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A smartphone plan isn't a luxury anymore—it's an essential utility that almost everyone needs to stay connected. So, when it comes to deciding on a plan, you don't want to pay an arm and a leg for it, especially if you're only trying to get one line.

It’s a new week, which means another TikTok trend has broken containment. This time, it’s all about the not-so-secret Group 7 — a supposedly exclusive club that’s taken over the app and appeared in countless viral videos over the past few days.

So… what exactly is Group 7?

Group 7 explained

Put simply, "Group 7" refers to a TikTok trend started by singer Sophia James while promoting her new single, "So Unfair." Hoping to get as many ears on her song as possible, James uploaded seven nearly identical videos with a simple premise: whichever one appeared on your For You Page determined which "group" you belonged to.

It began with James sharing her track alongside a parking ticket she’d just received. Over the rest of the day, she posted six more clips, with the seventh and final video — Group 7 — arriving last.

"i hereby declare group 7 is the most elite group," one user commented, racking up nearly 250,000 likes.

That final post quickly blew up, becoming an inside joke among those lucky enough to land in Group 7. Of course, with James’s original video now topping 17 million views and 2.3 million likes, the "exclusive" club isn’t quite as small anymore.

"I was just trying to promote my song. That's all it was," James told Mashable over email. "But the reason I make and perform music in the first place is to foster community and connect with people, so the way this thing is bringing people together is literally a dream come true."

The trend has since exploded, spawning more than 55,000 videos tagged Group 7 — each with its own spin on the phenomenon. There are dance clips set to so-called "Group 7 anthems," explainer videos where creators declare their own Group 7 allegiance before breaking down the trend, and plenty of rambling monologues from users outlining what they believe are the defining traits of a true Group 7 member.

Of course, with more than 17 million people having seen Sophia James’s original video, it’s safe to say everyone’s in Group 7 by now — or at least pretending to be.

Meet The Mashable 101: The top creators keeping the internet interesting in 2025

Like many viral moments before it, the trend fits neatly into a broader TikTok playbook: creators manufacturing “in-groups” to drive engagement and game the algorithm. Think OnlyFans creators posting two versions of the same dance — one wholesome, one risqué — and asking followers which one showed up first on their For You Page. Or the endless power-scaling edits from anime and superhero fans, sorting users into random teams based on their birth month and sparking endless comment-section debates about who would win.

Regardless, James seems thrilled with how her videos — and her single — have taken off on TikTok. As a playful reward for fans, she’s organizing a real-life Group 7 meetup, with the first one set for Friday, October 24, in London, England.

"This is the funniest thing I’ve ever seen, and I think you should all meet in real life," reads a note on James’s website.

In my review of the new M5 iPad Pro, I said that the new Apple tablet feels like a victory lap for Apple. Well, as an F1 fan, I'm going to use another racing metaphor to describe the newest MacBook Pro.

The new M5 silicon doesn't just surpass the competition; it actually laps the competition. Last year's M4 ship already sped past its rivals like Max Verstappen on a tear, and the next generation of Qualcomm Snapdragon X2 Elite chips won't even appear in Windows laptops until 2026. In the meantime, the fancy new M5 chip is already here and ready to claim its place at the top of the performance podium.

Apple provided its new MacBook Pro to Mashable for testing ahead of its official release on Oct. 22. Since we've only had a few days to stress test the Apple laptop, we'll update this review with a more in-depth report next week, including a battery run-down test.

M5 MacBook Pro review: By the numbers Credit: Joe Maldonado / Mashable

For my 2025 MacBook Pro review, Apple sent me a device with 16GB of RAM, 1TB of storage, and the optional Nano Texture display

• Display: Liquid Retina XDR display with HDR capabilities

• RAM: 16GB, 24GB

• Storage: 512GB, 1TB

• Size: 14 inches

• Colors: Silver and space black

• Resolution: 3024 x 1964

• Dimensions: 12.31” x 8.71” x 0.61”

• Weight: 3.4 pounds (1.55 kg)

• Ports: Three Thunderbolt 4 (USB-C), SDXC card slot, HDMI, MagSafe 3 charger, 3.5 mm headphone jack

• Brightness: 1,000 nits (1,600 nits with HDR content)

• Refresh rate: Up to 120Hz

• Touch ID: Yes

• Face ID: No

For now, the M5 MacBook Pro is only available in a 14-inch model, starting at $1,599, though I expect most users will want to pay more for additional storage and/or RAM.

