Hot Gadget Hacks How-Tos
How To: Watch Amazon Prime Videos on Your Android Phone
When it comes to watching movies and TV shows in Amazon's Prime Video service on an iPhone, it's as simple as installing the Amazon Prime Video app, signing into it, then playing content. However, on an Android phone, it's a lot more complicated.
Signal 101: How to Block Contacts from Calling or Messaging You
While it's a more secure platform for messages and calls, Signal's job isn't to prevent unknown users from contacting you, so you run into the same issues you would with a regular phone number. People you know that you don't want to talk to may try to strike up a conversation and you'll still get spam messages. Luckily, it's easy to block these suckers.
Google Assistant 101: How to Customize Your News Feed & 'My Day' Experience
The Google Assistant comes in several different flavors. There's the baked-in Google app on Android, the dedicated Google Assistant app on iOS, and the Assistant-powered Google Home smart speaker. But no matter how you access it, your Assistant will only get better if you take some time to personalize things.
Google Assistant 101: How to Manage Account Permissions
The Google Assistant is an incredibly useful tool that's now available for both Android and iOS. You can use plain English to send voice commands that range from turning off your smart lights to answering almost any question — but many of these features won't work properly if you have certain Google activity controls disabled.
Google Maps 101: How to Add a Stop After You've Started Navigation
More often than not, road trips will include unforeseen pit stops that have to be made, no matter how well prepared you are. In the past, making an unscheduled stop may have led to headaches and delays when your navigation app got off track, but thanks to a feature in Google Maps, this is no longer an issue.
How To: Customize Your Apple TV's Name
Your Apple TV is just that — your Apple TV, which means you probably want to personalize it a bit, to make yours stand out from everybody else's. And the easiest way to do this is by renaming it. If you live in an apartment building, this will help differentiate your Apple TV from your neighbors' when trying to use AirPlay.
How To: Adjust Exposure, Highlights & Shadows in Videos Using Adobe Premiere Clip
Adobe Premiere Clip gives mobile video editors the tools they need to make some great looking projects from their iPhone or Android device. Editors need ways to organize and trim clips, edit the look of those clips, add music, and more. For a smartphone app, Adobe Premiere Clip has these features in spades.
How To: Add Crossfade Transitions Between Video Clips in Adobe Premiere Clip
Crossfades are a great way to get from one scene to another. They bridge the gap between two video clips in a fresh, fun way. But can you even use this transition in a smartphone editor? You bet you can, and it's extremely easy.
How To: Add Fade Ins & Fade Outs to Videos in Adobe Premiere Clip
Fades are a classic video transition technique, either at the beginning or end of a scene. They can dramatically begin a film as the picture fades in from black, or they can slowly end the story as the screen moves into darkness. They can also be used within a movie as dramatic transitions to signify time has passed, but we won't cover that in this guide.
How To: Trim Individual Video Files in Your Freeform Adobe Premiere Clip Project
If you've just started a freeform editing project in Adobe Premiere Clip on Android or iPhone, what's next? The first thing you're going to want to do is trim down the video clips you imported into your draft, that way you can lay them out perfectly in your timeline and create the best video possible.
Adobe Premiere Clip 101: How to Save & Share Your Edited Videos
If you've taken the time to edit a video on your iPhone or Android phone, you probably have a purpose for it. Maybe you want to share it to YouTube in hopes of making the next viral sensation. Maybe you just want to save the video to your phone to show off to friends and family when you can.
Adobe Premiere Clip 101: Starting a Freeform Project You Can Edit Yourself
Adobe Premiere Clip is a great mobile app for users with little to no editing experience. Its automatic editor will sort your clips into a fun video in seconds, leaving you to just choose the music. But what if you're looking for more than automatic settings? What if you want some serious control over your project, from the editing to the way the image looks?
Plex 101: How to Change Video Quality to Save Mobile Data
When you're on the go, Plex makes sure your media always stays with you. Just install the server app for Mac or PC and enable remote access, then you can stream movies and TV shows from your computer to your phone over the internet.
