Swift Playgrounds adds new robots for budding coders

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Swift Playgrounds
Dive into coding with Swift Playgrounds.
Photo: Apple

Swift Playgrounds, Apple’s code-learning app aimed at youngsters, got a huge update today with the biggest new set of features sent the app came out in 2016.

With the Swift Playgrounds 2.0 update, coders get access to a host of new robots, as well as the ability to subscribe to third-party level creators so you can find and download new levels faster.

The new update comes hot on the heels of the launch of iOS 11.3 which brought new Animoji, iCloud Messages, business chat, and more to the iPhone and iPad. Apple also came out with new betas for tvOS 11.3 and macOS 10.13.4.

Swift Playgrounds is quickly evolving from a simple coding app for kids, to a full-on educational platform. Last year Apple added the ability to code robots from a few third-party companies. Now it’s expanding that to offer new robots from IBM named TJBot and Mekamon. The new robots can be found from the Add Subscriptions button in the app.

Users can no subscribe to playgrounds from third-party creators as well as browse and download their other content in the app. A new gallery view shows all the playgrounds in a single view making browsing faster.

The update is available now for free on iPad.

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