The Pwn2Own Berlin 2026 hacking contest has concluded, with security researchers collecting $1,298,250 in rewards after exploiting 47 zero-day flaws.
The competition took place at the OffensiveCon conference from May 14 to May 16 and focused on enterprise technologies and artificial intelligence.
Throughout the contest, the hackers targeted fully patched products across web browsers, enterprise applications, local privilege escalation, servers, local inference, cloud-native/container environments, virtualization, and LLM categories.
Competitors collected $523,000 in cash awards on the first day for 24 unique zero-days, and another $385,750 on the second day for exploiting 15 zero-days. On the third day of Pwn2Own, they earned another $389,500 for eight more zero-days.
DEVCORE won this year’s edition of Pwn2Own Berlin with 50.5 Master of Pwn points and $505,000 in rewards throughout the three-day contest after hacking Microsoft SharePoint, Microsoft Exchange, Microsoft Edge, and Windows 11, followed by STARLabs SG with $242,500 (25 points) and Out Of Bounds with $95,750 (12.75 points).
The competition’s highest reward was $200,000, awarded to Cheng-Da Tsai (also known as Orange Tsai) of the DEVCORE Research Team after chaining three bugs to gain remote code execution with SYSTEM privileges on Microsoft Exchange.
On the first day, Orange Tsai earned another $175,000 for a Microsoft Edge sandbox escape chaining 4 logic bugs, Windows 11 was hacked 3 times, and Valentina Palmiotti (chompie) of IBM X-Force Offensive Research collected $70,000 for rooting Red Hat Linux for Workstations and an NVIDIA Container Toolkit zero-day.
On the second day, the hackers demonstrated another Windows 11 local privilege escalation vulnerability, a root-privilege escalation vulnerability in Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Workstations, and zero-days in multiple AI coding agents.
On the third and final day of the contest, the competitors hacked Windows 11 and Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Workstations again, and used a memory corruption bug to exploit VMware ESXi.
After Pwn2Own ends, vendors have 90 days to release security patches before TrendMicro’s Zero Day Initiative (ZDI) publicly discloses them.
During last year’s Pwn2Own Berlin contest, won by the STAR Labs SG team, ZDI awarded 1,078,750 for 29 zero-day flaws and some bug collisions.
Automated pentesting tools deliver real value, but they were built to answer one question: can an attacker move through the network? They were not built to test whether your controls block threats, your detection rules fire, or your cloud configs hold.
This guide covers the 6 surfaces you actually need to validate.
Dynaudio is pulling out of North America.
In a tersely worded statement from Skanderborg, Denmark, the Danish loudspeaker manufacturer announced that it will refocus its future market development efforts on Europe and Asia. As part of that shift, Dynaudio says it will “cease operations of its commercial activities in North America and permanently shut down its U.S. subsidiary in the fall of 2026.”
That is not a small distributor adjustment. That is not a quiet change in rep coverage. That is Dynaudio exiting the North American market as a direct commercial operation.
The statement acknowledges that Dynaudio has achieved sales growth in North America in recent years, which makes the decision even more notable. The company points instead to ongoing economic challenges and market uncertainty as the reason for prioritizing markets it believes offer stronger strategic opportunities.
In other words, North America may not have been a disaster. It may simply have become too expensive, too unpredictable, or too low-priority to justify the investment required to keep a full U.S. subsidiary operating.
For a brand with Dynaudio’s history, dealer footprint, studio credibility, and recent product momentum, that is a significant industry development.
Dynaudio has not yet provided the detailed transition plan that dealers, customers, and service partners will want to see. The company says continuity of product support and customer service will be addressed and communicated shortly.
That will be the critical part of this story.
Owners of Dynaudio loudspeakers, custom installation products, automotive systems, and professional monitors will want to know whether warranty support, parts availability, repairs, and dealer service will continue in the U.S. and Canada after the subsidiary closes.
Dynaudio also currently lists North American service contacts for Dynaudio Pro, including Dynaudio North America in Illinois and additional service partners in the U.S. and Canada. That may provide a temporary support bridge, but it does not answer the bigger question: what happens after fall 2026?
The timing is hard to ignore.
Dynaudio did not look like a brand retreating from the U.S. market in 2026. Quite the opposite.
At AXPONA 2026, Dynaudio had one of its most visible recent North American showings, highlighted by the Dynaudio Legend, a luxury passive bookshelf loudspeaker that made its public debut in Chicago. The Legend was positioned by Dynaudio as a handcrafted, premium bookshelf speaker using matched natural rosewood veneer panels, Brazilian cherry corner pieces, and Danish assembly at Dynaudio headquarters.
The room created real interest because Legend felt like a reminder of what Dynaudio does best: elegant Danish industrial design, serious driver engineering, and loudspeakers that don’t need to look like they were designed by a committee of enraged refrigerator manufacturers.
eCoustics had two Dynaudio reviews planned this year, including an anticipated review of the Legend. That review has now been delayed, and in light of today’s announcement, the delay takes on a very different meaning.
Dynaudio also had a major presence at HIGH END Vienna 2026. The company’s Symphony Opus One immersive audio system was at the center of its demonstrations in Vienna before its June launch in Copenhagen. Dynaudio’s forthcoming Confidence i series was also previewed for High End Vienna, showing that the company was still pushing hard into the upper end of the market.
That is why this announcement lands with a thud. Dynaudio was not invisible. It was not quiet. It was not showing signs of creative exhaustion.
It was showing up.
The reversal becomes even sharper when you look back at Dynaudio’s North American investment.
In 2019, Dynaudio opened a 25,000-square-foot North American headquarters and Experience Center in Northbrook, Illinois. The facility was designed for product demonstrations, dealer and sales rep training, and warehousing to support regional demand.
That was a serious commitment.
Seven years later, Dynaudio is preparing to shut that U.S. subsidiary down.
The company has not said whether a third-party distributor will take over North American sales. It has not said whether existing dealers will continue to receive product. It has not said whether Canada will be handled differently from the United States. It has not said whether Dynaudio Pro, Custom Install, Home Audio, and Automotive are all affected equally.
