We can forget about big new features for iOS 12. Apple is focused on “addressing performance and quality issues” in 2018, according to a new report. Here are five things that should be at the top of the company’s repair list.
Siri’s voice recognition
Siri is missing features offered by rival virtual assistants like Amazon Alexa, but it’s unlikely that’s going to change anytime soon. Apple’s restrictions mean Siri will never be as flexible as its rivals. But Apple can (and should) improve its voice recognition.
It’s been over five years since the virtual assistant made its debut on iPhone 4s, and yet it still has problems understanding many users. Siri still cannot perform simple commands for some users, or properly transcribe dictation. Some even say it has gotten worse in recent years.
https://twitter.com/MattAgron/status/742475130035703808
Apple gave Siri a more natural voice with iOS 11, but that’s not enough. It doesn’t matter how convincing it sounds if its responses are way off target. Accurate voice recognition is a must for any virtual assistant, and with HomePod on the way, Apple needs to fix it now more than ever.
Notification Center
Notification Center has remained largely unchanged since it was introduced with iOS 5. It looks better now, but it’s fundamentally the same. In other words, it’s still a horrible mess.
Most of us get dozens of notifications every day, and if you don’t look at your iPhone regularly, the most important ones get lost among a sea of clutter. Apple really needs to fix this, and it should start by ripping off Android’s notifications.
https://twitter.com/vladsavov/status/928285021332496387
Android lets you categorize your notifications for every app, so your most important alerts are always visible at the top of the list, regardless of when they were received. That means an important email can’t be buried under 20 notifications from a game you never play anymore.
Android also groups notifications for each app so they don’t end up all over the place, and you can dismiss them all at once. You can even color-code them so they’re really easy to spot at a glance. Again, this prevents important messages from being lost within a long list of alerts.
Apple should hire some Android designers to fix iOS notifications. They are a mess. Ideas to fix them:
* Group notifications
* Unread dots instead of numbers
* Easier way to clear all pic.twitter.com/3hYuajvbYJ— Alex (@alexmuench) November 20, 2017
Google even gives its users the ability to snooze notifications so they reappear at a more convenient time, while developers can issue them with a timer. This means time-sensitive notifications — like a flash sale in a shopping app — don’t sit there after the sale has expired.
Portrait mode
Lots of iPhone users love Portrait mode, but most agree it could be better. With two camera lenses to rely on, it should do a better job of identifying your subject and not making them blurry around the edges. Sometimes it’s awesome; sometimes it’s a complete bust.
Apple should be able to fix this with improvements in software. Google nailed it in its Pixel 2 lineup, which has just one rear-facing camera, so Apple should be able to do better.
iPhone X’s status bar
iPhone X’s “notch” means we can’t have a complete status bar, and Apple decides what is displayed in the space available. Not everyone needs to see cellular and Wi-Fi signal strength, however. Some would prefer a Bluetooth indicator or battery percentage.
Apple needs to make the status bar customizable — just as it did with Control Center in iOS 11 — so that we can choose what’s displayed there.
Bugs
I’ve already ranted about how buggy Apple’s software has become. Some of the most serious issues in iOS 11 have already been addressed, but plenty of smaller glitches remain. There’s a whole Twitter Moment dedicated to them.
Nice overlap. pic.twitter.com/gvZVHkqAaE
— Jaden Geller ♂️ (@JadenGeller) November 4, 2017
Apple needs to eliminate these problems. It has earned a sterling reputation for spectacular software over the years, and there’s a risk that will be tarnished. We don’t (and shouldn’t) expect weird glitches and random freezes on iPhones and iPads.
I appreciate that smaller issues are difficult to identify in beta testing, and software will never be perfect. But it’s baffling that some of these problems made their way into public iOS releases — and still remain today. If Apple only fixes one thing on this list, bugs should be it.
What do you want improved?
What would you like to see Apple change or improve in iOS 12? Let us know down in the comments.
