlike Gmail, you can't create a new account with Inbox; you use a pre-existing email account within the Inbox client.

Some of the features born in Inbox — like the Smart Reply feature — have made their way to the native Gmail app. But some people prefer Inbox over Gmail because of its simplicity and the fact that Google's AI handles a lot of the legwork of keeping your Inbox clean and organized.

Just like the Gmail mobile app, the Inbox mobile app only lets you do email. However, unlike the Gmail web portal, the Inbox web portal also only allows you to do email, although your call logs and SMS messages from Google's other services appear in your Inbox folders.

In general, Inbox is just a different version of the Gmail interface, which makes one wonder how long the app will last.

Best use: Use the Inbox by Gmail app for your email if you'd rather not spend the time to keep things organized for yourself.

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Hangouts

Price: Free

DOWNLOAD ON GOOGLE PLAY

Okay, this is where things get really confusing. Hangouts started as a feature within Google Plus that was strictly for video chats. However, facing competition from the likes of Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, and others, Google needed a standalone service to grab some market share. So it ported out the Hangouts feature into its own app.

Now, using Hangouts, you can instant message people, conduct video chats, and place audio phone calls. However, you can't send SMS or MMS messages, which prevents Hangouts from being the all-encompassing messaging app from Google.

But Hangouts itself isn't long for this world. Last year, Google announced that it would split Hangouts into two different products: Hangouts Meet and Hangouts Chat. Hangouts Meet will encompass the video conference aspects of Hangouts and Hangouts Chat will focus on the instant messaging side.

Currently, the full-featured versions of both Hangouts Meet and Hangouts Chat are reserved for G Suite customers only. The vanilla Hangouts is still available on the Google Play Store, but who knows for how long.

Best use: Hangouts is honestly great at everything it does. However, as noted at the beginning of this article, Google doesn't want a one-size-fits-all messaging app, so who knows how long we'll have Hangouts.

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We're halfway done! Here are some more app lists!

10 best video chat apps for Android

Video calling is about as easy as it can possibly get these days. You can do it on computers, mobile devices, and even tablets. It's popular and widespread enough that you even have options. There …

10 best SMS apps for Android

SMS has been the gold standard for text messaging for a long time. Most cell phone plans just give them away in unlimited capacities these days and it's dead easy to use. As such, there …

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Google Allo

Price: Free

DOWNLOAD ON GOOGLE PLAY

After Google gave up on Hangouts becoming an alternative for WhatsApp users, it put out Google Allo, which is only about instant messaging. The big selling point for Allo is the fact that it integrates Google Assistant features into your chats, giving you access to things like Smart Reply.

To use Allo, you have to connect it with your phone number, which limits you to using Allo only on your phone. There's no tablet or desktop support for Allo, which is annoying.

However, even though you can instant message with people using Allo, you can't use the app as an SMS or MMS client. That means that, even though you connected your phone number to the app, you still have to text people using one app and then IM them using Allo.

What's super annoying about this limitation is that Allo does, in fact, give you the ability to send SMS texts. But the person who receives the message gets it from a weird, Google-owned proxy number, not your own.

Oh, and one last thing: Google is likely doing away with Allo by integrating RCS messaging into Android Messages through a new program called Google Chat (more on that later). There's nothing solid as of yet, but we'll likely see the end of Allo in the near future.

Aside from these significant caveats, Allo is a good app. What it does (instant messaging) it does well, with a colorful and easy-to-use interface with a lot of cool features.

Best use: Use for instant messaging only, and only use it if you have to. Allo is not long for this world.

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Google Duo

Price: Free

DOWNLOAD ON GOOGLE PLAY

Along with the split of instant messaging from Hangouts into Google Allo, Google created Google Duo to handle video chats. At first, video calling is all the app did. Now it can also handle audio calling. However, as usual, there are some limits.

Using Duo, you can not only place video calls to people using your Google account, but you can also call other mobile numbers. If the person you call has Duo installed on their phone, you can video/audio chat with each other for free.