Until Dynaudio clarifies those points, the safest reading is that Dynaudio is ending its own commercial operation in North America, while promising some form of future support continuity.
That distinction matters.
Dynaudio products may not vanish from every shelf overnight. Existing dealer inventory may remain in the market. A future distribution arrangement is possible. But none of that has been confirmed.
It is tempting to speculate.
The current U.S. trade environment has created real pressure for European manufacturers, and the U.S. and European Union trade framework has involved a 15% tariff structure on many EU exports. That kind of cost pressure matters when you are shipping large, heavy, premium loudspeakers into a dealer-driven market.
There is also the bizarre timing of President Donald Trump’s renewed comments that Greenland should be controlled by the United States rather than Denmark, a position that has strained relations between Washington and Copenhagen.
But there is no evidence at this stage that Greenland, tariffs, or any single political issue caused Dynaudio’s decision.
The more practical explanation is probably less theatrical and more painful: North America is expensive. Warehousing is expensive. Dealer support is expensive. Shipping is expensive. Product demos are expensive. Customer support is expensive. And in a market where high-end loudspeaker sales can be slow, seasonal, and dealer-dependent, even growth may not be enough if the margin math no longer works.
Not every retreat is a collapse. Sometimes it is a spreadsheet with a knife.
Dynaudio’s decision to exit North America is one of the more surprising hi-fi industry developments of 2026.
This is a company with a deep loudspeaker legacy, strong engineering credibility, a meaningful presence in home audio and professional audio, and recent show momentum at both AXPONA and High End Vienna. The brand was visible. The products were interesting. The Legend looked like a serious statement piece. Opus One suggested a more ambitious design-led future.
And yet Dynaudio has decided that its future market development efforts belong elsewhere.
GoerTek’s 2014 acquisition gave Dynaudio access to Chinese engineering, electronics, and wireless expertise, and Dynaudio’s 2016 management update referenced GoerTek-linked Asia-Pacific experience at the executive level. That does not mean China is “the reason,” but Europe and Asia as priority markets are consistent with Dynaudio’s ownership and long-term product direction.
That does not mean the brand is finished in North America forever. It does mean that the current structure is finished.
For customers, the immediate concern is support. For dealers, it is inventory, warranty coverage, and continuity. For the industry, it is another reminder that the North American hi-fi market may look attractive from the outside, but it is increasingly difficult to serve profitably from the inside.
Danish loudspeakers are not the problem.
The business of selling them here might be.
For more information: dynaudio.com
I know a frozen-treat machine isn’t the most obvious thing to buy in the middle of winter, but Amazon‘s Prime Day sale has dropped both the Ninja Creami Deluxe and Ninja Slushi to all-time low prices.
That makes these two deals a lot more tempting than they have any right to be in July, especially if you want to get ahead before summer or you just like ice cream, frozen drinks and weekend entertaining year-round.
The Slushi is the one I can speak to personally. I bought mine on June 3 last year for AU$424.15, which was the lowest price I’d seen at the time, and I’ve since made hundreds of frozen drinks with it across summer and winter.
The Creami Deluxe is the one I’d consider first if you’re more interested in ice cream than drinks. With the Deluxe version now at an all-time low, splurging feels a lot easier to justify, and I’m tempted to grab one myself.
All the deals below are Exclusive Prime prices, so if you don’t have a membership already, sign up now and get a 30-day free trial that you can cancel at any time.
Ninja products tend to attract a lot of attention, and the Slushi is one of the few that I think mostly deserves it. While you might assume one of the best blenders could do a similar job, it really can’t.
A blender crushes ice into a drink, which usually waters it down. The Slushi chills and churns the liquid itself, so the texture is much closer to a proper frozen drink.
The useful bit is Ninja’s RapidChill technology, which keeps the liquid moving while it freezes. Chilling your drink first can speed things up, but I usually find the Slushi is ready in under 30 minutes, and then it will keep it icy for as long as you need.
That’s important at parties, because people can keep coming back for refills without the mix turning into a block of ice or melting into a watery mess.
The main caveat is that the drinks need sugar to freeze properly. The machine will alert you if the sugar level is too low, so completely sugar-free drinks are not really the point here.
You also need to be careful with alcohol, because too much will stop the mixture from freezing. In practice, I’ve found it works best when you treat recipes as a starting point and adjust them after a batch or two.
Frozen cocktails are the obvious use, but spiced winter drinks that would normally be served hot are surprisingly fun as slushies, too.
At this all-time low Prime Day price, it’s much easier to recommend, and it gives you plenty of time to master a few recipes before the weather warms up again.
In the early 1990s, Don’t Copy That Floppy was an anti-piracy campaign that attempted to connect with computer-savvy youth through the power of hip-hop. While somewhat difficult to imagine given our current draconian Digital Rights Management (DRM) hellscape, warning kids about the potential legal ramifications of duplicating floppy disks containing copyrighted software was seen as necessary since at the time there was usually nothing preventing users from simply copying the contents of one disk to another.
Unfortunately 30+ years down the road, we’re now finding that somebody really should have been backing up some of those disks. Which is why the University of Cambridge of launched the Future Nostalgia project and produced Copy That Floppy! — a phenomenal guide on preserving the contents of floppy disks while we still can.
There’s no telling how much data could potentially be lost to time because its stuck on such an antiquated and fragile storage media, and the situation only gets worse with the passage of time. The problem isn’t just that modern computers don’t have floppy drives. The disks themselves degrade with age, a process which is accelerated if they aren’t stored properly.
As such, Copy That Floppy! only briefly touches on the most ideal situation — that is, buying a USB floppy drive and making copies of the bog standard 3.5 inch disks you might come across. It then moves right on into more advanced topics, such as interfacing with less common drive types, how to safely clean floppies, and the use of advanced tools such as Greaseweazle to analyze captured disk images.
We’ve seen demonstrations of some of these techniques before, and a few years back Adafruit got interested in floppy preservation with modern hardware. But in-depth guides like these that pull all that information together into one place are valuable resources.