Killian Bell is a freelance writer based in the U.K. He has an interest in all things tech and also covers Android over at CultofAndroid.com. You can follow him on Twitter via @killianbell.
38 responses to “5 things Apple needs to fix in iOS 12”
Hey, where do I get the wallpaper of the first pic?
+1 on the Siri voice recognition upgrade. At this point, Siri is almost *too* smart for its own good. The AI assistant constantly hears words properly, then … thinks about things furiously … and finally changes the words to something completely wrong. Maddening!
I concur
+1
in my language, Dutch we use a lot of English words that Siri apparently asumes must be something more Dutch’s sounding… And for those working in ICT it’s even worse as we mix Dutch and English even more frequently.
Whatever keyboard language you have installed should be considered valid languages to mix and match imho..
Apple should allow you to copy and past a PORTION of an SMS in messages. At present you can only copy a whole message.
I’d like to see that horrific, feature-poor, bug-laden music app overhauled—if not completely scrapped.
bring back zoomed view vs standard view.. as well the facial recognition is too sensitive, it unlocks all the time and i am deleting emails and other apps .. if you even hold the iPhone X away from your face and swipe screens it will end up on my your desktop and you are screwed.
1. Camera. There are now seven (7!) ways to capture things. I personally use photos and panos, and when either is picked the other isn’t directly pickable. I need to be able to arrange the buttons; even leave some off.
2. I have (way too) many apps. I need to be able to quickly find in what folder an app is.
3. Make Siri smarter, by all means. It’s embarrassing how incompetent she is. She has access to Wolfram Alpha and it has a world of data but she can’t use it to calculate even simple averages of temperature data.
4. In Car Play let us use our own navigation apps rather than just Apple’s.
How about having more than one setting on do not disturb. Like week day schedule and a weekend one.
I wish would for one fix the caps lock I hate that it doesn’t stay locked when you switch to and from numbers or characters and 2 on the iPhone x I can’t stand the placement of the mic button for dictation on text app I don’t know if its just me but I always activate dictation because of its placement.
Not even speaking about the carrier automatic selection, even if automatic is turned off.
When close to a border, iOS 11 will pick any carrier, even foreign, without warning instead of cutting service. Then you speak at roaming rates without even knowing.
In Vermont or Washington states? Very likely to pick a Canadian carrier.
In Switzerland? You’ll connect to a French, German, Italian or Austrian carrier.
In Normandy France, you’ll pick up a UK carrier.
This is just nonsense.
If this is a “feature” then remove the automatic carrier selection option since it’s totally ignored.
(Not talking about data roaming, but voice roaming).
This is ridiculous.
They need to fix the app installation/update process as it currently completely slugs the performance of the whole device when apps are being updated. Taps are ignored, general unresponsiveness, laggy, etc. Updating apps shouldn’t be allowed to have this much impact on the system performance.
(iPhone 6s in my case)
1. Siri should be able to recognize different lanuages at the same time (without changing the language in settings), for example when asking to play a song and that song is en French, Spanish or any other language and she doesn’t get it.
2. Improve system speed animations (not only reduce motion, but make them faster)
3. Make the 3d touch app switcher gesture available to boths sides of the screen.
4. A better option for one hand use, reachability is very limited (plus size models especially)
5. Manual controls for camera app
> 2. Improve system speed animations (not only reduce motion, but make them faster)
No kidding. I bought an iPhone X on release day, and just last week got an iPad Pro 10.5″, and the system animations are FAR better on the iPad than on the iPhone X which cost me twice as much.
I think there’s a major problem with Memory Management on the iPhone X that needs to be resolved YESTERDAY.
It must be the iPad Pro new ProMotion with the refresh rate at 120Hz. I was really expecting the iphone X to have this aswell, but you’re right they need to improve memory management too.
I want to use Siri but I find I have to repeat myself 3-4 times sometimes to get a response. If it does not work close to even 95% it is not something that will be used.
