Life

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Are ‘Ultra-Processed’ Foods Really That Bad for You?

The average American gets more than half of their calories from ultra-processed foods, according to a new federal report. That’s not surprising—ultra-processed foods are everywhere, and includes many of our cheapest grocery options. That’s why it’s concerning that ultra-processed foods have been linked to a variety of health problems, including heart disease, diabetes, mental health disorders, and everyone’s favorite, all-cause mortality.

But what counts as ultra-processed food? Let’s dig in, and maybe question a few assumptions along the way.

The new study, from the Centers for Disease Control, found that the most common source of ultra-processed food for adults was “sandwiches,” followed by sweet bakery products, sweetened beverages, savory snacks, and “bread, rolls, and tortillas.” For kids, the findings were similar, with pizza and savory snacks outranking sweetened beverages. For kids, bread didn’t make the top five. The study also found that consumption of ultra-processed food had actually dropped a bit from 2017 to 2023, the last year for which data was available. You can see the summary of results here.

Before we get too into the weeds here, there’s a big caveat worth remembering: When studies look at the health of people who do and don’t eat ultra-processed foods, they’re not necessarily studying the fact that the food is ultra-processed. We can say pretty definitively that a diet high in candy bars is bad for you, but is that because the candy bars are ultra-processed, or because they’re full of sugar? That’s not a question that the current research can really untangle, but it’s important one to consider. Are ultra-processed foods always bad, or are they just a category that includes a lot of foods we should eat less of?

How are ultra-processed foods defined?

This terminology comes from a classification scheme called NOVA that splits foods into four groups:

  • Unprocessed or “minimally processed” foods (group 1) include fruits, vegetables, and meats. Perhaps you’ve pulled a carrot out of the ground and washed it, or killed a cow and sliced off a steak. Foods in this category can be processed in ways that don’t add extra ingredients. They can be cooked, ground, dried, or frozen.

  • Processed culinary ingredients (group 2) include sugar, salt, and oils. If you combine ingredients in this group, for example to make salted butter, they stay in this group.

  • Processed foods (group 3) are what you get when you combine groups 1 and 2. Bread, wine, and canned veggies are included. Additives are allowed if they “preserve [a food’s] original properties” like ascorbic acid added to canned fruit to keep it from browning.

  • Ultra-processed foods (group 4) don’t have a strict definition, but NOVA hints at some properties. They “typically” have five or more ingredients. They may be aggressively marketed and highly profitable. A food is automatically in group 4 if it includes “substances not commonly used in culinary preparations, and additives whose purpose is to imitate sensory qualities of group 1 foods or of culinary preparations of these foods, or to disguise undesirable sensory qualities of the final product.”

That last group feels a little disingenuous. I’ve definitely seen things in my kitchen that are supposedly only used to make “ultra-processed” foods: food coloring, flavor extracts, artificial sweeteners, anti-caking agents (cornstarch, anyone?) and tools for extrusion and molding, to name a few.

Are ultra-processed foods always bad?

So we’ve learned that packaged snack cakes are ultra-processed, and so is a factory-baked loaf of bread that has 20 ingredients. Orange juice whose flavor has been manipulated would count, too. Coke and Diet Coke are both solidly in this category. It seems logical that we should eat less of these things.

But you could argue that the real problem with these foods is that they’re often sugary and high calorie, and many of the less-healthy members of the category are what stock the vending machines and convenience stores that beckon to us when we’re hungry and haven’t packed a lunch. The problem with these foods is that a diet full of them is unbalanced, due to the nutrition they do or don’t contain. The processing itself isn’t the problem.

So when we talk about ultra-processed foods, we have to remember that it’s a vague category that only loosely communicates the nutrition of its foods. Just like BMI combines muscley athletes with obese people because it makes for convenient math, NOVA categories combine things of drastically different nutritional quality.

Why the level of processing isn’t always the most important thing

Illustrating the point above, the USDA published their own study showing how you can create a healthy diet out of ultra-processed foods. A homemade breakfast burrito, for example, might contain canned beans, liquid egg whites, shredded cheese, and a store-bought tortilla. Those ingredients might be ultra-processed, but they’re nutritionally nothing like grabbing a Cinnabon on your way to work.

A pet peeve of mine is that the NOVA classification sometimes draws distinctions between things that aren’t really nutritionally different. Wine is in group 3 next to cheese and fresh bread, but cocktails are in group 4 with the Twinkies. Hard liquor has been distilled, you see, so it’s ultra-processed.

Canned vegetables are in group 3 (processed) while their fresh counterparts are in group 1. But canned veggies aren’t any less nutritious. Meanwhile, dried fruit is in group 1 (so wholesome!) even though it can be more sugary than cakes or cookies.

