TechRadar News

• A new menu has been spotted when you drag-and-drop files in Windows 11
• Currently only available in a (very) early version of an upcoming Windows 11 update
• Could it be enough to convince Windows 10 users to upgrade?

Microsoft is struggling to convince some people to upgrade to Windows 11 – but a new feature that’s currently being tested out could make people change their minds.

The feature is known as ‘Drag Tray’, and as Tom’s Hardware points out, it will appear when the user selects and drags a file in File Explorer, offering quick options to send the file via email, or to your smartphone.

The Drag Tray was spotted by X user phantomofearth in an early version of an upcoming Windows 11 update, known as Insider Preview Build 22635.4805.

Microsoft is experimenting with a new file sharing UI in Windows 11: the "Drag Tray". When dragging a file, the tray shows up at the top of the screen with a drag here to share hint and lists a few apps. Has a more options button to open the share sheet. (hidden, Beta 22635.4805) pic.twitter.com/LXpkTwKZu2January 24, 2025

As you can see from the video, dragging a file from File Explorer and dropping it on an icon of an app within the Drag Tray will open up the app and automatically attach the file. It looks pretty slick, and being able to drag and drop a file from your Windows 11 PC to your smartphone could prove to be incredibly helpful.

However, judging by the video, it looks like this feature will work best with Microsoft’s own apps – it uses the Phone Link app to send files to your phone, and either Outlook or Mail to send the file via an email attachment.

This shouldn’t be too surprising, as it’s obviously easier for Microsoft to integrate new features like this with its own apps, but if you use a different email client, such as Thunderbird, then you might not get the best experience. All is not lost, however, as in the video, we can see a ‘More options’ button, which looks like it’ll allow you to choose other apps.

It’s also worth bearing in mind that this is just a short video clip without much context – so we don’t know if you’re able to choose and rearrange the apps that are displayed in the Drag Tray, or if third-party apps appear if you have them installed, and they are simply not in the video as the user only uses Microsoft apps.

When will we get it?

Another important consideration is that this looks like it’s a very early glimpse of the Drag Tray feature, and that means the finished product could look and behave a lot differently from what we see here – and that also means more apps could be supported.

It certainly looks like it could be a very useful addition to Windows 11, and if it works well, it could convince people still using Windows 10 to upgrade to the newer operating system. This is a key aim for Microsoft, as there are still a significant number of Windows 10 users who don’t want to switch, but after October 14, 2025, the company will stop supporting Windows 10 with free updates, and that could leave Windows 10 holdouts in a tricky situation.

Adding cool new features like this to Windows 11 is a much better way to convince people to move to the operating system than some of Microsoft’s more heavy-handed attempts in the past.

However, we don’t currently know when we can expect Drag Tray to arrive. As Tom’s Hardware points out, Microsoft didn’t even mention Drag Tray in its release notes for the update, and it’s currently only found by using a third-party app called ViVeTool.

This suggests that the feature is very early in development, so don’t expect it any time soon. Presumably, Microsoft will continue to work on the feature and release it to Windows Insiders for testing over the coming months, where people who have signed up to be Insiders can test it out and report back if there are any bugs or issues.

Assuming that all goes to plan, then Microsoft could roll out Drag Tray to all Windows 11 users in the future. How long that will take is anyone’s guess, and there’s also the risk that the company doesn’t continue to work on it, and quietly drops the feature altogether.

That would be a shame, as adding new features like this to make Windows 11 easier to use is the best way Microsoft can convince people to upgrade from Windows 10 – and it’ll also benefit those of us who are already using Windows 11.

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• Security researchers find new ad for the sale of a stolen database
• The database belongs to the American National Insurance Company, and was first stolen in 2023
• It contains information belonging to thousands of customers and employees

Sensitive information belonging to thousands of customers and employees of the American National Insurance Company is being sold online after initially being stolen years ago, experts have claimed.

American National Insurance Company (ANICO) is a financial services organization providing a wide range of insurance and financial products, including life insurance, health insurance, property and casualty insurance, annuities, and pension plan services.

In 2023, the company suffered a cyberattack and lost sensitive customer and employee data. Now, almost two years later, the stolen information seems to be surfacing.

Plenty of sensitive information

The team at SafetyDetectives discovered the ad for the sale on a hacking forum, noting the seller was offering a 90MB CSV file, which, judging by a shared screenshot, seems to have been posted on BreachForums, one of the most popular hacking communities out there.

The seller claims the file contains 279,332 lines of sensitive customer and employee data. They also shared a small sample to prove their claims.

The data contains customer account ID numbers, status, email addresses, full names, birth dates, age, gender, marital status, generation, occupation, phone numbers, language, postal address, Inforce Premium amount, Inforce Premium amount annuity, and type of policy.

Employees have also lost information on their years in force, agent names, agent emails, MLGA/RGA names, and MLGA/RGA emails.

“This report issued by data breach lawyers at Console & Associates, P.C probing the 2023 data breach asserts that Social Security Numbers, financial account information and medical information was also exposed,” the researchers said.

“However, our cybersecurity team cannot verify if the data shared in this forum post includes such sensitive information or is linked to the reported breach as the author does not specify the exact source of the data beyond mentioning its presence on the dark web.”

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• Task execution now relies on more endpoints than ever before
• Businesses are struggling to control, manage and sustain AI
• All of this is threatening companies with “digital chaos”

Process automation and orchestration platform provider Camunda has warned that companies could face “digital chaos” if they don’t focus on getting their AI deployment right amid increasingly complex ecosystems.

The number of endpoints businesses rely upon to execute tasks has now risen to 50, up 19% in five years.

Camunda explores the rising complexity across business processes that threatens control, ultimately warning of an “Automation Armageddon.”

Complexity could cause “chaos”

Four in five (82%) now report increased compliance risks as a result of the lack of control brought on by a more complex landscape, with three-quarters (77%) highlighting higher risks of core business process failures.

Camunda SVP for Customer Success Kurt Petersen summarized: “Today’s digital infrastructures and processes are both complex and interdependent, making it a significant challenge.

“In a constantly evolving landscape, organizations often struggle with siloed tools and technologies, which hinder their ability to streamline operations or achieve full visibility.”

The report criticized businesses for using artificial intelligence, machine learning, and automation to tackle a single task rather than taking a broader, business-wide approach.

It found that 85% face challenges in scaling and operationalizing AI across their businesses, despite 93% acknowledging that AI must be “fully integrated” into their processes in order to maximize their ROI.

Even those who deploy AI across their processes aren’t happy with the results, with four-fifths (79%) lacking a way to control, manage and sustain it effectively.

