When it comes to bringing you a slice, Pizza Hut’s new robot can’t be topped

We love pizza, and we love robots, so when the two come together it’s something to get really excited about. A branch of Pizza Hut in South Korea has introduced a robot waiter to serve your slice, in an effort to increase its use of food-related technology, lessen staff pressures, and of course to attract the geeky and inquisitive to come in and eat at the restaurant.

The robot is called the Dilly Plate, and it has been created by South Korean food technology company Woowa Brothers, better known for its GrubHub-style local food delivery app called Baedal Minjok, which translates to Delivery Nation in English. Pizza Hut hasn’t agreed to employ the robot full time yet, and it has two weeks to prove itself.

If you’re picturing C-3PO bringing your pizza though, you’re going to be disappointed. Dilly Plate is considerably less humanoid, and a lot more functional in its design. There are no arms or legs, only a motorized platform with a plate on the top that holds your pizza. Presumably, you will have to do the heavy pizza lifting when Dilly arrives at your table, due to its lack of limbs. Dilly will be able to stack pizzas for efficient delivery, as it can hold 22kg of food.

Woowa Brothers founder and CEO Kim Bong-jin teased the introduction of Dilly Plate — which he called an autonomous serving robot — in an interview recently, and sees it as an experiment to help compare how people and robots can work together in a service environment. In particular, how robots can be used for deliveries and collections in apartment complexes and other enclosed spaces.

Although Woowa Brothers is best known for its app, it has been investing in robotics since 2017 and has already shown off another food-service robot called Deli. Deli is designed to both deliver food and take back used plates from large eating centers such as mall food courts. The CEO went on to talk about how these robots could be adapted for use in the outside world, delivering goods and collecting recyclable waste on the return journey. The parallels between this and how the Dilly Plate will work in the controlled environment at Pizza Hut are clear.

Pizza Hut is no stranger to robots in the workplace either, and had SoftBank’s Pepper robot working in a branch in Singapore, where it took orders and made recommendations. The unnamed Pizza Hut store is located in southwest Seoul.

Editors’ Recommendations

• Processed pies: Silicon Valley’s Zume Pizza ready to offer you dinner made by a robot
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A QR code may change the way we donate money to the homeless

To solve a problem created by us having less cash in our pockets and relying increasingly on cards and mobile payment systems, entrepreneur Alex McCallion has created Greater Change — a smartphone-driven platform where a QR code is scanned to donate money to homeless people. Initially launched on a local crowdfunding platform in late 2017, Greater Change is a fascinating project that uses modern mobile payment technology for good.

The way it works is simple. As a donator you have the Greater Change app on your phone, which then uses the camera to scan a QR code, where the donation is then made. The difference is the app also provides information on what the money is going toward, because the person you give the money to will be registered with local charities and will already have worked out a plan for their future. The money is not handled directly, and it’s clear to the donator how the funds will be used, and what the targets are.

For the homeless person, it’s a way to show they are committed to change, and it relieves the wariness of the public, who are unwilling to give money to professional beggars, or to feed addictions. The platform also works as a way to tell their story and humanize their situation. The QR code can be worn like an ID on a lanyard, placed on a sign, or on a card. Greater Change is also investigating contactless payments, and donations can also be made through the website.

McCallion, a graduate of Oxford University, wrote his thesis on how technology had not enriched the charitable world in the same way it has in the public and private sector. In a blog post written at the time of the crowdfunding, he said, “I decided that the solution had to be a way to give without carrying cash, combined with a method for empowering the homeless to show that they would be spending money on constructive solutions.”

QR codes are a convenient, easy-to-use, and familiar way to enable this. We already use them for mobile boarding passes at the airport, and for many other mobile tickets. Additionally, they are used to exchange contacts in apps such as Snapchat, Line, and WeChat, along with other mobile payment systems including Walmart’s own payment app. We’ve even seen them used to find pets, and on tech-laden bags.

In a BBC film on Greater Change, it’s shown that some people are not comfortable with the concept of treating homeless people the way scanned goods are treated at the grocery store; but for the homeless who are trying to change their lives, the scheme is seemingly welcomed. The Greater Change app is now being tested in the U.K. city of Oxford.

Editors’ Recommendations

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New Epson scanner converts photos from old shoe boxes to the cloud in seconds

Epson

Epson wants to help take old photos from a shoebox in the attic to a cloud-backed digital file — on Tuesday, August 7, Epson launched the FastFoto FF-680W scanner. Epson claims the FF-680W is the fastest scanner in the personal photo scanner category, while Wi-Fi allows for auto-backups and sharing using Dropbox and Google Drive.