M5 MacBook Pro review: Performance Credit: Joe Maldonado / Mashable

It's not an exaggeration to say that Apple's M-series silicon has been revolutionary. Apple has shown that it can design processors just as well as it can design anything, and the M chips have set new standards of power and performance efficiency.

In our benchmark testing, the new M5 MacBook Pro received a score of 17,470 on the Geekbench performance test. That's a notable improvement over the M4 chip (though not radically so). The M5 achieved a 17 percent improvement over the M4, and while we saw a bigger leap in performance from the M3 to M4, it's still a noticeable jump. We've tested 61 Windows laptops, Chromebooks, and MacBooks for our guide to the best laptops, and the M5 MacBook Pro outperforms 93 percent of them. For the most part, only extremely specced-out (and extremely expensive) gaming laptops can beat it, with the 16-inch MacBook Pro with the M4 Pro chip being the exception.

For context, Apple’s M-series chips have seemed untouchable ever since they debuted in 2020. Then, Qualcomm introduced the Snapdragon X Elite processor, which surged past the M3 chip and powered award-winning laptops like the Microsoft Surface 7. Well, it was nice to have some genuine competition while it lasted. As Mashable’s former tech editor Kimberly Gedeon wrote last year in her M4 MacBook Pro review, “Apple dropped the M4 chip and obliterated Windows laptops in one fell swoop.”

Now, we've got the M5 chip. Its 17,470 Geekbench CPU score easily beats the M4's score of 15,199 and the Surface Laptop 7's score of 14,548. Like I said, Apple has now fully lapped the competition.

The M5 processor can handle advanced programs without breaking a sweat I recommend investing in the space black version and a microfiber cloth to wipe away fingerprints. Credit: Joe Maldonado / Mashable

While I've only had a few days to stress-test the new MacBook Pro, I don't feel like I've come close to actually stressing its M5 chip, which has a 10-core CPU (four performance cores, six efficiency cores) and shiny new Neural Accelerators for running advanced AI models locally on your device. Apple also promises that the M5 “delivers over 4x the peak GPU compute performance for AI compared to M4,” and overall 45 percent better graphics performance than the M4.

Combined with a promised 30 percent bump in memory bandwidth, you can play demanding games like Cyberpunk. And at work, you can use Final Cut Pro while also uploading massive video files to the cloud simultaneously.

I've been playing around with large video files in Adobe Premiere Pro and AI plugins in Logic Pro, and so far, the new MacBook Pro has been up to the challenge. I suppose one day we'll get to a point where you can export 4K video files in seconds, but by today's standards, the M5 chip works quickly and efficiently.

One of my friends is a filmmaker and editor, and he's still using an M2 MacBook Pro for his daily workflow. He told me it's more than fast enough already for professional work, and at a certain point, Apple is just showing off.

So, if you need to create photos or videos professionally with tools like Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator, Premiere Pro, DaVinci Resolve, Logic Pro, or Final Cut, you'll get all the performance you need here. The same goes for AI models that need to run on your device. Only the most advanced power users will tax the M5 chip, and I haven't had any problems with overheating or excessive fan noise yet.

The new MacBook passes the Cyberpunk 2077 test Credit: Joe Maldonado / Mashable

Luckily for me, I'm playing through Cyberpunk 2077 for the very first time, and so I got to directly compare how this game runs on both a dedicated gaming laptop, the Lenovo LOQ 15 (AMD Ryzen 7, RTX 5060, 16GB RAM, 512GB SSD), and the M5 MacBook. I'm happy to say it passed the Cyberpunk test. Now, did it perform flawlessly? No.

Occasionally, the graphics would get blown out, and some fine details (like hair) appeared more pixelated on the MacBook, but in general, it played smoothly and looked beautiful on the Liquid Retina display. (I played with 1080 resolution, 30 frames per second, and all ray tracing features turned on.) It was one of those "You can have your cake and eat it too" moments for me.

We may never think of MacBooks as gaming laptops, but thanks to the latest Apple silicon, Apple loyalists don't have to lose out on gaming anymore.

M5 MacBook Pro review: Familiar hardware, new software

The new MacBook comes with macOS Tahoe 26, which brings Liquid Glass to your laptop. Now, I'm personally a fan of the Liquid Glass aesthetic. I think it matches Apple's brand perfectly. That said, Tahoe doesn't deliver as many noticeable upgrades as iOS 26 or iPadOS 26. Still, I like the design, transparent elements, and animations. You can also use Apple Intelligence and Shortcuts to automate certain tasks, though I haven't found much use for this in my daily workflow yet (more to come on this).