Petersen concluded: “If organizations are to successfully operationalize AI across their entire business, AI applications, and services must be orchestrated like any other endpoint within automated business processes. This will ensure they remain compliant and maximise the return on investment from their AI investments.”

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• Apple’s smart home hub is reportedly due to launch later this year
• It’s not too late for Apple to set a new standard for smart home devices
• There are three key things Apple must do in order to succeed

There’s been a lot of speculation over the past few months about Apple’s plans to launch a home hub that combines a display with a speaker and lets you control various smart home devices in the vicinity. According to a new report, it’s on track to launch this year, but there are still some key questions surrounding the product.

The report comes from Bloomberg reporter Mark Gurman, who claims that Apple’s device will feature a seven-inch display that resembles a “smaller and cheaper iPad.” It will be used to “control appliances, conduct FaceTime chats, and handle other tasks,” Gurman says.

That might not sound like a groundbreaking new product, and Gurman himself describes it as “essentially a HomePod with a roughly 7-inch screen.” Yet the reporter believes it will also be “Apple’s most significant release of the year” because it will be a step towards the company establishing itself more strongly in the smart home market.

As well as that, Gurman says the device “provides another platform for AI features” and that Apple will follow it up with a more advanced product in a few years’ time. This high-end version will come with a robotic arm that will let the screen follow a user around the room.

What needs to happen

(Image credit: Apple / Future)

It’s encouraging to see Apple making moves in the smart home space, but the company has a lot of work to do in order to make its device competitive against rivals like Google and Amazon. For one thing, Apple needs to tune up its software, including HomeKit, Siri and Apple Intelligence, if it’s going to give users the kinds of experiences they can get from Apple’s competitors.

There’s also a lot of talk that Apple is going to debut a tailor-made operating system called homeOS with the home hub. If that’s true, this new system needs to have an intuitive, user-friendly interface to help people hit the ground running with this unfamiliar software environment. Fortunately, Apple is one of the best in the world at developing intuitive interfaces – now the company just needs to make sure it doesn’t drop the ball.

Thirdly, it’s vital that the home hub launches with a competitive price. Apple’s philosophy is to be the best, and that often leads to it adding premium features that command a high price – just look at how expensive the Vision Pro and the original HomePod were.

But Apple is late to the smart home party, so it needs to ensure it releases something that is genuinely strong without putting people off with an eye-watering price tag. It’s a fine line to tread, but the recently redesigned M4 Mac mini proves that it can be done. Based on the rumors, it seems likely that its price will sit somewhere between a HomePod Mini ($99 / £99 / AU$149, which it itself due to be getting a HomePod mini 2 successor this year) and a base iPad ($449 / £499 / AU$749), but that's quite a big gap.

Will Apple be able to achieve all that with its home hub? That’s a question that we won’t have an answer for until the dust settles. But if any company has the resources to meet that challenge, it’s probably Apple.

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• Apple's Beats Powerbeats Pro 2 have been confirmed for 2025
• The headphones are rumored to get heart rate monitoring technology
• A hidden line of code in iOS 18 allegedly reveals that the Powerbeats Pro 2 can be used in conjunction with gym equipment to measure heart rate

Apple’s Beats Powerbeats Pro 2 are reportedly coming soon. The originals were a roaring success and lived on our best workout headphones list for an incredibly long time. Now, not only will the Powerbeats Pro 2 arrive in 2025, but the rumor mill is claiming they’ll be beating Apple’s own AirPods to the punch and cracking in-ear heart rate monitoring.

Spotted by MacRumors, one writer dug into iOS 18’s code and reportedly found that Powerbeats Pro 2 will be able to connect to exercise equipment, like the best treadmills and exercise bikes, harvest heart rate data, and display it in the Health app on your iPhone.

At this stage, it’s unknown how this feature will work when the user is also using an Apple Watch, whether one supersedes the other. The report also doesn’t mention whether the feature can be used without gym equipment and whether the information can be beamed straight from the earbuds to an iPhone without a go-between piece of kit like a treadmill.

In-ear heart rate monitoring isn’t entirely new technology: Polar, makers of the best heart rate monitors, previously collaborated with Sennheiser to create a set of Sennheiser Momentum Sport buds ‘powered by Polar’ with heart rate monitoring tech included.

Apple’s AirPods Pro 3 have been rumored to feature heart rate monitoring, but it looks like Apple will first include the technology in its new Powerbeats headphones before delivering it to the AirPods.

Analysis: Can earbuds really measure your heart rate?

(Image credit: Future / Becca Caddy)

Earbuds might seem like an odd place to pick up your heart rate when compared to the best fitness trackers or even an Apple Watch, which collects information from your wrist.

However, in an exclusive interview with TechRadar, Polar CEO Sander Werring said: “a hearable is actually quite a good place through your ears to measure your heart rate, measure fitness and body temperature.” Just like a watch, this information is collected using tiny pulses of light, used to read the levels of light absorption caused by differences in blood flow.

We’re excited to see what this new technology means for the Beats Powerbeats Pro 2 – and the Apple AirPods Pro 3.

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• The first episode of Paradise is streaming on Hulu and Disney Plus earlier than expected
• Sterling K. Brown, Julianne Nicholson and James Marsden lead the cast of the exciting new series
• Originally intended to be a three-episode premiere, episodes 2 and 3 will be released on January 28 instead

If you've been eagerly awaiting Hulu and Disney Plus' new series Paradise, then you're in luck because you can now stream the pilot episode after two of the best streaming services decided to do a surprise drop. We initially expected the series to premiere on January 28 but Disney is brightening our Monday with an exciting new episode to sink our teeth into. The episode is now available on Hulu in the US, and Disney Plus in other territories.

Paradise has been on my watchlist since it was first teased, and early critics' reactions place it at 88% on Rotten Tomatoes, which means it could well earn a place on our best Hulu shows and best Disney Plus shows roundups. The streamers have been going hard to promote the show too, as a recent social media clip playfully teased the first episode's drop, mirroring Severance season 2 which has been dominating social media recently promoting the new Apple TV Plus series.

The secret is out! Stream the first episode of Paradise NOW on Hulu and Disney+ before the three-episode premiere on 1/28. pic.twitter.com/9GpVpiLdoPJanuary 27, 2025

What do we know about Hulu's Paradise?

According to the official synopsis: "Paradise is set in a serene, wealthy community inhabited by some of the world’s most prominent individuals. But this tranquility explodes when a shocking murder occurs and a high-stakes investigation unfolds.”

Without giving too much away, episode 1 has a cliffhanger so hopefully the decision to release the pilot early will have fans keen to watch more. A first episode is meant to make a big impression and by the sounds of things, it's definitely done that!