The Epson FastFoto FF-680W, the second-generation scanner in the FastFoto series alongside the FastFoto FF-640, can scan at up to one image a second while maintaining a 300 dpi quality, the company says. The scanner uses batch capabilities to further push performance, allowing users to stack up to 36 images to feed through the scanner. The scanner can fit panoramic images up to 36 inches as well as smaller images, postcards, instant film, and documents up to 8.5 inches wide.

With built-in Wi-Fi, Epson added an Easy Auto-Upload tool, which allows the scanned images to connect to a selected cloud service, including Dropbox and Google Drive. USB connectivity is also available. For old photos with notes on the back, the scanner can scan both sides at once.

The scanner also includes software with text recognition to make documents such as receipts and tax documents searchable. The program allows the scans to be edited, organized, and shared as PDFs, or Word or Excel files.

“Epson recognized the need for a fast and easy scanning solution that enables people to digitize photos held captive in shoeboxes and albums stored away in closets and attics, and vulnerable to natural disasters, fires, and floods,” David Hawkes, scanner product manager for Epson America Inc., said in a press release. “FastFoto unlocked a new market with the introduction of the FastFoto in 2016, making it affordable and feasible to preserve a family’s legacy. The new FastFoto FF-680W incorporates feedback from customers with a host of new features, making it easier to bring memories of yesterday back to life using the latest digital technology.”

That speed and connectivity put the Epson FastFoto at a higher price than slower models, however, though it still sells for $50 less than the original list price of the previous generation. The scanner retails for about $600 starting today through select retailers.

Editors’ Recommendations

• Adobe Scan can now automatically turn business cards into phone contacts
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• Brother launches Work Smart series of compact, connected printers for home

Facebook Messenger now includes AR games you can play with your friends

If sending messages wasn’t already enough with Facebook Messenger, users can now challenge friends to multiplayer augmented reality games in video chat. With the new feature, currently rolling out, you can play with up to six people at a time from anywhere in the world.

To access the feature, you have to make sure you update your Messenger app to the latest version. Once you open the app and tap on an existing conversation, tap the video icon in the upper right corner of the screen. Then, tap the star button and select one of the AR games you would like to play. The person or group you’re video chatting with will then receive a notification that the game is starting.

For now, there are two games available to play called Don’t Smile and Asteroids Attack — both of which are pretty self-explanatory. With Don’t Smile, you get to test who can hold a serious face the longest. While playing Asteroids Attack, you can compete to see who can navigate their spaceship better.

More games are being rolled out within the coming weeks and months. One of which is called Beach Bump, where players get to pass a beach ball back and forth, and another is a matching cat game called Kitten Kraze.

The new feature is extremely similar to Snapchat’s Snappables — Lens-based games inside the Snapchat camera. Launched in April, users use facial expressions and other movements to control the game. For example, one game has players open their mouth and move around to catch falling eggs. Another is more interactive — allowing users to invite friends to a virtual dance party.

Facebook originally announced its plans to update its messaging platform at F8 2018 with new features and improvements to its digital assistant — Facebook M. One of the updates includes new ways for businesses to interact with customers through augmented reality.

When a customer chats with a business through Messenger, the business can prompt the customer to open their camera and see different filters and AR effects. For example, you can see how furniture looks in your home or also try on makeup looks before you purchase the products. It also keeps you from having to actually go into the store to check them out in person and might make you feel more confident about an online purchase.

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How to make emoji

Brenda Stolyar/Digital Trends

Language is always evolving, and the prime example of this in the digital age is surely the rise of emoji — the little cartoonish pictograms that adorn text messages, emails, even pictures these days. Every year brings a new wave of tiny, emotive drawings. Originating in Japan in the late ‘90s, emoji are now everywhere, a universal language that crosses devices, operating systems, and international borders. No matter what country you are from or language you speak, you can recognize the jubilance in the “Face with Tears of Joy,” or that the person sending you an eggplant emoji is hankering for some eggplant parmesan right now.

Emoji can convey a wide range of sentiments, but what if you want something specific, something not available among the typical slate of emoji? It is possible to make your own emoji, albeit with some restrictions. Here’s how.

Use a messaging service that allows for custom emoji

If you use a messaging app like Discord or Slack — the former is popular with people playing multiplayer video games, while the latter is used by a lot of businesses for internal communications — then you may be happy to learn that adding your own emoji is a simple process.