The hardware on the MacBook is impeccably designed, as ever. I especially love the tactile keyboard and port selection — you get plenty of Thunderbolt ports, HDMI, 3.5mm headphone input, and an SDXC card reader. The speakers on the MacBook are also surprisingly strong, as is the webcam tucked in the notorious top notch, the one design complaint most users (including myself) have of the modern MacBooks. (Stop me if you've heard all this before.)

Credit: Joe Maldonado / Mashable Credit: Joe Maldonado / Mashable Credit: Joe Maldonado / Mashable Is the new MacBook Pro 14-inch worth it?

Here's where I get frustrated. We've reached the awkward part of virtually every positive review we've written at Mashable in 2025, where we tell you that this is both an excellent product and not quite worthy of an automatic upgrade over the previous version. We're now getting new versions of our favorite headphones, smartphones, laptops, and tablets so fast that the actual upgrades are quite iterative, and often extremely so. You simply shouldn't replace your tech that often (though Apple does have a trade-in program, if you must).

And because the M3 and M4 chips are already so good, the new M5 just isn't a must-purchase if you have a relatively new Apple laptop. Even the M1 MacBook Air is still going strong for casual users. As Mashable's Stan Schroeder, an experienced Apple gadget reviewer, said last year, "Apple's M series chips are too good for their own good." That's the case with a lot of tech these days, which is a shame. (Apple, Google, Samsung, if you're listening, do we really need a new flagship smartphone every year?)

I could also see some professionals skipping the MacBook Pro altogether, and instead opting for a Mac Studio with the 32-core M3 Ultra or an M4 iMac. The relatively small screen of the 14-inch MacBook will be limiting for a lot of professionals, though it's a great fit for college students who need to run advanced software and yet stay mobile. I think there's a strong argument for video editors specifically to combine a Mac Studio or iMac with the M5 iPad Pro. You can do your everyday edits on the desktop, then use the iPad Pro's OLED and HDR-capable display to review footage on the go.

All of this is a complicated way of saying that the M5 MacBook Pro is absolutely worth it for the right user, but one of many professional solutions Apple now offers. There's no denying that it's a powerful, efficient device, which offers an impressive power-to-dollar ratio. It's also a shoe-in for our guide to the best MacBooks.

M5 MacBook Pro 14-Inch $1,584 at Amazon
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When a service that powers vast swathes of the internet experiences an outage, the shortcomings of putting all your eggs into one basket become abundantly clear. When Amazon’s AWS infrastructure went dark on a random Monday in October, so too did the company’s Alexa and Ring devices.

TL;DR: Live stream Arsenal vs. Atletico Madrid in the Champions League for free with a 30-day trial of Amazon Prime. Access this free live stream from anywhere in the world with ExpressVPN.

The Champions League is back with another batch of top-quality fixtures involving the best sides in Europe. Arsenal vs. Atletico Madrid is one of the biggest matchups from this round of games. Arsenal are coming into this contest with a perfect record, without conceding a single goal. Of course, Diego Simeone's side will pose a problem. They always do.

If you want to watch Arsenal vs. Atletico Madrid in the Champions League for free from anywhere in the world, we have all the information you need.

When is Arsenal vs. Atletico Madrid?

Arsenal vs. Atletico Madrid in the Champions League kicks off at 8 p.m. BST on Oct. 21. This fixture takes place at the Emirates Stadium.

How to watch Arsenal vs. Atletico Madrid for free

Arsenal vs. Atletico Madrid in the Champions League is available to live stream on Prime Video in the UK, but you don't need to be subscribed to Amazon Prime to watch this fixture. Instead, you can watch Arsenal vs. Atletico Madrid for free with a 30-day trial of Amazon Prime.

If you're abroad for this fixture, you might need to use a VPN to watch the Champions League for free on Prime Video. This process is straightforward:

1. Sign up for a 30-day Amazon Prime trial (if you're not already a member)

2. Subscribe to a streaming-friendly VPN (like ExpressVPN)

3. Download the app to your device of choice (the best VPNs have apps for Windows, Mac, iOS, Android, Linux, and more)

4. Open up the app and connect to a server in the UK

5. Live stream Arsenal vs. Atletico Madrid for free on Prime Video

Opens in a new window Credit: ExpressVPN ExpressVPN (1-Month Plan) $12.95 only at ExpressVPN (with money-back guarantee) Get Deal

The best VPNs for streaming are not free, but most do offer free-trials or money-back guarantees. By leveraging these offers, you can watch Arsenal vs. Atletico Madrid on Prime Video without committing with your cash. This isn't a long-term solution, but it does give you enough time to stream select Champions League fixtures before recovering your investment.

