Android is struggling to keep its market share in the United States, as Apple continues to take over in the market. But, despite Android as a whole losing ground, Google Pixel phones are becoming a bigger slice of the US market.

Counterpoint Research reports that, in Q2 2023, US smartphone shipments dropped by 24% year-over-year. That includes both iPhones and Android phones, and virtually every brand saw a drop in shipments. Samsung saw US shipments drop by 37% while Motorola saw a 17% drop. TCL saw the biggest decline at just shy of 70% year-over-year, and even Apple saw a 6% drop.

TL;DR

• The European Council has ended its adoption procedure for rules related to phones with replaceable batteries.
• By 2027, all phones released in the EU must have a battery the user can easily replace with no tools or expertise.
• The regulation intends to introduce a circular economy for batteries.

Don't get me wrong. Apple removing audio jack was the biggest facepalm in smartphone history. And you can thank it for not being able to make an upgrade without sacrificing audio jack (and SD card too :/). But USB-C is getting standardized everywhere now (laptops, smartphones, etc.). What makes USB-C earphones not worth the switch?

I am in the process of looking between repairing my phone or switching to a new one. And the no brainer evolution to the OnePlus 7 Pro I have is a Pixel phone. Pixel Phones are definitely not perfect, I know that the battery would fall faster than other phones but hey, that's ok, google chip in it, possibility to go GrapheneOs, all good.

But the A versions only having 128 GB, and needing to pay 100 extra Euro on the Normal and Pro phone for 256GB is ridiculous, and not allowing me to add a SD card for that! Is insane I restarted my phone in December fresh from zero, and in the last 9 months I used 163 GB of memory. 48GB of it is my music on Deezer, for which I pay to be able to download "HIFI" files which I am not willing to trade for using less space on my phone, I work in a place with no 4G, I've got a few playlist I switch between. The rest is 25 GB of Pictures, 7GB of games. 44GB of apps.

Now the answer to this is "Well now with your Pixel phone you can use the Google Cloud, Google Docs blablabla". Something insights by Google offering 3 month of Google one and 3 month of YouTube premium when you buy a Pixel phone. So much cloud that's soo cool! And you can just redownload things when you need it. Well I don't want to redownload my musics everyday when I listen to them, I don't want to trade and limit what I would call normal use. I know not everyone will resonate with this, but the carbon impact on bandwidth used from cloud in 4G is important.

Normalise SD cards, Normalise not using the Cloud as a solution for everything

Update 2 Days later

Hey, writting here because this post has brought a lot of people to talk about storage of data on phone, which is quite nice. I am writting here just because a lot of comments are repeating certain points and It wouldn't be useful answering to all of them if after their will be more comments saying the same thing.

I am not saying Cloud = Bad. It's great we have a place out there where we can Store Data in case anything happens. I simply wish either brand gave us more choice on data capacity, seeing a Pixel 7a only at 128 gb ain't cool, let me make a choice. Seing a Pixel & with 128gb or having to pay an extra 100€ for 256gb when a sd card is 30€ is not cool.

A personal server is in my plans, and it's one of the projects I'm the most impatient to have.

I understand that I have a different use of phones then the average, I simply want to be able to adapt the tools I use to my different use.

I have taken the step to take a look at the storage in my phone by curiosity and to look with a different eye my consomption of Storage, and have deleted 3gb of games, and 3gb of apps that where useless. I've also started looking into my photos and took out 3gb of photos I had which where useless. And I think there is more photos I'll delete, I am not done on that of course

My signal discussion are important to me, I am in a Long Distance Relationship, and discussions I have with my SO on Signal are the major part of my relationship, and I cherish them. I have set up signal so that it makes when charging at night a copy of my discussions, and when I have Sincthing, it loads the conv to a HDD Drive on my PC. That being said, in the floders I found bugged temp file from saves that did not end, for a total of 20 gb of Signal discussions (oof lol) which where deleted too. How ridiculus was it? Well in Storage>Files the weight of total files dropped from 20,68gb to 0,68gb

Anyway, I am now at 132gb :D! I'm not writting this because I am feeling attacked or to defend myself, just as a small update and because these are reocuring comment that's all, i'm still anwering here and there if you arrive a bit latter to the post, it's impressive from lemmy I feel to still be receiving comments and have a discussion that continues 2 day after a post. Usually on Reddit posts would die in 6 hours, and their where no dick's in the chat. I've read every single message, and answers other people did

Greetings, Android aficionados! 📱👋

Today, let's take a moment to get to know each other better. We'd love to know:

• Which Android devices are you currently using?
• What do you love most about them?
• What do you dislike?