HBO Now 101: How to Cast Shows & Movies to Your TV
While HBO Now does not support offline viewing yet, your smartphone is the perfect way to watch your favorite shows and movies on-the-go. Whether you're in a hotel running off Wi-Fi or you have an unlimited plan and are on the bus, if you want to binge some Game of Thrones, the HBO Now app is there for you.
How To: Use Google Maps to Share Your Location with Friends & Family
Life is all about spending time together with loved ones, experiencing new places together to enjoy and create memorable moments. Luckily, Google has made it easier for us to rendezvous with friends and family at specific places by letting us broadcast our locations using Google Maps.
HBO Now 101: How to Cancel Your Subscription
I'm a little biased — I love HBO. I wouldn't want to cancel my subscription, because there are constantly shows I want to watch. But I understand not everyone is like me. Some people might only subscribe to watch, say, Game of Thrones, then cancel their subscription when the show ends. In that case, if you're reading this before July 30th, you'll want to use this information five episodes from now.
Super Mario Run 101: How to Use the Bubble at Any Time to Go Back & Collect Items
Bubbles serve as extra lives to help you get through both Tour and Toad Rally modes in Super Mario Run. Even better, they let you rewind back to pick up any items that were missed. But unbeknownst to many, you can activate a bubble even if you haven't gotten knocked out yet.
How To: Drag & Drop Photos on Your iPhone in iOS 11
One of the more interesting improvements to the Photos app in iOS 11 includes a way to drag and drop a photo from one album into another album. In fact, you could even drag and drop multiple photos at the same time. And this is not an iPad-only feature — it works just as well on an iPhone.
Pokémon GO 101: How to Turn Off Augmented Reality
The augmented reality feature in Pokémon GO is one of the key components that draw people in to the popular Android and iPhone game. Indeed, there's nothing quite like the sight of a Pokémon standing around in an otherwise uninteresting parking lot.
Super Mario Run 101: How to Unlock Luigi, Yoshi, Toadette & Princess Peach
One of the best features in Super Mario Run is the ability to unlock other notable characters from the classic series on iPhone or Android. Each playable character in Super Mario Run has a slightly different skill set — be it speed or jumping — which can come in handy in certain maps or races.
How To: Repost Tracks to Populate Your Profile Stream on SoundCloud
SoundCloud is a great place to gather all your different tastes in music and display them as representations of who you are. You can display things like your own tracks, albums, manually-curated playlists, liked tracks and playlists, and reposted content all from within your profile page.
How To: Get Spotify, Pandora & Other App Controls in Waze to Stop Switching Between Audio & Maps
Who doesn't love listening to music or playlists when driving? The open road and an awesome playlist make for a perfect pairing, but it can become quite the challenge if you're trying to navigate at the same time. That's why Waze's built-in audio controls for compatible apps like Spotify and Pandora are so useful, so you can always keep your eyes on the map and road ahead of you.
Super Mario Run 101: Performing Basic Jumps
As a side scrolling game, performing various jumps in Super Mario Run on your iPhone or Android is as vital as eggs in a breakfast buffet.
How To: Easily Find the Perfect SoundCloud Playlist to Make Your Event More Memorable
Within the last week, there have been at least three times when someone asked me to play a good playlist. This is always a tough call. What if I play something that nobody likes? I probably will.
HBO Now 101: How to Transfer Your Account to Another Provider
Update: HBO discontinued this service. Your best bet for transferring your data from one account to another is to save a record of your watch list. That way, you can add your titles back manually with your new account.
Spotify 101: How to Make Your Music Sound Better by Using an Equalizer
You may not know this, but the Spotify app will let you add a bit of personal touch to all the music you stream. Unlike many other music streaming services, Spotify actually has fantastic equalizer support on both iOS and Android.
How To: Get VLC's Dark Mode on Android & Save Your Eyes at Night
When you're playing videos, the actual content should be the focus, not the media app's interface. But with VLC's default theme on Android, the bright orange-and-white motif shocks your eyes in a dimly-lit setting and draws your attention away from what really matters. Let's change that.
