Best Cloud Gaming Services

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Best Cloud Gaming Services

The dream of cloud gaming is the ability to play PC or console games on any device, anywhere, regardless of how low-power your hardware is. It promises you won't have to worry about updates, patches or upgrades. And the dream has come true to a large extent, making streaming games a reality. 

Cloud gaming has come far since the hype train left the station in 2018. There's still no guarantee that you'll have a seamless, consistent experience, but it has reached the point where it feels like you can sit down and start playing without getting bogged down by glitches -- at least most of the time. 

Network issues remain, but Wi-Fi 6 and 6E and 5G cell service have helped smooth over the rough spots. It's still not a great option, however, if you live in or travel to places somewhere with poor connectivity or if your broadband costs are exorbitant.

But from a gamers perspective, there are really only five major options dedicated to gaming, as opposed to general PCs-as-a-service, like Shadow, or closed-network solutions, like console remote play or Steam Link: Xbox Cloud Gaming (part of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate, one of our top game subscription services), Nvidia GeForce Now, PlayStation Plus Premium, Amazon Luna and Google Stadia. 

And of those five, only Xbox and GFN really deliver on the promise, though Luna has its high points. The only non-PlayStation that PlayStation Plus Premium works on is PCs. And while Stadia's got strong underlying technology, Google seems more interested in making money off the platform rather than a consumer service, and it's effectively let it languish.

The two top choices are completely different from one another as well. Xbox Game Pass Ultimate streams games from its subscription library, while GeForce Now streams games you already own, as long as they're supported. If you can afford it and already have a large library, they complement each other nicely.

Lori Grunin/CNET

Xbox Game Pass delivers something for everyone who plays games, making it a great option for many types of gamers. Though the feature is still technically in beta, it also delivers robust cloud gaming with the $15-a-month Game Pass Ultimate subscription tier ($1 promo price for the first month). In addition to all the Game Pass perks, it can stream to any device via dedicated apps (PC, some TVs, Android phones), browsers (for iPads, iPhones and Chromebooks) or Xbox. 

The library has close to 500 games, almost 400 of which are playable via the cloud, and that includes EA Play, with cloud support for quite a few of its games. That makes it one of the largest cloud-capable libraries available. And Game Pass offers some Xbox Game Studios games on day one -- the Studios produce a fair number of games -- and Microsoft says later this year it plans to expand support to allow you to play games you own via the cloud if they've left the service.

Some features, such as the frustrating "play with touch," feel like they're still in beta. Plus, as with many libraries, games come and go, and sometimes come again. It's also limited to 1080p at 60fps. 

Read our Xbox Game Pass review. 

Lori Grunin/CNET

Because of its smart set of plan options, solid performance and big and growing list of supported games, along with Nvidia's aggressive strategy for its data center and GPU businesses -- the bedrock on which GeForce Now is built -- it's a great choice for gamers who've amassed large game libraries and want to play them in more places. GeForce Now distinguishes itself from the competition because, in addition to a host of already free-to-play games, it lets you play games you've already paid for. It works primarily with Steam and Epic Games Store, but also GOG, and supports launchers for Ubisoft Connect and Origin. In other words, unlike all the others it doesn't require that you buy a special version of a game or stream games from a subscription library. 

It works, via an app or web browser, on Android; Windows and Mac OS; Chromebooks; Chrome, Safari (for iPad and iPhone) and Edge web browsers; and Some TVs natively, all TVs via Nvidia Shield. Plus, with a browser it can be coaxed to run on more novel devices as well, such as the Xbox or Valve Steam Deck. 

Pricing starts at free, basic 1080p streaming for hour-long sessions and ramps up to as much as $20 a month ($16.70 if you pay six months up front) for all the perks, including streams up to 4K/60fps HDR or 1440p/120fps for 8-hour sessions, ray tracing, priority server access and access to the highest-power servers.

Read our GeForce Now review. 

Screenshot by Lori Grunin/CNET

Given that it's the oldest service -- Sony launched PlayStation Now in 2014, then bought the assets of OnLive in 2015 -- you'd think Sony would have added a lot more capabilities. When it relaunched in a tiered plan model in June 2022, it incorporated a relatively large catalog of older titles and a refreshed version of PS Now, available in the $18 per month Premium plan ($10 per month if you pay annually). 

The non-console cloud gaming is strictly for PCs and only for a small subset of the catalog (and they're all PS4 or earlier games), via an app. And it doesn't include some of the desirable features of the service, such as the limited-time game demos, or features offered by other services, such as better-than-1080p quality and day-one availability.

Like Xbox Game Pass Ultimate's Cloud Gaming, though, you can stream games to your console if you're strapped for storage space or want to try before you buy. 

How to Play PS Plus Premium Games on Your PC

Sarah Tew/CNET

Amazon Luna is less than two years old, and has expanded since it launched, but it seems to get no love from its parent company. It's nearly impossible to find the service on Amazon's site, though you'll see lots of promotion for the optional Luna Controller. You don't need Amazon's controller to play games through Luna, but the controller can connect directly to your Wi-Fi network for the lowest latency possible.

It works through an app (PC, Mac, Fire TV and Fire Tablet) or browser (PC, Mac, iPad, iPhone, Android phone).

What makes it stand out is the large number of kid-friendly titles and its relatively granular parental controls for managing what they can or can't play. It's also joined at the hip with Prime Gaming, so you get the time-limited freebies and perks, plus integrated broadcasting via Twitch. Since it comes with a Prime subscription, if you're already a member you really don't lose anything.

It can get expensive, fast, though. The service is modeled after Prime Video. As a Prime member, you get access to the base games and the Luna Plus channel, which is essentially the core game library of a little more than 120 games-- you can also subscribe to it separately for $10 per month, with a seven day free trial. They're mostly older titles, without many AAA games. 

The rest comes in add-on channels, which currently include family ($6 a month), retro ($5 a month), Jackbox games ($5 a month) and Ubisoft Plus (a whopping $18 a month for less than 40 games). So if you're not a Prime member, the total monthly cost can range from $10 to $44. Quality tops out at 1080p and 60fps.

And unlike other services, you can't buy individual games in order to continue to play them via the cloud (like Stadia Pro) or locally (without losing progress) when they leave the rotation.