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Wired: Meta launched its inaugural AI image model from the Meta Superintelligence Labs on Tuesday, its effort to compete with the likes of OpenAI’s GPT Images 2.0 and Google’s Nano Banana 2 in the AI image generation race. The new model, called Muse Image, rolled out with deep integrations woven into the Instagram app. As part of this update, public Instagram profiles are now automatically opted into being fodder for generative AI remixes. All someone has to do is tag your account’s profile in a prompt — if it’s public — and they can use Meta AI to generate an image using your likeness.
Meta positions this feature as a cheeky way to personalize generations with images of real people. “Whether you want to design a custom event invitation, mock up a collaborative creative concept, or generate a personalized graphic, tagging a username lets Meta AI use public photos to build a visual that’s ready to post,” reads one of Meta’s announcement blogs about the new AI tool. […] Instagram’s help center site includes more details about how this feature will impact users, saying that “people may be able to create content with your Instagram content using AI features at Meta” if you leave your account public and on the default settings. (A previously archived version of this page from 2025 does not include similar, AI-focused language.) Instagram users who want to stop others from using their public posts for AI images (without switching your account to private) must manually disable the options under the app’s “Sharing and reuse” settings. However, turning off the setting only blocks future AI generations; any AI images already created from their content will remain.
Meta also says users will not be notified when others create AI-generated content using their posts.
Chinese hackers tracked as ‘UAT-7810’ are actively evolving their malware to expand their Operational Relay Box (ORB) network by compromising internet-facing networking devices, primarily unpatched Ruckus routers.
According to Cisco Talos researchers, the ORB network serves as a secure relay infrastructure for other China-aligned advanced persistent threats (APTs), including UAT-5918.
This type of infrastructure, which was previously documented by Google Mandiant, allows threat actors to proxy their network traffic through regional devices, making it appear to originate from legitimate local infrastructure to evade detection and complicate attribution.
The Talos analysts have identified new malware in the campaign, including LONGLEASH, a new version of the previously documented SHORTLEASH backdoor, DOGLEASH, a Linux backdoor, JARLEASH, an administrative tool, and LEASHTEST, a testing utility.
The researchers report that UAT-7810 primarily exploits known (n-day) vulnerabilities to gain initial access, including CVE-2020-22653, CVE-2020-22658, and CVE-2023-25717 in Ruckus routers, as well as CVE-2025-2492 in ASUS AiCloud routers.
The newly discovered LONGLEASH malware is an upgraded version of SHORTLEASH, first documented by SecurityScorecard in 2025, that significantly expands its capabilities.
The malware builds on the previous version, which supported command-and-control (C2) communications, web server hosting, network tunnel management, and operation as both a C2 server and client.
In addition to those, Talos researchers have now also observed the following capabilities:
Apart from LONGLEASH, the researchers have also discovered DOGLEASH, a lightweight Linux backdoor deployed via web shell scripts.
Upon launch, it opens a listening TCP port and authenticates incoming requests using a hardcoded password, supporting shell command execution, file access and modification, OS information retrieval, and arbitrary code execution directly in the host’s memory.
JARLEASH is a Java-based administrative tool that provides web-based file management and includes FTP, SFTP, and Netcat server functionality.
Finally, the threat actors have developed LEASHTEST, which can be used to verify whether an MIPS IoT device can perform functions related to malware operations, likely to help refine LONGLEASH’s MIPS support.
Cisco Talos concludes that UAT-7810 continues to expand its ORB infrastructure, actively replacing or extending SHORTLEASH with the more capable LONGLEASH while broadening its toolkit with new malware.
A complete list of the indicators of compromise (IoCs) linked to UAT-7810 activity and the latest toolset is available at the bottom of Cisco Talos’ report.
Security teams log 54% of successful attacks and alert on just 14%. The rest move through your environment unseen.
The Picus whitepaper shows how breach and attack simulation tests your SIEM and EDR rules so threats stop slipping by detection.
Despite earning a 90% “very positive” rating on Steam, Paddle Paddle Paddle (PPP) has been hit with an unusually high 21% refund rate. Mateo says his game has collected more than 55,000 refunds, and he’s now pointing to Valve’s famously lenient refund policy as the culprit. It doesn’t help that…
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When it comes to home cleaning, you can never be too prepared as there’s no telling what spills and stains you might have to deal with. A tipped-over glass of wine or a forkful of pasta that’s hit the floor is more of an inevitability, no matter how careful you are, but if you don’t have any gadgets to hand that can help you clean it all up, it can take ages to sort with a manual touch. This is why you need one of the best steam cleaners to hand.
Although the best hard floor cleaners are the perfect solution for everyday messes, steam cleaners provide a more heavy-duty approach when it comes to sanitising the mess in question. For instance, cleaning up a bit of mud left by your shoes after a long hike is an easy enough task for a hard floor cleaner, but something left behind by a pet or a child (if you catch our drift) is where steam cleaners come into effect.
As you may have guessed from their name already, steam cleaners operate by boiling water to produce a mess-targeting vapour which can then be concentrated to remove whatever it is that’s found its way to your floor. These appliances can work wonders, but because they are a more heavy-duty solution, they work best with sealed floors such as varnished wood or concrete. Anything less may be warped by a steam cleaner over time.
There’s a good variety of steam cleaners available, each with different power settings and accessories designed to target certain messes. It can all be a bit overwhelming if you’re approaching the market for the first time, but this is where the hard work of our expert testers comes in, as they’ve done the hard work for you to find out which of the bunch are actually worth buying.
All of the options selected for this list have performed brilliantly in our testing process, and we’ve made sure to keep a few budget-friendly options in the mix too for anyone who doesn’t want to spend too much money. Keep on reading to see which picks we currently recommend, and if you need other cleaning solutions for your home then we’ve got you covered with the best vacuum cleaners and the best carpet cleaners.
