The App Store is booming again, and AI may be why

The App Store is booming again, and AI may be why

Everyone said AI would kill apps. Instead, new app launches are soaring. According to a new analysis from market intelligence provider Appfigures, worldwide app releases in the first quarter of 2026 were up 60% year-over-year across both Apple’s App Store and Google Play. That percentage was an even higher 80% when looking at the iOS…

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How Google’s dev tools manager makes AI coding work

How Google’s dev tools manager makes AI coding work

As Google’s project manager for developer tools, Ryan Salva has a front-row seat to the ways AI tools are changing coding. Formerly of GitHub and Microsoft, he’s now responsible for tools like Gemini CLI and Gemini Code Assist, nudging developers into the new world of agentic programming. His team released new third-party research on Tuesday…

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GitHub Copilot crosses 20 million all-time users

GitHub Copilot crosses 20 million all-time users

GitHub Copilot, an AI coding tool offered by Microsoft-owned GitHub, has now reached more than 20 million users, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said on the company’s earnings call Wednesday. A GitHub spokesperson confirmed to TechCrunch that this number represents “all-time users.” That means five million people have tried out GitHub Copilot for the first time…

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OpenAI launches Codex, an AI coding agent, in ChatGPT

OpenAI launches Codex, an AI coding agent, in ChatGPT

OpenAI announced on Friday it’s launching a research preview of Codex, the company’s most capable AI coding agent yet. Codex is powered by codex-1, a version of the company’s o3 AI reasoning model optimized for software engineering tasks. OpenAI says codex-1 produces “cleaner” code than o3, adheres more precisely to instructions, and will iteratively run…

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