The series was created by This is Us' Dan Fogelman and stars huge names like Sterling K. Brown, Julianne Nicholson, James Marsden, and Sarah Shahi. It looks like an essential watch if you love a good political thriller like the recent Netflix sensation The Night Agent.

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• United Healthcare data breach affected around 190 million people
• The number initially hovered at around 100 million
• The majority of the victims have been notified already

The number of people affected by the 2024 Change Healthcare cyberattack is almost double the previous estimates, and now sits at approximately 190 million, the company has admitted.

“Change Healthcare has determined the estimated total number of individuals impacted by the Change Healthcare cyberattack is approximately 190 million,” said Tyler Mason, a spokesperson for UnitedHealth Group.

“The vast majority of those people have already been provided individual or substitute notice. The final number will be confirmed and filed with the Office for Civil Rights at a later date.”

ALPHV and RansomHub

Hackers would usually abuse this data in phishing attacks, business email compromise, wire fraud, and other forms of cyberattack, but so far it hasn’t happened, Mason added.

He said the company was, “not aware of any misuse of individuals’ information as a result of this incident and has not seen electronic medical record databases appear in the data during the analysis.”

In this context, it is worth saying that the company paid the ransom demand to the attackers.

When Change Healthcare suffered a ransomware attack in early 2024, it was believed an affiliate of the ALPHV operation was behind the attack. ALHPV, AKA BlackCat, was a notorious operator that worked on a as-a-service model, sharing the spoils with whomever managed to breach a victim and deploy their code.

However, when an affiliate struck Change Healthcare, and managed to extort it for $22 million, things changed. Instead of sharing the spoils, ALPHV’s operators took it all and disappeared from the face of the earth. The affiliate, which was left holding gigabytes of sensitive data, later rebranded to RansomHub, and became one of the greater threats.

They demanded a second payment, but it is unclear if that ever happened. RansomHub did remove Change Healthcare’s entry from its data leak site, suggesting that the victim firm may have paid it.

Via TechCrunch

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• Changes have been spotted in the Google Sounds app
• Pixel owners will soon be able to take more control over haptics
• The update could arrive alongside the Android 16 update

iPhones currently beat Android devices in the way they let you set specific ringtones and vibrations for specific contacts on your phone – though it seems Google has plans to catch up to some of this functionality on the best Pixel phones.

As spotted by tipster Nail Sadykov (via Android Authority), an upcoming version of the Google Sounds app lets you choose vibrations in the same way you can choose ringtones through the Sound and vibration menu in Settings.

It's not the full contact-specific customization available on iOS, but it's another step closer. There are 12 vibration patterns to choose from for your apps and alerts, including Swoop, Snare, Heartbeat, Swirl, Buzz and Bumps.

Being able to take more control over vibration alerts is certainly a welcome upgrade: it means you can increase or decrease the strength of the buzzes your phone is making, based on your personal preference.

Built-in updates

How the updated options could look (Image credit: Mishaal Rahman / Android Authority)

Note that the Google Sounds app is actually built into the Pixel software: it's not something you can download and install separately. You should be able to find it from Settings by tapping Apps > See all apps.

When you select Sounds you should see the version number at the bottom of the screen. The current version at the time of writing is 3.1, while the updates to vibration customizations have been spotted in version 3.2.

Exactly when Google plans to push the upgrade out to phones remains to be seen: with Android 16 now in the beta phase, it's possible that we won't get these options until Android 16 is officially launched in the next few months.

Your options will vary if you're using a non-Pixel device, depending on the features your phone's manufacturer has decided to add in. In the case of Samsung Galaxy phones, for instance, you can make use of Samsung's own Sound Assistant app.

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• AMD's new Ryzen AI Max+ 395 APU reportedly outperforms Nvidia's RTX 4070 laptop GPU
• This is thanks to the Radeon 8060S iGPU, with 40 RDNA 3.5 GPU cores
• It stems from AMD's marketing, while we await tests from users

While Nvidia is set to dominate the desktop GPU space against AMD and Intel with its new RTX 5000 series GPUs, new claims from Team Red hint at the perpetual underdog potentially putting up a bigger fight in the laptop GPU arena.

As highlighted by Notebookcheck, AMD's Ryzen AI Max+ 395 processor will reportedly surpass Nvidia's RTX 4070 laptop GPU, thanks to the Radeon 8060S iGPU offering up to 68.1% better performance in games - at least, according to AMD. This chip will utilize 40 RDNA 3.5 GPU cores, and Team Red's marketing materials (pictured below) showcase its performance boosts over the ROG Flow Z13 in several games using the RTX 4070 laptop GPU at native 1080p.

Considering the consistent domination from Team Green over the last few years in both the desktop and laptop GPU regions, this could be significant for AMD if it proves to be legitimate - one of the most notable performance leaps is present in Cyberpunk 2077 (which just received an update for DLSS 4 support), but without using any upscaling. If we want a real idea of how well this new laptop chip will perform against Nvidia’s discrete GPUs, we’ll need to wait for performance results when both DLSS and FSR are active for the respective GPUs.

Since Team Red's new Max+ 395 processor uses RDNA 3.5 architecture rather than RDNA 4, FSR 4 likely won’t be available on laptops that use the APU. As of now, that new upscaling method is exclusive to RDNA 4 GPUs, but that could change as time goes on.

(Image credit: AMD) What does this mean for the future of gaming laptops, or even handhelds?

Since the AMD Ryzen AI Max+ 395 APU is built primarily for laptops, any discussion of it finding its way to handheld gaming PCs is void for now - what this does mean, however, is that AMD may now finally compete with Nvidia within the gaming laptop space.

With games like Borderlands 3 potentially having a 44 fps difference and Hitman 3 maintaining a 62 fps difference over Team Green's midrange laptop GPU at native 1080p, we could be in for a major performance surprise. As previously mentioned, upscaling tools such as DLSS will play a huge factor in real-world performance differences, especially if the Max+ 395 doesn't have access to FSR 4, while all RTX GPUs will have access to DLSS 4 and the RTX 4070 notably also has access to Nvidia’s Frame Generation tech, which AMD presumably didn’t deign to use for this comparison... no surprises there.

Regardless, it's great for consumers. Even if the RTX 5000 series desktop GPU lineup blows AMD's new RDNA 4 GPUs out of the water - which they probably will - Team Red could have a secret weapon in the form of the Ryzen AI Max+ 395, especially given the sky-high pricing of Nvidia’s new cards. But laptops using AMD's new high-end APU certainly won't be cheap either…

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• An official Samsung blog post seemingly confirms that a Bluetooth-enabled S Pen for the S25 Ultra is on the way
• The new S Pen is not yet listed on any Samsung storefronts
• The stylus will be sold separately to the S25 Ultra itself

Samsung Galaxy Unpacked has been and gone, but we’re still basking in the excitement of having the long-rumored Samsung Galaxy S25, Samsung Galaxy S25 Plus, Samsung Galaxy S25 Edge, and Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra officially revealed.