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We test all steam cleaners in the same way. Each model is tested on hard floors, letting us see how well they clean tough everyday stains. We take before and after photos of cleaning to show the power on offer, and test how well cleaners get into the edges of the room. For cleaners with detail attachments, such as squeegees and wire brushes, we test how well they clean tough stains including tiles and grouting, burnt-on stains on oven shelves and limescale-encrusted shower screens. We report on how easy each cleaner was to use and how far it could clean on a tank of water.
Powerful and fast cleaning
Steam blast loosens tough stains
Simple controls
Doesn’t stand up on its own
For floors only
If you’re looking for a steam floor mop to quickly clean up hard floors, the Shark Klik n’ Flip S6003UK Steam Mop could well be the model for you. This well-priced steam mop is focused on floor cleaning, shipping with a double-sided mopping pad that clips to the bottom of the mop. It’s a huge mop, making short work of floors, as you can clean large areas with a single swipe based on our tests.
Cleverly, the Klik n’ Flip head can flip over partway through a clean, giving you the clean side of the pad to keep cleaning with, without introducing a lengthy changeover. This is a feature we found super handy, that let us clean larger areas without having to stop and start.
Cleaning performance was excellent, with the Shark Klik n’ Flip S6003UK Steam Mop tidying up mud on our tiled floor with ease, and picking up everyday kitchen stains: the steam blast function is particularly useful for cleaning up tougher stains, and we found that this helped remove dried-on pet food without having to get down on our needs.
Thanks to the design of the cloth, we found that we could push the S6003UK right into the edges of our room, giving us edge-to-edge cleaning. We needed to get down on our knees and manually clean areas far less with this model than rivals. Easy to use, easy to move and brilliantly priced, the Shark Klik n’ Flip S6003UK Steam Mop is the best steam mop that we have ever tested. If you’ve got lots of hard floors, this is a great model to buy.
Hugely versatile
Powerful floor cleaning
Makes short work of most jobs around the house
Have to hold trigger down
If you’re looking for a versatile steam cleaner that can be used across floors, windows and even to tackle bathroom tiles, the Vax Steam Fresh Total Home steam cleaner is a fantastic choice.
With two tanks on-board, the Vax Steam Fresh Total uses a combination of steam and detergent when in its upright mopping mode, with the latter adding a scent boost into cleaning.
Just note that when the device is in handheld mode, you can only use steam to clean. Vax includes a huge array of additional tools which can be used in both handheld mode or via the hose. These tools include a detail nozzle for pushing steam into hard-to-reach areas, a squeegee, and grout, scrubbing and even deep scrubbing brushes too.
In upright mopping mode, you can either use a tough HD steam cleaning pad or a softer steam pad depending on how dirty your floor is. Both options attach via velcro, so it’s easy to swap them mid-clean.
There’s also a built-in scrubbing brush to help agitate any tough and dried in stains too.
Want to refresh a carpet or a rug? Attach the included carpet glider which helps the Vax Steam Fresh Total Home to slide on carpet without causing any damage. Using the steam mop is impressively easy, thanks to its power button and intuitive switch that allows you to control the amount of steam that’s produced. A potential issue with using the mop is the fact you need to manually hold the trigger in order to start producing steam.
Although we appreciate the fact we can control the amount of steam, some may find this tiring and difficult to use after a while.
There’s unfortunately no option to collect solids, which you can find on the more expensive Dyson WashG1, however if you need fast and efficient cleaning around the house then the Vax Steam Fresh Total Home steam cleaner remains a seriously great choice.
Large water tank
Easy to fill
Heats up quickly
Powerful steaming
Versatile
Unclear steam dial
Bulky for small jobs
Noisy
If there’s one problem with cylinder steam cleaners, it’s that you have to wait for most of them to cool down before you refill and continue cleaning. Not so with the Polti Vaporetto Smart 100_B, which has a removable water tank, so you can fill it as many times as you need to complete your cleaning job, all without any cool-down time. We found this makes this cylinder steam cleaner a great choice for large and difficult jobs, but its bulk means that it’s not an ideal tool if you only want to tackle smaller jobs or just mop floors.
Although the controls are a little confusing on this model (the steam dial goes from min to max, but it’s not clear where about you are in the range), performance is mostly excellent. The Polti Vaporetto Smart 100_B coped well with our tough floor challenge, brought grout back to life and easily managed to clean up a hard floor.
There are tools to tackle most jobs, but only one mop pad in the box is a little disappointing, as this gets dirty quickly. That said, for the price, this is an excellent choice and the continuous cleaning makes it brilliant for large jobs, particularly those outside of hard floors.
Vac cleans in front of steam mop
Fast heat-up time
Good run-time per tank
Decent-length cable (7.5m)
Limited suction power
Average steam power
No pivot on head
The Bissell Vac & Steam 1977E is a fantastic time-saver, vacuuming and cleaning at the same time. We loved the original, and now the 1977E model has had a small update and now comes in a fetching blue colour. As a standalone steam cleaner or a standalone vacuum cleaner, this model won’t win awards; yet, the combination of the two features produces some powerful cleaning results. With a 400W bagless vacuum cleaner and 1100W steam heater, we found that small particles were sucked up before the microfibre pad steams the floor and picks up stains. For well-trodden areas in your home with hard floors, the Bissell Vac & Steam 1977E effectively halved our cleaning time. Bissell recommends three passes for a dirty area and that worked well for us, picking up dust and removing stains well.
The downside of the system is that it’s not very flexible, and it’s neither a good vacuum nor a flexible and powerful steam cleaner. Still, it’s the combination of parts that is important, and the Bissell Vac & Steam 1977E delivers on hard floor cleaning. We recommend this model for homes that need regular cleaning; our tester has dogs, so needs to clean daily, where the Bissell Vac&Steam 1977E came in handy. For deeper floor cleaning, the Shark S6003UK is a better choice.
Stands up on its own
Heats up quickly
Uses water efficiently
Seam volume not adjustable
Only one microfibre pad
Residue from messier stains
The Beldray Detergent Steam Cleaner is our top pick for the best budget steam mop that can also use detergent.