There’s a lot of overlap between unhealthy(?) foods and ultra-processed foods, so I understand why scientists are studying ultra-processed foods as a group. But demonizing UPF, as they’re sometimes called, often ends up putting the cheapest, most widely available food in the most shameful category. Is that fair, or does it just make you feel better when you’re eating fresh green beans and scoffing at people who buy canned?

The NOVA scale isn’t totally useless: It helps researchers keep an eye on how much of our food is coming from large-scale manufacturers. But it’s not a great way to evaluate what’s in our grocery bags, or on our plates.

What Is Hyrox, and Why Is Everyone Suddenly Doing It?

A few years ago, if you knew somebody who was into being strong and fast, who called themselves a “hybrid” athlete, or if they spent a lot of time on the rower and doing wall balls, they were probably into Crossfit, or one of the Crossfit-adjacent functional fitness gyms. But these days they’re more likely to be into Hyrox. Hyrox is a new sport—not just a workout style—that has taken off in a big way. 

Perhaps your gym (or workout app, like Peloton) has started offering Hyrox classes, or you noticed that the new Amazfit fitness tracker was first teased through a Hyrox partnership. To help you understand the trend, here’s an explainer of what exactly Hyrox involves, why people like it, and where you can learn more if you’re intrigued. 

Hyrox’s origins

Hyrox is a young sport, and was started by a company that holds a trademark for the name. (In that way it’s a bit like Crossfit, which is also a company, not just a term for a style of working out.) 

It’s been said that Hyrox is short for “hybrid rockstar,” since “hybrid” is a term that athletes often use when they feel they’re neither endurance athletes nor strength athletes, but something in between. 

The company hasn’t confirmed this theory. According to reporting from Hybrid Fitness Media, the company’s founders originally wanted the name “CuRox,” from the Latin verb currere, which refers to running. Even in those days they were referring to athletes as “roxstars,” so the theory is at least half true. The company adopted the name Hyrox after a trademark dispute with another company, and held its first race at a trade fair in Leipzig, Germany in 2018. 

Hyrox has structured competitions

Unlike Crossfit competitions, which may include just about anything in any format, Hyrox’s competitions always follow the same predictable format. Much like running a marathon, you can compare your time in a Hyrox race to what others have done. The race includes eight 1-kilometer runs (adding up to about 5 miles) with stations in between. Here’s the order: 

  • 1 km run, then 1000 meters on a ski erg (a machine where you pull two cords downward toward the ground, in a motion slightly reminiscent of using ski poles) 

  • 1 km run, then 50 meter sled push

  • 1 km run, then 50 meter sled pull

  • 1 km run, then 80 meters of burpee broad jumps

  • 1 km run, then 1000 meters on a rowing machine

  • 1 km run, then a 200 meter farmer’s carry (walking while carrying kettlebells in both hands)

  • 1 km run, then 100 meters of lunges while carrying a sandbag on your back

  • 1 km run, then 100 wall balls (where you squat and then throw a ball upward toward a target on a wall)

Elite Hyrox athletes can do all of that in about an hour. The average experienced competitor takes around 90 minutes, and beginners are obviously a bit slower. The weights of the kettlebells, sandbags, and wall balls depend on which division you’re competing in (men’s or women’s, pro or open). There are also doubles and relay formats.

Hyrox’s workouts are easy to start doing

Hyrox events are hard work, but they aren’t too difficult skill-wise. You won’t see barbell snatches like in Olympic weightlifting, or handstand walks like in the Crossfit games. For this reason, it’s relatively beginner-friendly. 

The events also give competitors a mix of strength and endurance work, skewed toward endurance. Running is obviously an endurance sport, and while the eight stations use more strength and power, you still have to do a lot of reps in a row, so pacing yourself is important. 

Hyrox classes and communities are popping up everywhere

Part of the fun of Hyrox is training for it alongside others, or so I’ve heard. While you can train for a marathon on your own, training for a Hyrox race means you need access to a rowing machine, a ski erg, and a wall with an appropriate wall ball target—most of which are hard to find outside of a gym oriented toward those events. (That said, most Crossfit gyms and many commercial gyms can provide these things.) 

To find a Hyrox club near you, Hyrox has a locator on its website. Also consider checking with gyms and fitness clubs to see if they may have started offering Hyrox classes or training groups. 

Five of the Best Free Cardio Workout Channels I’ve Found on YouTube

I discovered spin classes a decade ago, and subsequently got certified to teach them myself. In the years since, I haven’t focused on other kinds of cardio group classes—but for a time, I was obsessed with them.

