A fantastic Friday is upon us, friend. Hey, this is so cool! 🌒 Live in Baltimore, Boston, Buffalo, NYC, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., or Portland, Maine? Starting around 6:30 a.m. tomorrow, you’ll be able to spot a partial solar eclipse. Lucky you! How do you organize an eclipse party? You planet. Ouch.

Travel pro move: Don’t let sky-high roaming charges ruin your trip! Get the eSIM I use for affordable, secure mobile data in over 200 destinations worldwide. Download the Saily app, pick a plan and enjoy instant connection, all without a physical SIM! Easy peasy! Learn more and get 10% off now.  — Kim

It’s only March, and we’re nearing 100 degrees in Phoenix. I’m already sweating, dreading my power bills. It got me thinking about the stuff in your house that’s sucking up electricity 24/7, even when it’s turned off.

Phantom power may not seem like a big deal, but those little energy leaks can add hundreds of dollars a year to your power bill. The fix? A smart plug. It’s one of the cheapest smart home upgrades you can make, and it starts saving you money the second you plug it in.

💡 Smart plug 101

These tiny devices go between your wall outlet and whatever you’re powering — a TV, lamp, fan, coffee maker, you name it. Connect it to your Wi-Fi, then you can control the power from your phone or with your voice, using Alexa or Google Assistant.

You can set timers, monitor energy usage or just kill power completely when you’re not using something. Sweet.

💸 Here’s how it saves you money

• Shuts off phantom load: Stops electronics from quietly draining power all night. Your TVs, microwave, game consoles, chargers and even that Keurig that only brews one cup a day are guilty.
• Scheduled shutdown: Automatically turns off items like heated blankets or air purifiers after bedtime or when you leave the house.
• Remote access: Forgot to turn something off? Don’t want to get your butt off the couch? Open the app and do it from anywhere.
• Energy monitoring: Some models show exactly how much electricity a device uses, so you know what’s worth unplugging.

🔌 Best budget smart plugs (all under $20)

I did the hard work to tell you which ones are best and for what purpose. These are Amazon’s Big Spring Sale prices. So get ’em now before the sale is over!

Kasa smart plug (2 for $14, 25% off): Plug it in, download the app and setup is basically done. Works with Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant.

Amazon Basics (2 for $14, 15% off): Super simple setup on this one, too. Good buy if you have Echos around the house.

EIGHTREE (4 for $20, 33% off): Sleek round design, and compatible with Alexa and Google Assistant.

HBN (4 for $16, 20% off): Set timers, schedules and groups. Alexa- and Google-compatible for voice commands. Great price.

GE Cync ($12, 20% off): Matter-compatible, meaning it’ll talk to the rest of your smart home gear. Includes all the bells and whistles the others do.

Pro tip: Plug your TV, soundbar and game console into a power strip (50% off), then connect that strip to a smart plug. One command shuts the whole entertainment center down at once. Yup, I’m a genius.

😂 Last summer, I was checking the mail, and I opened my water and electric bills at the same time. I was shocked.

Now, do your good deed for the day and use the share icons below to spread the word! Thank you!

🚨 It’s not from Apple: There’s a phishing text going around that claims your Apple ID was used to approve a transaction, usually with a dollar amount included. Don’t click the link or call the number. Real Apple account alerts come through iOS push notifications or official emails, never texts.

Trust your gut: Amelia Mandeville-Marinaro had just given birth when her husband, Pete, received a call from their “bank.” Yikes, their money was in danger, and they had to move it immediately. Amelia shared on TikTok (3.2 million views) that alarm bells were going off in her head the whole time. So many scammers out there. You gotta be on your toes!

🎭 IRL dubbing: Imagine watching (and understanding!) a play in a foreign language. An off-Broadway theater in NYC is doing it with live AI translations for its longest-running play, Perfect Crime. Scan a QR code, pick from 60 languages and listen with your headphones. The cost to the theater? About $100 per hour. Something to consider if you’re live streaming a church service or something similar.

🛒 AI add to cart: Amazon is testing “Interests AI,” so you can chat to find things instead of typing in the search bar. Check if you have it by opening the Amazon app > Me tab (person icon) and tapping Interests. Of course, that data will help train Alexa+ with generative AI. Never stops.

🚀 The Fram2 mission: I’m sure you’ll see news about this on March 31. Astronauts are going to orbit both the North and South Poles for the first time ever. The crew will fly in a SpaceX Dragon capsule and spend up to five days in space. Oh, and they’ll be taking the first-ever X-ray of a human body off-planet. 

