Finding your Lyft ride will soon get a lot easier — you won’t have to search for an ambiguous pink, glowing mustache or a Lyft placard on the side of a car. Instead, you’ll be able to easily distinguish your ride with Amp, a colorful connected device that Lyft hopes will “elevate” its brand.
The Amp is an oblong, oval display that sits in a Lyft driver’s car. Resembling a car’s rear-view mirror, the front of the Amp houses a RGB LED screen with the Lyft logo in the center; the back features another marquee-like display. The main purpose of the device is to help the driver and passenger find each other quickly.
When your driver arrives, the app will mention the color of the Amp. As your driver’s Amp starts flashing a color, like green, the app will also let you turn your phone into a giant green display. That way you can wave your phone’s screen at the driver to get his attention. If you’re in a crowded area with multiple people booking Lyft rides, the color will be different for each person.
Jesse McMillin, creative director at Lyft, tells Digital Trends that the screens can animate in a million different ways, and further personalization will arrive at a later date. For example, you may get the option to choose a color and pattern for the driver’s Amp to display to make it even easier to identify your Lyft.
When you get in the car, the back of the Amp displays basic messages like, “Hello John.” Down the road, Lyft plans to increase the amount of interactivity passengers can have with this Bluetooth-connected device — McMillin’s suggestions include a way to leave a message for the passenger after you, or the possibility of playing Pac-Man or Pong during the ride.
While the mustache will officially be retired, the company wants to retain its lighthearted and fun attitude. The company launched in 2012, and the fuzzy pink mustache quickly became an easy way for people to identify their rides. Just last year, Lyft replaced it with the “glowstache,” but it looks like both are taking a back seat to the Amp.
“We just felt like as we grow and get bigger, lots of people were sharing and talking about Lyft,” McMillin said. “You might not always know what the mustache means, and it just takes a lot more work to help you what that means. [Amp] also kind of elevates the brand too — it feels like it might be a little more mature, and more broadly understood.”
Lyft is launching its second big marketing campaign this week, featuring Tobias Jelinek from Stranger Things. They show corporate executives from “Ride Corp.,” a rather obvious allusion to the company’s main competitor, Uber. The ads are fun, while still underscoring several key points that differentiates Lyft from its competitors.
You won’t see Amp on the road just yet — drivers will get it after hitting a 75-ride milestone, but only after Amp hits the road on December 31.
Not long ago, Apple treated independent repair like an act of outright hostility. The Cupertino giant locked down parts with serial-number pairing, while repair tools remained firmly out of reach of anyone outside its authorized repair network. More importantly, the company waged a legal and lobbying battle against right-to-repair legislation.
I've covered enough of these fights over the years to know what a shift looks like. That's why what happened in October 2026 genuinely caught me off guard. The day the iPhone Duo went on sale, what may be the most mechanically complex iPhone to date, Apple pulled off a surprising about-face. It published teardown-style repair manuals for a handful of major components.
Apple's first foldable phone is now on shelves, in short supply, but with an unreal amount of buzz around it. After all, it's the first foldable iPhone, and there's plenty that this phone gets right. But there's also a lot that is either broken or underwhelming. What's peculiar is the dialogue around this phone, and how it has completely overshadowed every other attempt at making a phone with a similar form factor.
I've spent some time with the iPhone Duo, and I've used the Galaxy Z Fold 8 for almost three months now. In my opinion, Samsung deserves more credit. When the Galaxy Z Fold 8 arrived earlier this year, it was celebrated in some circles and ridiculed in others for supposedly copying what Apple would eventually deliver with the iPhone Duo. The dialogue was pretty odd, for multiple reasons. Samsung has been making foldable phones for years, so claiming that it copied a product Apple hadn't even launched was simply absurd.
For years, Samsung’s Galaxy A phones have been some of the easiest recommendations for anyone who wants to go the Android route without paying flagship prices. But that part of the lineup could soon become harder to find at a good price.
According to South Korea’s Electronic Times, Samsung is cutting Galaxy A production by about 20% in the fourth quarter compared to its original plans. Component orders have reportedly dropped by a similar amount, which could mean roughly 10 million fewer phones over the year. Samsung is also said to be considering another production cut of more than 10% next year.