It’s sturdy and a mop we found to be easy to work with, given how lightweight it is. We also think the Beldray cleaner looks the part with its turquoise and white colour scheme, too, and is able to be conveniently disassembled with the handle can be removed with a literal touch of a button. The fact there’s a 5-metre cable here also enables this cleaner to go rather far round your house, and also helps its manoeuvrability. For its steaming powers, this Beldray mop comes with a 330ml water tank. That may sound small, but thanks to the fact it uses its water rather sparingly, you can actually go rather far before that tanks needs refilling. To go with the 330ml of water, this cleaner also has a 200ml detergent tank to help freshen up floors and offer a little more oomph for cleaning.
Beldray says water will heat up in 25 seconds, making this a relatively prompt mop to heat water up with. There isn’t much in the way of controls, apart from an onboard power switch, which is a handy addition considering other cleaners require you to physically turn it off from the wall. This appliance also comes with a Velcro-attached microfibre pad for the mop head, and a carpet glider to help it to move smoothly across carpeted surfaces.
In our testing, we found the Beldray Detergent Steam Cleaner to do a pretty good job of removing most of the mess we’d left down in tiles in one fell swoop. In addition, it saturated the colours of our rug when steaming a patch for 30 seconds, although didn’t quite get rid of a small stain that was left. It arguably did a better job of dealing with laminate flooring, as our dried muddy footprints were fully gone within 20 seconds without any marks or residue. Our toughtest test involving a combo of coffee and tomato paste stains dried into a patch of tiles arguably pushed this cleaner to its limits, with it taking around two and a half minutes for the stain to be fully removed.
A steam mop is designed specifically for hard floors, with a microfibre cloth used to pick up dirt and steam pushed through the cloth to clean and remove dirty. A steam cleaner is different, as it has different attachments for different jobs: nozzles and brushes for detail cleaning, window cleaning accessories and more.
The latter is better for tackling jobs around the house, but a steam mop is more convenient for everyday use. If you want a balance, you can get models that convert from a mop to a handheld unit for occasional detail jobs. Steam cleaners don’t have to use detergent, and use clean water and steam alone to remove stains. This makes them more gently cleaners in some regards, as you don’t have to use harsh chemicals to remove stubborn stains. That’s not to say that you shouldn’t use chemicals in the normal way.
For example, for cleaning floors and surfaces, using traditional detergent and disinfectant makes sense, although you can then use a steam cleaner afterwards for dealing with some stains. Likewise, you should still clean with cleaning products for the deepest clean, letting the steam cleaner handle deeper jobs. The larger the tank of water you have, the longer the steam cleaner can keep cleaning. This is more important on some models than others. Many models have a refillable water tank that you can remove and top up when you like. These ones heat water when its pumped from a tank, effectively giving you continuous cleaning. For these models, the size of the tank isn’t so important, as you can get water when you need it.
If you have a cleaner with a built-in tank where all of the water is heated at the same time, you have to have a cool-down time (up to 20 minutes or so) before you can refill and use them again. For these models, it’s important to have a running time that will last for the length of job you have, so that you don’t have to pause in the middle of cleaning. Steam cleaners, bar standalone steam mops, will come with a variety of attachments for different jobs. Largely, these are there to make specific tasks easier. Each accessory works by changing how steam is directed, such as a thin nozzle to help push steam towards tile grouting, or by providing a tool to help clean, such as a wire brush for cleaning an oven. Tools can do both, such as an upholstery brush that directs steam over a wider area and gives you a brush to agitate the upholstery and loosen dirt. When you buy a steam cleaner you should think about the jobs you want to do and make sure that your chosen model has the right accessories.
Steam is generally safe to use on most surfaces but there are some exceptions to this. As you’re using water, using a steam cleaner on an unsealed surface isn’t recommended. And, surfaces that may react badly to a lot of water, such as solid wood flooring, may not be suitable, as you could get swelling.
The situation is worse if you apply steam directly to the surface but also applies with steam mops. Although mop heads will absorb most of the heat of the steam, they can still get very wet, which is no good for many surfaces. For dealing with hard floors, we recommend that you buy one of our best hard floor cleaners, instead.
Steam is an effective way to kill bed bugs and their eggs, thanks to the high temperatures proving lethal. If you’re worried about an infestation, then steam cleaning soft furnishings can help. Make sure that you use the upholstery attachment and/or mattress accessory to clean. You should move slowly over the area, taking at least 30 seconds before moving the steam head in order to deliver a killing dose of steam. Make sure that you cover all areas, and press the steam head into crevices and around the bed; for mattresses, cover the sides and underneath, too.
Karcher commissioned research that showed that enveloped viruses, such as SARS-CoV-2, can be killed by high temperatures. Spot cleaning for 30 seconds at maximum steam level was enough to kill the virus. This shows that cleaning close-up is required to be effective, so cleaning with a burst of steam can be a good secondary way of disinfecting surfaces, although cleaning with detergent should always be done. Steam can be good on surfaces that are otherwise hard to clean, such as curtains and upholstery.
Using a steam mop is slightly different, as the microfibre cloth absorbs some heat. Steam mops will remove dirt, bacteria and viruses, but the pad should be cleaned at a high temperature in a washing machine to disinfect it after use. In short, then, a steam cleaner can help disinfect surfaces but should be used as an additional tool after traditional cleaning.
