360fly 4K review: The future of action cams

The quick take

If you’re looking for a fun way to capture yourself doing something cool or mildly dangerous, this is absolutely the camera for you. 360fly has polished nearly every rough edge from the previous model and delivered something that deserved to be considered among action cam fans.

The Good

• Fun design
• Single button makes quick captures easy
• Relatively easy to upload and share

The Bad

• Does not capture a full sphere
• Wi-Fi Direct is still awkward
• Massive lens is delicate, prone to scratching

Everything is better in 4K

360fly 4K Review

Last year, 360fly seemed like a camera in need of a market. The original design was clearly aimed at action cam folks, but offered few of the features necessary to hook those users and an app that was downright clunky. At the end of my original review I warned users would probably want to wait for the upcoming 4K model, and that time is now. 360fly 4K is here, and with it you’ll find a camera that lives up to the promise of the original — a 360-degree action camera.

Check out 360fly 4K side by side with the original 360fly!

Same same, but different, but still same.

360fly Hardware

360fly is a weird angular sphere with a single massive fisheye lens, a single physical button, and no ports. It’s nearly identical to the original 360fly design, which is solid. The single lens doesn’t capture a complete 360-degree sphere, but there’s also no need for stitching software either. It’s a single lens you mount on a bike or in your car or even on top of your head if you really wanted. The standard camera tripod screw on the bottom means it’ll work with about every camera mounting accessory, and the included GoPro adapter in the box means it’ll adapt to everything else. The single button gives you a single option — push once to record and go do your thing.

The magnetic socket on the bottom of the orb lets the camera sit flat when it isn’t mounted somewhere, and when you set 360fly on top of its charging dock you gain the ability to transfer video over USB to a PC. Needing to carry around a separate charging plate is as tedious for this camera as it is for anything else, but through that you get a camera that can be submerged 30ft without any damage. Compared to the barely splash resistant 360-degree competition or action cams that regularly require special cases for submersion, it’s a small compromise.

Surprisingly, the most useful addition to the design has been the light ring on the base of the camera. The big button on the side of 360fly glows several colors to indicate the current state of the camera, and the ring on the bottom now glows that same color. It’s slightly more noticeable in bright sunlight with a protective helmet on, and it’s way more noticeable on the bottom of a glossy drone 10ft above your head. The change is subtle, but so important.

Making the whole top of this camera a giant lens means there’s very little protecting the glass. This isn’t a huge problem for most cameras, where care is implied, but action cameras by nature are exposed to some roughness. For example, 360fly included a suction cup mount for its camera that is rated for well over 100 mph and we decided to test that claim on the front of a 2016 BMW k1300s Motorsport Edition.

The suction cup did in fact handle 120 mph without issue, but shortly after the motorcycle came to a stop the suction cup dropped to the asphalt and the camera became irreparably damaged. This four foot fall is fairly mild compared to the more intense GoPro footage you find out in the world, which is a serious problem for those looking to do something crazy with this camera.

Oh hey, a kitchen sink!

360fly Software

While little has changed about the overall design of the 360fly app, there are way more features now. 360fly now lets you edit photos and videos through the app in several significant ways, as well as use the app as a real time viewfinder with live filters and camera modes that can be applied while you’re shooting.

Editing photos and videos directly in the app is a huge improvement.

You can capture the whole scene around you, positioned vertically or horizontally just in case you’re drone surfing with your camera, or you can narrow the field of view down and have some fun with what almost looks like panoramic video. If capturing and sharing later isn’t good enough for you, 360fly has partnered with a Livit to allow live streaming a 360-degree sphere over your phone’s cellular connection.

It’s clear from the single big friendly button on the front of 360fly — which only allows you to record video — that photos aren’t the main priority for this camera. Many competing cameras are photo first, video second, but 360fly clearly feels most of its users will want to tap that big button and go do something worth sharing on video. The photo suite in the app is enough for great single photos or time lapses, complete with manual control over ISO and other details if you’re interested in a specific kind of shot. The resulting photos are on par with what you’d get from a Ricoh Theta S, save of course for the small black space on the bottom of the sphere where there is no image.

