Apple today announced the much-awaited next iteration to the mobile operating system that powers hundreds of millions of devices across the globe. Apple has confirmed iOS 11 features at the Worldwide Developers Conference 2017 in San Jose, California today. It brings several new features alongside improvements for core technologies that are crucial to the iOS experience.
One of the new features in iOS 11 includes synchronized messages on iOS and macOS. For example, if you delete a message on your Mac, it will also be deleted automatically from the iPhone or iPad.
Apple has made considerable improvements to Siri as well in iOS 11. The voice assistant will now sound more natural when responding to users. It will also be capable of performing translations in multiple languages including English, German, Italian, French, Chinese, and Spanish.
Siri has an “intelligence” feature which enables it to make suggestions that the user is going to find interesting. They can be about a news article based on the user’s preferences or predictive suggestions about what task they should do next.
iOS 11 brings a completely redesigned Control Center to iOS devices. It’s the panel which pops up when users slide up on the device’s display. They can use the panel to access important settings and features at one tap.
Apple Pay finally gets person-to-person payments with iOS 11. This will enable Apple to compete with the likes of Square Cash and Venmo. iOS 11 is going to bring an Apple Pay Cash Card which will also users to store the funds that they receive from P2P transactions. They can then transfer those funds to their personal bank accounts.
iOS 11 also brings the biggest makeover yet for the App Store. It now has a “Today” tab which will feature trending apps while gaming apps will now be listed in a dedicated tab. Users will also find how-to guides and content related to apps on the App Store so it’s going to have a more editorial aspect to it now.
Apple is paying special attention to the iPad with iOS 11. The tablet’s dock will be made similar to the Mac’s as users will now be allowed to add significantly more apps to it.
The new drag and drop feature will allow users to easily move content from one split-screen app to another. iOS 11 also allows users to save app pairings, they can keep two apps that they frequently use in split-screen together so that they can come back to them without having to set them up in split-screen mode again.
Indoor mapping has been introduced as well for airports and malls in some cities across the globe. Indoor maps will be available for malls in Boston, Chicago, Hong Kong, London, Los Angeles, New York, Philadelphia, San Francisco, San Jose, Tokyo, and Washington DC. Indoor maps will be available for 20 major airports in the United States and across the globe.
All this and more will be included in iOS 11 when it arrives this fall. A public beta program will be available later this month.