Thanks to a program funded by the great city of New York, I was able to take Zumba, cardio sculpt classes, and more for free when I was in my early 20s, long before I could afford a membership at a gym that offered such classes, let alone a certification course of my own. I still sign up for the occasional cardio class at the gym where I work, both to move my body and to indulge in the nostalgia, but I don’t go as often as I could—because if I’m in the mood to dance around or do some HIIT, I can access guided workouts on YouTube for free.

Some of the channels offering these classes are better than others, of course. Here are my favorites I’ve found over the years, if you’d like to join me in burning calories while saving some money.

The best cardio dance channels

Dancing is a great workout because it gets you moving and keeps you engaged. Just yesterday, I was at the gym and saw a packed Zumba class in the adjacent studio. Toiling away on the treadmill, I felt a pang of regret, wishing I could join that class, where everyone who looked so happy. For now, I’ll load up one of the options below.

Joseph Corella

On Joseph Corella’s channel 567Broadway, he shares choreography for show tunes so you can feel like you’re performing on stage, even if you’re just doing your best kick ball change around the house. He offers designated videos for warming up in addition to longer ones meant to serve as a full workout.

He keeps the classes accessible, walking you through the choreography slowly; none of it is too intimidating, though you always have the option to rewind and watch again until you get it. I like that he goes through the routines with actual people on stage with him instead of just featuring shots of himself—seeing normal-looking dancers nail the moves is really helpful and motivating.

The Fitness Marshall

The Fitness Marshall has nearly 7 million subscribers, which basically all you need to know about the channel, but I’ll tell you more. First of all, this is a high-energy channel. The instructor, Caleb Marshall, is a really fun and engaging presence. He leads you through dance routines set to popular songs, which I like because I find it a lot easier to follow instructions and retain routines when I am familiar with the music.

While the energy is a positive, Caleb doesn’t always give super-clear instructions. In the video above, you’ll see him start with a move without really explaining it verbally, then cue you to move into “Donkey Kong arms.” Sure, you can watch what he’s doing on the screen and replicate it yourself, but if you’re looking for more explicit instruction (or you’re just starting out), you might need to spend some time elsewhere first.

Pamela Reif

If you thought the Fitness Marshall had a lot of subscribers, Pamela Reif‘s numbers are even better: Nearly 11 million people subscribe to her channel, which has a lot of dancing workouts, but incorporates a significant number of traditional “workout” moves too. while Corella and Marshall are more likely to show you actual dance moves, Reif focuses on specific muscle groups, or serves up highly targeted offerings, like classes designed with no jumping moves, for those who have knee issues. Popular music, clear instruction, and a wide variety of video types make her channel an easy choice, and the on-screen graphics telling you what move to do and for how long make it very beginner-friendly.

HIIT and other cardio channels

Moving away from dance fitness, there are a ton of strength-based workouts on YouTube, but you can also find channels that incorporate HIIT and other calorie-burning approaches.

Fitness Blender

Fitness Blender is a company that provides a variety of workout videos from certified trainers, so you will definitely find a lot of strength training on the feed, but cardio and HIIT are in there too. I love that the video titles are very specific, like “Bored Easily Bodyweight HIIT Tri-Sets.” Why, yes, I do get bored easily. You have my attention.

Some the videos on this channel are behind a paywall, but you’ll find plenty of free options. I appreciate that the instructors give you a rundown of what each workout will include, including how difficult it will be on a scale of one to five, and how many minutes you’ll spend doing each part of the routine, from the circuits to the burnout phase. You can also see upfront whether you’ll need any equipment, so you won’t get halfway through a video only to realize you can’t really complete it. Since it’s a big fitness company, there are a load of well-produced videos, and they’re always adding more.

Danielpt Fitness

This is another channel where you’ll find a lot of strength training, but I recommend Danielpt for the subcategory of videos called Bodyweight HIIT. Typically about 30 minutes, these workouts are challenging, but don’t require any kind of equipment. The trainer doesn’t speak much, but as he moves through the routines—which incorporate a lot of jumping, clapping, and extra movement on top of the muscle training—you’ll see picture-in-picture insets showing you the next move, plus a countdown of how long you have to do it for. It’s not an ideal choice if you are keen on audio cues, but otherwise, it’s as straightforward as it gets.

Instagram’s Latest Update Added Reposts and a Snap Map Clone

Instagram is copying major features from three other social networks in one sweeping update. It’s adding a Snapchat-like Snap map, a Repost option clearly inspired by X (but implemented in style of TikTok), and for good measure, it’s also rolling out its TikTok-like “Friends” Reels feed globally. That’s a lot to take in, so let’s break this down.

Reels and reposts

Instagram Reels Repost.