Learn more about how we test steam cleaners
FAQs
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Test Data
Karcher SC5 easyFix Premium Steam Cleaner
Shark Klik n’ Flip Automatic Steam Mop S6003UK
Vax Steam Fresh Total Home Steam Cleaner
Polti Vaporetto Smart 100_B
Bissell Vac & Steam 1977E
Beldray Detergent Steam Cleaner
Full Specs
Karcher SC5 easyFix Premium Steam Cleaner Review
Shark Klik n’ Flip Automatic Steam Mop S6003UK Review
Vax Steam Fresh Total Home Steam Cleaner Review
Polti Vaporetto Smart 100_B Review
Bissell Vac & Steam 1977E Review
Beldray Detergent Steam Cleaner Review
UK RRP
£499
£149.99
£159.99
£165
£148.99
£39.99
Manufacturer
Karcher
Tokit
Vax
Polti
Bissell
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Size (Dimensions)
301 x 439 x 305 MM
100 x 110 x 1180 MM
x x INCHES
270 x 400 x 290 INCHES
280 x 229 x 1181 MM
1170 x 222 x 350 MM
Weight
9 KG
2.3 KG
4.63 KG
5 KG
4.81 KG
2.07 KG
ASIN
B077CBLBT3
B01N3930UF
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B079TNF6QL
B01MYDV5WI
B08HDJK24W
Release Date
2018
2020
2024
2021
2018
2021
First Reviewed Date
23/07/2018
17/11/2020
10/10/2024
22/02/2021
02/08/2018
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Model Number
–
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Vax Steam Fresh Total Home Steam Cleaner
–
–
BEL01097
Accessories
Floor cleaning kit, EasyFix + extension tube (2 × 0.5 m), hand nozzle, detail nozzle, round brush (small), microfibre cover for manual nozzle
Floor head
2x water filters, 250ml bottle of detergent
Mop head with microfibre pad and carpet glider, squeegee tool with microfibre cover, two small round brushes, curved nozzle, scraper tool and two extension tubes
Floor head (carpet and hard floors)
–
Provided heads
–
–
Carpet glider, floor head (3x mopping pads), 4x cleaning pads, scrubbing brush, deep scrubbing brush, window tool, detail nozzle, grout brush,
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–
–
Bin capacity
–
–
litres
–
–
–
Modes
–
–
Variable steam
–
–
–
Stated Power
–
–
1400 W
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–
–
Run time
–
–
hrs min
–
–
–
Water tank size
1.5
0.33
0.26
2
0.38
0.35
Floor cleaner type
–
–
Steam cleaner
–
–
–
Detergent capacity
–
–
0.13 litres
–
–
–
Steam cleaner type
Cylinder
Mop
2-in-1
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2-in-1
Mop
Cleaning solution tank
–
–
Yes
–
–
Yes
Steam pressure
4.2 bar
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–
4 bar
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Anthropic on Tuesday launched Claude Cowork on mobile and web, expanding a tool that has quietly become the company’s bridge between the developer-centric world of AI coding agents and the far larger market of knowledge workers who never open a terminal.
The rollout, which begins in beta with Max subscribers before expanding to additional plans, marks a strategic inflection for Anthropic. It transforms Cowork from a desktop-only agent into a cross-device platform where tasks can start on a laptop, continue autonomously in the background, and be reviewed from a phone — even after the user closes the app entirely.
“Your work goes everywhere with you, and keeps going without you,” Anthropic writes in its announcement.
The timing is deliberate. Alongside the mobile launch, Anthropic published usage data from 1.2 million anonymized Claude Cowork sessions sampled between May 11 and May 31, drawn from more than 600,000 organizations. The data paints a striking picture: the overwhelming majority of what people do with Cowork has nothing to do with writing software.
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The numbers tell a story that cuts against the dominant narrative in enterprise AI, which has fixated on coding assistants and developer productivity as the primary use case for large language models.
Business process and operations — tasks like pulling scattered updates into a single report, building onboarding checklists, and reconciling spreadsheets — accounted for 33.4% of all sampled Cowork sessions, making it the single largest category by a wide margin. Content creation and copywriting — producing drafts, slide decks, posts, and proposals — came in second at 16.4%.
Together, those two categories make up roughly half of all Claude Cowork usage. Software development, by contrast, accounted for just 8.7%. DevOps and infrastructure followed at 7%, with research and intelligence at 6.4%, data analysis and business intelligence at 5.8%, document processing and extraction at 4.1%, and sales and revenue operations at 4%.
The remaining 12 categories each represented less than 4% of usage, including personal assistance at 3.8%, education at 2.4%, and meeting intelligence at 1.8%.
Anthropic describes these dominant use cases as “the work around the work” — tasks that span nearly every role in an organization but rarely appear in anyone’s core job description. “People are using it for a variety of tasks that aren’t necessarily the hallmark of a specific role, but instead represent the connective work around a role that moves projects forward and keeps businesses running,” the company writes. “That means tasks like drafting a status update, building a slide deck, or condensing reams of research into a single report.”
That phrase — “the work around the work” — is Anthropic’s attempt to define and claim an entirely new category of AI productivity. It’s a calculated reframing: rather than positioning AI as a tool that replaces what professionals do, Anthropic is arguing that the most valuable current application is handling everything professionals do around their actual expertise.
The expansion to mobile and web introduces three concrete capabilities that reflect how Anthropic envisions Cowork fitting into daily workflows.
First, sessions now sync across devices. A user can start a task at their desk, check on its progress from a phone, and retrieve the finished output from any device. Second — and arguably more significant — Cowork can now run tasks in the background with no device online at all. Users can schedule work for a specific time, and Claude will execute it autonomously. Anthropic offers the example of setting Monday morning client prep for 6 a.m.: “Claude works through the email threads, transcripts, and recent news, builds the briefing doc, and leaves the follow-up email drafted but unsent. Review it over coffee.”
Third, when Claude encounters a decision that requires human judgment, it surfaces the question to the user’s phone. “Nothing ships until you’ve reviewed and approved it,” Anthropic states.
Desktop remains the most fully featured surface, with access to local files and the browser. But the web version also opens Cowork to users who cannot install a desktop application — a meaningful expansion in enterprise environments where IT departments control software installation.
The company also unified its interface: on web and desktop, chat and Cowork now share a single home screen, and projects and artifacts persist across both modes.
To encourage adoption, Anthropic is extending doubled Cowork usage limits through August 5.
The usage data and the mobile launch together reveal a company executing a two-track strategy. Claude Code, its terminal-based coding agent, dominates among software developers. But Cowork is designed to capture the vastly larger population of professionals whose work involves creating, organizing, and communicating information rather than writing code.
The contrast between the two products is instructive. As Anthropic notes, Claude Code “is most often used by software developers for the key parts of their role: building, debugging, and shipping code.” When developers do use Cowork, they tend to use it not for programming but for the communications-focused work that surrounds every role — status updates, documentation, and coordination.