What is the best VPN for Prime Video?

ExpressVPN is the best choice for bypassing geo-restrictions to stream live sport on Prime Video, for a number of reasons:

• Servers in 105 countries including the UK

• Easy-to-use app available on all major devices including iPhone, Android, Windows, Mac, and more

• Strict no-logging policy so your data is secure

• Fast connection speeds free from throttling

• Up to eight simultaneous connections

• 30-day money-back guarantee

A one-year subscription to ExpressVPN is on sale for $99.95 and includes an extra three months for free — 49% off for a limited time. This plan also includes a year of free unlimited cloud backup and a generous 30-day money-back guarantee. Alternatively, you can get a one-month plan for $12.95 (with money-back guarantee).

Stream Arsenal vs. Atletico Madrid in the Champions League for free with ExpressVPN.

TL;DR: Live stream Villarreal vs. Man City in the Champions League for free on Virgin Media Player. Access this free streaming platform from anywhere in the world with ExpressVPN.

The next round of Champions League fixtures includes some really interesting matchups, including Villarreal vs. Man City. The Spanish side are still searching for their first win in the group stage. Man City, on the other hand, are unbeaten after two games. Fans will be expecting Man City to triumph here, but Villarreal are a dangerous side on their best day.

If you want to watch Villarreal vs. Man City in the Champions League from anywhere in the world, we have all the information you need.

When is Villarreal vs. Man City?

Villarreal vs. Man City in the Champions League kicks off at 8 p.m. BST on Oct. 21. This fixture takes place at the Estadio de la Cerámica.

How to watch Villarreal vs. Man City for free

Villarreal vs. Man City is available to live stream for free on Virgin Media Player.

Virgin Media Player is geo-restricted to Ireland, but anyone can access this free streaming platform with a VPN. These tools can hide your real IP address (digital location) and connect you to a secure server in Ireland, meaning you can unblock Virgin Media Player to stream the Champions League for free from anywhere in the world.

Live stream Villarreal vs. Man City for free by following these simple steps:

1. Subscribe to a streaming-friendly VPN (like ExpressVPN)

2. Download the app to your device of choice (the best VPNs have apps for Windows, Mac, iOS, Android, Linux, and more)

3. Open up the app and connect to a server in Ireland

4. Visit Virgin Media Player

5. Watch Villarreal vs. Man City for free from anywhere in the world

Opens in a new window Credit: ExpressVPN ExpressVPN (1-Month Plan) $12.95 only at ExpressVPN (with money-back guarantee) Get Deal

The best VPNs for streaming are not free, but most do offer free-trials or money-back guarantees. By leveraging these offers, you can access free live streams of the Champions League without actually spending anything. This obviously isn't a long-term solution, but it does give you enough time to stream Villarreal vs. Man City (plus more Champions League fixtures) before recovering your investment.

What is the best VPN for Virgin Media Player?

ExpressVPN is the best choice for bypassing geo-restrictions to stream live sport on Virgin Media Player, for a number of reasons:

• Servers in 105 countries including Ireland

• Easy-to-use app available on all major devices including iPhone, Android, Windows, Mac, and more

• Strict no-logging policy so your data is secure

• Fast connection speeds free from throttling

• Up to eight simultaneous connections

• 30-day money-back guarantee

A one-year subscription to ExpressVPN is on sale for $99.95 and includes an extra three months for free — 49% off for a limited time. This plan includes a year of free unlimited cloud backup and a generous 30-day money-back guarantee. Alternatively, you can get a one-month plan for just $12.95 (with money-back guarantee).

Live stream Villarreal vs. Man City in the Champions League for free with ExpressVPN.

SAVE $500: The Bluetti Pioneer Na(Sodium) portable power station is on sale for $799, down from the list price of $1,299. That's a 38% discount.

Opens in a new window Credit: Bluetti Bluetti Pioneer Na(Sodium) portable power station $799 at Bluetti
$1,299 Save $500   Get Deal

Portable power stations are useful in all sorts of situations. Some models cater to weekends at the campground while others are perfect for when the power goes out at home. But what if you'll be using a portable power station in super cold weather? Not all stations will be able to operate or recharge at low temps. Bluetti, however, has a new solution and it's already on a great discount.

