Table of contents for 85 in Android Advisor

Google has announced it’s ensuring that password security straddles both your phone, your PC and your Chromebook. The company is bringing Password Checkup, a feature it introduced to Chrome in 2019, to Android. Password Checkup simply ensures that a password you either pick or are currently using hasn’t been exposed in a password breach. Every year or so password files at major sites are breached and leaked to the web. Knowing if your password has been stolen and compromised is a significant part of maintaining your online security. Google is bringing Password Checkup to Android versions 9 and later, via what it calls Autofill for Google. “Whenever you fill or save credentials into an app, we’ll check those credentials against a list of known compromised credentials and alert you if your…

At a time when version updates are becoming less of an issue and major phone makers are finally beginning to guarantee years of updates, Google might have found a way to end Android fragmentation once and for all: by turning it into a service. The signs are there. On 11 February, Google announced that several ‘Pixelfirst’ features in Google Photos – Portrait Blur, Portrait Light and Color Pop – won’t actually be coming to all Android phones as expected. Instead, Google is offering them as a benefit to Google One subscribers, effectively putting them behind a paywall along with what Google calls “other new machine learning-powered effects”. Granted, these aren’t huge features, and most people probably won’t even care whether they have them. Google Photos is a few steps removed from Android.…

Price: £1,149 (inc VAT) from fave.co/38kqM0d There are all sorts of concessions that you can pay to a phone depending on factors like price or its standing within a brand’s portfolio; when it comes to the Pro Maxes and Ultras of this world, however, there’s far less room for error. Just as hypercars have emerged as a class above supercars, so too have phones like the S21 Ultra in the flagship space – billed as uncompromising devices that can handle anything a user dares to throw at them, without so much as breaking a sweat – albeit for a premium, of course. The idiom ‘the bigger they are the harder they fall’ felt apt for last year’s Galaxy S20 Ultra, which promised so much – primarily from its impressive-sounding camera…

Price: £29 (inc VAT) from fave.co/30l6b7z Samsung Galaxy SmartTags have entered a market already dominated by the third-party Tile tracker, and possibly about to be disrupted by the rumoured circular AirTags from Apple. Can Samsung use the strength of its own Smart Things ecosystem to become a player? We tried them with a Samsung Galaxy S21 to find out. Similar to Tile Bluetooth trackers, Samsung Galaxy SmartTags work by attaching to a keychain and using Bluetooth and the larger Galaxy Find Network to locate lost items, whether they fell under the couch or were left in your last Uber driver’s car. The £29 tag itself is very Tile-like, with a somewhat thick, black ‘squircle’ design, and a small hole in the corner for a keychain or clip. It almost seems like Samsung went out…

Google has revealed that it’s beginning to roll out Schedule Send, a way for you to schedule texts in Android Messages in much the same way you might schedule an email. Schedule Send is one of several new features Google announced for Android, along with Password Checkup, an improved dark mode for Google Maps, and a few enhancements to Android Auto and Google Assistant. The tech giant designed the new Schedule Send feature to be simple to use – it’s certainly simple to explain. To trigger it, all you’ll need to do is long-press the Send button in Messages. That will open up the scheduling menu, and you’ll be able to pick a date and time to send your message. You’ll need an updated version of Messages to enable this,…

In just a few weeks, we should get our first sneak peek at the next version of Android when the developer preview builds start rolling out. But we may have just got our first taste of what Android 12 is going to bring, and if you like iOS 14, you’re going to love it. XDA Developers has got its hands on “an alleged early draft of a document that Google made to summarize changes in Android 12”, and there are some obvious UI changes. You’ll immediately see more rounded corners for notifications, a simpler Quick Settings pane, and clear indicators when apps are using the camera or microphone. There isn’t a lot to go on yet, but as you can see in the images, Android 12 is taking a few…