A fix for Apple Music Play Later. Right now it plays after the whole playlist instead of last in the queue.
My biggest annoyance and something I can’t believe wasn’t added yet, is a search function in the sharesheet UI…
The sharing/export options are sorted differently between apps, making it just painful to find what you’re looking for..
I just want to be able to swipe right inside the share sheet, to reveal a search icon that expands into a search field when tapped.
There are two things to change with Apple Watch. Both have to do with Messages.
First is to eliminate the need to double tap a message to delete it. Swiping left on a message brings up a trash can, then you have to wait for the ‘Trash’ symbol to appear a second time.
Second is to provide for a way to delete more than one message at a time.
Thanks!
You didn’t mention the two most important ones, as far as I’m concerned. 1) BATTERY LIFE. Performing the daily download of apps which have been updated shouldn’t drain 30 percent or more of battery life as it usually does for me. 2) Toggling of blue tooth and wifi needs to be made REALLY toggling as it used to be. If there’s any point the user community should refuse to get off Apple’s back about until it’s dealt with, it’s this! As a third issue – not directly iOS but still – restore the iOS app store to iTunes so that downloads to iOS apps can be done in iTunes and synced as they could before that egregious takeaway. That would address a major contributor to my #1 above. I also think Apple needs to fire some developers and replace them with ones whose innovative and problem-solving skills go beyond the ability to come up with new emojis.
P.S. I do agree with you about Siri – as far as I’m concerned it’s pretty useless as far as any sort of dictation and in fact I think it’s gone BACKWARDS in terms of being able to understand my input correctly over the last few years. And then there’s Apple TV, on which Siri is WORTHLESS. On the other hand and in all honesty, I have also installed the iOS version of Cortana and don’t really find that much better, and out of privacy concerns I won’t install Hey Google so can’t honestly compare that. So other than the inexcusable Apple TV Siri performance, I can’t fairly say that Siri in particular is significantly worse than its peer software.
I cannot honestly understand why they removed App installation and distribution from iTunes. I had to restore an iPad the other day because I upgraded, and it had to run OVERNIGHT on my Wi-Fi to restore Apps to the OS, and when it initially started the restore there was little to no rhyme or reason as to what it was installing and when, or what Apps had stalled or were in process. Having to do everything wirelessly is such a goddamn mess, some of us like to tether and manage for five minutes through a Lightning cable, instead of in some Wireless restore limbo for 6 hours.
I think you can still do a restore with cable through iTunes…can’t you? (If that has gone away I seriously WILL consider abandoning Apple for my next phone upgrade). I still backup my iPhone and iPad through iTunes. I would think the apps should come back too … the only issue is that if they don’t come back in the folders and/or organized on the pages you prefer, you don’t have the option to use the iMac mouse/trackpad to move the apps around on the iMac. Moving a zillion apps between pages with one’s finger on an iPhone is RIDICULOUSLY tricky and time-consuming, especially when it causes other apps to jump around and rearrange themselves further complicating the process.
No you can not install through iTunes, All the backup does is arrange the apps in the order you had them. It then installs over wifi, I have done this a couple of times. One thing Apple didn’t think of when removing this function is for all the non music buffs like me who are not that into music but because I back up and installed through iTunes I would go to the music store and browse, which led me to buy songs. Now I don’t go to iTunes at all except to backup maybe once a week so I don’t even bother browsing anymore. I would think that would be a huge loss of revenue.
Fix the browser Safari, try commenting on websites like Rolling Stone Magazine.
Fix the built in Mail app so it works with Yahoo email or just remove it, add back more control when creating an email account. I still get password is bad messages, when they are not from yahoo. Try finding a place to reset the password. Yahoo is a POS software, I am slowly moving off of it because of the awful downloads of each message, constant display error messages.
Add in an export to the stored password info. I have moved to a third party product because of the lack of being able to export it and print it.
Say it with me folks:
FIX. YOUR. MEMORY. MANAGEMENT. APPLE.