Easily the most important feature for action cam enthusiasts is the ability to add a little control to the viewer’s focus. You can publish a video and let the viewer pan around on their own, or you can create a viewing path that follows a specific object in the video. This could be a face, a bike, or even a cloud in the sky. The target will be the focal point until the user decides to try and look elsewhere, which means you have some control over the story being told with your video. While there is a Desktop client for all of this, you can do it all through the app with no issue.

This team wanted to throw every conceivable feature into its app, and for the most part succeeded. The app feels complete, and letting a third party handle steaming means the heavy lifting can happen elsewhere. Even sharing to other networks has improved, which is so important now. Quick sharing to Facebook or YouTube is a button press away, but if you’d prefer to keep using the 360fly hosting service for the best possible quality, that option is always right next to the others.

The only thing missing from this app is more defined audio control. Currently you can either keep the audio included with your experience, cut the audio entirely, or add a song of your choosing. These options are fine as long as you aren’t doing something louder than the microphones can handle, in which case what would really be helpful would be something that simply cut the audio in half so it wasn’t deafening to the viewer.

I need a snowboard and some duct tape.

360fly Experience

If you’re capturing yourself doing something crazy, it makes all the sense in the world to capture the entire moment. Using a regular action cam means you get to share a small window of what has happened in front of you. Using a 360-degree camera means the viewer get the whole picture. The look on your face as your take the turn, the faces in the crowd as you skate by, or the stuff happening behind you that you didn’t even know about until later. Action cams should always be 360-degree, especially when the creator can control the viewer’s focus with software as easily as you can with the 360fly app.

No matter how you look at it, 360fly 4K is a more capable and higher quality camera than its predecessor.

Fragility is a concern with every 360-degree camera with exposed lenses, but using 360fly placed a real emphasis on potential damage to the lens. There’s nothing to be done about the scuffs on the review unit we have here, and you can see the damage in every photo and video captured after the accident. On the other hand, there’s very little chance many of the other competing cameras would have handled the drop quite as well.

Having a light ring on the bottom of this camera makes a huge difference in how often you need to check and make sure it’s still recording. The app does a great job keeping you informed, but if you’re recording something dynamic it helps to not have to reach into your pocket and check quite as frequently. It’s dead simple to see the glowing red and know you’re still recording.

A fully charged battery isn’t quite enough to completely fill the included 64GB of internal storage, but it’s more than enough to record for an hour or capture a timelapse over four hours. The larger file size hasn’t made any significant difference in battery drain, which is fantastic. Despite being one of the physically smaller cameras of its kind, the battery lasts more than long enough to have lots of fun.

Should you buy it? Sure!

No matter how you look at it, 360fly 4K is a more capable and higher quality camera than its predecessor. Images and video are much nicer, it’s much more user friendly now, and the original design has held up well with some minor improvements. That having been said, it’s still a 360-degree camera aimed at folks wondering what comes after a GoPro, with a price tag that competes directly with the GoPro Hero 4 line.

If you’re looking for a fun way to capture yourself doing something cool, this is absolutely the camera for you. If you just want to take 360-degree photos and maybe a video every once in while, this is probably not your camera.

See at Amazon

Frequency illusion and exploding Samsung phones

Just because you’re hearing about Samsung phones exploding, doesn’t mean it’s actually happening more often.

Did you hear?! A Samsung phone caught fire on an Indian airplane! The device in question, a Samsung Galaxy Note… 2 — from 2012 — reportedly went up in smoke in an overhead compartment, before being doused in a bucket of water by cabin crew.

It’s one of a few prominent reports lately of Samsung phones other than the genuinely explosion-prone Note 7 going up in smoke. A couple of weeks back, The New York Post carried a story on a Samsung phone catching fire in the hands of a child (the paper incorrectly reported it as a Note 7 initially). Then shouty British rag The Sun published a story on a GS7 edge catching fire in the UK. Those are just two recent examples — many more have been reported in the media since the Note 7 fiasco erupted.

It seems like Samsung phones are constantly exploding! Maybe there’s a problem with all of them!

Frequency illusion, amplified by the effect of the modern media.