Read our Amazon Luna preview

Lori Grunin/CNET

Stadia will be three years old in November, but it seems like Google still hasn't figured out what to do with it as a service. The underlying technology is solid, but the service feels like it hasn't evolved at all in the interim, still offering only 51 titles for the subscription tier. Google shuttered its game studio over a year ago and in March the company launched its Immersive Stream for Games platform, which third parties can license in order to create their own streaming offerings .

There are only two tiers for Stadia: free and Pro. You can try Stadia Pro for a month free, and after that it's $10 a month. If you "buy" a Stadia game, you don't need to maintain your subscription to play it, but it will only play via Stadia. It runs in Chrome and it supports 4K and 60fps for a few of the titles.

It operates via an app on compatible Android phones, browsers (Chrome for PC and Mac, Safari for iPhone and iPad) or on a TV via a Chromecast Ultra.

One benefit of Google's push for third-party licensees is that Stadia has accumulated a nice-sized library of free game trials that you can play without an account. They're not very long -- they range from 30 minutes to 2 hours -- but they include higher-profile titles like Assassin's Creed Valhalla and Far Cry 6.

More essential reading for gamers

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Beyond Axie Infinity: 'Web3 Games' Hope to Convert Crypto Skeptics

Beyond Axie Infinity: 'Web3 Games' Hope to Convert Crypto Skeptics

The moment Chris saw Axie Infinity, he was hooked. He was once an avid gamer, playing hours of League of Legends every day, but stopped after deciding he was sinking too much time into an unproductive hobby. Axie Infinity promised something different. Inspired by Pokemon, it's a video game about training and battling monsters. That sounds like hundreds of other games, but one element distinguishes Axie Infinity. It's built on the blockchain.

Axies are the Pokemon of Axie Infinity, but they're owned as nonfungible tokens, or NFTs. A cryptocurrency called Smooth Love Potion is earned by battling these Axies. Players can also breed Axies, then either sell or battle with them. Chris, who declined to give his real name and goes only by the pseudonym Cryptobarbarian, felt he could justify playing video games again -- as long as it paid.

"It was fun for the first few weeks, but it gets boring really fast," the 28-year-old said. From there, he said, Axie Infinity became purely about making money.

Axie Infinity is a browser game. Accessing it is free, but you need to buy a team of three Axies to play. At its peak of popularity, bottom-tier Axies cost around $350 each, meaning playing the game once required a four-figure investment. The game allows Axie owners to lease out their monsters to other players, however. A longtime crypto investor, Cryptobarbarian told me he bought $30,000 worth of Axies and loaned them out in return for 40% to 70% of the profits. (CNET wasn't able to verify his purchases.)

The strategy paid off at first. Axie Infinity was a hot ticket in CryptoTown, generating over $15 million a day last August. But thanks to a combination of poor in-game economics, inflation threatening the real world's economy and a $600 million hack reportedly caused by a fake job posting, the price of Axies and the game's Smooth Love Potion cryptocurrency collapsed. The same monsters that cost hundreds of dollars last year now fetch under $10.

"I got around 100 players playing for me with high-end Axies," Cryptobarbarian said to me over Twitter, "which overall cost around $100,000 at the height and are now worth nothing."

To gamers, stories like this provide ample reason to reject "Web3 gaming," a term referring to the integration of NFTs and cryptocurrency into games. The significant carbon footprint of ethereum and bitcoin adds to the resentment. Be it Ubisoft bringing NFTs into Ghost Recon or Square Enix launching Final Fantasy 7 NFTs, gamers have fiercely resisted the blockchain coming anywhere near their industry.  

Three Axies in Axie Infinity. 

Sky Mavis

The fear is that crypto and NFTs will deform gaming into a side hustle, transforming its purpose from entertainment to moneymaking. Play-to-earn titles such as Axie Infinity prove the point; they're not games as much as they are financial speculation with the veneer of a game.

"I've never met anyone that played it just for fun," Cryptobarbarian said of Axie Infinity, "only to make money." 

But Axie Infinity doesn't represent the future that many Web3 developers envision for gaming. Video game firms, both small and large, are developing titles they hope will clean the slate of Web3 gaming. All are on carbon-neutral blockchains such as polygon or solana, which are far more efficient than ethereum. (Whether they're as secure is an open question.) The goal isn't to make titles that entertain crypto speculators, but rather to make games fun enough that people can justify playing them regardless of whether they earn crypto. 

"I've long been a believer that gaming is one of the consumer internet categories that is most likely to bring on mainstream adoption of crypto," said Amy Wu, head of gaming at FTX Ventures, the investment arm of the FTX crypto exchange. "But I also believe when you have a hit game with Web3 elements, it's very likely that the majority of players will never actually trade those tokens. They're just playing the game."

Free to play, play to own

The upcoming wave of Web3 games will range from free-to-play mobile titles to big-budget AAA games for PC and console. On the simpler end of the scale is Shatterpoint. With an art style inspired by Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, it's an action RPG for Android and iOS that, on paper, looks like many top App Store games. There's a single-player campaign plus a PvP multiplayer mode. You earn new weapons and gear as you progress and, much like Fortnite and Call of Duty, the multiplayer is broken up into different "seasons."

But these seasons, segmented by "the shattering" in the game, is where the blockchain comes in. Players will be given a certain list of goals each season. If they complete one -- say, being one of the first 100 players to reach level 50, or staying atop of the PvP leaderboard for a certain amount of time -- their character will be converted into an NFT. Only a limited amount of NFTs will be minted per season. 

There are two reasons why players might want to bother scoring an NFT. The shattering acts as an in-game reset, so any gear you've collected will vanish. NFT characters, of which there will be a limited amount each season, are permanent. However your character looks when it's minted into an NFT, with whatever combination of gear equipped, that's how it'll look in perpetuity. The second benefit is that these NFTs can be sold on a marketplace -- if there's a market for them.

A screenshot from Shatterpoint. 

Estoty Games

There are three crucial elements that make this model sustainable, says Shatterpoint developer Benas Baltramiejunas. First, the game is free to play -- unlike P2E games like Axie Infinity, which requires the upfront cost of three Axie NFTs. Second, none of the items retained as an NFT can resemble "pay to win" mechanics. There can only be cosmetic benefits to owning it, not a competitive edge. Last, and most important, the game is designed with the assumption that most people playing won't be interested in minting their character as an NFT. It has to be fun for them too.

"We're using the NFT approach to create a bit of competitiveness, to incentivize players to play," he said. Shatterpoint is monetized by traditional microtransactions and from taking a small cut of NFT sales -- 2.5% is the traditional cut creators take. Baltramiejunas hopes that focusing on NFTs will result in both better game design and fairer prices. If developers can create a compelling game, revenue can theoretically be sorted out organically through whatever the player base sets as the value of the NFTs. 

