Hey everyone! I hope you all enjoyed the WWDC showcase that just took place. Here’s a small overview for those who didn’t watch or those who may have missed it! So lets get started…
Hardware
MacBook Air 15’
The new bigger MacBook Air is here! It has the same thin design as the 13” but with a 15.3” screen. It has the same amount of ports, the same camera, the same colours and the same M2 chip. It’s rated at 18 hours of battery life, but of course we should get a better look at the battery life when the review units are sent out. I think this will be a great addition to the MacBook lineup, since a lot of people want a bigger display but don’t need the power of the 16’ MacBook Pro. It starts at £1399.
Mac Studio M2 Max/M2 Ultra
With the same design as the previous Mac Studio is is now supercharged by the M2 Max and M2 Ultra. The HDMI port has been upgraded to support 8K and up to 244hz. Other than that, it is mainly just a spec upgrade from the previous model with no major upgrades. Starting at £2099.
Mac Pro with Apple Silicon
It’s here! Supercharged by M2 Ultra! With up to 196GB or ram this machine is no joke. The new Mac Pro retains the cheese greater design and it is still upgradable. It has 8 thunderbolt ports on the back! It starts at a whopping £7199.
iOS 17
There is a big focus on communication in iOS 17, for Messages, FaceTime and the Phone app. New features such as contact posters, live voicemail, leave a message on FaceTime, swipe to reply, check in, redesigned area for iMessage apps and a completely new experience for stickers. There are also a few updates to AirDrop, such as Name Drop which lets you bring your phone close to someone else’s to exchange contact information! That’s so much cooler than giving someone your phone right?? You can also use this to share photos, AirDrop is getting even more convenient than ever. A brand new app called journal is coming to iPhone! It will create personalised suggestions to help you with your writing, sounds very intelligent and inspiring.
Something else new called standby is coming too! It’s like a Nightstand feature. As soon as you put your iPhone on a MagSafe charger in landscape mode iPhone will go into standby mode, and with the AOD on iPhone 14 Pro you can view it all the time, there are also plenty of options for customisation. This is probably my favourite feature of iOS 17 because of how left field it is and i think it will actually be very helpful, but I’ll wait until fall to test it on my personal iPhone!
iOS 17 will be available for iPhone XS and later.
MacOS Sonoma
So starting off the Mac will get the communication improvements that iOS 17 brought to the table. Of course we get some stunning new wallpapers that you can set on your desktop. The widgets are now available on the desktop too, which is pretty cool, and you can access the ones you have on your iPhone without having to download those specific apps! There’s also a new game mode to optimise your gaming experience and lowering the latency for AirPods and Xbox/PlayStation controllers. Death stranding is coming to Mac too. Other new features include video effects for meetings, improvements to safari and web apps in the dock. A very exciting year for Mac!
Audio and home
AirPods now adaptive audio which combines ANC and transparency mode to match the conditions of your surroundings which is a super cool new feature that I think will be very useful. Automatic switching between devices has also been made faster which is definitely a welcome addition!
AirPlay has now been improved to make it even more convenient to use on your HomePods. SharePlay has now been added to CarPlay so you can agree your music on those long car journeys!
TVOS has now been given a new control interface on the Home Screen, to do things like control your AirPods. And finally, can use your iPhone your find your Siri Remote nearby. FaceTime is dropping on Apple TV and it will use your iPhone or iPad camera automatically!
WatchOS 10
WOW! This is the redesign Apple Watch users wanted! Most of the Apple Watches interface has been completely redesigned, you can now access Smart Stack from any watch face just by turning your Digital Crown! So if you want to use a simple watch face, such as portraits you can still access important information at a glance! There are also two new watch faces, pallet and a snoopy themed watch face! There all a few new features in the workout app and the health app!
I have to say I’m very excited for Smart Stack, it looks very handy!
iPadOS 17
Finally we have the iPhone Lock Screen on ipad so we can further customise the iPad wallpaper and we can add widgets to it! We also have interactive widgets on the home screen so you can do things such as mark off a reminder! We also have other features such as live activities, Health app, improvements to PDFs, stage manger improvements and new features for Freeform.
If I'm being honest, I feel like iPadOS, yet again, didn't get much love but I will hold off on my thoughts until I use it later this year.
One more thing…
Introducing the revolutionary Apple vision Pro! It blends the real world with the digital world! You control it with your hands, voice and eyes. It is a completely 3D interface and everything’s looks like it’s actually in your room! There is no boundaries set by a display, apps don’t overlap each other, they simply exist together. You can also add environments to enchanted your experience and you can use the Digital Crown to immerse yourself into an environment. It’s just like magic. And of course it syncs in with iCloud so it will fit right in with your current devices. Its power by the new R1 chip and the M2 chip.
This is something completely new for Apple. I am very excited to see what this turns into!
Unfortunately it won't be available in the US until early next year, and there was no mention of UK release date. Apple have announced its costs $3499 in the US.
Thank you
Thank you so much for reading! I hope you're all excited for the new products and the new software for your existing devices. This years WWDC will be one to remember...