However, amid news of new upgrades and refreshed designs, we noticed a downgrade for the S25 Ultra that will leave some fans of Samsung’s highest-end flagship feeling puzzled – the loss of Bluetooth support for the S Pen stylus.

But fear not, S Pen fans: a new announcement suggests that Samsung could release a Bluetooth-enabled S Pen for the S25 Ultra after all – but it’ll cost you extra.

A footnote affixed to a recent post on Samsung’s Business Insights blog states “Bluetooth-enabled S Pens sold separately”, which suggests Samsung will soon offer the peripheral at an additional cost.

It’s not yet known whether the new Bluetooth-enabled S Pen will offer any new features, or simply give users access to the remote control and gesture features offered by the S24 Ultra's S Pen.

The S24 Ultra came with a Bluetooth-enabled S Pen that allowed users to make use of various gestures to control the phone remotely; for instance, you could trigger the camera, open apps, and navigate the phone’s UI.

The S Pen in the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra (Image credit: Future / Philip Berne)

The specs sheets released following Samsung Galaxy Unpacked confirmed that Samsung has axed Bluetooth compatibility from the S Pen included with the S25 Ultra, relegating the stylus to its original purpose as a drawing and writing tool.

Android Authority notes that the remote gestures enabled by the S Pen weren’t very popular, which would have impacted the decision to remove them. It's also possible that Samsung sought to allocate resources towards more marketable features, like an upgraded ultra-wide camera or enlarged display.

Still, some users will surely feel a tinge of disappointment at having to cough up more money to counter this downgrade, especially considering the S25 Ultra’s starting price of $1,299 / £1,249 / $2,149.

We’ve been otherwise impressed with Samsung's newest flagship so far – be sure to check out our hands-on Galaxy S25 Ultra review, as well as our hands-on Galaxy S25 review and hands-on Galaxy S25 Plus review for our first impressions of all three new devices.

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• The alleged customer information of 19 million TalkTalk customers has been discovered online
• However the authenticity of the breach has come into question
• TalkTalk says it is investigating the claims

British broadband and TV giant TalkTalk is investigating a possible data breach after alleged customer information was found for sale on a cybercrime forum.

Reports from The Register have confirmed this breach is suspected to have originated through a third-party vendor, and could affect up to 19 million former and current customers of TalkTalk.

The hacker who posted the data using the handle ‘b0nd’, claims the data contains personally identifiable information (PII), here’s what we know so far.

Another Telco target

The data is said to include PII such as email addresses, full names, IP addresses, phone numbers, and subscriber PINs.

"As part of our regular security monitoring, given our ongoing focus on protecting customers' personal data, we were made aware of unexpected access to, and misuse of, one of our third-party supplier's systems, however, no billing or financial information was stored on this system,” TalkTalk told The Register.

"Our security incident response team is continuing to work with the supplier regarding this matter and protective containment steps were taken immediately.”

However the authenticity of the breach has already been called into question, largely due to the size of the dataset, which contains 18.9 million individual’s data, significantly larger than the firm’s current customer base.

Calculations from The Register estimated that since its inception in 2003, TalkTalk has never amassed as many customers as the dataset claims to contain.

"Our investigations are ongoing, however, we can confirm that the number of potential customers referred to in certain online posts is wholly inaccurate and very significantly overstated," TalkTalk added.

TalkTalk is unfortunately no stranger to data breaches, as it suffered a ‘significant’ cyberattack back in 2015, which led to up to 150,000 of its UK based customers’ data exposed - landing the firm a £400,000 GDPR fine for failing to implement “the most basic cyber security measures,” which allowed hackers to “penetrate its systems with ease.”

It's not the only major telecommunications firm to run into difficulty lately, with up to 9 firms breached by Chinese state actors in a 'major incident' late in 2024.

What to do after a breach

If you think your data may have been compromised in this or any other data breach, there are a few ways you can protect yourself and mitigate any damage.

If your information has been exposed, this leaves you at risk of attackers using your data to commit identity theft, so closely monitoring your bank accounts and credit reports is crucial. Alternatively, checking out our list of best identity theft protections can simplify the process for you.

Without identity theft protection services, if you do notice any suspicious activity on your accounts, you’ll need to call your bank immediately, freeze your credit, change your passwords, and likely file police reports - which can be a rather gruelling process.

Also a concern, are social engineering attacks, most often in the form of sophisticated phishing scams. Once attackers have access to your PII, they can construct scams specifically for you, posing as family members or services that you use regularly.

To protect yourself from these, the key is being vigilant. Ensure to double check the credentials of any emails, texts, or calls you receive - especially ones which are unexpected and require action.

If you’re being offered a deal which is too good to be true or being hit with an emotional plea - be extra cautious in verifying the identity of the sender, and don’t hand your information over to someone you don’t know.

Be extremely careful when clicking links on emails, as this can lead to viruses or malware installed on your device, and can result in further information being taken.

Data breaches are an unfortunate inevitability for anyone with an online presence, so to proactively take steps to protect yourself, making sure you have a strong password is a great way to stay secure. Especially important is making sure you don’t repeat passwords for multiple sites, since this means if one password is exposed in a breach, it's contained to just that one site, protecting the rest of your data.

For security, a great tool is a multi-factor authentication app, which provides an extra layer of safety for any sensitive information. Yes, they can be a bit of a hassle when you’re scrambling for your phone to access the right code, but they're a whole lot more convenient than having your bank details stolen.

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• Marvel Snap is back in the US
• Affected players will be able to receive compensation package
• Everyone else will also receive bonus rewards

Mobile superhero card game Marvel Snap was one of the unexpected casualties of the brief US TikTok ban, becoming inaccessible to users in the US between January 19 and 25. This was due to the fact that its publisher, Nuverse, is a subsidiary of TikTok owner ByteDance.

Thankfully, the game is now back online in the region and the developer Second Dinner has outlined a generous compensation package not only for those affected by the outage but also for all Marvel Snap players.

As explained in a recent X / Twitter post, the studio wants to thank fans for their “dedication, patience, and support” and make good with those who missed out on time-based content.

This is on top of a separate package to “welcome back players, new and old, with some extra goodies”. These will be delivered to in-game inboxes sometime this week.