To add an emoji, you first need to actually create one. Messaging services will typically have restrictions — on Slack, which we’ll be using to demonstrate, emoji can be no larger than 64KB, and neither the height nor width can exceed 128 pixels.

Open the image-editing software of your choice (for example, the free, web-based Pixlr).

If you’re confident in your artistic skills, you could make an emoji using the tools provided in the program. For a traditional emoji look, start with a yellow circle using a shape tool. Note: Use a transparent background, so the emoji will show up seamlessly against any background.

Then, add features like a mouth and eyes using tools like the pencil or shape tool.

If you’re looking to make an emoji out of a currently existing image, the process is simple. First, find a picture you want to make into an emoji, such as a picture of Nic Cage in the movie Con Air.

Rich Shibley/Digital Trends

Open the image in your photo-editing software. Using the lasso tool, trace along the edge the future emoji.

Once you’ve made a complete circuit, cut the selection (CTRL + X), then create a new image (and preferably make the background transparent, so the emoji will look good against any chat background).

Paste the image into this new window.

Make any remaining edits you might want, then save the image as a PNG (so as to preserve the transparent background).

However you end up creating your emoji, once you’ve saved it, open up your messaging app (in this case Slack).

Click the emoji button, then scroll down until you see the link labeled add custom emoji here. Click it, then upload your image file and give the emoji a name.

On Discord, find the server you want to add an emoji to, then open the drop-down menu in the upper left …

… and select Server Settings.

Next, click Emoji, then click the Upload Emoji button.

Note: You’ll need permission within the server to upload emoji. If it’s a server you created, you’ll automatically have that, but if the server’s creator has placed restrictions on who can upload, you’ll have to talk to them.

The next level: Make a pitch to the Unicode Consortium

Uploading emoji to services like Slack or Discord is easy, but you might be wondering how to get your emoji into the company offered by major platforms like iOS and Android. As it turns out, the set of emoji that users find on just about every device (including such classics as “smiling face with sunglasses” and “zipper-mouth face”) is actually regulated by a group known as the Unicode Consortium. Unicode is a widely accepted standard for encoding text on electronic devices, ensuring that texts sent from a device will show up properly on the receiving end, no matter the make or model.

The consortium maintains a carefully controlled list of approved emoji. If you want your emoji creation to show up in this prestigious catalog, you’ll need to submit a proposal to the selection committee. The committee judges emoji based on a number of factors; aspiring emoji artists must take into account how frequently people would actually use the new emoji, how distinct the image is, and whether it fills a niche that other emoji currently aren’t. (Emoji can’t be specific people or brands, so our Nic Cage emoji is dead on arrival, sadly.)

The full requirements for making a proposal are available on the Consortium’s site.

Editors’ Recommendations

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• Mark your calendars — more than 150 new emojis are coming on June 5
• To celebrate World Emoji Day, Apple debuts over 70 new emojis coming to iOS 12
• Emojis could change the way you use maps on your phone
• How to remove the background from an image

How to make emoji

Brenda Stolyar/Digital Trends

Language is always evolving, and the prime example of this in the digital age is surely the rise of emoji — the little cartoonish pictograms that adorn text messages, emails, even pictures these days. Every year brings a new wave of tiny, emotive drawings. Originating in Japan in the late ‘90s, emoji are now everywhere, a universal language that crosses devices, operating systems, and international borders. No matter what country you are from or language you speak, you can recognize the jubilance in the “Face with Tears of Joy,” or that the person sending you an eggplant emoji is hankering for some eggplant parmesan right now.

Emoji can convey a wide range of sentiments, but what if you want something specific, something not available among the typical slate of emoji? It is possible to make your own emoji, albeit with some restrictions. Here’s how.

Use a messaging service that allows for custom emoji

If you use a messaging app like Discord or Slack — the former is popular with people playing multiplayer video games, while the latter is used by a lot of businesses for internal communications — then you may be happy to learn that adding your own emoji is a simple process.

To add an emoji, you first need to actually create one. Messaging services will typically have restrictions — on Slack, which we’ll be using to demonstrate, emoji can be no larger than 64KB, and neither the height nor width can exceed 128 pixels.

Open the image-editing software of your choice (for example, the free, web-based Pixlr).

If you’re confident in your artistic skills, you could make an emoji using the tools provided in the program. For a traditional emoji look, start with a yellow circle using a shape tool. Note: Use a transparent background, so the emoji will show up seamlessly against any background.

Then, add features like a mouth and eyes using tools like the pencil or shape tool.