"In free-to-play games you have whales which account for 10% of the player base but 90% of the revenue," Baltramiejunas said. "If you only have those microtransactions for monetization, you are only focusing on those whales during the content creation, and you're leaving everybody behind. However, with NFT integration, you don't need to monetize that aggressively. The market decides." 

NFT brands expand into gaming

While Shatterpoint is a mobile game that produces NFTs, the coming years will see many examples of the reverse: NFT collections turning into games. NFT drops, such as the famed Bored Ape Yacht Club, are doubling as crowdfunding platforms that produce games. Creators earn millions in royalties from sales, and use that money to expand the brand, theoretically boosting NFT prices in the process. Some brands are expanding into TV and film. Many are dabbling in gaming.

One such example is My Pet Hooligan. It's a product of AMGI Studios, an animation studio where former Pixar animator Colin Brady serves as chief creative and technology officer. The studio sees Unreal Engine 5 and blockchain technology as the next technologies that will drive entertainment, Brady told me at the recent NFT.NYC conference. 

AMGI Studios' goal of 2021 was to use Unreal Engine 5 to create an animated film for Netflix at half of the traditional cost. While the film was being greenlit, Brady explained, AMGI technical lead Kevin Mack approached him about starting an NFT collection. 

The result was My Pet Hooligan, a set of 8,888 3D rabbits. "We sold out in less than a minute, and all of a sudden people started saying, 'hey, when movie? When TV show? When video game?'" Brady said. The studio, filled with Unreal Engine programmers, already had a game in the works. 

The result is Rabbit Hole, a sandbox game that looks like a mix of Grand Theft Auto and Ratchet and Clank. Rabbit Hole is currently in closed alpha, available only for My Pet Hooligan NFT holders with only one map functional. The build of the game I saw at NFT.NYC was intriguing. It was certainly incomplete, with noticeable frame-rate issues, but had the clear foundation of a fun sandbox game.

My Pet Hooligan NFTs on the OpenSea marketplace.

AMGI Studios/OpenSea

Rabbit Hole will eventually be available for PC and console. Brady says the goal is to reach 1 million players by the end of the year.  To encourage the type of in-game socialization seen among players of Fortnite and Roblox, the studio developed a companion facial-recognition app for phones. If you perch your phone where a webcam typically is on a computer, it'll track your face and replicate all facial movements on your on-screen Hooligan.

Unlike Shatterpoint, which will integrate just NFTs, Rabbit Hole will use both NFTs and crypto. It will have a play-to-earn mechanic -- or play and earn, as technical lead Kevin Mack prefers to say -- in the form of in-game currency Karrots. These will be used to buy clothing, dances and more for the Hooligan avatars, but it doubles as a cryptocurrency that can be exchanged for ether or bitcoin. You can earn money playing Rabbit Hole, but Brady said it's not going to be life-changing cash. 

Then there's the NFT element. This is primed towards holders of the 8,888 My Pet Hooligan NFTs. While players who download the game will start with a generic Hooligan, My Pet Hooligan owners will be able to use their NFT as an avatar in the game. 

If the game gets popular enough, Mack said, there will be a certain prestige to owning one of these avatars. But he recognizes that to make that happen, the team has to make a game that people actually want to play.

"Superman No. 1 is valuable because Superman was a great comic," he said. "I think the NFT space for a while started to get that a little backward, where they thought the things were valuable just because they were collectable." 

To infinity...

Of all the NFT brands expanding into games, Bored Ape Yacht Club is the biggest. BAYC creators Yuga Labs are developing Otherside, a "metaverse" MMORPG. The term "metaverse" is nebulous, but in this case it refers to an open world where items are owned as NFTs and in-game currency is crypto that can be exchanged for dollars. Details on Otherside are scant, but Yuga has a huge warchest for it. The game's map will be made up of 200,000 plots of land, which players can buy and own. Over $350 million was raised from selling land back in May. 

Otherside may be the Web3 game with the highest budget, but perhaps the most ambitious is Star Atlas. 

In development since 2020, the Eve Online-inspired Star Atlas is crafted like a traditional AAA game. Michael Wagner, CEO of Star Atlas development studio ATMTA, told me there are around 200 developers working on the game. It's scheduled for release in 2026. 

Like Eve Online, Star Atlas is half game, half space simulator. Players ride spacecraft through the galaxy, socializing and battling with each other, exploring exoplanets, mining lands and meteors for resources and so on. 

Games like Eve Online are giant, big enough for players to lose themselves in for years. Star Atlas hopes to mimic that feat. On the way to doing so, it uses almost every new tool Web3 offers.

It starts with funding. Wagner said $185 million in revenue was raised in 2021, through the sale of an Atlas token and NFT ships, with a "substantial margin" of that funding development. In the game, ships, items and land will be owned as NFTs. There will be a comprehensive crypto economy built atop the game, which Wagner says will allow for not just a market, but a labor economy too. The economy isn't just in the game; part of Star Atlas will be built on the blockchain, meaning elements will be open source. People will be able to develop apps on top of this data, for things like spacecraft maintenance or resource management. 

Part of Star Atlas' economy will involve taxation. Just like in real life, a certain percentage of all sales will go to a treasury. There will be a DAO, or decentralized autonomous organization, in which token holders can vote on how these funds are used, be it to fund a new marketing campaign or a user engagement campaign. Then there will be another DAO specifically for the game itself, where token holders can vote on changes to the game, like additional features or ways to balance combat. 

"We've structured the economics of the DAO such that we don't lose control in the near term," Wagner said. "But in the future, it would even be possible for them to vote us out as the principal developer of the game and bring in somebody new if they think they could deliver the product in a superior fashion to us." 

Risks and rewards

The potential of Web3 gaming is tremendous, but its challenges are enormous. An examination of Star Atlas alone highlights many issues Web3 developers are likely to face.

First and foremost, making video games is hard. Making high-quality AAA games is harder still, even for veteran game studios, and the Star Atlas game alone is audacious in its ambition. The Web3 components offer additional opportunity for failure: An imbalanced economy, for instance, has the potential to completely break the game. Then there's security and regulation. Crypto has been a digital Wild West for years, with scams endemic. Regulators are slowly changing that. It's an open question whether Web3 gaming can survive in a regulated environment. 