Please, Apple, improve Contacts, especially the “note” inside Contacts — iCloud is truncating text and won’t allow the scroll bar to scroll down past the size of the page, as determined by the size of the device screen. The text is there, but can’t be accessed, viewed, edited, etc. Another thing, the cursor goes crazy in Contacts note field, and won’t stay where placed unless the I use the arrows to move the cursor around.
Did they ever deal with the battery problems if early iOS 11? I won’t UG unless they do. Thanks.
The iOS keyboard needs a lot of improvements too. Apple really needs to look at Android to get some good functionality and UI/UX ideas. With features such as: Number Row (at the top of the keyboard), Number Keypad toggle for faster number input, Swipe Input, and Long Press for Symbols, the Android keyboard is far superior than it’s iOS counterpart, making text input much faster and intuitive.
SE camera fails to focus, need reboot phone. Is sensor faulty? do I need new phone?
The App Store. Ever since iOS 11 and it’s new implementation, it is VERY difficult to successfully download apps, e s p e c i a l l y if it’s either (a) a brand-new app downloading for the first time, or (b) several updates at once. Now, I’m the first to acknowledge my internet is slow, but companies and developers need to work WITH slower speeds, not ignore them entirely. In the past, although it might take a while to download or update an app–it would, eventually, download or update. But with the new App Store and iOS 11, it’s like playing Russian Roulette to try and get a damn app downloaded and installed. (Sometimes rebooting a device helps… most of the time it doesn’t.) And nothing changed on my end; this is all on Apple.
Apple needs to fix Mac Photos syncing failure via iTunes to iPhones and iPads. This has failed to work since iOS 11 was introduced in late September last year
Does no one remember that we used to be able to group notifications by app in iOS? We had that ability in iOS 9 and then one day it was gone!
I’ve been pissed off about it ever since. But I can see why, everyone I’ve ever asked about it never knew wtf I was talking about.
Idk what genius thought it would be a great idea to omit that simple ability, but I despise him for it. Or her. I’m not sexist.
1-battery still drain’s like crazy,using a hotspot just sux it empty and many time’s it just shuts off at 20%
2- get my edited photo’s synced to photo’s stream so they appear on my mac and not just the original so i don’t have to mail my self the edited photo’s witch is a tedious and annoying work around for no reason
This is for Messages-
I’d like to be able to create a group of contacts on the phone to allow me to send a mass text to a select group.
Yes you can create groups through iCloud Contacts but if the contact has more than one phone number to it, then when you try to text the group the contact is in, it sends to all the numbers associated with that contact. Am I the only person who has someone’s home, mobile and business # for some in my contact list?
Yes there are apps available to do this but that created a whole other nightmare of combining contacts that shouldn’t have been combined.
Androids, at least Samsung’s, can create groups within the phone and it allows you to select the number you want to use. So why can’t we ?
The number of bugs and the frequency of SW updates makes Apple foolish. Apple does not know what their customers want or need, Apple just dumps on us. Greedy, incompetent and self serving. Change the culture back to the old Apple else I’ll buy the competitors products.
Let’s not get crazy here. Yes Apple is more than a little high handed and I fault them for that. But have you used Android? I have, and it’s a mess. iOS would have to get a LOT worse before I would switch.
iOS on the iPad is different from the iPhone. I want Apple to finish the job and do something about the desktop on the iPad. There’s too much space between icons. I have two screens of Apps on my iPP, but could fit them all on one if the icons were closer together. Maybe let US customize the size of the grid and the icons. And then how about doing away with the silly way apps arrange themselves. If I want a screen with Apps arranged around the edge and the middle blank I should be able to do it. If I want all of my media (BBC, CBC, DW, MPR) grouped tightly on one side then some space and all my graphics Apps (LimaFusion, Procreate, Graphic) in the opposite I should be able to do that. This fixed grid that pushes an app to the next row if you try to impose any order is absurd.