If you are a US player over collection level 500, you can expect to receive the following:

• 2 Spotlight Keys
• 5000 Season Pass XP
• 4150 Credits
• 6200 Collector’s Tokens
• 1000 Gold
• 5 Gold Conquest Ticket
• 3 Infinite Conquest Ticket
• 4000 Conquest Medals
• 1 Mystery Variant
• 6 Premium Mystery Variants
• 1 Cosmic Red Border (Super Rare)
• 3 Cosmic Gold Border (Super Rare)
• 155 x5 Random Boosters

If you are a US player under collection level 500, you will get:

• 6 Mystery Series 3 Cards
• 5000 Season Pass XP
• 7150 Credits
• 1000 Gold
• 1 Mystery Variant
• 6 Premium Mystery Variant
• 1 Cosmic Red Border (Super Rare)
• 3 Cosmic Gold Border (Super Rare)
• 155 x5 Random Boosters

The offering for non-US players is similar, though slightly less generous. Those over collection level 500 will receive:

• 2 Spotlight Key
• 3000 Collector’s Tokens
• 1500 Credits
• 1 Mystery Variant
• 1 Premium Mystery Variant
• 1 Cosmic Gold Border (Super Rare)
• 1 Cosmic Red Border (Super Rare)
• 155 x3 Random Boosters

If you’re outside the US and under collection level 500, then expect:

• 6 Mystery Series 3 Cards
• 3000 Credits
• 1 Mystery Variant
• 1 Premium Mystery Variant
• 1 Cosmic Gold Border (Super Rare)
• 1 Cosmic Red Border (Super Rare)
• 155 x3 Random Boosters

These are, frankly, incredibly lavish offerings that will provide a massive boost to players who get them. That said, there are some eligibility requirements to bear in mind here.

To qualify for the US rewards, you will need to have an account that was created in the US or recorded account activity in the US 30 days prior to the outage. If you are a US player who used a VPN to play during the downtime, you will still be able to receive the US rewards.

To be eligible for the rest, you simply need to have an account that was created before Jan 20, 2025, and not qualify for the US offering. It is not possible to receive more than one compensation package.

Interestingly, the message also says that the developer intends to partner with a new publisher and “bring more services in-house” to try and avoid similar issues in the future.

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• Britain lags behind Germany when it comes to "digital health", report claims
• Smaller businesses tend to rank less favorably, Zoho finds
• Those who focus on AI are considered ‘healthier’

Although an increase of nine percentage points has been observed compared with the previous year, still only 28% of UK businesses reported good "digital health" in 2024, new research has claimed.

Moreover, more than one in three reported average digital health (36%), and another third had poor digital health (36%), a report from Zoho found, claiming larger businesses seemed more prepared than smaller businesses.

Zoho revealed 40% of large businesses had good digital health, compared with 27% of medium businesses and just 18% of small businesses. However, while Britain was outpaced by Germany, with an average score of 33%, other European countries like Spain (27%), France (20%) and the Netherlands (19%) lagged way behind.

Small European businesses don’t have great digital health

The report explored the correlation between good digital health and attitudes – it found that businesses with good digital health were more likely to see artificial intelligence as critical (46%) compared with average (24%) and poor (65%) health businesses.

More than half (54%) of the British businesses analyzed plans to invest heavily in artificial intelligence.

However, Britain’s digital transformation is still underway, with one in three operating at least half of their operations digitally and a further one in four running the majority of their operations digitally.

Customer experience, efficiency, and improved employee experience were all highlighted as key focus areas for digitization in the year ahead.

“Good digital health is a critical foundation in order to realize ROI from investment in digital tools and technology," noted Zoho UK Managing Director Sachin Agrawal.

Agrawal added vendors should, “take a long-term view in their relationship with customers” to help them deploy tools, educate users, and drive adoption more effectively, thus increasing their ROI.

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• Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man's creator has defended the show's animation style
• Some Marvel fans have criticized how the series looks from a movement viewpoint
• Jeff Tramell says viewers should judge it after watching the whole season, rather than a two-minute trailer

Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man's showrunner has defended its animation style in the wake of fierce fan criticism.

Speaking to TechRadar ahead of the Marvel show's premiere on January 29, Jeff Tramell implored viewers to "give it a chance" after some fans reacted negatively to how it looks. Tramell, who also acts as the series' head writer and one of its executive producers, wants people to watch all 10 episodes before they comment on the animation techniques that have been used.

Ever since the Disney Plus animated series was first shown exclusively to D23 Expo 2024 members last August, fans have had plenty to say about the choice of animation. In the aftermath of said footage leaking online, threads on r/MarvelStudios, r/SpiderMan, r/MarvelStudiosSpoilers and other Reddit pages were full of comments labeling character movements as "weird", "off-putting", "awful", "rough", and "lazy".

Fans haven't held back over what they think about the show's animation style (Image credit: Marvel Animation/Disney Plus)

The negativity grew exponentially once the animated show's first trailer – one of six big entertainment stories you might have missed over the 2024 holiday season – was released, too. Once the teaser was revealed in late December 2024, new threads on r/SpiderMan, r/MarvelStudios, r/MarvelStudioSpoilers, and other Reddit pages were similarly packed with people's opinions on its animation. Indeed, from those saying Marvel was "trying too hard" and that the backgrounds look "empty", to even harsher critiques suggesting it looked "ugly" and "dogs**t", fans didn't hold back as they passed judgment on the series' animation style.

For what it's worth, some observers who don't believe the animation is as bad as it looks. Additionally, large swathes of Marvel's global fanbase have reacted positively to the show's art style, which honors the artistry of iconic Spider-Man comic book illustrators Steve Dikto and John Romita Jr. Even so, it seems the majority of viewers have already made up their minds about the Marvel Phase 5 TV show's animation.

See you in class!Stream the two-episode premiere of Marvel Animation’s #YourFriendlyNeighborhoodSpiderMan January 29 only on @DisneyPlus. pic.twitter.com/LbC5yH7w1dJanuary 24, 2025

Tramell, though, isn't giving up hope that those dissenters may change their minds once Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man launches on Disney Plus. Indeed, he believes that, once audiences see how the show looks and feels from a full episode standpoint, rather than the trailer's cut-together format, some fans may admit they too quickly and harshly judge its aesthetic.

"We wanted to set the show apart [from other Spider-Man animated shows]," Tramell told me. "Regardless of how you feel about the show, you have to there's nothing that looks like it. There's no Spider-Man that looks like our Spider Man. I think it's important to have one that's ours, and that feels unique [and] very much of its own thing. So, we really wanted to find something that set us apart from everything else, and kind of drives audiences towards us. So if you see our Spider-Man in a line-up, you're like 'that's Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man'.