"In many countries, consumer protection is the No. 1 driver of regulations. Given gaming is so mainstream, it will be a topic," said FTX Ventures' Wu. "100%, these assets are going to be regulated."

The final issue is the very commodity that fuels crypto tokens and NFT projects: hype. Games are often promised on NFT project road maps before a single second of development has been undertaken. As Brady noted, it took less than a day for My Pet Hooligan holders to demand the announcement of a game, movie or TV show to sustain hype and lift the NFT value. Vaporware is sure to be common.

Games will need to be developed in a way that insulates players from the crypto-rich speculators. Speculators outbidding each other can artificially raise the value of in-game items, which blocks players who actually want to play the game from accessing them. Recall the speculative bubble that caused the cost of entry to Axie Infinity to inflate to over $1,000.  

"I'm personally not interested in someone who's paying $100,000 for an NFT," said Brady. "That's a certain echelon. That's not normal society. I'm only interested if this helps every person."

Of all the developers I spoke to, a recurring theme was mistrust of any games company that promises a regular income, or dangles the possibility of earning enough money to quit the rat race. "Play-to-earn is not sustainable and is going to die off," said Baltramiejunas. Instead, the goal is for Web3 games to be more engaging than the games you play today, with the benefit of some pocket money on the side.

"If the game was good I would be satisfied with a little money as long as it's not totally a time waste," said Cryptobarbarian, reflecting on how much money he'd need to earn to justify playing games again.

"If I could earn some lunch money with it, that would be nice. But I think that will take at least a few more years before it happens." 

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PlayStation Plus Review: A Great Deal That's Also a Real Mess

PlayStation Plus Review: A Great Deal That's Also a Real Mess

Sony's PlayStation Plus subscription game service, originally intended to sell online gaming access, went through a big change in June. Still called PS Plus, it has now become Sony's version of Xbox Game Pass, offering access to a large and evolving Netflix-style catalog of games. While it does some things better than Microsoft, the new PS Plus still lags behind in other aspects of the service. 

The new PS Plus offers three subscription tiers, from an Essential package that mimics the old PS Plus, to Extra and Premium tiers offering hundreds of games, cloud streaming, monthly bonus games and online multiplayer access. What it doesn't offer, however, is a clean interface to make it easy to find games, and it also includes only a few of the biggest Sony games on the PlayStation platform. PS Plus mostly lines up with Xbox Game Pass on paper when you're going down a list of features. But for overall value and accessibility, it doesn't always feel like that when actually using it. 

PS Plus is a big plus

Before the big update, Sony offered two different PlayStation subscriptions. PS Plus for playing online, with a couple of bonus games every month, was $10. PS Now offered a catalog of mostly older games to download or cloud stream for the same price. The new PS Plus combines the two under a single name and comes in three tiers:

Essential: Same as the original PS Plus, with two or three bonus monthly games, which you keep only as long as you're an active subscriber; online play; cloud saves; and PSN Store discounts. It costs $10 a month, or $60 a year. (In the UK it's £7 a month or £70 a year, and in Australia it's AU$12 or AU$80.)

Extra:All the features of Essential and more than 400 PS and PS5 games available to download or selectively stream. It costs $15 a month, or $100 a year. (In the UK it's £11 a month or £84 a year; in Australia it's AU$19 or AU$135.)

Premium: A step up from Extra tier adding in PlayStation 1, PS2, PS3 and PSP games, growing the overall catalog to more than 700 games. That tier is available at $18 a month, or $120 a year. It also has time trial game demos, so subscribers try out certain games for a few hours before buying. (In the UK it's £13.49 a month or £100 a year. In Australia, where it's called "Deluxe" for some reason, it's AU$22 or AU$155.)

As for the games available, they're some of the best on the PlayStation console. This includes Death Stranding Director's Cut, God of War (2018), Demon's Souls (the updated 2020 version), Spider-Man: Miles Morales, Red Dead Redemption 2, Control and Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy. Those who have the Premium tier will also access classics from older generations, including Dark Cloud 2, Syphon Filter, Tekken 2 and Hot Shots Golf. 

Since PS Now included cloud gaming before it was integrated into the new PS Plus, this means game streaming is available from the get go. For Xbox Game Pass, that took years to implement. This means subscribers can play games on their consoles without having to download them or on their PC via the PS Plus app. Some of the classic games are only available to play via streaming, and as long as your internet connection is speedy and stable, there are hardly any noticeable hiccups. 

The Xbox Game Pass flavor of cloud gaming, however, lets you play some games on phones and tablets, or laptop web browsers.

The overall PS Plus catalog is larger than Xbox Game Pass, and it offers some unique features. But there are flaws with the service that Sony will need to address if it wants to match the popularity of Microsoft's service.

Read more: Best Games on PS Plus

Some major minuses

PS Plus' biggest issue is the lack of organization with the catalog of games. There are a few categories games are placed in, but there seems to be little rhyme or reason to it. The Xbox Game Pass user interface is similar to what someone would see on Netflix or Disney Plus, by having some of the more notable games and certain genres easily discoverable. PS Plus, on the other hand, doesn't have this so it's just tedious to find something of interest. 

Another glaring problem is the overall quality of games. It's not as though you'd expect all 700 games to be winners, but there are some absolute garbage games seemingly there just to pump up the numbers. This was the biggest issue with PS Now, and it carried over to the new PS Plus. Xbox Game Pass, in comparison, has just over 100 games available, but it seems like the games are of a higher overall average quality than what PS Plus has to offer. Compound the lackluster games on top of the lousy UI and finding a new game to play becomes a bit monotonous.

What makes the catalog issue even more frustrating is the lack of certain Sony-published games. Microsoft made it clear that its games will be available on Xbox Game Pass from launch day, and they will stay on there. It's been true for Halo Infinite and Forza Horizon 5, and will be for upcoming games like Bethesda's Starfield. 

Sony has yet to do the same with many of its well-known classic games as well as its most recent titles. PS Plus feels like it should include The Last of Us Part 2, Horizon Forbidden West and most of the Gran Turismo titles… but it doesn't. 

There's also the question of the longevity of the titles. PS Now routinely had titles available for a few months before they were removed, and it's unclear if PS Plus will do the same. 

While cloud streaming is available at launch, there's a lack of platforms available to stream to. There are no apps for iOS or Android, and the PC app, while it works, reportedly has problems with not being able to launch certain games. 