Microsoft Copilot’s getting smarter: Better late than never, I suppose. Look for two new deep reasoning agents in April. Researcher can dig through multiple sources and pull insights from third-party tools like Salesforce, while Analyst can turn messy data into clean spreadsheets. 

🐣 Not a practical yolk: Ever seen a chicken hatch from an open egg? A Japanese student actually pulled it off, and the video’s racking up thousands of upvotes on Reddit. The clip shows him cutting the egg open and injecting things into the embryo. After 21 days, a chick pops out. Strange but amazing.

☀️ Wake up! Amazon just dropped some new goodies at great prices for their Big Spring Sale.

• Treat yourself at breakfast with a Belgian waffle maker (25% off).
• Prefer a smoothie on the go? Grab a two-pack of portable blenders (20% off).
• Update your sad old pot to a Ninja coffee maker (20% off).
• A mug warmer (17% off) keeps coffee and tea at the perfect temp.
• Work comfortably on a seat cushion (15% off) while you tackle emails.
• Give your feet a break. Slide this footrest (37% off) under your desk.
• Winding down? Under-eye masks (45% off) make your couch feel like the spa.
• Use a scalp massager (23% off) to melt away the day’s worries.
• Dive into a good book with a Kindle Colorsoft (20% off).
• Or upgrade your evening binge-watch with a TV backlight (29% off).

🛌 Temps are rising: Stay chill all night long with a cooling comforter (28% off) and bed pillows (32% off). Sweet dreams.

💻 Such a turnoff: Try Windows’ “shade” shortcut to shut down your PC. Right-click on your desktop and go to New > Shortcut. In the location field, type: %windir%System32SlideToShutDown.exe. Click Next, name the shortcut and hit Finish. Double-click this shortcut to open a pull-down shade at the top of your screen. Drag it to the bottom to power off.

🔕 Notification overload? Android’s Notification Cooldown lowers the volume and mutes alerts for two minutes when too many come in at once. Go to Settings > Notifications. Under General, tap Notification Cooldown. It’s live on Google Pixels and coming to Android 16 soon, so save this.

✨ Drag and drop like a boss: On your iPhone or iPad, no more copy and paste. Move text, images, files, links and photos between apps with just your finger. Press and hold on something, like a photo in Safari or a chunk of text in Notes, until it lifts slightly. Let go where you want it to land (like Mail, Messages or Files), and boom! There it is! 

Big Tech chooses the emails you see: That’s why (gasp) my newsletter and other stuff you want to see can get lost in junk or promotions. Try my email pick built around your privacy, StartMail. Hit this link for a free seven-day trial.*

😓 To-do list stress? Goblin.tools uses AI to estimate how long tasks take and breaks them into easy steps. Type in your to-do (like spring-cleaning the house) and hit Add (+). Rate how detailed you want the steps by clicking the 🌶 icon. Yup, it’s free.

Not for little eyes: Set maturity ratings on Netflix, so your kiddos don’t watch anything too adult. Open the app, select My Netflix > Menu (three-line icon) > Manage Profiles and pick your kid’s profile. Then, tap Viewing Restrictions > Maturity Rating and enter your password. Set the level you’d like.

🎉 Let the weekend begin! Woo, you made it to Friday. It’s time to kick your tech into weekend mode.

iPhone: Set a Focus Mode that shuts down Slack, Outlook or any app that screams “9 to 5” but still lets mom, your spouse or your dinner reservation texts come through. Go to Settings > Focus > Personal. Add your VIPs and set it to auto-activate Fridays at 6 p.m.

Android: Open the Gmail app, tap your work account > Notifications > None. That’s it! Your work inbox can wait till Monday. Bonus points if you swap your wallpaper for something that says “weekend mode activated.”

✈️ Heading overseas? Watch this video on how easy it is to set up an eSim on your phone. Roaming fees can get outrageous fast. Saily eSIM is a simple, affordable way to stay connected in more than 200 countries. Plans start as low as $1.89, and activate automatically when you land. Get 10% off with my exclusive deal!

👏🏻 Look at that, you’re one click smarter! Now, go make it count. See you right back here tomorrow with another issue of the best tech newsletter in the USA. On tap, cheap ways to make your old tech better. You don’t want to miss that! — Kim

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