Apple previewed support for RCS messaging in the iOS 18 Messages app at WWDC24. Adding Rich Communication Services will bring enhanced texting between iPhone and Android users, with features not possible before.
It’s a change Apple dragged its feet on for many years. Along with RCS support, Apple is also introducing new features like polls for iMessage, enhancing group chat interactions. Learn more about these changes.
We found more precious nuggets in new software releases from WWDC24: new wallpapers for Apple devices. They include Mac versions that reference old-school icons, iPad landscape and portrait wallpapers in various colors, and similar pretty images for iPhone.
“This new dynamic wallpaper floats over old Macintosh iconography, Control Panel, and applications like the Calculator and MacWrite, Apple’s early word processor,” Basic Apple Guy said of the new-old Mac wallpaper he found.
Sending money to another iPhone user is about to get as simple as holding the two handsets near each other. The upcoming feature is called Tap to Cash.
It’s a private and secure payment system. The two users don’t even need to exchange phone numbers.
New features in Apple Maps in iOS 18 will be a boon to hikers. The app is getting topographic maps along with thousands of suggested hikes across national parks in the United States.
The app can also create custom walking routes.
In a major update, iOS 18 gives iPhone users big look-and-feel customization options as well as new generative AI-based functionality like a smarter Siri, Apple revealed during Monday’s WWDC24 keynote.
“iOS 18 is a big release that delivers more ways to customize your iPhone, stay connected and relive special moments,” said Craig Federighi, Apple’s senior vice president of software engineering.
The iOS 18 update will roll out to developers as a beta first. Then, after rounds of developer and public betas, become public for all in September when the 2024 iPhones arrive.
Apple is introducing a new Game Mode in iOS 18 and iPadOS 18. The feature minimizes background activity to deliver higher sustained performance and smoother gameplay.
Additionally, Game Mode will reduce audio latency with AirPods and game controllers for better responsiveness.
Apple is finally adding T9 dialing support to the iPhone’s Phone app with iOS 18. The feature lets you search for contacts or phone numbers directly from the dialer.
T9, or text on 9 keys, is predictive text technology that enables you to enter a character with a single keypress for each letter.
After Cupertino confirmed rumors that it would integrate ChatGPT into iOS 18, iPadOS 18 and macOS Sequoia as part of its Apple Intelligence framework, Elon Musk threatened to ban iPhones and other Apple devices from his company’s offices over security concerns.
“If Apple integrates OpenAI at the OS level, then Apple devices will be banned at my companies,” Musk — who runs Tesla, X and SpaceX, among other things — said on the platform formerly known as Twitter. “That is an unacceptable security violation.”
Pigs must be flying and hell has frozen over because the official Apple Calculator application is headed for iPad. It’s a feature missing from the tablet since its launch in 2010 but iPadOS 18 will include one.
It goes beyond simply an expanded version of the iPhone app. Apple built in a Math Notes calculator that allows users to write equations with a stylus and have the iPad solve them.
iPadOS 18 includes many long-requested features, including greater Home Screen personalization options and a Calculator app, at long last. But it’s the many new AI-related enhancements that really stand out.
“Our most versatile device is becoming even more powerful and intelligent than ever with iPadOS 18,” said Craig Federighi, Apple’s SVP of Software Engineering. “With fun new ways to personalize the Home Screen, a redesigned Photos experience, major updates to the Notes app, the addition of Calculator with Math Notes, and the groundbreaking introduction of Apple Intelligence, iPadOS 18 brings incredible new features designed for the unique capabilities of iPad, making it even easier for users to get tasks done.”