With the right scanning app, your iPhone or iPad can scan documents with vivid clarity. There’s no need for a printer-size scanner — you just need your Apple gear. A great example of such an app, iScanner is now on sale for only $24.97 (regularly $199.90).
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.
Apple dramatically expanded the reach of its Apple Sports app, bringing the live scores and statistics service to more than 90 additional countries and regions ahead of this summer’s much-anticipated FIFA World Cup soccer tournament.
“The World Cup unites fans across the globe, making it the ideal moment to bring Apple Sports to even more users,” said Oliver Schusser, Apple’s vice president of Music, Sports, Apple TV, and Beats.
Recently promoted Apple Chief Hardware Officer Johny Srouji will reorganize his division and shift oversight of product design in a move aimed at speeding up development of future devices, according to a new report Tuesday.
When Apple unveiled the MacBook Neo, the company’s most affordable laptop ever, the most obvious question was: How did Apple manufacture a sub-$600 with solid specs and a premium build?
The answer lies in how Apple turned defective iPhone and Mac chips into a business. Surprisingly, these faulty chips have powered some of the best Apple products over the years. The technology that enables this manufacturing miracle is called chip binning, and it allows Apple to turn defective processors into a virtual goldmine.
★★★★★
Steve Jobs in Exile by Geoffrey Cain serves up a comprehensive history of that other computer company Steve Jobs founded, NeXT.
The book, released Tuesday, starts in 1985 with Steve Jobs being forced out of Apple. It tells the tumultuous tale of what happens after Jobs poaches five Apple employees, they all gather in his bare living room, and ask, “Well … now what?”
Starting fresh at just the right moment in history, they invented the computer architecture of the modern era with a powerful UNIX foundation, object-oriented programming and emerging web technologies. It’s an intensely frustrating tale of Jobs blowing chances at success left and right, letting perfection be the enemy of the good.
Pair this book with Apple: The First 50 Years and you have the complete picture. It’s a shorter read that covers fascinating years where Steve grew up as a leader.
Apple kicked off a very generous signup incentive for new Apple Card customers, offering enough Bonus Daily Cash rewards to effectively cover the cost of a pair of AirPods Pro 3.
But it’s important to read the fine print. This promo isn’t a trick, but getting a free pair of earbuds takes a lot more effort than simply signing up for a credit card.
Apple previewed a sweeping set of accessibility upgrades Tuesday that weave Apple Intelligence into some of its most relied-upon features — VoiceOver, Magnifier, Voice Control and Accessibility Reader. We can expect to see all changes arrive later this year.
The company also announced auto-generated subtitles for uncaptioned video, a new eye-tracking wheelchair control feature for Vision Pro and the launch of an adaptive MagSafe accessory called Hikawa Grip & Stand for iPhone.
“Apple’s approach to accessibility is unlike any other,” said Apple CEO Tim Cook. “Now, with Apple Intelligence, we are bringing powerful new capabilities into our accessibility features while maintaining our foundational commitment to privacy by design.”
May 19, 2001: Apple revolutionizes the world of computer shopping when it opens its first two Apple Stores. Located in Tysons Corner, Virginia, and Glendale, California, the new outlets represent the culmination of a long-term dream for Cupertino.
It’s the start of something massive. Within two and a half decades, Apple will expand its retail operations to more than 500 stores in 27 countries and regions around the world. And they will become some of the most profitable retail outlets anywhere on a dollars-per-square-foot basis.
Some power banks feel like a compromise until your phone finishes recharging: You plug in, put your iPhone down and wait. The Vionta B5 solid-state power bank by Adam Elements attaches magnetically to your iPhone, charges it wirelessly and flips out into a 360-degree adjustable stand so you can keep using your phone while it tops off.
It’s on sale for just $59.99 (MSRP $75) — and it fits in a pocket!
Apple might be planning to make Genmoji much more useful in iOS 27. The feature, which currently lets users create custom emoji, could soon suggest AI-generated emoji based on your personal photo library and the phrases you type most often.
That would solve one of the biggest problems with Genmoji: Most iPhone users forget it exists. Despite being genuinely fun and useful, Genmoji remains one of the most overlooked Apple Intelligence features.
But Apple might change that with iOS 27.
iOS 27 will offer additional AI-powered grammar assistance, according to an unconfirmed report Monday. This will go beyond the writing tools already available through Apple Intelligence and will work in macOS and iPadOS, too.