PS4 and PS5 owners who want the absolute most bang for their bucks should subscribe to at least the Extra tier of PS Plus. It's still a wealth of great games to play at a reasonable monthly price. Fans of some of the older titles could see a reason to jump to the Premier tier in order to play those classic games, while the Essential tier should be avoided, as it makes little sense to not pay the extra $5 a month to access hundreds of games. 

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Windows 11 review: Microsoft's subtle changes make you ask, update or wait?

Windows 11 review: Microsoft's subtle changes make you ask, update or wait?

Microsoft made Windows 11 available on Oct. 5 on a rolling basis as a free upgrade to most Windows 10 users. If you have Windows 8, you'll have to get the free upgrade to Windows 10 first, then download Windows 11. Before you decide whether or not to install the new OS, let's talk about what we like and don't like about the upgrade.  

An operating system, whether it's MacOS on your MacBook or Google's Wear OS on your smartwatch, gets better the more transparent it is to the user. And that user is you, sitting in front of a laptop keyboard or tapping on a phone screen. So sorry, no Spinal Tap "goes to 11" puns here. That's mostly because Windows 11 feels more like Windows 10.5 than a generational leap -- not that there's really anything wrong with that. 

Maybe the shift from Windows 10 to Windows 11 feels subtle because the jump from Windows 8 to Windows 10 was so gigantic. Big enough for Microsoft to skip an entire version number, even. That generation was all about righting a ship that had gone somewhat off-course, leaning too far into tablet territory, trying to convince everyone that Windows laptops and tablets were as cool as iPads. They're not, and that's OK: I work on a Windows machine, I do plenty of PC gaming on one, but when I flip through news headlines in bed at night, it's on an iPad. 

Read more: Surface Pro 8 review: a familiar flagship for Windows 11

Windows 10 started out with favorable reviews and has remained in everyone's good graces precisely because it got out of the way of whatever you were doing instead of trying to force its ideas on you. But more importantly, it was free* -- which includes an asterisk to indicate it was generally available as a no-cost upgrade to anyone with a nonancient PC. 

Before 2015, Windows upgrades either cost some money, or if you bought a new laptop or desktop, the latest OS just came preinstalled. Apple's OS X moved to a similar free-to-upgrade model around the same time. Except for system builders, the idea of paying separately for a computer operating system is basically extinct. That's a big change from when you had to hand over $120 to Microsoft for the privilege of upgrading from Windows 7 to Windows 8.

Who can get Windows 11?

The list of compatible PCs is frankly a little narrower than I would have expected. The base requirements are a 64-bit processor, 4GB of memory, 64GB of storage, UEFI secure boot and TPM (trusted platform module) 2.0. It's that last one that gets tricky for some people, especially on cheaper laptops. If you've got a CPU older than a seventh-gen Intel Core series (we're up to 11th-gen now), you might be in trouble. If you want to check, use the Microsoft PC Health Check app. There are workarounds for installing Windows 11 anyway, but proceed with those at your own risk. 

Microsoft

Visual cues 

If there's one thing that immediately stands out about Windows 11, it's this: The start menu and taskbar are now centered on the bottom of the screen, rather than aligned to the left by default. Yes, that's the single biggest visual and interface change you're going to see on day one. Sure, there's plenty more going on underneath, but it feels like this UI shift is there mainly to let you know there's something new and different going on under the surface. 

And there is a good deal going on in Windows 11. For casual or mainstream users, you're unlikely to notice much of it, though there are some standout upgrades worth noting. 

Read more: Microsoft Surface Laptop Studio review: The screen is everything

Get some Android in your Windows

One of the big selling points of Chromebooks, which run Google's ChromeOS, is that most Chromebooks can run just about any Android app, from phone-centric favorites like Instagram to mobile games. That breaks Chromebooks out from being restricted to just cloud-based apps and frankly adds a lot of functionality to your $300 or so Chromebook. 

Microsoft is adding similar functionality to Windows 11 , both to compete with Chromebooks and to forge greater bonds between Windows PC users and Android phone users, just as Macs and iPhones are inexorably bound. 

But... that feature is not included with the launch version of Windows 11. It's going to be previewed sometime in the coming months, so I wouldn't expect it to be added as a fully baked feature until some time in 2022. 

That's a shame, because easy access to Android apps was probably going to be the biggest single practical change in Windows 11 for most people. Sure, there are plenty of other ways to do this, using an app like Bluestacks or even the Your Phone app from Microsoft, but it's not simple enough for everyday users. 

Microsoft

Snap groups and multiple desktops 

Easily organizing a bunch of open windows so you can see and access them when you want -- and hide them when you don't -- is handy once you get the hang of it. The ability to snap windows into preset slots on the desktop has been around for a while now, but the new Snap Groups and Snap Layouts offer a few new ways to wrangle your windows.

By hovering over the "maximize" button on the top right corner of most windows, you'll get a pop-up showing a bunch of layout options. Minimize these apps, and you can pop them all back up again in the same exact spots, by hovering over any of the snapped window icons in the task bar. 

But... not every app I tried allowed me to snap its window. Web browsers, system tools and many other random programs did, but programs such as Photoshop and Steam did not (hovering over their maximize buttons didn't offer the snapping options pop-up menu). 

If you have a gigantic monitor, use multiple monitors or need several thinly sliced web browser windows open at once, it can be handy. On a laptop screen, you're generally not looking at one or maybe two windows at once. 

Multiple desktops are a common MacOS feature, and a good way to keep multiple facets of your digital life organized. For example, you can keep all your work apps -- email programs, browsers, video conference apps -- on one desktop, and all your gaming apps on another. Like on a Mac, you hot-swap between them, it's really just a change in how your open apps are visualized. 

You can actually do that in Windows 10 as well, but it's a pain. In Windows 11, Desktops have their own taskbar icon by default, and creating and organizing multiple desktops is even easier than on a Mac, which is not something you'll hear very often. 

Wither the Widget?

Every gadget-maker loves widgets, defined in consumer tech terms as small icon-like apps that usually sit in a group somewhere on your device's UI. Usually it's useful little things like the weather, stock prices, your latest emails or calendar items, or a small newsfeed. Your iPhone and iPad have them, Android devices have them, Macs have them (under the usually hidden Notification Bar on the right side of the screen). Windows used to have built-in widgets, too. They were called Gadgets and died along with Windows 7. 