Credit: Instagram

Reposts are finally coming to your Instagram profile. The new Repost feature will let anyone repost public reels or posts onto their own page, without having to bother with the previous Instagram Story workaround. These will show up in your friends’ feeds, but unlike on other sites, reposts won’t be mixed in with your regular posts on your own profile, and will instead be housed in a new Reposts tab. Like a quote post over on X, you can also add your own comments to reposts, which will show up on top of them in a small bubble. To control whether your posts can be reposted, navigate to Settings and activity > Sharing and reuse.

Welcome to Instagram Map

Instagram Map

Credit: Instagram

Instagram’s new Map feature will let users share their most recent active location with their fiends on an interactive map, which the site can use to promote more location based content. It’s reminiscent of Snapchat’s Snap Map feature, but with one major difference. Snapchat lets you share your location even when you’re not using the app, but Instagram limits location updates to when the app is actively open. It’s also important to note that location sharing is disabled by default, so you’ll need to turn it on manually (under Messages > Map > Settings) to post your location to Instagram Map.

Instagram hopes that users will use the Map feature to plan hangouts, but I’m personally looking forward to using it to make sure I’m nowhere near my Instagram followers. Instagram will also display Stories with location-sharing enabled on the Map page, so if your friend or favorite local influencer posts about a new cafe, it will show up there as well, and you won’t even need to have location sharing on to see it. Similarly, users can also share Notes, or short messages, directly to the Map.

“Friends” tab in Reels goes global

Friends tab in Reels.

Credit: Instagram

Meta has already trialed a dedicated Friends feed for the Reels tab in the U.S., but now it’s rolling out globally. If you ever wanted one place that shows you all the weird reels your friends are liking and commenting on, this is it. This will only show Reels that your friends have created, liked, commented on, or reposted, but if you do want some extra privacy, Meta says it’s working on rolling out ways to hide your own likes and comments from showing up in this feed, as well as mute activity from specific friends. The Friends tab is found right on top of the Reels screen, although I have yet to locate the new privacy controls—they’ll likely need some time to reach everyone.

The Seven Best Non-Gaming VR Experiences for Meta Quest

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Most people strap on a VR headset to shoot zombies, socialize, or watch movies, but there’s growing collection of virtual reality experiences on Meta Quest headsets that aim at something other than escapism. They’re about history, empathy, or just immersing yourself in a weird job you’d never try in real life. Below are some of the most interesting non-game experiences I’ve tried in VR: some are educational, some are artsy, and some are so realistic they made me sick, but all of them prove that VR has more to offer than just games.

On the Morning You Wake (To the End of the World)

Remember that day back in 2018 when the United States Emergency Alert System mistakenly sent every residents of Hawaii a text alert that read, “BALLISTIC MISSILE THREAT INBOUND TO HAWAII. SEEK IMMEDIATE SHELTER. THIS IS NOT A DRILL”? It probably didn’t seem like too big of a deal to you, but that’s because you weren’t in Hawaii at the time. If you had been, you’d have spent 38 minutes—that’s how long it took for the clarifying follow-up text to arrive—in a world where the end of everything was coming. It was not a drill, and all you could do was wait for the flash. On the Morning You Wake (To the End of the World) is an evocative VR documentary that examines how those 38 minutes changed people’s lives, what it feels like to know the end has come, and how scary it is that the next ballistic missile text probably won’t be a mistake.

Titanic VR

It’s not exactly fun to be on the deck of the Titanic just before it sinks, but it’s really interesting—through some goggles, anyway. Titanic VR features an immersive, 360 cutscene where you float away on one of The Titanic’s few lifeboats, meet “the unsinkable” Molly Brown, and watch helplessly as the massive ocean liner slips into the cold North Atlantic, taking 1,500 or so passengers to their watery graves. Then you can fast forward to the present for an interactive simulation where you are a maritime archeologist who pilots a submersible to visit the sunken wreck of The Titanic. Your mission is to discover, recover, and preserve historical artifacts. I tried very hard to slam into the wreckage and go out with a bang, but it’s not that kind of experience.  

Anne Frank House VR

This poignant VR experience lets you walk through a faithful recreation of the Secret Annex in Amsterdam where Anne Frank, her family, and others hid from Nazis for two years. Once you open the hidden door behind the bookcase in Anne Frank House VR, there are no avatars and no narration beyond occasional selections from Anne’s diary spoken into the stillness. There are no goals or tasks to fulfill, leaving you alone with the weight of history, free to make what sense you can of the things that were left behind. Here is the small kitchen table where Anne Frank ate her meals. There is the narrow bed where she shared a first kiss with Peter. Here are the pictures she cut from movie magazines and taped on the wall. Mercifully, there is no sudden bang on the door announcing the arrival of the Gestapo; it would be too much to take. 