"I think our style grows on you," he continued. "So, I would say 'give it a chance'. I know there were a lot of initial thoughts about how it looked in the two minute teaser, but I'll also say that teaser is super cut up. Once the show comes out, you'll see those scenes don't play in the way that they play in that trailer. So, just give it a shot, watch it, and let it grow on you. If it doesn't, that's fine, too. I love our look and I think everyone else who gives it a shot will do as well."

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• Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer has committed to supporting the Nintendo Switch 2
• He also revealed that he congratulated Nintendo CEO Shuntaro Furukawa on the console’s reveal
• This likely means more Xbox franchises coming to Nintendo platforms

Good news multi-platform gamers, it looks like Xbox will go all in on supporting the Nintendo Switch 2. This comes from Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer, who recently spoke on the Gamertag Radio podcast.

Spencer said that he has a “game-first not platform-first” mindset, though quickly clarified that Xbox hardware is still "fundamental to what Xbox is” and here to stay. He added that he isn’t a fan of “trying to gatekeep the games” from other platforms.

He also revealed that he had messaged Nintendo CEO Shuntaro Furukawa around the console’s reveal, giving him a “big congrats”. He said that he is a fan of Nintendo’s innovation and will “always applaud the moves that they make” and that he is “really looking forward to supporting them with the games that we have.”

These words shouldn’t come as much surprise, as they coincide with a wider multi-platform push by Xbox. The original Nintendo Switch is already home to a number of Microsoft games, including Minecraft, Ori and the Blind Forest, and its sequel Ori and the Will of the Wisps. These were joined by Pentiment and Grounded, after an announcement by Phil Spencer in February 2024 that more games would be coming to other platforms.

As for which games could be coming to Nintendo Switch 2, it’s still up in the air. We know that at least one Call of Duty title is highly likely, as Microsoft committed to bringing the franchise to Nintendo platforms in a legally binding ten-year agreement back in February 2023. Major Xbox franchises such as Halo, Gears of War, and Forza Horizon also seem like obvious choices to make the leap, but we’ll just have to wait and see what Microsoft has in store.

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• Rumor has it that Nvidia is leaving its graphics card making partners thin on margins with RTX 5000 boards
• This could mean that pricing comes in above the MSRP for those third-party boards more often than not
• A previous rumor also suggested this, and while this remains speculation, hearing the notion again isn’t particularly comforting

The launch of next-gen GPUs has been beset by rumors of possible pitfalls for both Team Green and Team Red – and we’ve just heard another gloomy piece of speculation regarding Nvidia’s RTX 5000 graphics cards.

The contention from Wjm47196 on Chiphell (the Chinese forum isn’t always the most reliable source, but this particular leaker has been right in the past) is that Nvidia’s putting the squeeze on its third-party graphics card making partners, potentially pushing up pricing of their RTX 5000 boards.

Wjm47196 believes that Nvidia has left those partners with very slim margins in terms of the cost of the components for the Blackwell graphics cards, which is evidently coming uncomfortably close to the MSRPs set by Team Green (leaving little room for profit).

Now, with their higher-end products, graphics card manufacturers always lump a hefty premium on top of the MSRP, which is the price you pay for higher clock speeds (thanks to better cooling, and build quality) and an overall faster GPU.

But the problem is that with the entry-level models sporting baseline specs, these card makers are going to struggle to produce anything that’s at, or close to, the MSRP. So, prices could be jacked up more than with the baseline RTX 4000 models, if this rumor is right.

Potentially adding insult to injury is that as Wccftech (which spotted this) points out, Nvidia’s own Founders Edition graphics cards – models which are guaranteed to be at the MSRP – could be very low on stock too. In short, options might be very hard to find at the MSRP level, which would be disappointing.

(Image credit: Nvidia) Analysis: Stock and pricing woes adding up to a real headache?

Obviously, this is not what PC gamers on the lookout for a next-gen GPU want to hear. We’re told that part of the reason for margins being so slim for board makers is the price of GDDR7 video RAM, which has significantly upped the overall cost associated with the components for Blackwell graphics cards (known as the BoM or Bill of Materials). That cost is, of course, inevitably passed on to the consumer.

So, we have a couple of worries with the RTX 5000 series now. Firstly, there have been persistent rumors about how stock is going to be thin on the ground at launch, and the volume of the chatter around this is definitely concerning.

But now, on top of that, is the idea that third-party RTX 5000 graphics cards will be priced somewhat above the MSRP level in the main, a notion which is backed up by recently spilled purported prices from a Finnish retailer (which listed Gigabyte’s RTX 5080 models, with only one at the recommended price).

While all of this remains gossip, essentially, all the separate pieces add up to a worry that the $999 MSRP (in the US) that Nvidia pinned on the RTX 5080 – which was the most pleasantly surprising revelation on the price front, given the rumor mill was claiming it’d be 20% more than that, at least – will pretty much be a pipe dream. As the Founders Edition could sell out very quickly, as might any third-party RTX 5080s at the MSRP level, which may not be many, by all accounts.

Add plenty of salt, naturally, but the more I hear about the upcoming Blackwell GPU launch, the more I’m getting concerned that buying one of these graphics cards is going to be a much more difficult – and pricier – proposition than it should be. Particularly if we do end up in a scenario where stock is lean, MSRPs are jacked up in the first place, and price gougers are coming in on top of that.

There is, of course, always AMD’s RDNA 4 rivals, at least for those who don’t need a high-end GPU, but that launch has been an odd one full of unpredictable twists and turns of its own.

AMD’s RX 9070 models won’t arrive until March now, but perhaps the reason Team Red is taking its time to get things right is not only because this is a good idea – and maybe a new philosophy at the firm – but also because AMD has time, given how Nvidia’s RTX 5000 launch is shaping up.

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You have the power to take charge of your data. This is the theme of this year's Data Privacy Week, an annual event that aims to raise awareness about online privacy.

Data Privacy Week 2025, which takes place between January 27 and 31, is all about helping you take control of your data—whether that data is the websites you visit, the apps you use, or any other identifier information you may willingly (or not) share when using the internet.

Here at TechRadar, we proudly advocate online privacy and want to help you regain agency over your online data. Over the week, we'll be giving you everything you need to support your journey. This page will be home to all of our latest advice, experiences, and privacy tool recommendations. Check back regularly for more from Data Privacy Week 2025 on TechRadar.

The best cheap VPN: Surfshark
The first rule of taking back control over your data is minimizing the information you share online in the first place. Surfshark is one of the best VPN tools on the market that can help you do that. For as little as the equivalent of $2.19 a month, you'll get premium privacy across unlimited devices for a very tiny price. Take Surfshark for a test drive with a 30-day money-back guarantee.