Well, probably not. What we have here is a case of frequency illusion. (Sometimes called the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon.) This is a cognitive bias — a trick of the mind — where something which has recently come to the personal or collective attention seems to appear with much greater frequency shortly afterwards.

That’s amplified considerably by the modern media, which is quick to jump on unrelated stories like the Note 2 catching fire over India, and present them in the narrative of the Note 7 battery fiasco. Had the Note 7 not had battery issues, a story about a single smartphone malfunctioning (albeit spectacularly) on an airplane, with no harm coming to anyone, wouldn’t have been splashed around major news outlets as much as it has been.

What’s more, the idea of there being a broader problem with Samsung batteries simply doesn’t stand up to common sense. The Galaxy Note 2 has been around for four years, selling well over 5 million units in its year of release alone. If there’d been a battery problem as serious and widespread as that of the Note 7, it would’ve come to light literally years ago.

The idea of a wider problem with Samsung phones simply doesn’t stand up to common sense.

The same argument applies to the Galaxy S7, which had racked up sales of 26 million units by early July. Given that out of a million or so “bad” Note 7s in the U.S., around 100 caught fire in the first month, we’d be looking at thousands of GS7-related cases if the problem was common to both phones.

It’s also worth remembering the sheer number of phones Samsung sells. Samsung was the world’s biggest smartphone seller in 2015, shifting some 320 million phones, according to Gartner. It’s battled Apple for the number-one spot for the past several years. Many of those phones, especially cheaper models, have user-replaceable batteries.

Which brings us back to our airborne Galaxy Note 2 fire over India. The Note 2 is an old Samsung phone with a removable battery, which opens up the strong possibility that an off-brand battery may have been used.

“In India, it’s easier to get a hold of third-party batteries than those made by Samsung,” AC India editor Harish Jonnalagadda told me. “Non-certified batteries often retail for one-fourth the cost of the genuine product, making them a much more lucrative option for price-conscious buyers. Meanwhile, retailers are able to eke out better profits by selling third-party batteries, which is why they continue to push them onto customers.”

There’s a non-zero chance of any lithium-ion battery catching fire.

Lithium-ion batteries pack a lot of power into a small space. At any point in time, there’s a non-zero chance of a something or other going wrong and releasing all that energy at once. Given that Samsung sells more phones than anyone else, the prominence of that brand in reports of battery fires (outside of the Note 7) isn’t surprising. The same applies to the many reports in years past of iPhones catching fire when charging, given that Apple also sells a hell of a lot of iPhones.

MORE: What makes a phone battery explode?

Between the sheer number of Samsung phones out there, the number with replaceable batteries, the tendency for uncertified batteries to be used in some countries — and the important effect of frequency illusion and the modern media, it’s not surprising that there are more reports of exploding Samsung phones in the news. (And also that it seems like it’s happening more often.)

But that doesn’t mean that there’s any flaw with other Samsung batteries, or that exploding batteries are any more common now than before the Note 7 fiasco.

Samsung Galaxy Note 7

• Galaxy Note 7 recall: Everything you need to know
• Samsung Galaxy Note 7 review
• The latest Galaxy Note 7 news!
• Here are all four Note 7 colors
• Complete Galaxy Note 7 specs
• Join the Note 7 discussion in the forums!

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10 Chrome extensions you didn’t know existed but should be using

What are the best Chrome extensions I should be using?

The amount of time most people spend browsing the internet continues to rise each year, and Google’s Chrome browser attempts to be the most comfortable and versatile browser out there. To aid in its quest, Google allows for developers to market small software extensions that modify and (in most cases) ameliorate your browsing experience. Here are 10 Chrome extensions you didn’t know about but should be using.

• Dark Reader
• TL;DR
• Keepa
• Web Timer
• PanicButton
• Ghostery
• Feedly Mini
• HTTPS Everywhere
• The Great Suspender
• Extensity
• Pushbullet
• LastPass
• uBlock Origin
• Honey
• Magic Actions for YouTube

Dark Reader

Chrome’s natural white background can become tiresome after a few hours of viewing — Dark Reader has the answer. It changes blinding, bright pages into high contrast, dark-themed pages that are easy on the eyes. You can adjust the filters and font settings and add certain webpages to an ignore list in the case of complete incompatibility.