As of Oct. 21, the Bluetti Pioneer Na(Sodium) portable power station is on sale for $799, down from the list price of $1,299. That's a 38% discount that shaves $500 off the list price. Since Bluetti only launched this model in October, this is a first-time discount on the new power station.

Bluetti is the first company to launch a consumer portable power station that uses sodium-ion battery cells, debuting at this year's IFA in Germany. You're probably wondering why use sodium-ion when we have truly amazing LiFePO4 (lithium iron phosphate) batteries in most portable power stations. Well, those have some serious temperature limitations and they won't work or recharge in super low temps. Sodium-ion, however, is cool with the cold.

SEE ALSO: One of my favorite portable power stations just dipped to a record-low price at Amazon

The Bluetti Pioneer Na can safely recharge at temps as low as 5 degrees Fahrenheit and operate in as low as -13 degrees. That will be ideal if your portable power station will experience low temps in the winter. Bluetti mentions it's a must-have for ice fishing or snow camping.

It comes with 1,500Wh of power. In real-life scenarios, that works out to about 44 hours of WiFi router juice and about 50 hours for a 10-watt LED light. If the Bluetti Pioneer Na is coming along on an ice-fishing trip, it'll be able to recharge a satellite phone about 29 times or keep a 20-watt light on for almost 29 hours.

Bluetti mentions this model can get back to 80 percent charge in just 45 minutes when using AC power. You can also use up to 500W of solar for fully-remote recharging. It'll get a full charge in about 2.5 hours when attached to 500W of solar panels.

If your winters involve working outdoors in the cold, ice fishing, or ice camping, the Bluetti Pioneer Na is an ideal portable power station. Freshly launched, it's already on sale for just $799 which means now it a great time to snag this new model. The negative temperatures could be just weeks away.

The Onyx BOOX Palma 2 Pro is now available for pre-order worldwide, costing $400, and it's expected to start shipping in early November. This new pocket-sized gadget is an e-reader that's built with almost all the features you'd expect to see in a modern smartphone.

In a market dominated by hybrids and EVs, one mainstream crossover stands out for delivering impressive fuel economy without the help of electrification. It proves that efficiency doesn’t have to come at the cost of simplicity, or affordability. With its refined engine, lightweight design, and advanced transmission, it offers fuel-sipping performance that rivals some hybrids while keeping ownership costs low.

Whether it’s finding your next train or taking a flight across the ocean, travel can be incredibly stressful. Google Wallet is already an essential travel app, but it’s getting a nice update that will make it even more useful on the go.

RESERVE THE NEW SAMSUNG GALAXY AND GET $100 CREDIT: As of Oct. 21, reserve the new Samsung Galaxy device to get a $100 credit when you purchase the device between Oct. 21 and Nov. 16, while supplies last.

Opens in a new window Credit: Samsung New Samsung Galaxy Device Preorder as of Oct. 21 and get a $100 credit Get Deal

Samsung's newest Galaxy Event is here, and with it comes a brand new Galaxy device to add to your collection. It's set to launch in just 10 hours, with all the information being announced via Samsung's live "Worlds Wide Open" event today. Explorng a "new era of multimodal AI", it's set to very likely debut a new XR headset, co-developed with Google and Qualcomm. "Project Moohan", as it's called now, is the first product built for Android XR, and you'll get to see it very soon. For now, however, you can go ahead and reserve yours and save some cash.

As of Oct. 21, reserve the new Samsung Galaxy device to get a $100 credit when you purchase the device between Oct. 21 and Nov. 16 while suppies last. That's $50 more than Samsung usually offers on its preorder specials, so you're getting a bit of a better deal than what's on offer.

SEE ALSO: Samsung is randomly having a huge sale on 2025 Neo QLED TVs a month before Black Friday — save up to 45%

You'll need to fill out the form to reserve your products as of Oct. 21 and purchase between Oct. 21 and Nov. 16. Your credit you earn from the promotion will be added to your additional products you purchase. To reserve, all you need to do is provide your first and last name, email, and mobile number if you wish to do so.

If you decide to reserve a device and then not buy one, you won't be out any money. But if you do want to get the new Galaxy device, you'll be getting some hefty savings off of it. It's a good idea to go ahead and lock yours in if you're even remotely curious.

You typically think of power banks as bricks of varying sizes. But there are also some compact options out there. If all you want a power bank for is to give you a quick top-up while you're outside, this Anker power bank is just the one you need, and it's small—and for today, cheap.