However, if you place a video call with an Android user who doesn't have Duo installed, it defaults to a regular audio call. After the call, the user is encouraged to install Duo.

If you video call a person who's using a non-Android device like an iPhone, and they don't have Duo installed, the call doesn't go through at all, and you have to contact them through other means.

It's also worth mentioning that it is possible — although tricky — to use Duo with your Google Voice number instead of your SIM number. However, it is far easier to use your SIM number with the app.

Best use: Google Duo is great for video calls with other users who also have Duo installed. If you're trying to communicate with someone who doesn't have Duo, things get really complicated, and it's probably easier to just call them using your phone's dialer or use another shared app.

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Android Messages

Price: Free

DOWNLOAD ON GOOGLE PLAY

Currently, Android Messages is the only app from Google that fully supports SMS and MMS texting using your SIM card number. And wouldn't you know it, that's about all this app does.

If you are lucky enough to be a Project Fi subscriber, Android Messages supports RCS messaging, which makes texting more like instant messaging (à la iMessage). However, if you're not on Fi, only certain mobile carriers support RCS messaging through Android Messenger.

In the future, Android Messages will likely support RCS messaging for all, as well as the ability to text from your desktop using a web portal. These features are in development and exist as rumor only at this point.

But, if and when those features roll out, it will make Google Allo essentially irrelevant. That's why Google is moving the Allo team to work on Google Chat instead.

Best use: As of today, the only reason to use Android Messages is to send SMS and MMS messages. In the future, it might be your one-stop shop for messaging on Android. Maybe.

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Google Voice

Price: Free

DOWNLOAD ON GOOGLE PLAY

Google Voice is one of the older applications on this list. Using Voice, you can sign up for a free phone number from Google and use it to make free phone calls and send free text messages.

If you download the Voice app from the Google Play Store, you can use that app to make phone calls, send SMS (including group MMS), and view and listen to voicemail. However, you can only do these things with your Google Voice phone number.

In other words, if you wanted to send a text from your Google Voice number and then send a text from your regular SIM number, you would need to perform both tasks in two different apps. Same with phone calls and voicemails.

However, you can forward your Google Voice calls and messages to your SIM number, which then lets you control everything from one app. However, that app won't be Google Voice.

Best use: As it stands, Google Voice is perfect for people who use their Google Voice number as their primary number. For everyone else, it's probably easier to use your phone's built-in dialer for calls and Android Messages for texts.

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Chat

The upcoming Chat service won't be a standalone app, but rather a behind-the-scenes system that is incorporated into Android Messages. After years of trying, Google finally gave up on trying to create a messaging app for Android that could compete with Apple's iMessage. Instead, it is getting mobile carriers to change the way they host texting, and that new method is called Chat.

At its most basic level, Chat is just a code word for RCS messaging, which you can read more about here. The idea is that carriers will "turn on" Chat support, and then Android users will be able to communicate using RCS messaging with other users who also have Chat support. If either end of the conversation doesn't support Chat, the fallback will be traditional SMS and MMS.

Google knows that releasing yet another messaging app would be futile, as it has already proven that making a chat app work well is exceptionally difficult for the company. With Chat baked right into Android Messages, you can expect Google to push Android Messages hard over the next few years.

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Round up

Now that you know the details on each device, here's a quick round-up of how you should be using each app:

Purpose	App to use
Email	Gmail or Inbox, depending on preference
Instant messaging	Hangouts (for now)
Video calls	Google Duo
SMS & MMS	Android Messages

You should ignore Google Allo as there's no telling when it will be dismantled entirely, and you should only use Google Voice if you have a Google Voice phone number (and use it a lot). Using Hangouts as your instant messaging app is fine for now, but even that service may get dismantled once Chat starts to take hold.

Someday, Google might stop fighting it and release a single app that can handle your instant messaging, video calls, and texting all at once. Considering you can already do that with the Facebook app as well as WhatsApp — and people really like to use those platforms — proves that Google is just being stubborn.

NEXT: The 10 best Google Home apps

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