See at Chrome Web Store

TL;DR

TL;DR is the answer to articles on the internet that are too long to read. Highlight article text, click the TL;DR button located next to your address bar, and read a well-constructed summary of the article. You can adjust the length of the summary depending on how much time you have or how involved you want to get. It does a good job of condensing the article without cutting out important bits of information.

See at Chrome Web Store

Keepa

Keepa gives you some pretty in-depth information about Amazon products and prices, and lets you set price-drop alerts to keep you in the know. Check price history charts for all iterations of a product (including different colors and sizes), and compare Amazon prices from all over the world. You can even import your Amazon wishlist and assign alerts for when specific items drop below a certain price. Go to Amazon and hover over any item while Keepa is running; a graph will pop up with extended information. Never get ripped off again!

See at Chrome Web Store

Web Timer

Web Timer is a double-edged sword. You’re getting data that helps you better manage your time, but said data can be depressing. You’ll find yourself asking questions, like, “Did I really spend four hours on Reddit yesterday?” You can add sites to a white-list so that time spent is not recorded, and you can change time measurement parameters from “Today”, to “Average”, to “Lifetime.” Take Web Timer for a spin — you won’t be disappointed.

See at Chrome Web Store

PanicButton

This app is ideal for the classic situation where you’re slacking off at work and your boss happens to walk by. Before you have a chance to yell “Lunch break,” he or she sees Facebook, Reddit, and whatever else you have open in Chrome. PanicButton provides you with a single button or single keyboard key (default F4) that scoops all open tabs into a hidden bookmarks folder that can be restored at a later time. You won’t always need PanicButton, but when you do need it you’ll be glad it’s installed.

See at Chrome Web Store

Ghostery

Want to block advertising companies from creating a profile around your browsing tendencies? Want to load webpages faster than ever before? Want to have more overall privacy on the internet? Ghostery lets you choose what trackers to block on a website-to-website basis. The first time you turn Ghostery on in Chrome, you’ll be amazed at how many trackers are watching your moves. Trackers stay blocked across webpages, so you’ll deal with increasingly less trackers the more you browse.

See at Chrome Web Store

Feedly Mini

This extension provides you with an easy way to see your RSS feeds now that Google got rid of Google Reader. If you have the Feedly app on your Android phone, you can add websites from your computer while you’re navigating the web. A small button sits at the bottom right side of your browser — click it and choose from several options including Facebook sharing and page tagging.

See at Chrome Web Store

HTTPS Everywhere

HTTPS essentially creates authentication between you and the web server hosting the specific webpage. This helps reduce the chance of someone hijacking the information sent between you and the web server. This extension creates HTTPS authentication wherever you go, and it is a must have if you’re worried about surveillance, censorship, or identification theft.

See at Chrome Web Store

The Great Suspender

Everyone who uses Chrome knows about the enormous footprint it leaves on your memory. If you’re an hour or two into an internet trail and have about fifty tabs open, you’ll be happy to have The Great Suspender in your corner. It will auto-suspend tabs after a set time, and you can manually suspend tabs whenever you want. You can also place certain tabs on a whitelist (say the tab playing your YouTube video), and tabs can be opened even after closing and re-opening Chrome.

See at Chrome Web Store

Extensity

You’re going to need an organizer for all the Chrome extensions you have working for you. Extensity collects all extensions and places them in one button beside your address bar; enable and disable extensions with one click and create profiles for separate preferences. Extensity keeps your browser toolbar uncluttered and gives you mastery over your browsing experience.

See at Chrome Web Store

Pushbullet

Receiving notifications from your Android phone right in Chrome is a great way to not miss an important text or call. Pushbullet also allows you to send SMS messages from your phone and send messages through apps like Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, and Kik. When you receive and acknowledge a notification in Chrome, the notification will be dismissed from your phone — alerts will no longer pile up while you’re busy working away at your computer.