SAVE $300: As of Oct. 21, you can grab the TCL 75-inch QM8K QD-Mini LED 4K TV at Amazon for $1,699.99 instead of $1,999.99. That's a savings of 15% on a 2025 model.

Opens in a new window Credit: TCL TCL 75-inch QM8K QD-Mini LED 4K TV $1,699.99 at Amazon
$1,999.99 Save $300   Get Deal

The 2025-26 NBA season tips off today, so you might want to upgrade your TV if you haven't in awhile. While it's not exactly the best time overall to buy a TV, it's a pretty good time to snag a 75-inch TCL QM8K 4K TV.

"A worthy flagship model" from TCL, according to PCMag (also owned by Mashable's publisher, Ziff Davis), the 75-inch QM8K QD-Mini LED 4K TV from 2025 is on sale for $1,699.99 at Amazon. That's 15% or $300 off its list price of $1,999.99. If you wait around until Black Friday, you can probably get an even better price. But rest assured, if you need to upgrade today, you'll still be getting a solid price. According to price-tracking site camelcamelcamel, this is the 75-inch QM8K's second-best price on record.

As far as specs go, the QM8K is pretty impressive. It offers up to HDR5000 brightness, 3800 local dimming zones, a peak brightness of 720 nits with a full-screen white field and 2,849 nits with an 18% white field. Translation: it's very bright, its colors are fairly wide and generally accurate, and the contrast is excellent — even when viewing at an angle. It's also equipped with a 2.2.2-channel Bang & Olufsen-designed speaker array with Dolby Atmos spatial audio, a 144Hz native refresh rate with VRR and AMD FreeSync Premium Pro, a low 12.9ms input lag, ATSC 3.0, Wi-Fi 6, and plenty of ports for all of your peripherals.

PCMag's reviewer writes that while the QM8K is costly, its "excellent mini-LED picture quality, good speakers, and plenty of features" make it a worthy choice — particularly when it's on sale. Save 15% on the 75-inch model just in time for basketball season.

Linux commands often have long lists of options they support, many of which are single-letter mnemonics. These can be tricky to learn and remember, but their redeeming feature is their reusability: common options are shared by different commands.

Modern LLM Agents can debug code, analyze spreadsheets, and book complex travel. Given those capabilities, it’s reasonable to assume that they could handle something simpler: waiting. Ask an agent to monitor your email for a colleague’s response or watch for a price drop over several days, and it will fail. Not because it can’t check email or scrape prices. It can do both. It fails because it doesn’t know when to check. Agents either give up after a few attempts or burn through their context window, checking obsessively. Neither work. 

This matters because monitoring tasks are everywhere. We track emails for specific information, watch news feeds for updates, and monitor prices for sales. Automating these tasks would save hours, but current agents aren’t built for patience.

To address this, we are introducing SentinelStep (opens in new tab), a mechanism that enables agents to complete long-running monitoring tasks. The approach is simple. SentinelStep wraps the agent in a workflow with dynamic polling and careful context management. This enables the agent to monitor conditions for hours or days without getting sidetracked. We’ve implemented SentinelStep in Magentic-UI, our research prototype agentic system, to enable users to build agents for long-running tasks, whether they involve web browsing, coding, or external tools. 

Azure AI Foundry Labs

Get a glimpse of potential future directions for AI, with these experimental technologies from Microsoft Research.

Azure AI Foundry Opens in a new tab How it works

The core challenge is polling frequency. Poll too often, and tokens get wasted. Poll too infrequently, and the user’s notification gets delayed. SentinelStep makes an educated guess at the polling interval based on the task at hand—checking email gets different treatment than monitoring quarterly earnings—then dynamically adjusts based on observed behavior. 

There’s a second challenge: context overflow. Because monitoring tasks can run for days, context overflow becomes inevitable. SentinelStep handles this by saving the agent state after the first check, then using that state for each subsequent check.

These demonstrations capture Magentic-UI with SentinelStep at work, completing a range of tasks in a timelapse sequence.  Core components

As the name suggests, SentinelStep consists of individual steps taken as part of an agent’s broader workflow. As illustrated in Figure 1, there are three main components: the actions necessary to collect information, the condition that determines when the task is complete, and the polling interval that determines timing. Once these components are identified, the system’s behavior is simple: every [polling interval] do [actions] until [condition] is satisfied. 

Figure 1. SentinelSteps’s three main components in Magentic-UI’s co-planning interface. 

These three components are defined and exposed in the co-planning interface of Magentic-UI. Given a user prompt, Magentic-UI proposes a complete multi-step plan, including pre-filled parameters for any monitoring steps. Users can accept the plan or adjust as needed.