Microsoft

Now they're back. On the plus side, with its own taskbar button, the new widgets are easy to find. Hit the button and a semi-transparent panel pops out from the left edge of the screen. It has, by default, widgets for weather, your Outlook calendar, photos you may have in OneDrive, a To Do list and a few others. You can customize the list a bit, but there are not too many options for now. Below that is a newsfeed that looks like it's curated by the same people who do the news curating on the home screen for the Microsoft Edge browser. You can hide stories from any specific outlet by clicking on a menu icon in the news section or hit a "manage your interests" button to customize the feed, but by default, it's pretty basic. Lots of sports, Fox News and celeb gossip. 

Microsoft Teams integration

Do you use Microsoft Teams instead of Zoom, Facetime or Google Hangouts? You'll be able to get to it and launch it a little faster, because it's fully integrated into Windows 11 now. I've never been invited to a Microsoft Teams meeting, except by people who work for Microsoft. 

It's interesting to note that Windows users can now pop into Facetime meetings with the latest iOS "invite anyone" feature. Clearly there's a lot of competition for video meeting mindshare (faceshare?). 

Other quality of life improvements

As I'm often referring to system tools, settings menus or other on-screen things in my writing, I take a lot of screen shots. On a Mac, that's easy -- Shift + Command + 4. In Windows, well, it's never been quite that simple. The built-in Snipping tool is, however, slightly less annoying under Windows 11. Now you can take a snip by hitting Windows + Shift + S, although it copies the screenshot to the clipboard, it doesn't automatically save the image, you'll still have to do that manually. 

The Edge browser now has a safe Kids Mode that's easy to access by clicking on your profile in the upper right corner, and can be customized for different age groups. 

Auto HDR -- a feature that moved over from the Xbox Series X -- give games that don't support high dynamic range a boost to lighting, brightness and contrast for a more HDR-like look. 

I'm waiting for a revamped version of the Microsoft app store, which will allow for third-party services like game stores and web browsers. The Opera browser is available now, the Epic Games storefront is expected soon. No word on other browsers like Firefox or Chrome, or the popular Steam PC game storefront. Eventual Android app support will come, at least initially, from an Amazon-branded Android app store, rather than from Google Play. 

Who should get Windows 11? 

Despite my lukewarm embrace of the new Windows OS, there's no compelling reason to skip it. That's because, any new PC OS launches in an unfinished state, and the best improvements and most polished versions come later, from Windows 8.1 to Windows 10 Creators Edition. 

I've used various preview builds of Windows 11 across multiple PCs for months, along with the final release build, and it's been fine, almost completely trouble-free, and I've never once thought about rolling back to Windows 10. 

That said, Microsoft's gonna Microsoft sometimes. Some long-term Windows irritations have stuck around. When setting up the OS for the first time, there are still plenty data-sharing and ad-personalization checkboxes to uncheck, and the built-in Edge browser still buries the default search engine settings (to switch the default search engine from Bing to, say, Google) several submenus deep. Switching which apps do what by default is also more complex now; you literally have to assign each file type -- .htm, .html, etc. -- one by one. Hopefully this will get streamlined at some point.

If you're going to buy a new laptop or desktop at pretty much any point after today, it'll probably come with Windows 11 preinstalled. In that case, you don't have to make a conscious decision, just go with the flow. If you have a current-gen Windows laptop, tablet or desktop, you'll be able to download and install Windows 11 either now or at some point in the near future. It's being rolled out slowly, probably to avoid a huge rush of same-day downloading.

As a general rule of thumb, I always suggest that you don't jump up and be the first person on the block to download a new OS update, whether it's for your laptop, phone or tablet. Issues will inevitably pop up, if only because of the tremendous breadth of hardware configurations and accessories, from printers to mice to VR headsets, that need to work right. 

That said, testing for Windows 11 has been extensive, and the main issues so far have been with how icons are displayed, some menu weirdness and occasional File Explorer problems. 

My final word on the subject, for now: If you want to try and download/install Windows 11 on day one, go for it. If you want to wait a few weeks (or a few months), that's fine, too.

---

Source

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Windows 11 review: Microsoft's subtle changes make you ask, update or wait?

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Windows 11 review: Microsoft's subtle changes make you ask, update or wait?

Microsoft made Windows 11 available on Oct. 5 on a rolling basis as a free upgrade to most Windows 10 users. If you have Windows 8, you'll have to get the free upgrade to Windows 10 first, then download Windows 11. Before you decide whether or not to install the new OS, let's talk about what we like and don't like about the upgrade.  

An operating system, whether it's MacOS on your MacBook or Google's Wear OS on your smartwatch, gets better the more transparent it is to the user. And that user is you, sitting in front of a laptop keyboard or tapping on a phone screen. So sorry, no Spinal Tap "goes to 11" puns here. That's mostly because Windows 11 feels more like Windows 10.5 than a generational leap -- not that there's really anything wrong with that. 

Maybe the shift from Windows 10 to Windows 11 feels subtle because the jump from Windows 8 to Windows 10 was so gigantic. Big enough for Microsoft to skip an entire version number, even. That generation was all about righting a ship that had gone somewhat off-course, leaning too far into tablet territory, trying to convince everyone that Windows laptops and tablets were as cool as iPads. They're not, and that's OK: I work on a Windows machine, I do plenty of PC gaming on one, but when I flip through news headlines in bed at night, it's on an iPad. 

Read more: Surface Pro 8 review: a familiar flagship for Windows 11

Windows 10 started out with favorable reviews and has remained in everyone's good graces precisely because it got out of the way of whatever you were doing instead of trying to force its ideas on you. But more importantly, it was free* -- which includes an asterisk to indicate it was generally available as a no-cost upgrade to anyone with a nonancient PC. 

Before 2015, Windows upgrades either cost some money, or if you bought a new laptop or desktop, the latest OS just came preinstalled. Apple's OS X moved to a similar free-to-upgrade model around the same time. Except for system builders, the idea of paying separately for a computer operating system is basically extinct. That's a big change from when you had to hand over $120 to Microsoft for the privilege of upgrading from Windows 7 to Windows 8.

Who can get Windows 11?

The list of compatible PCs is frankly a little narrower than I would have expected. The base requirements are a 64-bit processor, 4GB of memory, 64GB of storage, UEFI secure boot and TPM (trusted platform module) 2.0. It's that last one that gets tricky for some people, especially on cheaper laptops. If you've got a CPU older than a seventh-gen Intel Core series (we're up to 11th-gen now), you might be in trouble. If you want to check, use the Microsoft PC Health Check app. There are workarounds for installing Windows 11 anyway, but proceed with those at your own risk. 