Whether you're rocking the latest flagship or cherishing a reliable budget device, we want to hear about your experiences. Share the brand, model, and any standout features that make your phone shine. Who knows, you might inspire someone to discover their next Android companion! 🌟💬

Remember, let's keep the conversation friendly and inclusive. Everyone's perspective is valuable, no matter the device they use. We're here to celebrate the diversity within the Android ecosystem and learn from each other.

Hey Android enthusiasts!

Calling all customization lovers! 📱🌟 Show off your amazing homescreen setups and join the fun! Whether it’s sleek and minimalistic or vibrant and expressive, we want to see it all!

Share a screenshot of your homescreen and let us know your device, favorite launcher, widgets, and must-have first page apps! Bonus upvotes for before/after examples!

Let’s exchange some creative inspiration! 🦾

The only app I can't live without. Except for gboard, all of my applications are Foss. There is no competition for gboard's swipe typing, not to mention its many capabilities like as searching for gifs, stickers, being able to paste copied images, translating, and so on. I'd like to know how I can use gboard while maintaining my privacy. According to what I've heard, it sends all typing data to Google's server. If you ask me, that's a massive no-no. Do you have any suggestions?

(Posting this here rather than !askandroid@lemdro.id as it's a quite general question)

I had a look at the GSM Arena phone finder, and it the choice is getting smaller and smaller every year (only 43 phones from 2023, reviewed by the site, had a jack)

The remaining ones are mostly

• Xiaomi Redmi
• Zenfones
• Sony
• Samsung entry range

So, has everyone switched to Bluetooth / USB-C dongles, or are there still a few people holding to the jack until the very end?

One should be at the bottom one at the top. I understand space on the phone is a premium but a second port would make the phone so much more usable. Wired headphones, flash drives, camera modules, speaker modules, keyboards, even connection to a TV, all could be used while charging. It's a shame it's not a thing, USB is extremely versatile port, but you only get one and it's used for charging half of the time. (I am aware dongles exist)

Simple question really! Are any of you running a Custom ROM? Furthermore, are any of you running a De-Googled ROM?

Why do you run your custom ROM, and what are the drawbacks?

SUMMARY

• The EU has identified WhatsApp as a gatekeeper in the messaging industry and has given it a few months to enable interoperability with other apps.
• The EU's Digital Markets Act aims to promote fair competition and give consumers more options for alternative services.
• WhatsApp has already begun working on interoperability with other apps, potentially allowing smaller players like Signal to compete more fairly.

cross-posted from: https://lemdro.id/post/66697

What is your must have open source application available on fdroid?

New pipe - the YouTube front end is absolutely critical for my lifestyle.

Livestream:

#MadeByGoogle ‘23: Keynote

Preorder deals:

Google Store

BestBuy

Videos:

Google Pixel 8/8 Pro Impressions: Software Magic! - Marques Brownlee

Google Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro hands - on Engadget

Pixel 8/8 Pro Hands-On! | EVERYTHING New! - 9to5Google

Google Pixel 8 Pro - Early Thoughts! - Dave2D Articles:

The Pixel 8 Pro has better cameras, a brighter screen, and a lot of new AI tricks -Verge

Google Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro hands-on: Generative AI and a temperature sensor on your phone - Engadget

Android 14 info:

gen ai wallpaper - Mishaal

clock/weather update - Mishaal

VPN info Mishaal

Pls let me know if I miss something, I'll post it as soon as I can.

So far, for me, liftoff and connect seems the most complete.

So, up front, I'll admit I'm one of those guys that gets hung up on tiny, largely irrelevant quirks in apps. Yeah, I'm great fun at parties.

So, what's your favourite keyboard app? I keep coming back to SwiftKey. I feel like it's the best typing experience for me, with fairly accurate prediction and correction — although it's far from perfect, of course. I've seen plenty of people complain about it, and apart from Microsoft adding Bing to it, it's not received much in the way of innovation or useful updates since they bought it.

I particularly like that a long press on the backspace key will delete one whole word at a time, speeding up the longer you hold it down. I simply haven't found the backspace methods on Gboard or the Samsung keyboard (which used to be Swype I guess?) to be as predictable or reliable. Gboard's swipe back doesn't feel predictable in what it will do, and Samsung's backspace is more like iOS.

I also find SwiftKey to be the best at remembering sequences of words; if I start typing my address, it'll generally remember each successive word and offer it as the main prediction on the top row. Samsung and Gboard both do that to some extent, but I just haven't found them to be as reliably predictable in the results.

On the other hand, I hate that SwiftKey doesn't can't add an image to its clipboard. Copying and pasting images is a breeze with both Gboard and Samsung's keyboard, but with SwiftKey I pretty much have to download/screengrab and upload any image I want to insert in a chat or post.

So, that's it. Rant over! What's your favourite keyboard app, and does anything irritate you about it?