Gear

With the 2017unveiling of the ID Buzz concept, Volkswagen announced that the iconic VW bus—forever a symbol of beachy road trips and 1960’s hippie freedom—was returning to the market as an EV. The hype machine went into overdrive.

Jump to 2024, and the vehicle that has been on roads in Europe for about two years is finally, finally, making its way onto US shores.

The cost (around $60K) is maybe higher than many had anticipated, and the vehicle’s range (around 230 miles) is likely lower than many had hoped. Throw in a very long wait from the unveiling to its arrival in the marketplace, and the hype has dwindled. After spending a day behind the wheel of one, however, I can say that the ID Buzz has rekindled some of that excitement I felt way back in 2017.

If you buy something using links in our stories, we may earn a commission. This helps support our journalism. Learn more. Please also consider subscribing to WIRED

Kwikset is no newbie in the lock game. The company has been around since the 1940s making your classic locks and doorknobs and has been making smart locks under its Halo line since 2019. The Halo line originally consisted of two locks, the Halo Keypad and the Halo Touch. As of today there’s a third: the Halo Select.

It tends to really be used only by developers, but the address bar and search box up at the top of the Google Chrome interface has an official name: the omnibox. It reflects the multipurpose capabilities of this little text field, as it’s able to do much more than look up web addresses and run searches on Google.

When you know about everything the omnibox can do, you can save time jumping between different apps and sites, and get things done more quickly. What’s more, Google is constantly adding new features to the omnibox. Most recently, as you might expect, the company added an integration with Gemini AI.

I’m here to make friends, bask in the kind, accepting glow of internet comments, and speak the dark truth you’ve all long known to be true: The N64 controller, Nintendo’s infamous trident joypad for its third home console, is, and always was, awful.

You may think you like it. If you’re of a “certain age,” there’s a fair chance you have fond memories of being huddled around a TV screen, screeching with fury as you got hit by a blue shell in Mario Kart 64; losing yourself in the frenetic chaos of multiplayer Super Smash Bros.; or exploring Hyrule with wide-eyed wonder in Ocarina of Time.

If you buy something using links in our stories, we may earn a commission. This helps support our journalism. Learn more. Please also consider subscribing to WIRED

Unless you’re a keyboard enthusiast or a gamer, with custom builds for specific tasks, it’s highly likely you’re using whatever keyboard you saw first on a shelf at Best Buy. You probably know nothing about it, other than the fact that it works and gets you through the day. But a company called Nuio, cofounded by brothers Tom and Greg Wilson, want to up the ante on ordinary keyboards, starting with the Flow Keyboard—a premium, fully wireless, ergonomic, split keyboard.

If you buy something using links in our stories, we may earn a commission. This helps support our journalism. Learn more. Please also consider subscribing to WIRED

I held Earth in the palm of my hand. Universe Sandbox, a celestial body simulator, isn’t available on the PlayStation 5, yet I was running it inside the PlayStation VR2 with the help of the relatively new PC adapter. It was thrilling to access a whole new library for Sony’s virtual reality headset. Until it stopped working.

In late September, Donald Trump gushed on Truth Social about a just-announced business venture: “The Official Trump Watch Collection,” which, he added, would make a “great Christmas Gift.”

The pair of watches, initially named “Fight Fight Fight” and “Victory Tourbillon,” retail from between (the recently inflated) $799 and $100,000, and the timepieces were said to feature “premium, Swiss-Made materials” and include “intricate details.” However, as watch connoisseurs began to review the Trump Watches marketing materials, they were less than kind about the craftsmanship. WIRED’s watch expert called them the most tragic celebrity watches yet.

If you buy something using links in our stories, we may earn a commission. This helps support our journalism. Learn more. Please also consider subscribing to WIRED

Look, you’re probably here because you recently received an iPhone notification that the battery for your AirTag is running low. Or, maybe you purchased a refurbished version of Apple’s tracking device and want to make sure it has plenty of juice to last for a while. Either way, I’m here to assure you that replacing an AirTag battery is simple. The whole process should take only a couple of minutes.

A sleek, gold car pulls up to a bustling corner market, and a middle-aged couple alights. A woman eases a suitcase into the same vehicle’s spacious trunk. Later, a doodle and its master watch rocket videos in the front seat as the car eases around the neighborhood. No driver, no steering wheel, no pedals, no waiting, no traffic, no worries: This Tesla Cybercab drives itself.

That’s the vision shown off by Tesla CEO Elon Musk last week during a presentation broadcast from a set at Warner Bros. Studio, outside of Los Angeles. Some 20 prototypes cruised the movie lot as a series of mocked-up images showed scenes of the idyllic tomorrow these sleek people-movers could usher us into. But experts say Tesla’s brave, new city of the future will need more than a few robotaxis to transform this hi-def rendering into reality.

If you buy something using links in our stories, we may earn a commission. This helps support our journalism. Learn more. Please also consider subscribing to WIRED

Students, it’s the worst time of your life, you might as well save a little money. Just kidding, life only gets harder from here. Kidding. Again. Maybe. What is not a joke is this deal. Dell is giving students a 10% discount on things students need like Dell XPS laptops and Alienware gaming rigs. Don’t call them that when you tell your parents you need one. Just say it’s a Dell 32-inch 4K OLED Monitor, no need to say anything about gaming. It’s for your eyes, because they’re starting to bleed from all the term papers.