In addition, Apple will also use AI to generate wallpapers for their devices and also make shortcuts easier to create in the Shortcuts app.
MacMagic is the Swiss Army knife of Mac utilities: It can perform scores of optimization tasks, from clearing gigabytes of storage to batch processing hundreds of files.
A MacMagic lifetime upgrades license is currently on sale for just $22.98 with code MACSAVE.
Anthropic’s Mythos AI helped indie hackers bypass Apple’s Memory Integrity Enforcement, a hardware security system used in the M5 processors that power the latest MacBook Pros.
Apple spent five years developing MIE, but the hacking team at Calif, a small security startup based in Palo Alto, California, said it used Mythos Preview to find bugs in the M5 chip — and built a working exploit in just five 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.
The new Govee TV Backlight 3 camera-based TV ambient lighting system sets a category record for imaging resolution, the company said Monday. And, crucially for Apple users, it works natively with Apple Home via Matter right out of the box.
May 18, 2006: The world — and, more specifically, the Apple-watching press — gets its first glimpse of the swanky new Fifth Avenue Apple Store in New York City.
Previously hidden behind a black plastic wrapper during development, that all changes a day before the store’s grand opening. Workers remove the covering to reveal a 32-foot glass cube adorned with a floating, white Apple logo. At 10 a.m., members of the press go on an exclusive tour of the new venue.
All signs point to Apple reinventing Siri as a conversational AI chatbot in iOS 27, complete with a standalone Siri app. With privacy in mind, the app will reportedly contain an option to automatically delete your Siri chats every 30 days.
This privacy-first approach should give Apple’s AI chatbot an edge over its competitors.
The Apple Magic Mouse doesn’t go on sale very often, so don’t miss a rare deal that saves you 19% on the svelte input device for your Mac or iPad. This new Apple Magic Mouse deal drops the price to just $63.99.
The sale is on the USB-C version, not the older Lightning model, so it’s a great opportunity to upgrade.
May 17, 1983: John Sculley takes the helm as Apple’s third president and CEO. The former Pepsi-Cola boss is short on tech experience but long on marketing, which will become increasingly important as the personal computer revolution ramps up.
Steve Jobs personally lured Sculley to Apple using one of the most famous lines in the history of business. “Do you want to spend the rest of your life selling sugared water,” Jobs asked Sculley, “or do you want a chance to change the world?”
Rumors point to an updated version of the HomePod mini and a new Apple TV 4K coming this year. What’s holding them up? The same thing that’s been giving Apple problems for years: AI.
Here’s what to expect from these two smart home accessories, and why Apple’s struggles with artificial intelligence have kept them off the market.
The SanDisk Extreme is a pocket-size 2TB SSD that’s speedy and reliable. It hits read speeds up to 1,050 MB/s and write speeds up to 1,000 MB/s over USB 3.2 Gen 2.
And right now, you can grab this tiny SSD (that’s gigantic on the inside) on sale for just $269.99. That’s nearly half off the regular price of $499.99.
May 16, 1994: Apple launches the PowerBook 540c, one of the best laptops in the company’s history.
Part of the innovative 500 series of PowerBooks, the 540c is the laptop to own in 1994. Blisteringly fast, packed with innovative features, and offering the best notebook display on the market, it’s a triumph on every level. Although for $5,539 (over $12,400 in today’s money), it had better be.
AI is changing the kind of apps you can run on a Mac. From voice-first writing tools to meeting assistants and smarter file management, these new AI apps can save hours every week.
After months of testing, these are the AI apps that earned a permanent spot in my workflow.
AI writing tools work wonders, but AI detectors can flag your content if it leans too heavily on robo-prose. If you want your AI writing to be undetectable, you must edit all that content yourself, but it takes time to add the human touch. Sometimes, there just isn’t room in the schedule, but that’s OK. There’s a robot for that, too. You can use an AI humanizer like Undetectable Humanizer.
The Undetectable Humanizer transforms your AI-generated text into natural, human-like prose to help it bypass AI detection systems. This tool is a great get for writers, content creators and business owners who need to save as much time as they can when creating engaging content. A lifetime subscription to this effective AI humanizer’s pro plan is on sale now for $139.99 (regularly $2,880).