Price: £949 (inc VAT) from fave.co/3sRNZ1w The Samsung Galaxy S21+ is the awkward middle child of the S21 family: it’s slightly bigger and better than the standard Galaxy S21, but it’s not quite the all-singing, all-dancing Galaxy S21 Ultra (page 21) – but that’s not to say there’s not a place for the Galaxy S21+ in this big, crowded world. The bigger display and better battery life of the Galaxy S21+ make it more tempting than the entry-level model, and with a price cut compared to the S20+, it’s much cheaper than the high-end S21 Ultra too. But with so many similarities to its predecessor, is the Samsung Galaxy S21+ worth the money? Well… DESIGN While the Samsung Galaxy S21+ shares similarities with its predecessor, design certainly isn’t one of them, with…

While some people place performance, value for money or battery life above all else when choosing a new phone, for many it’s a device’s camera set-up that defines whether it’s worth picking up or leaving well alone. There’s an inherent issue in knowing just how good a phone’s camera set-up actually is before buying one. Looking beyond a device’s own marketing, there’s little to guarantee that you’re getting a pixel-perfect snapper without actually testing it out extensively beforehand. There’s also the matter of what you might intend to use your phone’s camera for: are you looking for a great stills camera, a top-quality pocket video camera or a device that spits out the sharpest selfies possible? Depending on the use case, some phone cameras are better suited to certain tasks than…

Android 11 makes numerous changes throughout the OS, including some tweaks to system navigation. Starting in Android 11, almost all devices will default to Google’s new gesture navigation, which might take a little adjustment on your part. There are a few ways you can make navigation on Android 11 more to your liking in just a few taps. THE QUICK-SWITCH GESTURE Several phones have tutorials that teach you how to use the new gesture nav system, but none of them get around to explaining the quick-switch gesture. This is one of the most useful parts of Android’s gesture nav, allowing you to move between apps instantly. You can always enter the multitasking overview by swiping up and holding, but you can switch to the last-used app simply by swiping left to…

Android updates might be the butt of many a joke, but Samsung is working hard to make sure it’s no laughing matter for Galaxy owners. Just months after promising most new Galaxy phones would be receiving three generations of Android version updates, Samsung has vowed to deliver four years of security updates to nearly every Galaxy phone made since 2019. That’s an impressive promise for a phone company that, just a year ago, wasn’t guaranteeing anything in terms of updates. Most new phone purchases were good for a year or two of updates, but only the Pixel, which is made by Google, and Android One-based phones were on the record about how long you would be receiving updates. Now Samsung is doing one better than Google, which guaranteed only three years of version and security updates…

Price: £219 (inc VAT) from fave.co/3qrtqHI Priced at £219, the Samsung Galaxy Buds Pro are worthy options for Samsung-focused Android users who want a little bit of everything packed into their wireless earbuds, whether it’s attractive audio performance, excellent waterproofing, a comfortable fit, or active noise cancellation. With their unique voice detection feature and impressive waterproofing, they even manage to come out ahead of other earbuds aimed at a similarly wide market. Unfortunately, you’ll need to be fully committed to the Samsung ecosystem if you want to get the most out of them, but their versatility makes them a solid choice for anyone with an Android device. DESIGN They certainly look good. Elements of both the Galaxy Buds Plus and the Galaxy Buds Live reveal themselves in the design, and I…

Price: €749 (around £640) The Mi 11 is yet another compelling flagship from Xiaomi, with serious internal specs paired with product design that’s been polished to a tee, so long as you don’t mind that it’s a big phone even by modern standards. The main gripe remains a familiar one – Xiaomi’s MIUI Android skin remains middling at best, and the clunky software keeps tripping the hardware up, holding the Mi 11 back from being truly perfect. DESIGN I’ve already said that the Mi 11 is big, but it’s worth emphasizing. At 164.3 x 74.6mm across the front, it’s only a hair smaller than the Galaxy S21 Ultra (page 21) – the largest phone in the new Samsung line-up. In Xiaomi’s defence, it’s kept the Mi 11 impressively slim at 8.1mm,…