Processing

Once a run starts, Magentic-UI assigns the most appropriate agent from a team of agents to perform each action. This team includes agents capable of web surfing, code execution, and calling arbitrary MCP servers.

When the workflow reaches a monitoring step, the flow is straightforward. The assigned agent collects the necessary information through the actions described in the plan. The Magentic-UI orchestrator then checks whether the condition is satisfied. If it is, the SentinelStep is complete, and the orchestrator moves to the next step. If not, the orchestrator determines the timestamp for the next check and resets the agent’s state to prevent context overflow.

Evaluation

Evaluating monitoring tasks in real-world settings is nearly impossible. Consider a simple example: monitoring the Magentic-UI repository on GitHub until it reaches 10,000 stars (a measure of how many people have bookmarked it). That event occurs only once and can’t be repeated. Most real-world monitoring tasks share this limitation, making systematic bench marking very challenging.

In response, we are developing SentinelBench, a suite of synthetic web environments for evaluating monitoring tasks. These environments make experiments repeatable. SentinelBench currently supports 28 configurable scenarios, each allowing the user to schedule exactly when a target event should occur. It includes setups like GitHub Watcher, which simulates a repository accumulating stars over time; Teams Monitor, which models incoming messages, some urgent; and Flight Monitor, which replicates evolving flight-availability dynamics. 

Initial tests show clear benefits. As shown in Figure 2, success rates remain high for short tasks (30 sec and 1 min) regardless of whether SentinelStep is used. For longer tasks, SentinelStep markedly improves reliability: at 1 hour, task reliability rises from 5.6% without SentinelStep to 33.3% with it; and at 2 hours, it rises from 5.6% to 38.9%. These gains demonstrate that SentinelStep effectively addresses the challenge of maintaining performance over extended durations.

Figure 2. SentinelStep improves success rates on longer running tasks (1–2 hours) while maintaining comparable performance on shorter tasks.   Impact and availability

SentinelStep is a first step toward practical, proactive, longer‑running agents. By embedding patience into plans, agents can responsibly monitor conditions and act when it matters—staying proactive without wasting resources. This lays the groundwork for always‑on assistants that stay efficient, respectful of limits, and aligned with user intent.

We’ve open-sourced SentinelStep as part of Magentic-UI, available on GitHub (opens in new tab) or via pip install magnetic-ui. As with any new technique, production deployment should be preceded through testing and validation for the specific use case. For guidance on intended use, privacy considerations, and safety guidelines, see the Magentic-UI Transparency Note. (opens in new tab) 

Our goal is to make it easier to implement agents that can handle long-running monitoring tasks and lay the groundwork for systems that anticipate, adapt, and evolve to meet real-world needs. 

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The post Tell me when: Building agents that can wait, monitor, and act appeared first on Microsoft Research.

SAVE $100: As of Oct. 21, the Apple Mac Mini (M4, 16GB RAM, 256GB SSD) is on sale for $499 at Amazon. That's $100 off the list price.

Opens in a new window Credit: Apple Apple Mac Mini $499 at Amazon
$599 Save $100   Get Deal

Apple is really dominating the tech news cycle right now. The brand has treated us to new product launches, new streaming bundles, and a good dose of controversy. What more could we ask for?

We could ask for deals, that's what. And that's exactly what we're getting thanks to the limited-time discount on the ever-popular Mac mini. As of Oct. 21, the Apple Mac Mini (M4, 16GB RAM, 256GB SSD) is on sale for $499 at Amazon. That's $100 off the list price and close to the lowest-ever price for this model.

SEE ALSO: Apple still has not yet officially announced these expected new products

So why is the Apple Mac mini such a popular choice? Well, sometimes the best things come in small packages. This affordable desktop has 16GB RAM and 256GB SSD with an incredibly small physical footprint. Tight on desk space? No worries.

It's also built for Apple Intelligence and offers a range of ports including a Thunderbolt, HDMI, Gigabit Ethernet ports, front-facing USB-C ports, and a helpful headphone jack. For once, Apple has thought of everything.

Score a $100 discount on the Apple Mac mini at Amazon.

SAVE UP TO 45%: As of Oct. 21, several 2025 Samsung Neo QLED TVs are on sale for up to 45% off. Deals include the budget-friendly 65-inch QN1EF for $749.99 ($620 off) or the 85-inch QN90F with Vision AI for $2,699.99 ($1,800 off).

