May 31, 2013: The Chicago Sun-Times fires all 28 of its photographers, with the goal of training its staff to shoot photos using iPhones instead. Pulitzer Prize winner John H. White is among those who lose their jobs.
The move is significant not just because of what it says about the declining newspaper industry. It also spotlights the iPhone’s growing acceptance as a professional camera.
Who needs a computer or expensive photo editing software like Adobe Lightroom? You can edit pictures right on your iPhone with Apple’s free, built-in tools.
The Photos app comes with a ton of professional editing tools baked into it. If you didn’t line your shot up quite right, you can fix the crop and perspective. If you took it a split second too late, you can use Live Photo functionality to replace the shot. You can add a Portrait mode blur after the fact, and even change which part of the image is in focus.
Here are the eight great editing tools built right into your iPhone.
When will you be able to add your driver’s license or state ID to Apple Wallet on your iPhone? In the United States, it varies by where you live. It’s not up to Apple: Each state and territory maintains a completely independent registry of drivers and identification cards, so each one must independently pass legislation and implement digital IDs.
If you live in Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Georgia, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Maryland, Montana, New Mexico, North Dakota, Ohio, Puerto Rico or West Virginia, you can do it today. (Our guide will show you how to add your driver’s license to Apple Wallet.) Otherwise, check our map and lists below to see how likely your state is to let you add your ID to Apple Wallet, and when it might happen.
In several states, Apple’s state ID initiative enables iPhones and Apple Watches to hold a digital copy of the user’s driver’s license, in the same way these devices store credit cards and airline tickets. And across the United States, you can create an Apple Digital ID based on your passport that can get you through some airport security checks.
The day when an iPhone can completely take the place of an old-fashioned wallet remains years away, but it’s a goal Apple is working toward. Apple Pay is making progress on replacing credit cards, you can put airline tickets in the Wallet app, and the same goes for loyalty cards.
But no wallet is complete unless it can hold an ID. And that’s where Apple’s digital ID initiative comes in. Here’s what you need to know to add your driver’s license, state ID or federal passport to your Apple Wallet.
WhatsApp wants to make Meta AI a lot more useful on the iPhone. To that end, Meta is working on a new feature that allows users to upload documents and get AI-powered summaries and answers right in WhatsApp.
For iPhone users, this sounds like a meaningful upgrade. Instead of switching between apps to analyze PDFs, notes, presentations or spreadsheets, users will be able to hand files directly to Meta AI without relying on another chatbot.
If you’ve been sitting on an older Apple device, now might be a good time to put it toward something new. The iPhone giant has quietly updated its U.S. trade-in estimates, boosting values across most of its current iPhone, iPad, Mac and Apple Watch lineup.
If you feel like every photo you take looks boring and overprocessed, you can change your iPhone camera settings to take natural, lo-fi pictures.
Turning down the exposure can prevent the photo from looking unnaturally bright (and more like something shot on an older digital camera). If you have a newer iPhone, you can even change its Photographic Style to “Natural,” for better-looking colors. A few quick trips into the Settings app can turn off the lens distortion on the Ultra Wide and selfie cameras, for that pure fisheye look.
You can even take things a step further and download a different camera app — one that captures totally unprocessed photos straight from your iPhone’s sensor.
Here are my top tips for taking lo-fi iPhone photos.
Apple is reportedly preparing to overhaul one of the iPhone’s most cluttered menus: the AirPods settings screen.
Over the years, the AirPods settings screen has grown more cluttered with every new feature Apple introduces to the popular earbuds. That could change with iOS 27, which could come with a completely revamped layout for the AirPods settings.
On the latest episode of the Cult of Mac podcast: Apple might go back to the iPhone future, thanks to some metallurgical magic that involves a special titanium alloy.
We discuss the pros, the cons and the possible timeline for such a retro upgrade.
Also on the Cult of Mac podcast:
Listen to this week’s episode of the Cult of Mac podcast in the Podcasts app or your favorite podcast app. (Be sure to subscribe and leave us a review if you like it!) Or watch the video version, embedded below.
Apple is reportedly testing a prototype quad-curved OLED screen for the iPhone 19 Pro as part of its push toward an all-screen iPhone. If the leaks prove accurate, it could mark Apple’s biggest redesign since the iPhone X.
The rumored 2027 flagship phone is said to come with under-display Face ID and be curved on all four sides. It could give buyers a compelling reason to skip the iPhone 18 Pro.
Apple stopped signing iOS 26.4.2, meaning iPhone users who updated to iOS 26.5 can no longer roll back to the previous version.
Whenever Apple rolls out an iOS update, it allows users to go back to the previous version if they run into bugs or other issues. But once the company considers the new release stable, it stops signing the older build.
Apple might be having second thoughts about aluminum on the iPhone. A few months after switching the iPhone 17 Pro away from titanium, the company is now reportedly experimenting with an improved titanium alloy that could fix a huge problem with the metal.
If Apple finds a way to make it practical, we could see titanium return to a future iPhone Pro. But the problem is that titanium isn’t as good as aluminum at transferring heat. Aluminum’s better thermal properties are likely why Apple moved away from titanium in the first place. Also, aluminum is cheaper and easier to recycle.
Fortnite returned to the App Store in almost all regions, ending its years-long absence that began when Epic Games sued Apple over in-app purchases.
The battle royale’s comeback is real, but Epic Games’ claim that it has already won isn’t completely true. Epic Games brought back Fortnite to the App Store on Tuesday, following the game’s U.S. return last year. But there’s an exception — Australia — and the legal fight that made this possible is nowhere near finished.
Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference kicks off June 8, and all eyes are on iOS 27 — the software update that could define the iPhone experience for the next several years.
Given a steady drumbeat of reliable rumors, a surprisingly complete picture of the update has already emerged. Here’s what to expect in iOS 27 regarding the big Siri revamp and more. We’ll see if the keynote confirms it all.
WhatsApp is testing a new feature on iPhone where messages automatically disappear once you read them. The privacy-focused feature, called “After reading,” also gives users fine-tuned control over how long their texts remain visible after someone opens them.
The new feature builds upon WhatsApp’s existing disappearing messages functionality. Currently, users can choose to automatically delete sent messages after one day, seven days or 90 days.
This week on the Cult of Mac podcast: A fresh iOS 27 rumor says the iPhone’s Camera app will get a serious upgrade. And it sounds like the best of both worlds — heavy customization if you want it, status quo if you don’t.
Also on the Cult of Mac podcast:
Listen to this week’s episode of the Cult of Mac podcast in the Podcasts app or your favorite podcast app. (Be sure to subscribe and leave us a review if you like it!) Or watch the video version embedded below.
If your iPhone is always blowing up with junk and spam, you can stop notifications dead in their tracks. You may not know that you can entirely disable notifications per-app and turn off different types of notifications to keep them from cluttering your phone.
I’m not afraid to disable all notifications from an app if it crosses me one time too many. For others, I allow notifications on the Lock Screen, but disable them from Notification Center, so they’re more temporary.
Here’s how you can do it, too. Check out our quick video.
The colorful Pride Luminance wallpaper and watch face add beautiful color gradients to your iPhone and Apple Watch. You can download them both after updating to iOS 26.5 and watchOS 26.5.
Since they’re part of Apple’s annual Pride collection, they come with a bunch of preset styles for various pride flags. But you can customize the Lock Screen wallpaper and the Apple Watch face however you want. With a light and dark shade of the same color, the vertical stripes and gradients shimmer and animate when you swipe up to unlock your phone. Or you can go to the other extreme, picking up to 12 colors from the Luminance palette.
This is easily the best Pride wallpaper Apple has produced yet — in fact, it’s a great wallpaper, period. Check it out in our quick video or keep reading.
Since I spend a lot of time using Safari on my iPhone, any new tips and tricks I learn can feel life-changing. Apple’s mobile web browser proves absolutely instrumental to my iPhone usage (and odds are, it does for you, too).
Here are a few of my favorite hidden features. These Safari tips will help you browse the web faster, clean up your experience and restore tabs you accidentally close. I also have a handy shortcut you can download at the end.
Keep reading or watch our video.
May 12, 2005: Longtime Apple frenemy Bill Gates tells a German newspaper that Apple may have hit it big with the iPod, but that its success isn’t going to last forever.
The reason for the Microsoft co-founder’s doomy take on the iPod’s future? He thinks mobile phones will steal the music player’s market share.
The good news for Gates is that he was right on the money. The bad news for Microsoft is that Apple cannibalized itself by making the iPhone. And Apple’s smartphone became even more successful than the iPod.
Apple’s newly released iOS 26.5 update supports end-to-end encryption for RCS messaging between iPhones and Android devices.
However, the feature requires the cooperation of wireless carriers. Fortunately, Apple released a list of which ones do, and all three of the biggest U.S. carriers are on board: AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon.
If you’ve noticed that the iPhone’s autocorrect has been especially bad over the last few months, you’re not alone. It appears that iOS 26.2 introduced a bug that made the keyboard much more frustrating to use. Luckily, the solution is simple. You can learn how to reset autocorrect on your iPhone really quickly.
First, you need to update to iOS 26.4, the release that fixed the iPhone’s autocorrect bug. Then, resetting your keyboard dictionary will get rid of any bad patterns it may have picked up since December.
Keep reading or watch our quick video.
This week on the Cult of Mac podcast: We’ve been complaining about just how stupid Siri can be for years, but Apple’s failure to deliver a promised AI upgrade just cost the company a cool $250 million.
We discuss how you can get your sliver of that payout, whether a stupid Siri is a deal-breaker (obviously not, since we all swear by our iPhones), and how Apple can really make things right.
Also on the Cult of Mac podcast:
Listen to this week’s episode of the Cult of Mac podcast in the Podcasts app or your favorite podcast app. (Be sure to subscribe and leave us a review if you like it!) Or watch the video version, embedded below.
There are two types of iPhone owners in the world: Those with a carefully manicured, minimalist Home Screen of perfectly arranged icons, and those with random icons spilled haphazardly across the screen.
If you find yourself among the latter group, you might think that it’s too late for you — that making a beautiful, aesthetic Home Screen is beyond your creative ability.
Well, cleaning up your iPhone’s Home Screen is a lot easier than clearing out your basement or organizing your kitchen junk drawer. A Home Screen that works better and looks better comes down to just a few simple tips. You can set one up in just minutes.
Here’s how.
Safari’s Hide Distracting Items feature lets you remove ads from your iPhone, along with other elements on the page that irritate you. It doesn’t require an ad blocker or a paid extension — Apple built it right into the browser.
Hide Distracting Items is not an ad blocker per se. But if pop-ups and other items that cover the page with no obvious close button pester you (like a cookie banner) Hide Distracting Items can come to the rescue. Here’s how to use it — keep reading or watch our video.