See at Chrome Web Store

LastPass

Having multiple, complex passwords is becoming ever more important, but keeping track of them all can be a pain. The LastPass extension brings everything you love about the password manager to Chrome — generate strong passwords, save all passwords, and even store credit card information for easy checkout. LastPass autofills password fields, so you’ll only have to remember one master password that unlocks your vault. This is a free extension, but a premium version can be unlocked that features full syncing across all devices.

See at Chrome Web Store

uBlock Origin

Choosing an extension that blocks ads doesn’t have to be a difficult decision. uBlock Origin is an open-source extension that aggressively blocks ads while using less memory than the other big ad-blocking services. If you want to go one step further, there are thousands of filters that can be applied to uBlock Origin, including tracking blockers and malware domain blockers.

See at Chrome Web Store

Honey

There are plenty of deals available when you shop online — the only problem is that they’re sometimes hard to find. Honey is a neat extension that finds coupon codes for you. When you’re at a checkout screen, just click the Honey button and the best coupon code available will be automatically applied. Honey will also show a list of coupon codes that recently worked with whatever site you’re currently on.

See at Chrome Web Store

Magic Actions for YouTube

Magic Actions is an extension designed for a better YouTube experience. Set all videos to start in HD, enable cinema mode for a darkened screen, hide those annoying video annotations, and block ads. For anyone who watches a lot of YouTube — who doesn’t? — this is an incredibly useful extension.

See at Chrome Web Store

Your favorite extension?

Hit the comments section below and let us know what Chrome extensions you use most.

Grab these unlocked phones at up to 33% off right now!

Your next phone doesn’t have to cost a ton — here are a few great deals.

Amazon is currently offering select unlocked phones at a discount of up to 33%, dropping prices on some of them to under $100. The list includes a variety of different phones, like the OnePlus 2, Nextbit Robin, Alcatel Idol 3 and many others. Unlocked phones make great backup devices or even new phones, and don’t come loaded with tons of carrier bloat. You have the freedom to move them between carriers as you need, and with these discounts they are even more affordable.

The deals here include:

• Alcatel Idol 3 – $100
• Moto G4 Plus – $249
• OnePlus 2 (64GB) – $240
• ASUS ZenFone Zoom – $300
• BLU Studio Touch – $80

There are a number of other deals available, so be sure to hit the link below to check them all out. Will any of these be your next phone? Let us know which one in the comments!

See at Amazon

Here’s what your next Roku streaming boxes will look like

After releasing a cheap, updated streaming stick to great reviews, it was only a matter of time before Roku officially revealed updates for the rest of its line-up. This is not that time. Dave Zatz (who also blew the lid off Roku’s rebranding efforts not long ago) has come through with images and details of Roku’s currently unannounced updates, and for the most part, they’re the logical next steps many expected.

First up are the Roku Express and Express Plus, two replacements for the company’s existing Roku 1 streaming box that we really don’t know much about. The design is pretty distinctive, though: while the 1 was a glossy squircle with a flattish top, the Express twins look like a traditional matte black streamer that’s been bisected with a butter knife. A shot of the Express’s rear reveals only an HDMI output, too, which frankly sucks since the Roku 1’s RCA ports came in really handy for older televisions.

The next steps up are the Roku Premiere and Premiere Plus, the latter of which pack an Ethernet port and a microSD card slot for adding local storage. Zatz suggests these two might also pack the ability to playback 4K contact, though we’ll have to wait until Roku gets chatty to know for sure. He is, however, sure that the more premium Roku Ultra will play HDR video and 4K (though the name basically implied it all anyway). That high-end Roku will look near-identical to the Premiere and Premiere Plus save for the addition of a button to find your missing remote and an optical out for improved audio.

We’re not sure that we love the rebranding, but whatever — it seems like a fait accompli at this point anyway. More importantly, these images look to be high-quality press renders, which suggests a full-blown Roku announcement is coming very soon. Do yourself a favor and don’t start your holiday shopping too early, okay?

Source: ZatzNotFunny

NSA operative might have accidentally leaked its hacking tools

American authorities are still digging into how a set of NSA’s hacking tools landed in the hands of a group called Shadow Brokers who then leaked them online. According to Reuters, they’re now focusing their investigation on a theory that one NSA operative used the tools on a remote computer three years ago. They believe the operative left them there exposed, and that’s where Russian hackers got a hold of them. The exploits allow users to take advantage of security systems’ software flaws. They can target a number of companies’ products in particular, including Cisco’s firewalls and routers, putting their customers at risk.