How To: Disable Notification Previews for All Apps in iOS 11
I couldn't live without seeing previews of certain notifications on my iPhone, but there are definitely some that I'd like to hide, either because they're annoying or because I don't want anyone else to see them. Previously, you could only disable notification previews for Apple apps such as Mail, Messages, Photos, and Wallet, but in iOS 11, you can disable previews for every single app on your iPhone.
How To: Save Cellular Data by Using Wi-Fi Only for FaceTime Audio & Video Calls
This may not matter to you if you only FaceTime from your iPhone occasionally, but if you're FaceTiming every day on a limited data plan from your cellular provider, you're going to want to conserve as much data as possible by making sure that you're connected to Wi-Fi only — especially if they are video calls.
Spotify 101: How to Improve Sound Quality for Streaming & Downloaded Music
Spotify's massive song catalog can be streamed in decent quality on iPhone or Android without any tinkering. But if you're an audiophile, you've probably noticed that the sound quality can fluctuate from time to time.
How To: Find Out What Music Is Trending on SoundCloud Right Now
SoundCloud is a really interesting alternative to Spotify and Pandora in that it will never really give you the exact mainstream song that you want. If you're looking for new up-and-coming artists that are making some wonderful alternative remixes to mainstream music, then SoundCloud is the right music streaming app for you.
Super Mario Run 101: How to Conserve Battery Life While Playing on Android or iPhone
If there's one thing that iPhone and Android users can agree on, it's that playing mobile games can drain your battery like nothing else. But it doesn't always have to be this way. If the game you're currently addicted to is Super Mario Run, there are two settings you can change to greatly reduce battery drain on any phone.
How To: Create Playlists on SoundCloud to Help Organize Your Music
The nice part about creating a song playlist is that it's essentially like your own customized album. You can organize all your different music tastes into one large collection or separate them into each of their own genres.
Super Mario Run 101: How to Unlock Toad
Though not quite as agile as the world famous plump plumber Mario, Toad, the lovable fungus, is still one of the most fun characters to use while playing Super Mario Run. Thankfully, he is also by far the easiest character to unlock in the game, requiring no special tasks to complete.
YouTube 101: How to Manage Your Search History & Clear Watched Videos
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Get your mind out of the gutter. Search histories can and should be managed. Many folks are uncomfortable knowing that every video they click and every phrase they search is being recorded and saved, and YouTube is no exception.
Snapchat 101: How to Create & Use Your Own Personal Bitmoji
Bitmojis are not only a good way to personalize your Snapchat account, but also a really fun Snap addition to play around with. A bitmoji is basically like your little avatar, letting you design your mini-self whichever way that you desire.
Twitter 101: How to Stop Getting Notifications from Anyone That You Don't Know
Twitter is a hotbed for abusive accounts. Because it's such an open app, strangers from all over the world can see your tweets. Obviously, not everyone agrees on everything, but sometimes things can escalate to the point where it's considered harassment from people you don't even know.
How To: Disable Auto-Playing Videos in the iOS 11 App Store
Apple just jumped on the auto-play bandwagon with their revamped App Store in iOS 11. Now, when you visit an app or game page that has a video trailer, it will automatically play. This can not only get pretty annoying, but it can eat up your precious data. Luckily, there's a way to restrict these auto-playing videos to Wi-Fi only — or disable them altogether.
Twitter 101: How to Go Live Without Leaving the App
It seems that every major social media platform is adding a "Go live" feature to their apps lately. Twitter, in particular, has been at the forefront of the live broadcasting craze for quite some time now.
Snapchat 101: How to Unlock Hidden Filters & Lenses
There's nothing more fun than unlocking a hidden Snapchat filter or lens and beating everyone to that perfect first selfie. So when a new filter or lens comes out, like the current Uganda Knuckles one, it's always interesting to see how things will turn out.