Follow Benjamin on Threads to keep up with his latest projects. Benjamin blogs about Apple news and rumors and posts insightful product and app reviews. Read his work on 9to5Mac and his personal blog.
Benjamin Mayo also creates apps for iOS as a professional indie developer and contractor; more details here. Email to discuss making your iOS project.
Follow @bzamayo on Twitter and follow @bzamayo on Threads.
The iPhone 16 lineup include a few advancements in repairability. Perhaps, the most significant hardware change is a new type of battery adhesive, that allows for simpler and safer battery replacements once the frame of the phone has been taken off.
iFixit demonstrates this in action in its teardown video. By applying a low-voltage electrical current, the adhesive holding the battery down releases, and the battery cleanly pops out of the phone chassis.
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As part of his iPhone 16 coverage, Chinese blogger Geekerwan did a battery test of the new flagships, comparing all the iPhone 16 models to the iPhone 15 Pro, iPhone 15 Pro Max and some Chinese Android flagships.
Mirroring other testers’ findings, the iPhone 16 Pro Max set new records for battery longevity, easily clearing 10 hours of life in his test. But what’s perhaps more interesting is that the 15 Pro Max actually gained an hour of extra battery life running iOS 18, compared to when the test was conducted on the same phones running iOS 17. The 15 Pro also saw proportional improvements …
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Update: Apple shared this statement to 9to5Mac on today’s developments:
“At Apple, we’re proud of the fact that we’ve built over 250,000 APIs that allow developers to build apps that access our operating system and functionalities in a way that ensures users’ privacy and security. To comply with the DMA, we’ve also created ways for apps in the European Union to request additional interoperability with iOS and iPadOS while protecting our users. Undermining the protections we’ve built over time would put European consumers at risk, giving bad actors more ways to access their devices and data. We will continue to work constructively with the European Commission on a path forward that both protects our EU users and clarifies the regulation.”
Under the scope of the Digital Markets Act, the EU commission today announced proceedings to compel Apple to improve support for third-party connected devices like smartwatches, headphones, VR headsets with iPhone and iPad.
The notice says the Commission will specify how Apple should provide interoperability with iOS functions like notifications and device pairing. Within six months, the commission will have instructed Apple about how it expects third-party device integration to work.
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iOS 18 includes a new feature where you can choose to require Face ID to open an app, or go one step further and hide it from your device altogether. This second option removes the icon from the home screen, and places the app in a specially obscured Hidden folder in the App Library.
Biometrics are normally required to even see the contents of this hidden folder, before you can access one of the apps hidden inside it. However, now that iOS 18 has been released to the world, users are discovering ways to find out which apps have been hidden, with no Face ID required.
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Today, Apple has announced even more languages that Apple Intelligence will support over the course of the next year.
The first Apple Intelligence features will launch exclusively in US English, in October with the release of iOS 18.1. Additional languages and more capabilities will roll out over the next year. Here’s what we know so far as to the announced language support …
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Apple Music takes a significant-if-subtle step forward in iOS 18, with the New tab. ‘New’ is more than just a new name for the previous ‘Browse’ tab.
Each user will see a different curated collection of music in the New tab, based on their personal listening preferences …
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iOS 18 brings a big change to Control Center on your iPhone. With iOS 18, Control Center has a bunch of new controls and now flows over multiple pages. This includes changes to the Connectivity widget, which puts the Bluetooth toggle behind a second tap.
By default, to access Bluetooth settings, you must first tap on the corner of the 2×2 widget to open a full-screen group of toggles. You can then change Bluetooth. However, if you want a Bluetooth toggle available at the top level, toggleable with a single tap just like iOS 17, you can add it back yourself. Here’s how.
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A long-requested feature for Android users switching to iPhone is the addition of T9 dialling. This is a shortcut to dialling phone numbers from your address book, by typing in letters on the keypad.
For instance, to call John you’d press 5 6 4 (for J O H). On many Samsung and other Android phones, this would search for the closest alphabetical match to a person’s name in your contacts. iPhone has not had this feature … until now with iOS 18.
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Apple has just released tvOS 18 for the public, the latest software update for the Apple TV set-top box. You can get the new operating system version on Apple TV HD (2015) and all Apple TV 4K devices.
There’s also a new version 18 update for HomePod and HomePod mini, also available now. Here’s what’s new …
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With iOS 18, Apple lets you customize the app icons on your iPhone and iPad. You can choose between light mode, dark mode, or tinted style appearance for your icons.
However, when you choose dark mode icons, you may notice that not all of your icons change. Here’s why that happens …
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The Apple Store is down, ahead of iPhone 16, iPhone 16 Plus, iPhone 16 Pro, iPhone 16 Pro Max preorders going live. (Apple Watch Series 10, and AirPods 4 are already available to order.)
