Apple took the wraps off of the latest version of its iOS operating system, and it promises to bring a boatload of new features to your iPhone and iPad. Available later this fall, iOS 10 is one of the largest updates to the operating system to date. The OS has been upgraded from the bottom up, but these are the three biggest innovations.
Lock screen
Apple wants to change the way you interact with your iPhone’s lock screen by making it far more interactive.
It starts with Apple’s new Rise to Wake feature, which turns on your iPhone’s screen whenever you lift it up. Motorola’s Moto X offered a similar function that showed you notifications and the time on a black and white screen to help save battery life. Apple’s solution lights up the entire screen, though — so I’m not sure how much this could impact your handset’s battery.
You can also interact with your notifications from the lock screen via 3D Touch — as long as you have an iPhone 6s or 6s Plus. For example, if you have a text message on the lock screen, you can long-press it using 3D Touch to send a reply without opening the Messages app.
Swiping up from the lock screen still pulls up the Control Center, but now if you swipe from the right to the left you’ll open the music player.
Swiping in from the right on the lock screen also opens the Camera app, which is a bit easier than swiping on the tiny camera icon in the corner of the iOS 9 lock screen. Swiping in from the left, meanwhile, pulls up your widgets screen.
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Photos
Apple is finally catching up with Google when it comes to its Photos app. In iOS 10, the app can now perform scene and object recognition, so you can search for things like dogs or New York City and the app will pull up photos showing those items. You can already do that in Google’s Photos app, but Apple is obviously hoping it can bring back some users that have left for its rival’s offering.
A new Memories tab organizes photos based on where you took them and with whom you took them. At the top of each entry is a premade movie created using all of the photos and videos you took on your trip. It’s a pretty neat feature that will inevitably make you wish you were still on your vacation and not stuck in your office with your coworker.
Apple Muisic
Apple Music also received a major update, with a new interface that looks far easier to navigate with big, bold text. The Now Playing screen is much more attractive and less bland and now includes lyrics. Spotify also includes lyrics, but only on the desktop version.
The For You section is also far less convoluted and seems more inviting than its current incarnation. That said, it’s hard to say whether consumers will want to give Apple Music a try after its rocky start. And pulling people away from Spotify could prove a difficult proposition for Apple Music. Unless, that is, it continues to get songs and albums from the likes of Taylor Swift whose offerings aren’t available on Spotify.