This pattern — where AI handles the connective tissue of work rather than its core substance — aligns with what Anthropic describes as people using “Claude Cowork to assemble and structure the information they can use to act on their expertise.” The company illustrates this with three examples: a lawyer using Cowork for document formatting and filing while reserving legal judgment for themselves, a hiring manager synthesizing interview feedback while spending more time on candidate conversations, and a team lead producing a slide deck that explains a decision while focusing on actually making that decision.
The implications for Anthropic’s business model are significant. Developer-focused tools, while high-profile, serve a relatively narrow market. The Ramp AI Index published in May showed Anthropic pulling ahead of OpenAI in business adoption for the first time — with 34.4% of firms paying for Anthropic’s services compared to OpenAI’s 32.3% — and suggests the company’s enterprise push is gaining traction. Claude Code was identified as the primary driver of that shift. But Cowork targets an addressable market that is orders of magnitude larger: every knowledge worker with a laptop, a pile of spreadsheets, and a slide deck due by Friday.
The mobile launch arrives during one of Anthropic’s busiest — and most turbulent — stretches in its history.
Just last week, Anthropic launched Claude Sonnet 5, a new model that narrows the performance gap with its more expensive Opus-class models while maintaining lower pricing. The model is available at introductory pricing of $2 per million input tokens through August 31 before rising to $3 per million input tokens. Sonnet 5 serves as the engine underneath Cowork, and its improved agentic capabilities — better reasoning, tool use, and sustained task completion — directly enhance Cowork’s ability to handle complex, multi-step workflows.
Two weeks before that, Anthropic released Claude Tag, a Slack-native AI agent designed for team collaboration. Where Cowork focuses on individual task delegation, Claude Tag operates as a multiplayer tool — a single Claude identity that everyone in a Slack channel can interact with, building context from conversations over time.
According to Anthropic’s announcement, 65% of the company’s own product team’s code is created by its internal version of Claude Tag. Fortune reported that Anthropic’s head of product for Claude Code and Cowork, Cat Wu, described the distinction: “Claude Code, Cowork, and chat are very single-player, whereas Claude Tag is built to be interactive and multiplayer.”
Together, Cowork and Claude Tag represent a pincer strategy: Cowork captures individual productivity workflows across devices, while Claude Tag embeds AI into team communication channels. Both are designed to push Anthropic deeper into enterprise operations, beyond the developer seat.
The expansion also arrives against a backdrop of unresolved security concerns. On July 1, security firm Armadin — led by Mandiant founder Kevin Mandia — published research detailing what it described as a full sandbox escape in Claude Cowork on Windows, as reported by SiliconANGLE. The attack chain involved DLL sideloading against the Claude desktop executable to gain trusted access to Cowork’s virtual machine service, then exploiting undocumented parameters to achieve root access and bypass network restrictions.
Anthropic responded that the vulnerability did not qualify as a security issue because exploiting it requires an attacker to already have local code execution on the host machine. Armadin, however, raised a broader concern: that deploying local virtual machines on nontechnical users’ systems creates visibility gaps that endpoint security products struggle to monitor.
This tension takes on new dimensions as Cowork moves to mobile and web. The web and mobile versions run tasks server-side rather than in a local virtual machine, which eliminates the specific attack surface Armadin identified but introduces different questions about data handling, especially for scheduled background tasks that process email threads, calendar data, and documents without real-time user oversight.
Anthropic’s announcement states that “the decisions still come to you” and that nothing ships without review and approval. But as Cowork takes on increasingly complex autonomous workflows — processing contract folders, building client briefings from multiple data sources, drafting emails — the surface area for prompt injection and data exposure grows correspondingly.
When Cowork first launched in January, TechCrunch reported that Anthropic explicitly warned about prompt injection risks, noting in its blog post: “These risks aren’t new with Cowork, but it might be the first time you’re using a more advanced tool that moves beyond a simple conversation.”
Anthropic’s enterprise push is also colliding with geopolitical reality. CNBC reported Monday that Alibaba will ban employees from using Anthropic’s AI tools starting July 10, placing Claude Code on a high-risk software list. The move followed Anthropic’s June letter to the U.S. Senate accusing Alibaba of carrying out what it called “the largest known distillation attack” against its models.
The Alibaba ban, combined with reports that Anthropic is closing loopholes that allowed Chinese companies to access Claude through third-country entities, underscores the increasingly fraught environment for AI companies attempting to serve global enterprise customers while navigating U.S. export and security restrictions.
At the same time, Anthropic is investing massively in infrastructure. Reuters reported Monday that Anthropic signed a $19 billion, 20-year lease with TeraWulf for a data center being built in Hawesville, Kentucky, with 401 megawatts of computing power expected to become fully operational in 2028.
That kind of capital commitment only makes sense if the company expects enterprise demand — not just from developers, but from the millions of knowledge workers that Cowork targets — to grow dramatically.
Anthropic is transparent about the limitations of its usage analysis. The taxonomy classifies sessions by the type of work being performed, not by the job title of the person doing it.
There are no standalone categories for marketing, finance, or HR — functions that are likely absorbed into the dominant “business process and operations” bucket, which may partly explain why that category commands a third of all usage.
The sample is also rate-capped rather than proportional to traffic, meaning the numbers are shares of sampled sessions, not absolute volumes. Usage during peak hours is somewhat underrepresented. And roughly 5% of sampled sessions involved personal, non-work use — hobbies, personal assistance, and companionship-style conversations — meaning the data doesn’t purely reflect workplace activity.
The company also acknowledged that its labeling pipeline changed around May 11, which is why the analysis window begins on that date rather than covering a longer period.
Anthropic’s mobile launch and usage data arrive at a moment when the enterprise AI market is shifting from proof of concept to proof of value. The question facing every company deploying AI tools is no longer whether the technology works — but whether it delivers measurable productivity gains across an organization, not just within engineering teams.