▶ Read more in our full Surfshark reviewView Deal

Data Privacy Week: the privacy risks of being online

Huge US data broker hack compromises privacy for millions worldwide
The Gravy Analytics hack, a breach of a US data location broker that holds data from millions of iPhone and Android users worldwide, was another reminder of the great dangers of data collection.

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Data Privacy Week: how to take your privacy back

How to clean up your digital footprint: 3 privacy-boosting tips
Minimizing your online data trail is key to protecting your digital privacy. Here are three easy steps to help you do that today.

How to protect yourself and your data online
While you can’t become 100% invisible online unless you’ve never logged into a website before, you can still get very close to removing your information from the internet. Here's how.

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Want to hit restart on your online presence? Here's 5 tools you need to stay truly private online
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• GPU-like PCIe card offers 10PFLOPs FP4 compute power and 2GB of SRAM
• SRAM is usually used in small amounts as cache in processors (L1 to L3)
• It also uses LPDDR5 rather than far more expensive HBM memory

Silicon Valley startup d-Matrix, which is backed by Microsoft, has developed a chiplet-based solution designed for fast, small-batch inference of LLMs in enterprise environments. Its architecture takes an all-digital compute-in-memory approach, using modified SRAM cells for speed and energy efficiency.

The Corsair, d-Matrix’s current product, is described as the “first-of-its-kind AI compute platform” and features two d-Matrix ASICs on a full-height, full-length PCIe card, with four chiplets per ASIC. It achieves a total of 9.6 PFLOPs FP4 compute power with 2GB of SRAM-based performance memory. Unlike traditional designs that rely on expensive HBM, Corsair uses LPDDR5 capacity memory, with up to 256GB per card for handling larger models or batch inference workloads.

d-Matrix says Corsair delivers 10x better interactive performance, 3x energy efficiency and 3x cost-performances compared with GPU alternatives, such as the hugely popular Nvidia H100.

A leap of faith

Sree Ganesan, head of product at d-Matrix, told EE Times, "Today’s solutions mostly hit the memory wall with existing architectures. They have to add a lot more compute and burn a lot more power, which is an unsustainable path. Yes, we can do better with more compute FLOPS and bigger memory, but d-Matrix has focused on memory bandwidth and innovating on the memory-compute barrier."

d-Matrix’s approach eliminates the bottleneck by enabling computation directly within memory.

"We’ve built a digital in-memory compute core where multiply-accumulate happens in memory and you can take advantage of very high bandwidth - we’re talking about 150 terabytes per second," Ganesan explained. "This, in combination with the series of other innovations allows us to solve the memory wall challenge."

CEO Sid Sheth told EE Times the company was founded in 2019 after feedback from hyperscalers suggested inference was the future. “It was a leap of faith, because inference alone as an opportunity was not perceived as being too big back in 2019,” he said. “Of course, that all changed post 2022 and ChatGPT. We also bet on transformer [networks] pretty early on in the company.”

Corsair is entering mass production in Q2 2025, and d-Matrix is already planning its next-generation ASIC, Raptor, which will integrate 3D-stacked DRAM to support reasoning workloads and larger memory capacities.

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Dyson tends to make quite a fuss when it releases a new vacuum (and rightly so). But towards the end of 2024 we spotted what looked like a brand new cordless vacuum that had been stealth-launched, with no fanfare: the Dyson Digital Slim.

It's not a flagship model, and at the time of writing it was only available direct from Dyson in the US, although there are Amazon listings in both the US and AU. It looks to be a pared-back, slimmed-down, more budget-friendly alternative to the brand's flagship models. (It's not to be confused with the Dyson V12 Detect Slim, another non-flagship model, which launched alongside the Dyson V15 Detect in 2021.)

We haven't had a chance to test this one out ourselves yet, so ahead of our official review, here's everything we know about the Dyson Digital Slim, and how it compares to the rest of the best Dyson vaccums...

Dyson Digital Slim: design & features

As you might have guessed from the name, one USP here is that this is a more streamlined stick vacuum option. The Digital Slim is lighter than any of the flagship Dyson stick vacuums, with a shorter overall height. It also has the smallest dust cup – one that's small enough to be annoying if you have a larger home or are dealing with lots of dirt or pet hair. Although one saving grace is that the bin-emptying mechanism is the current, simplified design found on the newest models.

Dyson is widely considered to be one of the best cordless vacuum brands, and you're getting all the standard benefits of other stick models. Namely, it's easy to maneuver with a super-pivotable floorhead, it comes with an optional wall dock for charging, there's no cord to fuss around with, and it can easily be converted into a handheld by removing the wand and adding a detail tool.

The Digital Slim has a straightforward emptying mechanism, and can be charged directly or via a wall dock (Image credit: Dyson)

It's operated via a trigger, which needs to be continuously depressed. Only the newest Gen5detect replaces this with a more finger-friendly one-touch button. You can choose between three suction modes – low, medium and high.

Information is conveyed via a small LCD screen on the main body of the vacuum. This will tell you how much battery you have left (in hours and minutes) and which mode you're using, as well as alerting you of any maintenance tasks that need doing – for example, if the filter needs cleaning. That screen is a relatively modern addition in the Dyson vacuum range, first introduced in 2019 with the Dyson V11.

An LDC screen provides information, and there's a multi-floor floorhead with anti-hair wrap features (Image credit: Dyson)

The Digital Slim has an inline design, where the wand, bin, cyclones and motor are all stacked one after the other. This was introduced with the Dyson V11, and is designed to maximize suction efficiency.

Under the hood, there's a Hyperdymium motor that rotates at 120,000rpm. That's actually a better motor than you'll find on the Dyson V8, the oldest flagship model in the current lineup, although Dyson says it generates slightly less suction than that model overall. Filtering is in line with older flagships – designed to capture 99.99% of particles as small as 0.3 microns.

At a maximum of 40 minutes, the battery life matches the V8. That increases to 60 minutes on the V11 and V15, and to 70 minutes on the Gen5detect, but it's important to note that the extra power comes with the payoff of extra weight. 40 minutes of cleaning (or less, if you need to amp up to medium suction model) should still be plenty for most smaller homes.

The Digital Slim typically comes with a Multi tool (left) and Crevice tool (right) (Image credit: Future)

In terms of Dyson tools and floorheads, it's a minimal selection included with the Digital Slim. The floorhead is a Motorbar with hair-detangling features, and suitable for use on both hard floor and carpet (there's no extra Fluffy floorhead, specialized for hard floor use). You'll also get a Combination tool, which includes a smaller nozzle and brush for general detail cleaning, and a longer Crevice tool for getting into narrow spaces. Other tools may be compatible, and the extras can vary depending on retailer, so it's worth double-checking what's included before you buy.