Mission: ISS

It’s sad, but you and I are never going to outer space. The closest we’ll probably get is the virtual reality experience offered by Mission: ISS, a realistic space travel sim that lets you float around in zero gravity as you orbit Earth in the International Space Station, dock a space capsule, and take a spacewalk. Sadly, I wasn’t able to experience more than the initial stage of floating around in the ISS: this game is so realistic, it made me instantly motion sick, just like I’d be on a real space station!

Simtryx

I’m obsessed with the virtual reality training programs available on Meta. This unexplored genre is filled with experiences give you an unfiltered look at occupations and vocations you’d have no way of experiencing, like driving a forklift or disassembling a turbine engine, without dumbing them down by making them “fun.” Simtryx is the best one I’ve found. This augmented reality medical training tool is designed to test fledgling doctors and nurses’ diagnostic skills. It’s an exam, so it offers no guidance; it just presents users with a bunch of tools—that listen-to-your-heart thinger, that popsicle-stick-tongue dealy, you know, doctor stuff—and an AI-powered patient to poke and prod. Then it expects you to make a medical diagnosis before a timer runs out.

I’m sure this is a useful tool for medical professionals, but it’s hilarious when you don’t know what you’re doing. Your patients will answer anything you ask thanks to AI, and you can prescribe all kinds of drugs. “A stomach ache, you say? 500ccs of Fentanyl, stat!” So far I’ve killed a bunch of people and diagnosed even more with “Hell if I know,” but after much trial and error, I was able to correctly diagnose this sad sack with cirrhosis of the liver:

Simtryx patient

Credit: Stephen Johnson – Simtryx

Being a doctor is super easy. Note: this is serious doctor biz. Login credentials are “only available to Simtryx partners at the moment,” so you might have to plead to be let in like I did.

OneLab VR

Created by the Centers for Disease Control, OneLab VR was designed to train laboratory professionals and testers in scientific best practices, but they left it open so any jerk can mess around in the virtual lab. It’s set in a realistic 50,000 square-foot public health laboratory, where (presumably mad) scientists can operate centrifugal force machines, properly dispose of with biohazardous waste, sterilize instruments in autoclaves, and much more, all without actually dropping containers full of pathogens or drinking hazardous waste. It’s multiplayer too, so instructors can guide students, but there’s no reason you can’t use it to dick around with your friends. If you like following meticulous procedures that you don’t fully understand, or you just want to pretend you’re wearing a lab coat, you will love OneLab VR.

Notes on Blindness

Based on the audio diaries of theologian John Hull, who gradually lost his sight in the 1980s, Notes on Blindness is an artistic journey into empathy that is only possible in virtual reality. It doesn’t try to simulate blindness (super easy to do by closing your eyes), it immerses the user in a visual and aural interpretation of what Hull called “a world beyond sight.” It’s a quiet, emotional, and deeply personal experience, and you do it with a VR helmet on, so no one will see you cry.

Disney Is Killing the Hulu App

Bad news, Hulu fans: Disney has plans to kill your app.

As Variety reports, the company announced the news during a quarterly earnings call on Wednesday. The plan? Fully absorb the Hulu experience into the Disney+ app. Why have two apps when you could have one? (Other than, of course, the fact that these are two separate services entirety.)

From Disney’s point of view, it’s a total win. By keeping Hulu and Disney+ in one app, both services can operate on one “tech platform.” That will, supposedly, save the company money, as well as improve the customer experience—at least, according to Disney. Plus, from a business perspective, the company can bundle ad sales for both Disney+ and Hulu. Get ready to see a lot of ads for these two services together.

What does this mean for Hulu subscribers?

Of course, most of us do not work for Disney, and do not directly benefit from the things that increase the profits of the company. What will impact you, if you’re a Hulu subscriber, is how Disney handles this merger of sorts.

First things first: This isn’t happening overnight. According to Disney, the new combined Disney+ and Hulu app won’t be available until 2026. Until then, you’ll be able to carry on business as usual.

Once the new app is here, and Disney shuts down the standalone Hulu app, you won’t be forced to subscribe to Disney+ just to watch Hulu as well. Disney says you’ll still be able to subscribe to Hulu by itself, even if you do have to use this combined app to watch it. You might be aware that you can already watch some Hulu content on Disney+, but it’s a much more limited experience than the one Disney is now pitching.

According to Variety, Disney plans to market Hulu + Live TV separately, as it combines the service with Fubo, another live TV service that focuses on live sports. That said, a Disney+ rep told Variety that there are plans for Hulu + Live TV to be folded into the Disney+ app at some time in 2026.