If you’re looking to make an emoji out of a currently existing image, the process is simple. First, find a picture you want to make into an emoji, such as a picture of Nic Cage in the movie Con Air.

Rich Shibley/Digital Trends

Open the image in your photo-editing software. Using the lasso tool, trace along the edge the future emoji.

Once you’ve made a complete circuit, cut the selection (CTRL + X), then create a new image (and preferably make the background transparent, so the emoji will look good against any chat background).

Paste the image into this new window.

Make any remaining edits you might want, then save the image as a PNG (so as to preserve the transparent background).

However you end up creating your emoji, once you’ve saved it, open up your messaging app (in this case Slack).

Click the emoji button, then scroll down until you see the link labeled add custom emoji here. Click it, then upload your image file and give the emoji a name.

On Discord, find the server you want to add an emoji to, then open the drop-down menu in the upper left …

… and select Server Settings.

Next, click Emoji, then click the Upload Emoji button.

Note: You’ll need permission within the server to upload emoji. If it’s a server you created, you’ll automatically have that, but if the server’s creator has placed restrictions on who can upload, you’ll have to talk to them.

The next level: Make a pitch to the Unicode Consortium

Uploading emoji to services like Slack or Discord is easy, but you might be wondering how to get your emoji into the company offered by major platforms like iOS and Android. As it turns out, the set of emoji that users find on just about every device (including such classics as “smiling face with sunglasses” and “zipper-mouth face”) is actually regulated by a group known as the Unicode Consortium. Unicode is a widely accepted standard for encoding text on electronic devices, ensuring that texts sent from a device will show up properly on the receiving end, no matter the make or model.

The consortium maintains a carefully controlled list of approved emoji. If you want your emoji creation to show up in this prestigious catalog, you’ll need to submit a proposal to the selection committee. The committee judges emoji based on a number of factors; aspiring emoji artists must take into account how frequently people would actually use the new emoji, how distinct the image is, and whether it fills a niche that other emoji currently aren’t. (Emoji can’t be specific people or brands, so our Nic Cage emoji is dead on arrival, sadly.)

The full requirements for making a proposal are available on the Consortium’s site.

Editors’ Recommendations

• Everything you need to know about Discord, the chat app for gamers
• Mark your calendars — more than 150 new emojis are coming on June 5
• To celebrate World Emoji Day, Apple debuts over 70 new emojis coming to iOS 12
• Emojis could change the way you use maps on your phone
• How to remove the background from an image

Are you rocking Android Pie on your Essential Phone?

Other Android OEMs — pay attention to what Essential’s doing.

This Monday saw Google release its final build of Android Pie for the Pixel and Pixel 2 lineup, and just minutes after this was announced, Essential came out of nowhere with an official Pie update for all Essential Phone owners.

That sort of turnaround time is pretty much unheard of when it comes to third-party OEMs updating their hardware to new versions of Android, and as you might expect, a lot of us were quite excited by this news.

Some of our AC forum members have been talking about this for a couple days, and looking through the threads, it would appear that most all PH-1 owners are rocking and rolling with Pie.

richeich
08-06-2018 01:16 PM

“

My update size is 1047.2 MB. I’ll hold off until I get home. Amazing that we get it on release date. So impressive.

Reply

StayClassy101
08-06-2018 04:25 PM

“

I own a pixel 2 and essential. my essential phone had pie and on the pixel 2 it still hasn’t popped up yet.

Reply

revtech
08-06-2018 12:55 PM

“

Unbelievable! I was just wondering if we’d be getting the Aug security update today, and voila! Downloading right now 👍

Reply

SRFast
08-06-2018 12:57 PM

“

My nephew’s PH-1 on T-Mo is downloading the Android 9 Pie update now!

Reply

How about you? Did your Essential Phone get the Android Pie update?

Join the conversation in the forums!

Android 9 Pie

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• Join the Discussion

Which pie flavor is each Android OEM?

It’s cobblering time!

Android 9 Pie is upon us, and besides trivial features like a new navigation system, okayish set of “digital wellbeing” features, and more battery savings, we have something actually worthwhile: a new dessert nickname. In this case, Pie.

The great thing about the Android ecosystem is that manufacturers can make changes to the operating system to make their own flavors of software. Similarly, the greatest thing about pie is that each baker can make changes to recipes to make their own unique flavors. If you don’t like pecan pie you’re a complete and irredeemable monster you can grab a slice of apple pie and eat to your heart’s content. With that said, it’s time to find out if your favorite Android OEM matches your favorite pie flavor!

