Setting Up Your Home Office

As I write this, I'm coming off a lunch break that lasted a little too long because I couldn't stop watching YouTube Shorts on my TV. And if Instagram Reels are your own vertical video poison—and you own an Amazon Fire TV device—you can now do the same. Starting today, you can download the new Instagram for TV app to watch Reels on your big screen via a dedicated interface that should be way more natural than simply casting the mobile app from your phone. Currently exclusive to Amazon devices, the Instagram for TV app supports up to five accounts and comes with full functionality for searching for Reels and profiles, as well as liking Reels and browsing comments or reacti…

Oh, you’re here because you captured the image of someone’s Instagram Story and want to know if they’ll get a notification about the screenshot, à la Snapchat? We’ve all been there, but they’re not going to find out if you took a screenshot of their grid post or story, at least not through a notification. There are a few instances where an Instagram user might be made aware that you’re sharing their content, though, or at least filing it away for later. Here’s everything you need to know about taking screenshots, saving, and sharing in Instagram, so you can lurk in relative peace. Can you screenshot someone's Instagram Story or grid post?If you screenshot someone’s grid o…

We may earn a commission from links on this page. A popular productivity method encourages you to start your day by “eating the frog”—that is, tackling your biggest, most important task of the day first, then moving through the lesser ones in turn. For many, structuring their to-do list around their greatest responsibility is a good way to stay motivated and ensure top priorities are handled expediently. But not every person works best that way. I know I don't. Even for people who generally do enjoy tackling the hard stuff first, not every day is the same. If you find the prospect of jumping into a massive project first thing in the morning daunting—every day, or just tod…

We may earn a commission from links on this page. The urge to spring clean your home is a strong one. You know warmer months are coming, things are about to look up, and you want to enjoy all of that in a fresh, revitalized environment. Typically, that involves your standard cleaning, but what if you shook it up this year? Try a spring decluttering approach instead, getting rid of what no longer serves you so you can really enjoy your space. Here's how to do it. Assess your spaceThis is something I practice a lot, especially since I started heavily decluttering about two years ago: I stand in a room and look at it as objectively as I can. When you get used to things—a bu…

Apple just released iOS 18.4 and macOS 15.4 for the iPhone and Mac, respectively. Once you complete the update, you'll see a prompt informing you that, as part of the update, the company has enabled automatic updates on your device, even if you had previously switched them off. This means that, unless you do something, Apple will start downloading and installing future software updates to your devices on its own. To test this out, I disabled automatic updates on my iPhone and on my Mac, and then began updating to iOS 18.4 and macOS 15.4. Sure enough, once the updates were complete, Apple duly informed me that it had gone ahead and enabled automatic updates on my devices. …

As a big fan of background music, I was intrigued by iOS 18.4's Control Center changes. It adds a new tab called Ambient Music to Control Center's list of customizable controls. You can use this to add one of four pre-selected Apple Music playlists (or your own) to the Control Center, your lock screen, or the Action Button (provided your iPhone has one). Up until now, you could play music via the Now Playing widget in the Control Center, but dedicated controls to launch playlists were missing. This feature is different from Background Sounds, which lets you play nature sounds on your iPhone in order to help you focus better. Even though Background Sounds is useful for eve…

If you own a pair of AirPods, you might have quite the futuristic upgrade arriving later this year. That is, unless you're a former Google customer—otherwise this will seem a bit like old news. According to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman, Apple is working on a live translation feature for AirPods with the release of iOS 19. Gurman's sources appear to be keeping as quiet as possible, as the feature is still quite secret, so it's not clear exactly which AirPods models are going to be compatible with this feature, should it arrive with the update. But seeing as most new AirPods features seem to hit the second-gen AirPods Pro these days, my guess would be those buds—maybe AirPods 4…

It feels like a minor problem, I'll admit it. But you know when you check into a hotel and have to spend the next fifteen minutes connecting all your Apple devices to the network? Starting from your iPhone, then moving to your iPad, and then your Mac? Well, it looks like Apple understands your pain. According to a new report from Bloomberg's Mark Gurman, iOS 19 will include a new feature that will automatically connect multiple devices to the same public Wi-Fi network after you log in with just one of them. That's convenient for a couple of reasons. Beyond just keeping you from having to cycle through all your devices, it can also reduce the amount of paperwork you have t…

