14 of the coolest apps and tech products not available in Europe

Pandora is an extremely popular online radio service, with 80 million active users. But Europeans wanting to give it are out of luck: It’s only operational in the US, Australia, and New Zealand due to "licensing constraints."

Facebook Graph Search was a radical revamp of Facebook’s search box that was first introduced in March 2013. It allows for natural-language search queries — or more simply, you can just type what you want and it understands it. “Friends who went to the University of Oxford and like Kendrick Lamar,” or “People who are single and like Oasis.”

Although Graph Search has been discontinued as a product name, its natural-language features still exist — but they're only available for Facebook users who use English (US) as their language, the primary language of Facebook's developer team. It is yet to launch for English (UK) or any other European languages.

Samsung is including different processors in its new flagship smartphone depending on the region it is being sold. In much of the world, it comes with the Snapdragon 820, which it more powerful that the A9 processor in the iPhone 6s — but in Europe, it only has an Exynos 8809, which is weaker than the A9. It's not clear why Samsung opted for the weaker processor.

The Amazon Dash Button is a mini-gadget that Amazon customers can use to order staple goods with via the push of a button. You might have one next to the washing machine that you press whenever you’re low on washing powder, or one to order new nappies by the crib. Once again, it’s an example of Amazon's latest products not being available in Europe.

Hulu is an American streaming service that runs content from everyone from 21st Century Fox to TimeWarner. But Europeans will have to sit this one out, as it’s only available inside the US. It doesn't have the appropriate rights for its content to show it elsewhere.

In America, if you upload a photo, it can recognise your friends and suggest tags for them. But due to privacy laws, this feature isn’t available in Europe: It can identify where faces are, but you need to enter in whose face it is manually.

Europeans don’t even get the same search results that Americans do. The “right to be forgotten” in the EU stipulates that European citizens can apply to have outdated or irrelevant web pages about them removed from search results.

The web pages themselves aren’t removed — but hidden from search, they become a whole lot harder to find. This is why Google includes the message “Some results may have been removed under data protection law in Europe” when presenting search results for names.

The Nook is an e-reader/tablet produced by Barnes & Nobles, a US bookshop chain. It’s currently available in the UK — but not for much longer. On March 15, it is closing down its digital content store in Britain, and transferring existing customers to Sainsbury’s.

The Nook has been in trouble for some time: In July 2015, it closed down the Nook Store for most of its other international customers.

Facebook Moments is a neat photo-sharing app from Facebook that helps manage your photos and share them privately with friends. It uses facial recognition tech to figure out who’s in your photos, then (with your permission) sends them to them. But because of Europe’s privacy and data protection laws, it’s not available here.

Seamless is a food delivery app that works with thousands of restaurants — but only in America. It operates in New York, Boston, Washington, Miami, and elsewhere. It's based in the US, and is yet to try launching the app in Europe.

Venmo lets you send money to your friends quickly and easily via your smartphone, and you can sign up with your Facebook account. It’s a US company, and only operates within the US: It doesn't have the appropriate licenses to run elsewhere.

Snapcash is Snapchat’s answer to Venmo. It lets you send money to people using the ephemeral messaging app. But like Venmo, it only works if you live in the USA — again, likely due to regulatory requirements.

Lyft is a ride-hailing app in the vein of Uber, known for its trademark bright pink moustache. But while Uber is frantically steering towards world domination, Lyft is yet to launch outside of America.