As you'd expect, you're not getting the fancier features that come with the newest Dyson stick vacs. There's no automatic suction adjustment based on floor type or dirt levels, no real-time reports on what's being sucked up, and no laser-equipped Fluffy floorhead for illuminating dust on your hard floors. However, for many, these kinds of features aren't essential.

Dyson Digital Slim: price & availability

The Dyson Digital Slim started appearing online in fall/winter 2024. At the time of writing, it was only available to buy direct from Dyson in the US, at a list price of $499.99 but discounted to $249.99 (also at the time of writing). It's also on sale via Amazon US, with the same discount. In Australia, it's not available to buy direct from Dyson, but does have an Amazon AU listing, with a price of AU$813.26. It's currently not available in the UK.

At list price, that places the Digital Slim between the V8 (at $469.99) and the V11 (at $569.99). However, if we take the discounted price, it's the cheapest Dyson cordless stick vacuum option by some margin.

At TechRadar, our mid-range price bracket for vacuums is $250-$500. Anything above that is premium, and below is budget – so at it's discounted price, the Digital Slim would be considered a budget model. It's more advanced than most of today's best cheap vacuums, with features like the LCD screen for information.

Dyson Digital Slim: specs

Below, we've compared the Digital Slim with the least advanced Dyson stick vacuum in the current lineup (the Dyson V8), the newest and most advanced (the Dyson Gen5detect), and a mid-range model (Dyson V11).

Should I buy the Dyson Digital Slim? Considering buying it if...

You have a small home

The Digital Slim is smaller and nimbler than other Dyson vacuums. That, and the fact it has a smaller dust cup and shorter runtimes, make it more suited to smaller homes. View Deal

You're on a budget

At full price the Digital Slim is roughly in line with the Dyson V8, but it's regularly discounted to half price, dropping it into the budget price bracket (just!) and making it excellent value for money for what you're getting. View Deal

Don't buy it if...

You have shedding pets

The small dust cup and relatively low power compared to other Dyson stick vacuums means we wouldn't recommend this model to pet owners. Our guide to the best vacuums for pet hair has plenty of alternative recommendations. View Deal

You have a large home

The small dust cup and shorter runtimes mean the Digital Slim isn't the best choice for larger homes – you'll find your cleaning sessions interrupted by bin-emptying and recharging.View Deal

Quordle was one of the original Wordle alternatives and is still going strong now more than 1,000 games later. It offers a genuine challenge, though, so read on if you need some Quordle hints today – or scroll down further for the answers.

Enjoy playing word games? You can also check out my NYT Connections today and NYT Strands today pages for hints and answers for those puzzles, while Marc's Wordle today column covers the original viral word game.

SPOILER WARNING: Information about Quordle today is below, so don't read on if you don't want to know the answers.

Quordle today (game #1098) - hint #1 - Vowels How many different vowels are in Quordle today?

• The number of different vowels in Quordle today is 5*.

* Note that by vowel we mean the five standard vowels (A, E, I, O, U), not Y (which is sometimes counted as a vowel too).

Quordle today (game #1098) - hint #2 - repeated letters Do any of today's Quordle answers contain repeated letters?

• The number of Quordle answers containing a repeated letter today is 0.

Quordle today (game #1098) - hint #3 - uncommon letters Do the letters Q, Z, X or J appear in Quordle today?

• No. None of Q, Z, X or J appear among today's Quordle answers.

Quordle today (game #1098) - hint #4 - starting letters (1) Do any of today's Quordle puzzles start with the same letter?

• The number of today's Quordle answers starting with the same letter is 0.

If you just want to know the answers at this stage, simply scroll down. If you're not ready yet then here's one more clue to make things a lot easier:

Quordle today (game #1098) - hint #5 - starting letters (2) What letters do today's Quordle answers start with?

• W

• O

• B

• T

Right, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON'T WANT TO SEE THEM.

Quordle today (game #1098) - the answers

(Image credit: Merriam-Webster)

The answers to today's Quordle, game #1098, are…

• WATER
• ORBIT
• BRIDE
• TOUCH

I decided to change my start words today and it resulted in a fail. Usually I start with AUDIO and STEER, but today I went with RADIO and SURGE. My thinking – which, on reflection, is totally illogical – was that I was wasting a letter by using a double E, but I still wasted a letter anyway by using R twice. D'oh!

Tomorrow, I’m returning to my tried and trusted start words, even though I feel there must be a better pair out there.

Completing the Daily Sequence made me feel better.

How did you do today? Let me know in the comments below.

Daily Sequence today (game #1098) - the answers

(Image credit: Merriam-Webster)

The answers to today's Quordle Daily Sequence, game #1098, are…

• ENSUE
• STAID
• DETOX
• RELAX

Quordle answers: The past 20

• Quordle #1097, Saturday 25 January: GIVER, GROOM, GUSTO, MAKER
• Quordle #1096, Friday 24 January: GRIND, STOCK, SERVE, TOUCH
• Quordle #1095, Thursday 23 January: RUGBY, SASSY, WORRY, BANAL
• Quordle #1094, Wednesday 22 January: SLANT, TRUNK, WOOZY, EATEN
• Quordle #1093, Tuesday 21 January: CHART, VIGOR, PRINT, SPAWN
• Quordle #1092, Monday 20 January: SIXTY, THONG, TATTY, ROBIN
• Quordle #1091, Sunday 19 January: WREST, RINSE, SCOUR, CANNY
• Quordle #1090, Saturday 18 January: BLARE, ITCHY, BICEP, PIPER
• Quordle #1089, Friday 17 January: CATCH, WEARY, SWOON, LATHE
• Quordle #1088, Thursday 16 January: PARTY, BLUNT, TWEED, PLANT
• Quordle #1087, Wednesday 15 January: RISEN, PLATE, RURAL, ENVOY
• Quordle #1086, Tuesday 14 January: SWARM, SCRAP, ONION, BELCH
• Quordle #1085, Monday 13 January: EYING, GIDDY, CHEAP, PETAL
• Quordle #1084, Sunday 12 January: BRIEF, PETAL, WOMAN, FELON
• Quordle #1083, Saturday 11 January: ASCOT, FIBER, ROGUE, SMELL
• Quordle #1082, Friday 10 January: BIGOT, INLET, LEECH, TUNIC
• Quordle #1081, Thursday 9 January: RESET, HUMOR, TENOR, IMAGE
• Quordle #1080, Wednesday 8 January: MINCE, SADLY, RISEN, VOUCH
• Quordle #1079, Tuesday 7 January: CREED, FILET, ROUTE, TAPER
• Quordle #1078, Monday 6 January: PIVOT, WOOLY, GRUNT, GROOM