Did you know you can customize Google to filter out garbage? Take these steps for better search results, including adding Lifehacker as a preferred source for tech news. If you’re anything like me, you might have moving app icons on your iPhone Home Screen right now. It took me a few days to notice this, but now when I tilt my phone up, down, left, or right, my icons will actually shift in that direction, and the highlights the new Liquid Glass effect added around them will move as well. Technically, this isn’t a new feature. Apple calls it the “parallax effect,” and if you’ve ever played an old 16-bit sidescroller, you’ve probably seen it before. It’s when a background m…

Is your iPhone, iPad, or Mac a little hard to use? Lucky for you, Apple has announced key accessibility features coming to all its devices later this year. These include Accessibility Reader, which makes small fonts easier to read, and Vehicle Motion Cues, which prevent motion sickness while using Apple devices in vehicles. If some of these sound familiar, it's because they may already be on one or two Apple devices, but are now set to come to others as well. While the company's already tipped its hat as to what's in the works, expect to hear more details during WWDC 2025, scheduled from June 9 to 13. That's where Apple usually unveils all of its annual operating system u…

There are two kinds of iPad fans in this world: those who love the tablet just the way it is, and those who desperately wish Apple would make a touchscreen Mac, already. While Apple may never bring macOS to the iPad (at least, not in my lifetime), there's reason to believe Apple's tablet might soon be closing the computing gap between it and the Mac. Could iPadOS 19 finally solve the iPad's multitasking problem? According to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman, Apple is planning a sizable overhaul to its tablets with iPadOS 19. Gurman's sources say the changes this year focus on "productivity, multitasking and app window management." It seems the team wants the iPad to function more …

Did you know you can customize Google to filter out garbage? Take these steps for better search results, including adding my work at Lifehacker as a preferred source. Earlier this month, we saw a new running world record—more specifically, running backwards. In heels. Christian Roberto López Rodríguez claimed the fastest 100m backwards in high heels with an impressive time of 16.55 seconds. I may not be setting that sort of record, but I do see running backwards crop up time and time again as a trendy idea for the average runner. Sometimes called "reverse running," it's exactly what it sounds like: runners literally turning around and jogging backwards. But does running b…

If you're looking to buy a new iPhone 17 this year, not only do you have a number of models to consider, you also have a number of colors to choose from. But some users who opted for the iPhone 17 Pro and 17 Pro Max are claiming that the color they picked isn't the color they see today. According to these users, their iPhones have changed color over the short period of time they've owned them. Obviously, the internet has dubbed the issue "colorgate." Apple is no stranger to "gates," of course, especially when it comes to the iPhone: There was "antennagate," when the iPhone 4's redesigned antennas reported caused cellular connection issues; "bendgate," when the iPhone 6 P…

We may earn a commission from links on this page. Sony's PlayStation VR 2 headset is getting a permanent price price drop this March, down to $400 from $550. That'll include the headset, the controllers, and a pair of wired earbuds—but is that a deal worth getting excited over? Well, for Sony, maybe. The price cut comes a year after Bloomberg reported that Sony had stopped making new PSVR 2 units and shifted efforts towards getting rid of excess stock. That points to lower-than-expected sales for the peripheral, and it's easy to see why. Sony's VR loyalists were surprised to hear when the headset came out, for instance, that it would not work with the existing library of…

"Antifa" is in Donald The President's sights. Following the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, The President has blamed "radical leftists" for pushing political violence against those on the right—even as the assassin's motives remain under active investigation. As such, the president is going after Antifa, calling it a "domestic terrorist organization," despite the fact that Antifa is not actually an organization, and that the U.S. has no domestic terrorist designation. When the president of the United States enflames tensions in this way, it's no surprise our discourse enflames as well. Here's one such example: You may have seen posts on social media…

YouTube's recent price hike has clearly left a hole in the market. If you want a fully ad-free YouTube experience, you currently need to pay $13.99/month (up from $11.99) or use a third-party workaround. But now, YouTube has a compromise. The service's new Premium Lite plan comes in at $7.99/month ($6 cheaper) and is supposed to block ads on most, but not all, content. With YouTube Premium Lite, YouTube won't show ads on popular categories of long form video, like gaming, fashion, beauty, news, and more. That's a bit vague, but in a video with Johanna Voolich, YouTube's Chief Product Officer, she says this means that all "core creator content", including podcasts…

Part-time work is great for increased flexibility, but a significant bummer when it comes to benefits. Luckily, a new rule now opens the door for millions of part-time workers to start building their nest eggs earlier through employer-sponsored retirement plans. This rule—part of the Secure Act 2.0 passed in 2022—reduces the waiting period for part-time employees to join their company's 401(k) or 403(b) plans. Here's what you need to know to take advantage of this change and maximize your savings this year. How part-time workers can save more for retirementUnder the new rules, part-time workers can qualify for their employer's retirement plan after just two years of servi…