Any information on pricing?

Not at this time. Right now, you can bundle Hulu and Disney+ for $10.99 per month, or $19.99 for the mostly ad-free experience. One would hope that by bundling the services in one app, Disney plans to keep these services at this price. But as we’ve seen across streaming services, prices only continue to go up.

All the Biggest New Features and Changes in iOS 26 Beta 5

This week, Apple dropped the fifth developer beta for iOS 26. It arrived a little less than two weeks after the company released the first public beta for the update, so public testers can expect to see public beta 2 sometime soon. As with all iOS beta cycles, developers get the beta first, followed closely by a public beta release.

Developer beta 5 (which will be the same as public beta 2) is largely an aesthetic update: Many of the changes have to do with how iOS looks and feels, rather than features that add new functions to your iPhone. Still, it’s an interesting glimpse of what Apple’s software team is thinking as they continue to test and perfect the next big iOS update before its official launch this fall.

Here’s what’s new:

‘Classic Mode’ for Camera

In the Camera app’s Settings page, you can now find a new “Classic Mode Switching” toggle. This doesn’t bring back the Camera app from iOS 18, however. Instead, when enabled, the scroll direction when switching camera modes reverses. Apple has long given you the option to switch scroll directions for your Mac’s mouse or trackpad, but if I’m not mistaken, this is the first time you have been able to choose the scroll direction of an element within a particular iOS app.

I’m not beta testing iOS 26, and I wouldn’t have thought this was such a big deal. But this post on X discussing the change has over 1,500 likes, so I imagine there are a bunch of testers about it.

The Select button returns in Mail

The Mail app’s “Select” button lets you quickly enter select mode, so you can start rounding up different emails in your inbox. Apple’s engineers might have thought this button was a bit redundant, since you can select messages even faster by just swiping with two fingers, as iOS 26’s Mail app hides the Select button away in the ••• menu.

That changes with beta 5: Select has returned, and is exactly where you’d expect to find it coming from iOS 18.6. It’s possible Apple will reverse course in a future beta, but it’s here for now.

New animations

After updating your iPhone to the latest beta, you’ll find a new UI change right away: You can now swipe up the Lock Screen to reveal the passcode screen, which has a new, jiggly animation:

Control Center has a similar animation to it when thumbing through the pages as well:

An updated Low Battery alert for the Dynamic Island

If you have an iPhone with a Dynamic Island, you’ll see a subtle Low Battery pop-up appear when your battery hits 20%. You can long-press this alert to get a shortcut to turn on Low Power Mode, but you wouldn’t know that just by looking at the original alert.

In beta 5, Apple updated this alert to make it larger. With that, the company included instructions to tap the alert to turn on Low Power Mode, and also updated the low battery icon.

New AirDrop icon

The fifth iOS 26 beta updates the AirPlay icon, to better reflect Apple’s new design language:

New Macintosh HD icon

This isn’t technically an iOS 26 thing, but I have to mention it: Apple’s fifth macOS 26 beta replaces the classic Macintosh HD icon. The new icon resembles an SSD, the type of storage drive that has been featured in most Macs for well over decade now. The old icon, which resembled a drive with a spinning hard disk, is iconic, but not necessarily accurate, as Apple hasn’t sold Macs with this type of drive for ages.

Still, the old icon is classic macOS, and the new one is, well, not so classic. Maybe it’ll grow on me, but I wouldn’t mind it if Apple workshopped this one a bit more, like it did the Finder icon.

If you’re not yet running the iOS 26 developer beta

You can test out these changes, and all of iOS 26’s new features, by installing the iOS 26 beta 5 on your iPhone right now. I don’t recommend it, however. This is still the developer beta, which is meant for software developers. Anyone can register their Apple Account as a developer to test it out for free, but you run the risk of taking on bugs and other glitches Apple hasn’t caught yet.

The public beta, on the other hand, only comes out after Apple confirms the developer beta doesn’t have any devastating issues that would affect a larger pool of users. You still run the risk of instability, which is why I don’t run betas on my personal devices, but it’s less risk, so if you’re going try a beta, I’d recommend it over the developer beta.

How to Choose Between a Flip Phone and a Folding Phone

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For a while after the first iPhone came out, way back in 2007, it felt like we knew what all smartphones would look like from then on out: Big, rectangular “candy bars.” It’s not a bad approach, since it keeps things simple and lets the apps take center stage, but there’s no denying that the sheer variety of the pre-iPhone landscape had a special kind of excitement to it. 