• Google
• Samsung
• LG
• OnePlus
• Motorola
• HTC
• Essential
• Huawei
• Xiaomi

Google — Cream Pie

There aren’t many frills to a good cream pie, and there aren’t many frills to Google’s version of Android. Both a cream pie and Google’s Android will blind you with a stark white interface. Google’s Android won’t slow your phone down with questionable features, and a proper cream pie won’t slow you down with questionable ingredients. Anyone can jump into Google’s Android and feel comfortable, and anyone can bake a cream pie without too much trouble.

Samsung — Pumpkin Pie

Pumpkin pie is the most popular pie in the world according to five seconds of research, and Samsung’s software is the most popular version of Android according to the fact it’s the only OEM that consistently makes money on its mobile division. A pumpkin pie will leave you feeling a bit more bloated than a cream pie would, but the extra flavor is worth it. Pumpkin pie is a staple at many holiday dinners, and so are Samsung phones when you realize you have nothing else that’s interesting to talk about with your family.

LG — Sweet Potato Pie

It looks an awful lot like pumpkin pie, but once you bite in you immediately know that it isn’t, and you get kinda hungry for actual pumpkin pie. But you already said you’d eat sweet potato pie for the next two years, so this is just your life now. That’s not to say sweet potato pie isn’t delicious in its own right, and you can use the same toppings you planned on using with the pumpkin pie. At the end of the day, you still have a satisfying dessert.

OnePlus — Chocolate Satin Pie

OnePlus’ version of Android isn’t too different than what Google offers, and a chocolate satin pie isn’t much harder to make than a cream pie. One key feature on OnePlus phones is the system-wide dark theme, and a chocolate satin pie definitely looks like a dark themed version of a cream pie. It has a distinct flavor that most people will enjoy, and you can experiment with different ingredients on top of the core chocolate flavor.

Motorola — Modern Gourmet Foods Mini Apple Pie Baking Kit

There are few things more American than apple pie and a company based in Chicago. Sure, you can go to the store and buy a complete pie. OR, you can just get the pieces of a complete pie and put it together yourself. This takes some work, and some of the ingredients are… less than savory… but it also means you can include ingredients no one has thought of yet.

HTC — The crumbs at the bottom of a pie tin

There was something there at some point, but by now we’re not exactly sure what. And we’re not sure just how long this empty pie tin is going to be around when there are still some full pies out there. Every now and then, someone will come along and put more pie in this exact same tin, but then it’s empty again soon after.

Essential — discount pie that will probably make you sick

You know you want some pie, and you get to the freezer at your local grocery store. You find a flavor that looks great and — even better — it’s half off!. It’s from a brand you know and trust, but then you see the expiration date. It’s today. Yeah it’s on sale, but that’s still a lot of money to spend on a pie that may not be supported in the future. The pie itself is kinda barebones, and you have to pay extra money for toppings that other pie makers include in the base price. You buy the pie anyway and tell every single person — whether they asked or not — that it was the right choice.

Huawei — Pizza Pie

It’s the right shape, but that’s really it. It’s tasty, but it’s not at all what you imagine when you say “pie.” You’re happy to have it, but you certainly can’t use the same toppings as on a regular pie. Unlike other pies, you can get this in truly large sizes so you can share it with others.

Xiaomi — Whataburger Apple Pies

The taste is almost there but the shape is definitely different, like it’s trying to be something else entirely. It’s still delicious, and it can survive on its own merits. Unfortunately, it’s only available in certain regions, meaning most customers don’t know this delicious pie even exists.

What say you?

Which pie flavor do you think represents your phone’s manufacturer? Let us know down below!

Android 9 Pie

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• Everything you need to know about Android 9 Pie!
• Will my phone get Android Pie?
• How to get Android 9 Pie on your Pixel right now
• Join the Discussion

Google Pixel 3: News, Rumors, Release Date, Specs, and more!

Everything we know about what’ll likely be one of the year’s best phones.

Google first introduced its Pixel series in 2016, and since then, has been hard at work to establish itself as a serious player in the smartphone market. Google may be one of the most powerful and iconic companies in the world, but when it comes to hardware, is still very much a newcomer.

We saw vast improvements with the Pixel 2 compared to the original Pixel line, and we’re expecting to get that again with the Pixel 3. Google’s quickly learning what it takes to compete with the likes of Samsung and Apple, and seeing as how the Pixel 2 was one of 2017’s best phones, there’s a lot riding on this year’s entry.

Ladies and gentlemen, here’s everything we know so far about the Google Pixel 3.