Opens in a new window Credit: Samsung Samsung NEO QLED TVs Save up to 45% on the QN1EF, QN90D, QN90F, QN990F 8K, and more Shop Now

Samsung is having a major sale on its 2025 Neo QLED TVs more than a month before Black Friday. We don't know if it's moral support for the Galaxy XR headset event that's happening during the evening of Oct. 21, or if it's nothing more than such is the yearly cycle of TV deals — it's not uncommon for brands to start pushing its current year TVs in the fall to make room for the new ones coming around CES in January.

But honestly, the "why" isn't important. What is important is the extra few weeks of fall movies and football you'll get with your new TV, versus waiting for Black Friday TV deals.

SEE ALSO: The scariest horror movies on Shudder to keep you up at night

Before you choose your model and size, let's get one thing straight: What does Neo QLED mean, like actually? Neo QLED is really just Samsung's proprietary term for QLED paired with Mini LED. Regular QLED TVs feature a panel of brightness-enhancing, color-boosting quantum dots laying over a traditional LED panel, right? Neo QLED TVs do use those quantum dots, but instead of a regular old LED panel lighting the screen, the backlight is packed with a bunch tinier-than-usual LED bulbs. This gives each inch of the screen more customized control of brightening and dimming for a more accurate picture — the parts of the scene that need to be punchy and colorful will be, but they won't bleed over into the parts of the scene that need to be dark and detailed.

As for the difference between the Samsung Neo QLED TVs, the price difference could be attributed to number of dimming zones (clusters of mini LED bulbs that can control their own light), refresh rate, and glossy vs. glare-free screens.

Not every single size of every single Neo QLED model is on sale (or in stock), but there are still a ton of options. We've handpicked a few of the best deals below:

• Samsung 55-inch QN1EF Neo QLED 4K TV — $679.99 $1,299.99 (save $620)

• Samsung 65-inch QN1EF Neo QLED 4K TV — $749.99 $1,699.99 (save $950)

• Samsung 75-inch QN70F Neo QLED 4K TV — $1,099.99 $1,599.99 (save $500)

• Samsung 75-inch QN90D Neo QLED 4K TV — $1,799.99 $3,299.99 (save $1,500)

• Samsung 65-inch QN90F Neo QLED 4K TV — $1,599.99 $2,499.99 (save $900)

• Samsung 85-inch QN90F Neo QLED 4K TV — $2,699.99 $4,499.99 (save $1,800)

• Samsung 65-inch QN99F Neo QLED 8K TV — $4,299.99 $5,499.99 (save $1,200)

If you need to get rid of an old TV to make room for your new one, you can recycle old TVs at most Best Buy stores.

Most drivers probably don't realize they're missing out on some of the best features of Google Maps. Below that simple surface, though, is a lot of intuitive gestures and features designed to make driving safer, less stressful, and a lot smoother. These are simple, easily accessible interactions built right into the app's core to make your time behind the wheel secure and seamless.

Windows 11's recovery mode is there to help you whenever your main Windows interface is having problems. So when that's having problems, it's not ideal. This is what a few users sadly suffered after updating their OS, but thankfully, a fix is on the way.

SAVE $108.81: The DeWalt 20V Max Power Tool Combo Kit is on sale at Amazon for $699, down from the list price of $807.81. That's a 13% discount.

Opens in a new window Credit: DeWalt DeWalt 20V MAX Power Tool Combo Kit $699 at Amazon
$807.81 Save $108.81   Get Deal

Winter is a great time for indoor home improvement projects. The weather has us indoors anyway, so why not make it just the way you like it? If you're searching a power tool kit that'll help get the job done, check out this Amazon deal.

As of Oct. 21, the DeWalt 20V Max Power Tool Combo Kit is $699 at Amazon, marked down from the normal price of $807.81. That's a 13% discount that shaves $108.81 off the normal price.

In the best way possible, this is a do-it-all tool combo kit. It's a nine-tool cordless power tool kit that comes with two batteries and chargers. It includes a circular saw, a right-angle drill, compact drill driver, impact driver, reciprocating saw, and plenty more. There's even a jobsite Bluetooth speaker in the kit. For easier portability, the DeWalt kit comes with two contractor bags.

SEE ALSO: One of my favorite portable power stations just dipped to a record-low price at Amazon

Before you get deep into the winter home improvement projects, make sure your tool are up for the task. If you could use some upgrades, consider today's sale price on the nine-piece DeWalt 20V Max Power Tool Combo Kit. It'll save a big headache of back and forth trips to the hardware store in the future.