Finally, the standard set by the iPhone finally has some lasting competition. There have been a few attempts to break away from the candy bar approach since 2007, including my beloved Xperia Play gaming phone (which had a PlayStation controller built-in), but nothing really stuck until the advent of flexible OLED screens.

Over the past few years, two major formats that deviate from the iPhone shape have been embraced by companies including Google, Samsung, and Motorola. These foldable phones have stuck around long enough to span multiple generations, proving they’re not just a flash-in-the-pan gimmick. Even if they’re still a small percent of the overall market, they seem like the best opportunity we have to escape the original iPhone’s dominance.

But there’s still one question in mind—which kind of foldable phone is better?

Right now, the foldable phones with the most support come in two versions: one that opens horizontally like a book, and one that calls back to the flip phones of the ‘90s and early 2000s, opening vertically like a makeup compact. These tend to get called “folding phones” and “flip phones,” respectively, which is a bit annoying to me given that they both technically fall under the umbrella of “foldables,” but it’s the language I’ll use for the rest of this comparison.

Each have their pros and cons, and with the releases of recent shining examples like the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 7 and the Motorola Razr Ultra, I’ve finally gotten extended hands-on time with both. I do think there’s a clear winner here, but depending on who you are, both offer compelling alternatives to the non-folding brick you’ve probably been carrying around for the past decade.

Portability

By far, the thing that stands out to me most about foldables is portability, but folding phones and flip phones each have different priorities in this case.

Folding phones, for instance, don’t tend to look that different from non-folding options when they’re closed, and can actually be a little thicker. The Galaxy Z Fold 7, for instance, is 0.35 inches thick when folded, while the iPhone 16 Pro is 0.32 inches thick. That’s not bad at all, especially compared to previous models or alternatives like the 0.4 inch thick (when folded) Google Pixel 9 Pro Fold, but it also doesn’t immediately make folding phones look more portable. 

The Galaxy Z Fold 7 (left) next to an iPhone 15 Pro (right).
The Galaxy Z Fold 7 (left) next to an iPhone 15 Pro (right).
Credit: Michelle Ehrhardt

The catch is that, when unfolded, folding phones offer way more screen space than a normal phone, giving you a better value for the real estate they take up in your bag or pocket. In that way, they can be seen more as portable tablets, with popular options like the Galaxy Z Fold 7 and the Pixel 9 Pro Fold both boasting impressively large 8-inch displays when unfolded. They’re not small devices overall, but they provide the most display you can get while taking up as little space as possible. Plus, they can actually get pretty thin when unfolded, with the Galaxy Z Fold 7 in particular being just 0.22 inches thick when fully stretched out.

Flip phones, meanwhile, do actually give you a smaller overall package. With these, you don’t get more screen space, but instead pack a normal phone’s screen space into less overall area. When unfolded, they look like any other candy bar phone, but when folded, they call back to the clamshell phones of many a millennial’s youth.

Razr Ultra halfway between being flipped open.
Razr Ultra halfway between being flipped open.
Credit: Michelle Ehrhardt

Unfortunately, that does mean they can be a little thicker than a non-folding phone when folded up, with the Razr Ultra hitting 0.62 inches thick and the Galaxy Z Flip 7 reaching 0.54 inches thick. On the flipside, they’re much less tall in this mode—the Razr Ultra is just 3.47 inches tall and the Z Flip 7 is actually a little shorter at 3.34 inches tall. Given that the iPhone 16 Pro is 5.89 inches tall, that compromise might just be worth it for anyone who’s short on bag or pocket space.

Plus, like folding phones, flip phones also tend to be thinner than their non-folding counterparts when unfolded. The Razr Ultra is 0.29 inches thick when opened up, and the Z Flip 7 is a slender 0.26 inches thick.

Which approach to portability will appeal more to you probably depends more on your priorities—do you want something that takes up the same space as a normal phone, but packs more into that package, or do you want something with an overall smaller profile than a normal phone when it’s folded up? Personally, as someone with small or even nonexistent pockets, I prefer the latter, but cases can be made for both. Since this is my article, though, flip phones are taking the win for now.

Usability

The next big advantage to folding and flip phones is their enhanced feature sets. Sure, they tuck away well, but when you actually have them unfolded and in your hands, what do you get for your extra investment?

For folding phones, the answer is obvious: more screen space. This can be great when browsing the internet, reading a book, or multitasking with side-by-side apps, but it unfortunately has a drawback to it. As much as I compared folding phones to tablets earlier, they have an Achilles heel: aspect ratio.

While tablets tend to use rectangular screens that work well for gaming and videos, a folding phone’s main display is essentially just two regular smartphone screens side-by-side—therefore, these devices usually have to try to contort content to fit into a more square space.