The usage data suggests that the answer, at least for Cowork, is emerging in an unexpected place. It’s not in the glamorous work of building software or conducting research. It’s in the unglamorous, universal labor of turning messy information into structured outputs that move organizations forward — the status reports, the onboarding checklists, the variance memos, the client decks.
By untethering that capability from the desktop and making it available on every device, Anthropic is betting that the most valuable AI agent isn’t the one that writes code. It’s the one that handles everything else.
Ever since Meta launched its first smart glasses developed in collaboration with Ray-Ban, they have built a reputation as a creep’s weapon. The outrage is justified, as a lot of people are not comfortable being recorded or captured without being told about it. Now, Meta is taking concrete steps to make sure that the camera-equipped smart glasses do not violate any person’s privacy. To that end, the company has announced that it will disable the onboard camera on its smart glasses if someone covers or tampers with the white LED indicator light.
Meta argues that the white LED indicator serves as an alert signal for any other person who might be in the field of view. “We are continuouslyimproving our ability to detect tampering, and now we’re updating the glasses to disable the camera if they detect the LED was physically tampered with or destroyed. No other kind of camera has done this, and we’re proud to lead the industry forward,” the company said in an official announcement.
Meta says that it is updating the smart glasses to ensure that if the LED system is physically disabled or covered, the camera will be entirely disabled. The change will be first implemented on the second-generation Meta smart glasses. To recall, Meta now offers smart glasses that have been developed in collaboration with Ray-Ban and Oakley. Just over a week ago, the company also introduced an in-house line-up that was developed without any third-party brand collaboration and with a lower asking price, as well.
Over the past few months, numerous reports have uncovered an underground market where owners of the Meta AI smart glasses can get the LED indicator lights disabled. Numerous listings have also been spotted on online platforms where such services have been offered. Meta is going to take action against such activities, as well.
Meta says that it is not only going to disable the camera capture on devices with a tampered or obstructed LED light. Going a step ahead, the company will remove all the ads, posts, and online listings on its platform that advertise such services. Additionally, the company says it will also be implementing a ban on accounts that offer such services and hopes to take legal action against entities or businesses that are doing it.
Summer stretches days longer and pulls people toward trails, water, and full days outside. A watch that handles knocks, stays readable in bright light, and runs for extended stretches without a charger becomes more than nice to have. The Apple Watch Ultra 3, priced at $699.99 (was $799), fills that role for many who want one device to cover serious activity and everyday tracking.
The casing is 49mm of solid titanium on the wrist, which feels right at home and like a little additional muscle, despite the fact that it still fits securely on your wrist for regular wear. The fact that Grade 5 titanium handles dents and scratches with easily, as opposed to other aluminum models that are just battered around, is a significant advantage. The true show-stopper is the flat sapphire crystal, which protects the screen from the inevitable bumps into rocks or equipment during a climb, surf session, or simply fooling around and bumping items into other gear. Water resistance extends to 100m, and it has a depth gauge and a water temperature sensor, making it ideal for pool laps, snorkeling, or even assessing diving conditions. If everything else fails and you’re in a remote location, a built-in siren will sound a reassuring 86 decibels to summon rescue. All of this adds up to a watch that feels like it can take on everything the season throws at it, rather than something delicate that needs to be handled with care.
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![Apple Watch Ultra 3 [GPS + Cellular 49mm] Running & Multisport Smartwatch w/Rugged Titanium Case w/Black...](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/41H6S7vjc+L._SL160_.jpg)
The screen now has a larger active area, although the case size remains unchanged. It still packs a punch, with a peak brightness of 3000 nits, making it visible even in the midday light. So you can still read the time and examine your maps even in the most extreme situations. By moving to LTPO3 technology, battery efficiency has actually increased, allowing you to leave the screen on in the background without draining the battery. It’s a godsend whether you’re out on a walk or a bike ride because you don’t have to lift your wrist every few minutes to view the screen. Night mode and viewing angles have also been improved, reducing eye strain as light levels change.
Battery life has to be the number one reason this watch is worth considering right now; with normal use, it lasts roughly 42 hours, and with battery saver mode, you can extend it to 72 hours on a long journey. Real-world testing indicates that it’s not just talk; actual users have reported constant drain times even with GPS and other tracking equipment functioning in the background. If that’s not enough to put your mind at ease, the watch also charges quickly, reaching 80% in 45 minutes. So, if you have a long day ahead or a multi-day vacation planned, a fast charge in the morning or during a break will keep you going for another full day. For anyone who has experienced the stress of running out of power in the middle of nowhere, this is a game changer.
New capabilities such as satellite messaging let you to send a text or contact emergency services when you’re out of range of a cell tower, and dual-frequency GPS provides super-accurate position data no matter where your activities take you. If you find yourself in a region with 5G, the watch will connect quickly for calls, texts, and data. These features combine to make the Ultra 3 a more comprehensive off-grid companion without making it heavier or more difficult to use in everyday life.
Health insights have just become much more practical with the addition of hypertension notifications following a brief calibration time. Your watch already tracks your ECG, heart rate variability, temperature, blood oxygen, and sleep patterns; now recovery data is right alongside your training metrics, allowing you to understand how all that hard work is affecting your rest time. When it comes to striking the right balance between fitness and general wellness, your sleep scores and apnea alarms are all important factors to consider.
The watch stays spot on with fitness tracking whether you’re jogging through difficult terrain, swimming in open water, or participating in any other sport. Its dual-frequency GPS keeps locked in even when things get complicated, and the depth and water temperature sensors are useful for tracking your dives. Then there’s the workout guidance and stats, training load, heart rate zones, and anything else you need to organize your workouts without having to carry any additional gadgets. Whether you’re hitting the trails or sailing through the water at high speeds, this watch can handle it.
Running your watch’s software on a daily basis feels snappy thanks to the S10 chip’s power and 64GB of available storage. Complications update quickly, programs launch instantly, and on-board processing ensures that everyday tasks remain smooth and responsive. Like before, pairing it with an iPhone is simple, with notifications, music control, and data synchronization all operating as expected. And as new watch faces and tools are released, they simply slip in without requiring you to learn a completely new method of using the watch.
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