Edward Snowden and some security experts pinned the leak on Russian hackers from the start, what with the ongoing digital war between the US and the world’s largest nation. If you’ll recall, Russia is being blamed for several high-profile security breaches in the US, including the most recent Guccifer 2.0 leak that contains documents from the Democratic National Convention.

The fact that Shadow Brokers dumped the tools online just like Guccifer 2.0 did supports authorities’ belief that Russians are behind this incident, as well. Center for Strategic and International Studies cybersecurity expert Jim Lewis said: “The dumping is a tactic they’ve been developing for the last five years or so. They try it, and if we don’t respond they go a little further next time.”

Reuters also revealed that after the NSA found out that its tools were stolen, it deployed sensors to detect whether foreign countries with cyberattack capabilities like Russia and China had been using it. When it didn’t pick up any suspicious activity, it didn’t bother notifying the companies that could be affected by the exploits.

At this point in time, investigators are still looking into the possibility that the operative in question did it on purpose, and that another person might have committed a similar mistake that made the tools more vulnerable. They’re also still confirming whether Shadow Brokers are directly connected to the Russian government. What they’re sure of, however, is that it wasn’t the work of a whistleblower like Edward Snowden and that the hackers didn’t directly infiltrate NSA’s headquarters.

Source: Reuters

Fotr takes you back to photography’s bad old days

Before digital, photographers of all calibers had to be careful, since there were several limits imposed on what they could do. For instance, you only had a limited number of exposures per reel and you had to pay to print all of your images, even the duds that were destined for the trash. It all sounds dreadful, but that doesn’t mean that companies like Fotr aren’t going to try and recreate it for the smartphone age. The app, very simply, forces would-be snappers to be as careful as they used to, since Fotr will print out every image you snap with it.

Once you’ve downloaded Fotr, you’re encouraged to buy a “roll of film,” that’s actually a set of prints that’ll be delivered to your door 10 days after shooting. If you want a traditional 6 x 4-inch, 24-frame color roll, it’ll cost you €18 ($20), while the most expensive reel produces 7 x 5-inch, 36-frame color images for €30 ($33). You have a choice between monochrome and color “films” and a series of Instagram-style filters that imitate the look and feel of classic photo stocks. For instance, if you select BW3, your images will mirror Kodak’s Tri-X monochrome film, while C2 is modeled on Fuji’s Velvia which comes with a blue tint and brighter colors.

It looks as if the mainstream photography world is, at least on the surface, rekindling its love with physical photos. Fujifilm’s been keeping the genre ticking over with its Instax cameras (including ones with Michael Kors) but this year’s Photokina was full of other entrants. Even Leica — Leica! — has a printing camera called the Sofort, and Amazon has launched its own Shutterfly-style cloud printing service. Although, all told, it’s probably still better for 90 percent of smartphone photographers to be able to pick and choose one good shot from a thousand.

Via: TechCrunch

Source: Fotr

The best laptop stands

By Kimber Streams

This post was done in partnership with The Wirecutter, a buyer’s guide to the best technology. Read the full article here.

If you spend hours every day hunched over a laptop at your desk, get a laptop stand. Paired with a mouse and an external keyboard, a laptop stand can help fix your posture and reduce neck and arm pain. After months of testing 11 laptop stands at a coworking space and in our home office, we found that the Rain Design iLevel 2 works best for most people who use the same desk all the time. It’s sturdy, it’s adjustable for a wide range of humans and laptops, and it looks nice. It’s also expensive, but no other laptop stand we tested matched the iLevel 2’s stability and adaptability.