Microsoft

Visual cues 

If there's one thing that immediately stands out about Windows 11, it's this: The start menu and taskbar are now centered on the bottom of the screen, rather than aligned to the left by default. Yes, that's the single biggest visual and interface change you're going to see on day one. Sure, there's plenty more going on underneath, but it feels like this UI shift is there mainly to let you know there's something new and different going on under the surface. 

And there is a good deal going on in Windows 11. For casual or mainstream users, you're unlikely to notice much of it, though there are some standout upgrades worth noting. 

Read more: Microsoft Surface Laptop Studio review: The screen is everything

Get some Android in your Windows

One of the big selling points of Chromebooks, which run Google's ChromeOS, is that most Chromebooks can run just about any Android app, from phone-centric favorites like Instagram to mobile games. That breaks Chromebooks out from being restricted to just cloud-based apps and frankly adds a lot of functionality to your $300 or so Chromebook. 

Microsoft is adding similar functionality to Windows 11 , both to compete with Chromebooks and to forge greater bonds between Windows PC users and Android phone users, just as Macs and iPhones are inexorably bound. 

But... that feature is not included with the launch version of Windows 11. It's going to be previewed sometime in the coming months, so I wouldn't expect it to be added as a fully baked feature until some time in 2022. 

That's a shame, because easy access to Android apps was probably going to be the biggest single practical change in Windows 11 for most people. Sure, there are plenty of other ways to do this, using an app like Bluestacks or even the Your Phone app from Microsoft, but it's not simple enough for everyday users. 

Microsoft

Snap groups and multiple desktops 

Easily organizing a bunch of open windows so you can see and access them when you want -- and hide them when you don't -- is handy once you get the hang of it. The ability to snap windows into preset slots on the desktop has been around for a while now, but the new Snap Groups and Snap Layouts offer a few new ways to wrangle your windows.

By hovering over the "maximize" button on the top right corner of most windows, you'll get a pop-up showing a bunch of layout options. Minimize these apps, and you can pop them all back up again in the same exact spots, by hovering over any of the snapped window icons in the task bar. 

But... not every app I tried allowed me to snap its window. Web browsers, system tools and many other random programs did, but programs such as Photoshop and Steam did not (hovering over their maximize buttons didn't offer the snapping options pop-up menu). 

If you have a gigantic monitor, use multiple monitors or need several thinly sliced web browser windows open at once, it can be handy. On a laptop screen, you're generally not looking at one or maybe two windows at once. 

Multiple desktops are a common MacOS feature, and a good way to keep multiple facets of your digital life organized. For example, you can keep all your work apps -- email programs, browsers, video conference apps -- on one desktop, and all your gaming apps on another. Like on a Mac, you hot-swap between them, it's really just a change in how your open apps are visualized. 

You can actually do that in Windows 10 as well, but it's a pain. In Windows 11, Desktops have their own taskbar icon by default, and creating and organizing multiple desktops is even easier than on a Mac, which is not something you'll hear very often. 

Wither the Widget?

Every gadget-maker loves widgets, defined in consumer tech terms as small icon-like apps that usually sit in a group somewhere on your device's UI. Usually it's useful little things like the weather, stock prices, your latest emails or calendar items, or a small newsfeed. Your iPhone and iPad have them, Android devices have them, Macs have them (under the usually hidden Notification Bar on the right side of the screen). Windows used to have built-in widgets, too. They were called Gadgets and died along with Windows 7. 

Microsoft

Now they're back. On the plus side, with its own taskbar button, the new widgets are easy to find. Hit the button and a semi-transparent panel pops out from the left edge of the screen. It has, by default, widgets for weather, your Outlook calendar, photos you may have in OneDrive, a To Do list and a few others. You can customize the list a bit, but there are not too many options for now. Below that is a newsfeed that looks like it's curated by the same people who do the news curating on the home screen for the Microsoft Edge browser. You can hide stories from any specific outlet by clicking on a menu icon in the news section or hit a "manage your interests" button to customize the feed, but by default, it's pretty basic. Lots of sports, Fox News and celeb gossip. 

Microsoft Teams integration

Do you use Microsoft Teams instead of Zoom, Facetime or Google Hangouts? You'll be able to get to it and launch it a little faster, because it's fully integrated into Windows 11 now. I've never been invited to a Microsoft Teams meeting, except by people who work for Microsoft. 

It's interesting to note that Windows users can now pop into Facetime meetings with the latest iOS "invite anyone" feature. Clearly there's a lot of competition for video meeting mindshare (faceshare?). 

Other quality of life improvements

As I'm often referring to system tools, settings menus or other on-screen things in my writing, I take a lot of screen shots. On a Mac, that's easy -- Shift + Command + 4. In Windows, well, it's never been quite that simple. The built-in Snipping tool is, however, slightly less annoying under Windows 11. Now you can take a snip by hitting Windows + Shift + S, although it copies the screenshot to the clipboard, it doesn't automatically save the image, you'll still have to do that manually. 

The Edge browser now has a safe Kids Mode that's easy to access by clicking on your profile in the upper right corner, and can be customized for different age groups. 

Auto HDR -- a feature that moved over from the Xbox Series X -- give games that don't support high dynamic range a boost to lighting, brightness and contrast for a more HDR-like look. 

I'm waiting for a revamped version of the Microsoft app store, which will allow for third-party services like game stores and web browsers. The Opera browser is available now, the Epic Games storefront is expected soon. No word on other browsers like Firefox or Chrome, or the popular Steam PC game storefront. Eventual Android app support will come, at least initially, from an Amazon-branded Android app store, rather than from Google Play. 

Who should get Windows 11? 

Despite my lukewarm embrace of the new Windows OS, there's no compelling reason to skip it. That's because, any new PC OS launches in an unfinished state, and the best improvements and most polished versions come later, from Windows 8.1 to Windows 10 Creators Edition. 

I've used various preview builds of Windows 11 across multiple PCs for months, along with the final release build, and it's been fine, almost completely trouble-free, and I've never once thought about rolling back to Windows 10. 

That said, Microsoft's gonna Microsoft sometimes. Some long-term Windows irritations have stuck around. When setting up the OS for the first time, there are still plenty data-sharing and ad-personalization checkboxes to uncheck, and the built-in Edge browser still buries the default search engine settings (to switch the default search engine from Bing to, say, Google) several submenus deep. Switching which apps do what by default is also more complex now; you literally have to assign each file type -- .htm, .html, etc. -- one by one. Hopefully this will get streamlined at some point.