If you are looking to buy Apple’s shiny new gadgets, start refreshing the Apple Store at 5 AM PT, or in about six hours time. All the new iPhones, Watches and AirPods ship to customers beginning September 20.
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Apart from some marketing materials, we have not yet seen Apple Intelligence image generation features in action. Image Playgrounds and Genmoji are not currently available in the iOS 18.1 Apple Intelligence betas; they are rumored to launch as part of the iOS 18.2 cycle later this year.
However, Apple has today shared a real-world example with WIRED magazine. Pictured above, adorned with a AI watermark applied by WIRED, it depicts Apple SVP Craig Federighi’s dog.
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So, Apple just updated its base model AirPods for the first time in years. There’s now two new models, one with Active Noise Cancellation, and one without – starting at $129.
ANC was the hero exclusive feature of AirPods Pro … until today. So how do the new AirPods (not Pro) stack up? Here’s all the differences.
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Apple today announced that Apple Intelligence will begin in beta starting in October, with iOS 18.1. The first features of the Apple Intelligence suite will be exclusive to US English language users.
Apple will roll out Apple Intelligence to more languages over time. In December, the company will add support for English dialects in Australia, Canada, New Zealand, South Africa and the United Kingdom. New languages will roll out in 2025 …
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Apple today announced the new A18 chip, featuring a six-core CPU, five-core GPU, and sixteen-core Neural Engine for faster artificial intelligence performance. Apple also said the A18 has a new memory subsystem to traffic data as quickly as possible.
Compared to iPhone 15 with the A16 Bionic chip, Apple says the A18 chip is up to 30% in single-core CPU performance.
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Apple today announced the iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Plus, which Apple said “is built from the ground up” for Apple Intelligence.
The iPhone 16 features a new capacitive button on the side of the device to make it easier to capture photos and videos; Apple calls this the ‘Camera Control’. The action button, previously exclusive to iPhone 15 Pro, is also included on iPhone 16, replacing the mute switch.
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Apple has announced some new hearing health related features, coming as a software update for AirPods Pro 2.
This includes a hearing protection mode being enabled by default, offering passive noise cancellation in loud environments. Apple is also launching a “clinical grade” hearing aid mode, as part of a software update coming later this year.
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Following usual tradition when Apple is launching new hardware, the Apple Online Store is down ahead of the ‘Glowtime’ Apple event which kicks off at 10 AM Pacific Time today.
The company is expected to announce a new iPhone lineup; iPhone 16, iPhone 16 Plus, iPhone 16 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro Max. Apple Watch Series 10 will also be announced featuring a design change and new larger screen sizes, along with a new generation of AirPods, and potentially some other surprises.
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Supply-chain analyst Ming-Chi Kuo this morning posted his latest estimates for iPhone 16 shipments, ahead of Apple’s event later today where the new iPhone 16 lineup will be finally unveiled.
Kuo expects iPhone 16 shipments for 2024 to be about 89 million units, down slightly from the 91 million units of the iPhone 15 shipped in the same period last year. As Apple tries to order what it will sell, this indicates that the company is not anticipating a huge jump in customer demand for the new phones.
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On the iPhone 15 and iPhone 15 Plus, Apple finally got rid of the Lightning port and replaced it with USB-C. This opens up a whole new world of convenience of connecting accessories and peripherals. The iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max go one step further, as the USB-C port on the pro models supports USB-3 speeds, enabling up to 10 Gbps data transfer speeds.
USB-C makes it easy to connect displays, external storage, cameras, and charge using the same cable as all your other devices. Here’s what you can do with your new iPhone and its shiny new port …
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As part of its September ‘Glowtime’ event taking place on Monday, Apple will update all of its Apple Watch models, including the low-end Apple Watch SE, the mainstream Apple Watch Series 10 and the high-end Apple Watch Ultra 3.
While much attention will be on the Series 10’s redesigned thinner chassis and larger display, Bloomberg reports the other major new feature for the watches will be sleep apnea detection.
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The first episode of Slow Horses season four is now available to watch on Apple TV+. The spy series, headed by Gary Oldman as Jackson Lamb, began in April 2022 and has been rolling out new season at a rapid clip.
It has risen in popularity ever since its premiere, and the British show is now outperforming worldwide on the service. Season four is based on the fourth book in the Mick Herron franchise, called Spook Street.
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With the Major League Soccer ending in October, Apple has dropped the price of the season pass one last time to reflect the remaining time. For the rest of 2024, MLS Season Pass is now $9.99, its lowest price ever.
And for Apple TV+ members, you can now subscribe to MLS Season Pass completely for free. The only catch is to remember to cancel before the next season starts and the subscription returns to its normal pricing.
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Best known for their network attached solutions (like my beloved DS920+), Synology have recently launched a new product in their lineup, called the Synology BeeStation.
The BeeStation aims to simplify the idea of a home NAS, offering a local network backup option as an alternative to cloud solutions like iCloud and Dropbox. Here’s how it works.
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