Who this is for

Hunching over a laptop is terrible for your back and neck. Photo: Kevin Purdy

Laptops are ergonomic nightmares. When you’re using a computer, the top of the screen should be just above eye level, and your keyboard should be just below elbow level. This arrangement isn’t possible with a laptop alone: Because its screen and keyboard are so close together, you either have to hunch forward and crane your neck, or raise your hands and arms, straining your shoulders and wrists—sometimes both at the same time. Raising your gaze by using a stand-alone monitor is ideal, but if you don’t have the budget or space, the next best thing for your posture and health is a laptop stand, plus a separate keyboard and mouse.

How we picked and tested

Most of the laptop stands we tested. Photo: Kimber Streams

A good laptop stand should raise your laptop so that your eye level is 1 to 2 inches below the top of your screen when you’re sitting (or standing) up straight. (Do not use your laptop’s keyboard and trackpad when it’s propped up on a stand, which is no better than hunching over the laptop on your desk. Instead, use an external keyboard and a separate mouse or trackpad.)

Everyone has a different body, a different laptop, and a different desk setup, so recommending a single fixed-height laptop stand that will work for everyone is impossible. And if you work at a sit/stand desk, you need to be able to adjust the height of the screen to account for your sitting and standing postures. This means that most people should get an adjustable laptop stand so that they can tweak the laptop’s height as needed.

A stand designed to hold your expensive laptop must also be sturdy, and it shouldn’t wobble or shake while you’re typing on a nearby keyboard; a portable stand must be light, designed to fold up fairly small, and quick and easy to set up and break down—but it still needs to be stable.

Finding comprehensive reviews of laptop stands is tough, so with those criteria in mind, we looked at 38 models and tested 11 with a variety of laptops on a variety of desks with a variety of people, across the span of several months.

Our pick

The Rain Design iLevel 2 is sturdy, stylish, and simple to adjust. Photo: Kimber Streams

The Rain Design iLevel 2 offers easy-to-use adjustability and a simple, sturdy aluminum design. It’s expensive, but no other laptop stand we tested was as quick and simple to set up for different heights, laptops, and postures. Plus, it looks stylish on your desk, with an open-back design handy for stashing cables, and the aluminum helps conduct heat away from your laptop.

The iLevel 2’s laptop platform tilts upward when you slide a knob on the front of the stand from the left to the right; the stand lowers your laptop when you slide the knob back to the left. Though the range will vary slightly depending on the depth of your laptop, the iLevel 2 raises the back of a laptop roughly 6 inches above the desk surface on its lowest setting and about 7¾ inches at its highest level. That range is tall enough to raise a laptop to eye level for most people sitting at a desk, and quickly switching between height settings is easy, too.

If you frequently transition between sitting and standing, and if you’re over 5 feet 8 inches tall, the iLevel 2’s top height may not be high enough for you to use while standing. If you’re using a sit/stand desk, you’ll be better served by the taller Roost Laptop Stand, though that model is harder to adjust. If you’re 5 feet 8 inches or below, the iLevel 2 should work fine.

A collapsible, portable option

Simply pull the two rubber feet apart to unfold the Roost, and push them together to fold the stand up. Photos: Kimber Streams

If you need a laptop stand to take between work and home, or to use while traveling, the Roost Laptop Stand is the best portable option we tested. This lightweight model folds up into a long, thick stick. And though it’s easy to set up and collapse, it doesn’t sacrifice stability. Switching between the Roost’s three height settings is a bit tricky, but gets easier with practice.

A fixed stand that looks nice

The Rain Design mStand isn’t adjustable at all, but it has an attractive look and does the job of elevating a laptop. Photo: Kimber Streams

If our top two picks are too expensive, but you want a laptop stand that looks nicer than a stack of books, the best option is the Rain Design mStand. This sturdy, aluminum platform has a hole for cable management and a nook to store your keyboard, but unlike our other picks, it isn’t adjustable.

The cheapest option: Using stuff you already own

Books work just as well as any laptop stand, and you can customize them. Photo: Kimber Streams

If a laptop stand just isn’t in your budget, you can use pretty much anything to raise your laptop screen to eye level. We like books—except for stability, they’re just as effective as any fixed laptop stand, and you can even customize the height and colors. We recommend using wide, flat books (think textbooks, cookbooks, or coffee-table books) to create a stable base.

This guide may have been updated by The Wirecutter. To see the current recommendation, please go here.