Multitasking on the Galaxy Z Fold 7.
Multitasking on the Galaxy Z Fold 7.
Credit: Michelle Ehrhardt

That means a lot of cropping and letterboxing. As I discovered while reviewing the Z Fold 7, most apps still don’t make good use of a folding phone’s extra display space, especially video forward ones like TikTok. Gaming fares a little better, but support depends on the developer. You’re not necessarily getting a worse experience when using an unoptimized app on a folding phone’s main display, but you’re also not making much use out of your extra investment, which I’ll get into in a bit.

To be fair, folding phones also come with cover screens, so you can use them like a normal phone while they’re closed. That’s great for quick one-handed use, and more recent models like the Z Fold 7 have now made sure their cover screens are no longer thinner than the displays on non-folding phones (a big issue on older models), which means you can swap over to using the cover screen for a more traditional aspect ratio. But again, that still means that unless you’re planning to use apps in a side-by-side multitasking mode, or use text-based apps that are more easily resized, you can’t rely on getting the same experience that you would on a typical tablet.

Razr Ultra fully unfolded.
Razr Ultra fully unfolded.
Credit: Michelle Ehrhardt

Flip phones, meanwhile, essentially operate exactly like non-folding phones when opened. That means no aspect ratio issues, but also no bonuses. If you’ve used a smartphone at any time over the past few decades, you’ll know what to expect. That said, like folding phones, they also come with cover screens to use when they’re folded up, and these can have some toy-ish charm to them. They’re not as functional as a folding phone’s cover screen, which is essentially the same as a non-folding phone’s main screen, but these smaller displays are a great way to quickly check messages, read the time, or access minimalist versions of select apps in a hurry. They won’t be able to open every app, but using the cover screen while folded can make flip phones extra useful if you like to use your phone with one-hand, as they’re overall smaller than even non-folding phones in this form factor. I’d still give cover screen usability to folding phones overall, but it’s a nice touch.

Before I move on, I should also mention one extra feature that both folding phones and flip phones have. Because they have cover screens right next to their rear cameras, it’s easy to take selfies with them. That’s a boon for influencers and social media butterflies, since rear cameras are usually much more powerful than the pinhole cameras built into most phones’ main displays. Usually, folding and flip phones will feature pinhole cameras as well, but you’re probably better off turning the phone around to take your selfies with a more powerful camera setup.

A selfie taken using the Razr Ultra's rear camera.
A selfie taken using the Razr Ultra’s rear camera.
Credit: Michelle Ehrhardt

Overall, folding phones do have more you can do with their screens than flip phones, so I’ll give this category to them, but note that not every app is going to take up the whole screen when you unfold them.

Price

Whether you’re buying a folding phone or a flip phone right now, both come at a premium. The cost of manufacturing a durable screen and all those moving parts is just too much for foldable devices to compete on pricing with comparable non-folding configurations right now. But for my money, flip phone pricing is a lot easier to stomach.

Yes, you get less overall screen space with a flip phone. But with decent options like the base Motorola Razr starting at $700 (and down to $600 at time of writing), getting a flip phone just feels more attainable for the average person at this moment. Granted, these more inexpensive models do have compromises, like weaker chips and smaller cover screens, but even top-of-the-line flip phones, like the Razr Ultra and the Galaxy Z Flip 7, still don’t break the $1,500 mark.

Meanwhile, folding phones tend to cost more than even a really good laptop. The two most popular ones right now, the Galaxy Z Fold 7 and the Pixel 9 Pro Fold, start at $2,000 and $1,800, respectively. That’s a lot to spend on extra screen space that a lot of apps can’t even make use of.

With that in mind, I’m going to have to give pricing to flip phones. You’ll be able to make great use out of every bit of your dollar on these devices, and because of their unusual aspect ratios, I just don’t think folding phones can say that yet.

Should you get a flip phone or a folding phone?

Razr Ultra cover screen.
Razr Ultra cover screen.
Credit: Michelle Ehrhardt

If you’re the type of person to go all-out when buying a device, getting a folding phone is certainly tempting. You’ll get more screen space, it’ll make a great conversation piece, and manufacturers usually deck these models out with the most powerful chips they can muster.

But for everyone else, I think a flip phone is still the better choice. They simply offer more value for your money, while still being able to pull off neat tricks like taking selfies with their rear cameras or showing texts on their cover screens. Plus, they actually have folding phones beat when it comes to portability.

This could change over time, if phones with other unusual form factors start to make more of a dent in the “candy bar” look. But for now, flip phones do a great job of offering something new while still fitting into the candy bar ecosystem when needed. Folding phones, meanwhile, are just too strange when opened up for most developers to bother with supporting.

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