Everything Else You Need To Know About The Upcoming IOS15
Overview of iOS 15
Apple announced the latest version of its iOS operating system, iOS 15, in June 2021, with a fall release date. iOS 15 introduces new features for FaceTime calls, distraction-reduction tools, a redesigned notification experience, enhanced privacy features, and complete reimaginings of Safari, Weather, and Maps.
Notifications in iOS 15 have been redesigned to include contact photos for people and larger app icons. To minimize distraction, a notification summary group notifications together for timely delivery and organizes them by priority.
Focus is a new feature that allows users to prioritize notifications and apps based on what they want to focus on at any given time. When a user's Focus is set to block incoming notifications, their status in Messages is displayed to others. Using on-device intelligence, iOS will suggest a Focus for various occasions, such as work hours or winding down for bed, but users can also create a custom Focus. When one Apple device's Focus is set, it is automatically applied to all other Apple devices.
Safari now sports an entirely new design. Controls are now easier to reach with one hand and place a greater emphasis on the content of a webpage. A new, compact tab bar floats at the bottom of the screen, allowing users to quickly switch between tabs. Tab Groups enable users to save and easily access tabs across multiple devices. For the first time, there is also a customizable start page and web extensions.
Maps now includes a new 3D view of cities that includes significantly enhanced detail, such as buildings, pedestrian crosswalks, and bike lanes. There is a new city driving experience with improved road details and Transit features such as pinned favorite lines, disembarkation notifications, and augmented reality walking directions.
iOS 15 introduces voice isolation and Spatial Audio to FaceTime calls, allowing voices to appear to originate from the person's location on the screen. FaceTime also supports Portrait mode and introduces a new grid view that allows for simultaneous viewing of multiple faces. SharePlay is a new feature that enables users to collaboratively share media during a FaceTime call. Additionally, users can generate shareable links to scheduled FaceTime calls that can be accessed from Android and Windows devices.
In iOS 15, the Weather app has been redesigned to include more graphical representations of weather data, full-screen maps, and dynamic layouts that change in response to changing weather conditions. Completely new animated backgrounds now reflect the sun's position and current precipitation more accurately, and notifications indicate when rain or snow begins and ends.
In iOS 15, the Wallet app gains support for new key types, including those for homes, offices, and hotel rooms. Customers in participating states in the United States will be able to add a driver's license or state ID to the Wallet app later this year.
With a new design and an interactive interface, the Photos app is a significant update to Memories. Memories integrates with Apple Music by leveraging on-device intelligence to provide song recommendations for personalized Memories.
Live Text is a new feature that leverages on-device intelligence to identify text within a photo, which users can then search for, highlight, and copy. Spotlight can now search for images based on their location, subject, scene, object, or text. Spotlight now includes web image search and enhanced results for actors, musicians, television shows, and feature films. Contacts' enhanced results now include recent conversations, shared photos, and, if shared via Find My, their location.
Additionally, iOS 15 introduces new privacy features, including the ability to process Siri requests directly on the iPhone, which improves responsiveness, Mail Privacy Protection, which prevents senders from knowing when an email has been opened and detecting the recipient's IP address, and an App Privacy Report view that shows how frequently apps use the permissions granted to them.
There are dozens of tweaks and changes to other apps, including user-created tags, mentions, and an Activity view in the Notes app, Trends, Walking Steadiness, and a new sharing tab in the Health app, a system-wide Shared with You feature for highlighting content shared in Messages conversations, and a new For All of You row in the TV app to recommend entertainment for the entire household.
iOS 15 is compatible with iPhone 6s and later, which means it will run on all devices capable of running iOS 14. It is scheduled to be released this fall.
How to Install and Download iOS 15
iOS 15 is currently only available as a developer preview beta. Registered developers can download the iOS 15 beta profile from the Apple Developer Center, and after installing the profile, beta updates will be available over-the-air. It is recommended to install iOS 15 on a secondary device, as this is a beta version of the software that may contain bugs or issues.
Apple will refine iOS 15's new features and address bugs during the software's testing period, which will last several months. Additionally, developers can use this beta testing period to integrate support for the new operating system and new iOS 15 features into their apps.
In July, iOS users will be able to test the public beta at beta.apple.com.
iOS 15 will be available to all users with compatible devices starting in the fall, and users can check for updates in the Software Update section of their device's Settings app.