The latest Pixel 3 news

August 8, 2018 — Pixel 3 XL appears in more hands-on photos and unboxing video

Previous renders and real-world pictures have already given us a clear look at the Pixel 3 XL’s design, and to help make that image as clear as humanly possible, SlashLeaks recently shared three additional hands-on photos and an unboxing video of the phone.

One of the photos shows the back of the white Pixel 3 XL while the other two showcase the front. We once again see that Google will be sticking with just one rear camera and a rear-mounted fingerprint sensor, and unfortunately, that notch hasn’t shrunk at all since the last time we saw it.

Moving over to the unboxing video, it’s apparent that Google’s using very similar packaging compared to the Pixel 2 and 2 XL. The box does contain a pair of wired USB-C earbuds in addition to the Pixel 3 XL, but seeing as how Google experimented with this idea for last year’s release, we aren’t entirely sure if the free buds will stick around for the final retail packaging.

August 6, 2018 — October 4 launch date leaked for the Pixel 3

While we’ve seen plenty of leaked renders and specs for the Pixel 3, talk about its release date has been fairly quiet. That is, up until now. As spotted by Brandon Lee from the YouTube channel This is Tech Today, the Pixel 3 is shown to be released on October 4 according to the website Famebit.

Famebit is a website that allows companies to connect with content creators and work out deals to create sponsored content for YouTube videos, Instagram posts, etc. An ad on the site was recently created by Google and asks for Canadian creators to switch to the Pixel 3 and then making a video talking about their experience.

In this listing, it’s stated that “The Pixel 3 phone is launching October 4, 2018.”

While there’s no way to confirm if this ad really was created by Google, that October 4 date is what we were previously expecting anyways. That’s the same day Google used to announce the Pixel and Pixel 2 before, so it makes sense that it’d keep the trend going this year.

When will the Pixel 3 be released?

In 2016 and 2017, Google held its hardware event on October 4. We don’t have a concrete date for this year’s event quite yet, but there’s no reason to believe Google will deter from this pattern.

Another October 4 event isn’t out of the question seeing as how that falls on a Thursday this year, but at the very least, we should be looking at some point in early October.

Pre-orders for the Pixel 3 will likely open shortly after it’s announced that same day with shipments going out at least a couple of weeks later.

How much will the Pixel 3 cost?

Over the past couple years, pricing for Google’s Pixel phones has remained mostly the same. The MSRP for the Pixel and Pixel 2 series is as follows:

• Pixel w/ 32GB — $649
• Pixel w/ 128GB — $749
• Pixel 2 w/ 64GB — $649
• Pixel 2 w/ 128GB — $749
• Pixel XL w/ 32GB — $769
• Pixel XL w/ 128GB — $869
• Pixel 2 XL w/ 64GB —$849
• Pixel 2 XL w/ 128GB — $949

I imagine we’ll see similar numbers with the Pixel 3, but don’t be too surprised if we get a Pixel 3 XL variant that crosses the $1000 threshold.

Google Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL

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• Google Pixel 2 and 2 XL review: The new standard
• Google Pixel 2 specs
• Google Pixel 2 vs. Pixel 2 XL: What’s the difference?
• Join our Pixel 2 forums

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Project Fi

Watch the Samsung Galaxy Note 9 launch event: Live Aug 9 at 11:00 a.m. ET!

The new S Pen-toting flagship is ready to burst onto the scene.

It’s the moment we’ve been waiting for since the Galaxy S9 was announced: the Galaxy Note 9’s launch event. The Note fans among us have had August 9 circled on the calendar for weeks now, and it’s finally time to see the successor to the phone that’s in so many pockets today.

We’re always interested in the spectacle that is a Samsung launch event.

Many of the Note 9’s specs and details have leaked, but that doesn’t mean we aren’t interested in the spectacle that is a Samsung launch event. Part of the experience of getting a new Samsung phone is seeing all of the circumstances surrounding its launch, and they’re always a good time.

It all gets going at 11:00 a.m. ET in New York City — that translates to 8:00 a.m. PT, 4:00 p.m. CET and 8:30 p.m. IST for folks elsewhere in the world. No matter where you are, you can watch the show unfold right here at the video player above. As the launch event wraps up, be sure to follow all of Android Central’s coverage to get every bit of Note 9 information you desire!

Samsung Galaxy Note 9

• Samsung Galaxy Note 9 rumors: Release date, specs, price, and features!
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• Do you plan on upgrading to the Note 9?
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• Join our Galaxy Note 9 forums