Tag Archives: how-to

Setting up a virtual private network on your phone or laptop means a much better level of privacy and security for you and your data. VPNs help to hide your browsing activity and protect your sensitive data from other people, including the company supplying your broadband service. Using a VPN …

A burr grinder is the automatic, electronic version of the manual coffee mills people have been using to grind coffee for centuries. Whether it’s a flat or conical burr grinder (I explain the differences in my Best Coffee Grinders guide), those heavy-duty burrs are going to break coffee beans down …

In 2022 I wrote an op-ed for NBC News Think about leg hair, of all things. The piece detailed a monthlong experiment during which I stopped shaving. Aside from one paragraph about bodily autonomy and Roe v. Wade, I thought it was a mild article. Boring, even. The internet disagreed. …

For decades, the only way to get a hearing aid was to visit a doctor and have one prescribed for you—probably in a strip mall office advertised on the marquee only with “HEARING AIDS” in block letters. These centers still exist, but they’re fortunately a dying breed, because in August …

I started journaling in 2019. It's not that I love keeping a journal, exactly. It's more that I find my brain works better if I spend a little time dumping its contents onto paper every morning. This practice got me through 2020, an extremely difficult year, and I've kept it …

Knowing your way around some keyboard shortcuts—whether for Windows, macOS, or individual programs—is perhaps one of the best time-saving productivity hacks there is. You don't have to reach for the mouse or trackpad to navigate to a new place on the screen, and you don't have to hunt through menus …

Deleting digital accounts that you rarely or never use not only reduces the amount of clutter in your online life—it keeps you safer too. Every extra account you've got is an extra target for a hacker, an extra database that might leak, and an extra way that someone might get …

There are a ton of tricks that smart displays can do. But not all of them are created equal or are worth doing on this style of advice. The basics are easy—just about anyone knows how handy it is to ask any smart speaker or smart display to tell you …

We really like physical photos around these parts. Our guide to the Best Instant Cameras has a collection of modern gadgets that print out pictures that you can stick on your fridge or pin on your walls. But what about the ones that started it all? Polaroid cameras have been …

It’s shadow time, baby! Soon, people living in North America will get to experience their first solar eclipse in almost a decade. Even though the last solar eclipse in North America happened in 2017, the next one isn’t expected until August 2044, so seizing this moment is critical. More than …