The tech world never sleeps, and it can be hard to keep up with all the latest developments. But if you’re feeling a little behind the news, you’re in the right place. Our ICYMI (In Case You Missed It) round-up covers all the biggest tech stories from the past seven days, getting you up to speed in just a few minutes.
And what a week it’s been: big surprises from Apple and Google, a massive Cloudflare shutdown that took half the internet with it, the latest challenger to take on ChatGPT, and much more. So, settle in for a delectable digital digest that’ll have you in the know before you can say “AirDrop works with Android”…
7. Black Friday kicked off early
We’ve been following all the latest sales and picking out the hottest discounts on our live blog pages, so be sure to check those out below if you’re in the market for a deal or two. From appliances and smart home kit to laptops, headphones, smartwatches and more, there are deals to be found across the board.
6. Apple and Google named the best apps of 2025
As the year draws to a close, Google and Apple – gatekeepers of the Android and iOS app stores – start dishing out awards for their favorite apps of the past twelve months. This year was no different, with both firms announcing their shortlisted winners within a day of each other.
Google went first, revealing Focus Friend by Hank Green to be its top app of the year. Other honored names included Luminar, Edits, Wiser and Pingo, with many more receiving recognition for their efforts in the Android ecosystem.
It was Apple’s turn a day later, and the company went all out by nominating a whopping 45 apps and games across a wide range of categories, each of which had three winners. BandLab, Ladder and Tiimo garnered top spot as joint app of the year winners, and they were joined by apps made for iPad, Mac, Vision Pro, Apple Watch, Apple TV, and more.
5. We tested the Nano Banana camera
It’s safe to say that in our current age, if there’s a tech gadget, someone has jammed artificial intelligence (AI) into it. That’s as true for the Caira camera as it is for anything else, but in this case the end result is something you might actually want to use.
In fact, it’s more than that, as Caira makes for an excellent camera that’s bolstered by on-camera AI editing smarts powered by Google’s Nano Banana model. The device snaps onto your iPhone magnetically, works with real DSLR lenses, and packs in a dedicated Sony sensor. The real intrigue comes after capturing an image, when you can enter a command into an AI prompt window and have the on-board intelligence edit your pictures to your requirements.
We took it for a spin and were impressed with its abilities – this isn’t some cheap toy that you’ll quickly get bored of. But is it enhancing your creativity, or just taking over? That’s something we can’t quite decide.
4. Disney and YouTube TV patched up their differences
Back in October, a raft of Disney-owned channels started disappearing from YouTube TV, the result of the two companies failing to agree on a new streaming deal. Now, though, that’s in the past, and like two long-time friends making up after a nasty spat, it’s all water under the bridge.
We noticed earlier this week that Disney channels had made a comeback on YouTube TV, all thanks to Disney and YouTube signing a multi-year agreement to get things back to the way they should be. There was even a pleasant surprise thrown into the mix in the form of ESPN Unlimited.
Simply put, YouTube TV subscribers now have access to ESPN Unlimited, including premium content such as a live WWE events. That wasn’t available to YouTube TV members before Disney and YouTube’s temporary separation, showing that good things can come from bad breakups.
3. Google somehow made Android work with AirDrop
If there’s one thing we know about Apple, it’s that the tech giant doesn’t like sharing. It prefers to keep its proprietary techs to itself, so it came as a massive surprise to hear this week that Google had found a way to make its Quick Share feature work with Apple’s AirDrop.
That means you can now send a file from your Android device and an Apple fan will be able to accept it using AirDrop on their iPhone. And all this was seemingly done without Apple’s direct involvement – and possibly even without its knowledge.
We can’t imagine Apple is very happy about being blindsided in this way, but there may be little it can actually do. For one thing, stopping Google’s new trick might be difficult to pull off from a technical standpoint. For another, forcing Google to backtrack would likely earn the attention – and ire – of the European Union, which has been relentless in its desire to force Apple to give up the crown jewels of its ecosystem and make them available to its bitterest of rivals.
There’s no way of knowing how this situation will play out, so we suggest you sit back, buckle up, and grab the popcorn.
2. Cloudflare gave us our latest global outage
Even the most terminally online of us probably don’t give too much thought to what’s keeping the internet afloat, but the reality was brought home this week when Cloudflare suffered a major outage, taking down scores of websites and crippling our ability to rot our brains and post cat memes when we should be working.
In case you’re not aware, Cloudflare provides a range of services to a vast array of websites, from delivering images to preventing DDoS attacks and more. When Cloudflare crashed, users found they were unable to connect to their favorite sites, including ChatGPT, X, Canva and more.
After initially suspecting a cyberattack, Cloudflare revealed the true cause: an error in its backend system caused a key file to double in size, which was then automatically propagated across Cloudflare’s entire network. Because the file was now larger than the software’s size limit, Cloudflare crashed – as did a huge number of sites that relied on its services. As with the AWS outage in October, it was an apt demonstration of how highly centralized the internet has become – and how risky that is.
1. Gemini 3 landed to take on ChatGPT 5.1
ChatGPT has been the number one AI chatbot pretty much ever since it launched, and while there have been many challengers, few have been able to lay a serious claim to its crown. Google, though, is hoping that’s all about to change with the release of Gemini 3.
We decided to see if Gemini 3 could put its money where its mouth is, stacking it up against ChatGPT in a range of tests and challenges as part of TechRadar’s special AI Week. The result? A dead heat, with ChatGPT pulling ahead on some occasions, Gemini on others.
What was noticeable was how much both models had in common, with any differences feeling more like accents than radically different philosophies. If anything, it shows how far AI chatbots have come for ChatGPT’s reign to face such a forceful threat.
Follow TechRadar on Google News and add us as a preferred source to get our expert news, reviews, and opinion in your feeds. Make sure to click the Follow button!
And of course you can also follow TechRadar on TikTok for news, reviews, unboxings in video form, and get regular updates from us on WhatsApp too.