I'm sure there was a point in time when it was cool to receive a text from a business or service, but it's not today. Our phones are sounding off way too often these days, in part because of the rise in spam messages. Many of these messages arrive because your number happened to end up on an organization's subscriber list for one reason or another. Perhaps you donated blood one time, and now you are contacted every other day about setting up your next appointment; maybe you gave money to a political candidate, and now that candidate's party is blowing up your phone for more money. In many cases, you can send a STOP text to end the madness. But if the organization doesn't…

When the Nintendo Switch 2 was officially announced, it was hard to feel like it wasn’t just more of the same. With no weird 3D gimmicks and no absurd naming scheme, did it even really feel like a new Nintendo device? But eagle-eyed viewers picked up on something else—Nintendo, it turns out, might be the first console maker to build a mouse right into its default controller. At about 1:01 into the announcement trailer, you can see what looks like an optical sensor pop up on the side of one of the Switch 2’s Joy-Con controllers (or whatever they end up being called), and just a few seconds later, those same two controllers glide along a desk on their side, as if t…

Nintendo Switch 2 is officially coming to stores on June 5. In just over two months, you might have the opportunity to own Nintendo's newest (and most expensive) console and play the latest Switch 2 exclusives (Mario Kart World looks ridiculously fun), assuming you can snag one of them. Because if you want to boot up a Switch 2 on launch day, you'll almost certainly need to preorder it. Unless you're lucky enough to find a store that has extra consoles in stock, or there turns out to be exceptionally low demand (unlikely given eight years of building anticipation among the Nintendo faithful), these things are going to be a rare commodity. One option, of course, is to pre…

Did you know you can customize Google to filter out garbage? Take these steps for better search results, including adding my work at Lifehacker as a preferred source. This week, California governor Gavin Newsom signed a handful of new laws that regulate artificial intelligence and social media. Among them is SB 243, which requires that chatbots provide "clear and conspicuous" notice that they are not a real person. The law goes into effect on Jan. 1, 2027. SB 243 also requires chatbots interacting with children to provide a reminder every three hours to take a break and prohibits chatbots used by minors from generating sexually explicit content. The law mandates that com…

It should be as easy to cancel a service as it is to subscribe to it, and at long last, it's about to be. For anyone who's ever found themselves trapped in an endless maze of customer service calls trying to cancel a subscription—especially when the company doesn't want you to—relief is finally on the way. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has introduced a new rule that will require companies to make canceling subscriptions as simple as signing up for them. Here's what you need to know. The "Click to Cancel" ruleUnder the new FTC regulation, if you can sign up for a service online with a single click, companies must provide an equally straightforward cancellation process…

The FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) is warning consumers about a type of fraud in which threat actors pretend to be from trusted financial institutions in order to obtain login credentials and gain access to financial and personal data. The consequences are high: With stolen credentials, scammers can gain full control of your accounts and your money. According to the FBI advisory, criminals will quickly wire funds from your bank to cryptocurrency wallets, making the money nearly impossible to trace and recover, and lock you out of your account in the process. Here's how account takeover scams work—and how to avoid becoming a victim. Account takeover scams m…

If you wanted to play some tunes on your iPhone this afternoon, but found nothing would play, it's not just you: As of Tuesday afternoon ET, Apple Music is down. Apple's System Status website currently confirms Apple Music's downtime. As of this piece, the site shows the following status for Apple Music: Apple Music - Outage Today, 2:26 PM - ongoing Some users are affected Users may be experiencing intermittent issues with this service. All other Apple services, including the App Store, FaceTime, iMessage, and all iCloud services, are currently online. I first saw the news thanks to 9to5Mac's Chance Miller. Both Miller and I are personally not experiencing any issues w…

Usually you can blame a low-quality video stream on a bandwidth slowdown or a poor internet connection—sites like YouTube will adjust a video's resolution accordingly, so instead of a crisp HD or 4K stream, you end up with a blurry, pixelated mess. You can manually adjust the resolution to make it look better, but you'll probably run into buffering issues, since your internet can't keep up. Recently, however, something else is happening to cause YouTube video quality to tank. Users are reporting that when they start a video—whether it be a YouTube Short or a standard clip—the stream will load in very poor quality, anything from 360p all the way down to 144p. While some a…