If you're going to buy a new laptop or desktop at pretty much any point after today, it'll probably come with Windows 11 preinstalled. In that case, you don't have to make a conscious decision, just go with the flow. If you have a current-gen Windows laptop, tablet or desktop, you'll be able to download and install Windows 11 either now or at some point in the near future. It's being rolled out slowly, probably to avoid a huge rush of same-day downloading.

As a general rule of thumb, I always suggest that you don't jump up and be the first person on the block to download a new OS update, whether it's for your laptop, phone or tablet. Issues will inevitably pop up, if only because of the tremendous breadth of hardware configurations and accessories, from printers to mice to VR headsets, that need to work right. 

That said, testing for Windows 11 has been extensive, and the main issues so far have been with how icons are displayed, some menu weirdness and occasional File Explorer problems. 

My final word on the subject, for now: If you want to try and download/install Windows 11 on day one, go for it. If you want to wait a few weeks (or a few months), that's fine, too.

---

Source

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Best free and paid photo editing apps for iPhone and Android

Best free and paid photo editing apps for iPhone and Android

With phones like the iPhone 13 Pro, Pixel 6 Pro and Galaxy S21 Ultra packing cameras that can give DSLRs a run for their money, it's no wonder we take so many photos using just our phones. But when we get back from our day trip in the hills or our walk around town, it's easy to just forget the images we've taken that day and let them gather dust further and further down our phone galleries. 

Brett Pearce/CNET

Doing some creative photo editing can be a great way to get more out of your photography. And it doesn't even matter if you have the latest, greatest phone with the best camera setup on the back or an older, cheaper phone; the iPhone App Store and Google Play Store on Android are jam-packed with great free and paid photo editing apps that can give your existing shots a whole new look, all from the comfort of your favorite squashy armchair. 

I've rounded up a selection of my top picks, so have a read, make a cup of tea and settle down for an evening editing session. You can even turn your favorite shots into a photo book.

You can also check out these creative ideas to flex your photography muscles at home if you want to shoot and edit something new.

Edited in Snapseed.

Andrew Hoyle/CNET

1. Snapseed 

Free on iOS and Android.

Google-owned Snapseed offers a wide range of exposure and color tools to make tweaks to your images, but also has plenty of filter options, from vintage styles to modern, punchy HDR looks. You can layer the effects up to create some interesting edits on your image. And best of all, it's totally free.

Edited in Lightroom mobile.

Andrew Hoyle/CNET

2. Adobe Lightroom 

iOS and Android, some functions available for free, or $5 per month for full access.

Adobe Lightroom remains an industry standard for professional photographers and the mobile version is much the same. You'll find no stickers, animations or emoji here, but you will get fine grain control over your image and the same set of tools you'd find in Lightroom on desktop. It's the app I use the most to edit my own images on my iPhone and iPad, not least because the images sync in the cloud, letting me start on one device, and continue on another. 

Edited in Photoshop Express.

Andrew Hoyle/CNET

3. Adobe Photoshop Express

Free on iOS and Android.

Photoshop Express has many of the same features you'd find in Lightroom, including exposure, contrast and color editing options, but strips out some of the pro tools and cloud syncing and, crucially, ditches the subscription fee. It's a great tool for tweaking your images to bring out their best, but you'll also find a decent selection of filters and overlay textures, as well as tools for making cool collages from your images.

It's not as open to wild creativity as other options on this list, but it's a solid editing app at a price that's hard to argue with. 

Edited in Prisma.

Andrew Hoyle/CNET

4. Prisma 

iOS and Android, $8 a month or $30 a year.

Prisma doesn't deal with subtle filters and basic image corrections. Instead, its trippy filters will transform your images into often bizarre artistic creations. The results have a painterly effect and indeed many filters are inspired by artists such as Salvador Dali and Picasso. The filters are strong, and while you can tweak them, not every filter will work with every image. I found some to be more suited to portraits while other filters worked best with landscapes.

But it's great fun to experiment with and when you find a photo that works, it really works. 

5. Bazaart

iOS only , $8 a month or $48 a year.

Bazaart's montage and collage tools let you combine multiple different elements -- from photos, to text, to graphics -- and layer them all up to create a finished work of art. It has tools that let you instantly erase the background from behind a portrait subject (I was amazed at how well it worked!) in order to put in a new background or layer up multiple effects. It also has a huge variety of templates to create gorgeous collages for Instagram stories too. 

There are so many different ways you could try and composite different images together that the only boundary will come down to how creative you're feeling. Head over to Bazaart's Instagram page for some inspiration. 

Edited in Photofox.

Andrew Hoyle/CNET

6. Photofox

iOS only .

Like Bazaart, Photofox has powerful tools for removing subjects from background that let you composite in new backgrounds, or apply awesome effects. I particularly like Photofox's dispersion effect, which makes it look like your subject is bursting into particles (trust me, it's cool), as well as the glitch effects and the double exposure that overlays two images on top of each other. 

As with Bazaart, there are endless possibilities of what you can do by layering and compositing different types of images and applying different effects to each. 

Edited in VSCO.

Andrew Hoyle/CNET

7. VSCO

iOS and Android, limited functions for free, or $20 a year with a seven-day free trial.

VSCO began life making color grading presets for Lightroom and its roots are clear in the app today. Rather than offer stickers and animated GIFs for Snapchat enthusiasts, VSCO is all about the more artful filmic color filters. The app has a huge range of presets available, including looks designed to emulate classic rolls of film from Fujifilm, Kodak and Ilford.

It's got a great selection of black-and-white filters too, making it a great choice to experiment with if you're into your moody monochrome shots.

Edited in PicsArt.

Andrew Hoyle/CNET

8. PicsArt

iOS and Android, limited functions for free or $48 a year for the whole suite.

PicsArt has a huge range of editing tools available to you, from basic adjustments like exposure and contrast, through to cinematic color grading and dramatic filters that transform your images into painting-like pieces of art. There are loads of options for both the tone and shape of your face in selfies -- I won't go into the ethics of using these tools for "beauty" purposes, but I had fun in using the tools to intentionally transform my features into bizarre proportions. 

There's a whole Instagram-style social sharing element to PicsArt as well, if you're interested in that. Personally I was mostly interested in the editing options.

Make sure to check out my guide on creative at-home photo projects, see our whole catalog of awesome tips and tricks for better phone photos.

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