Apple iOS 14 Preview: all the new features
Apple has officially released the first public beta of iOS 14. Aside from minor bug fixes, it doesn’t introduce many new features.
So, the first online-only WWDC opening keynote will be remembered for years. For many, it will be the hallmark event that finally had Apple part ways with Intel and develop its own custom silicon for the Mac. The event was live-streamed on YouTube, of all places. Finally, many will certainly remember it as one of the most serious visual treat iOS has had in years.
iOS 14 was announced last night with lots of new quality-of-life improvements and new features that have been a long time coming. There’s still a long time until iOS 14 arrives to the list of supported devices, but the wait will be worth of it.
iOS 14:
Widgets:
The new homescreen widgets and the App Library might not be on the same page as far as impact goes, but it will forever change the way you interact with your phone.
Widgets have been redesigned, they still show the same amount of useful info at a glance, but they are now finally great. Previously limited to the dedicated widget pane to the left of the main home screen, widgets can now be freely moved around and resized across your home screens and mix-matched with your app icons. You can completely ditch away app icons in favour of the fresh new widgets if you wish so.
Excellent feature is widget stacking, which lets you create a space-efficient carousel with widgets.
Compact Incoming calls :
Apple finally caved in and introduced a compact incoming call screen with iOS 14. Hence no abruptly interrupted experience when you receive an incoming call. As calls can now be displayed as banners at the top of your home-screen. Those banners are flickable, and this wouldn’t hang up the call.
App Library:
The new App Library automatically organizes all of your apps into one simple, easy‑to‑navigate view. Apps are sorted by category and your most used apps are always just one tap away.
Picture-in-picture:
PiP, as picture-in-picture is more commonly known, was introduced on the iPad all the way back with iOS 9, but weirdly enough, it wasn’t available on the iPhone until iOS 14 came along yesterday.
PiP is probably more useful on the iPads’ larger displays than on the limited screen that’s available on an iPhone. PiP only works with select popular streaming apps right now.
YouTube? We got it working by having YouTube Premium and accessing the website through Safari, but not with the official YouTube app.
Messages:
Messages now feel like a complete app that’s got in covered on all fronts. You can now mention specific contacts in group chat, which will alert them even if they have muted the specific group chat. Yes, you can do that now as well. Inline replies are another life-saving feature that will greatly improve the experience.
Inline replies
Now you can reply directly to a specific message in a group conversation. You can view replies in the full conversation or as their own thread for a more focused view.
Siri:
With its new compact design, Siri has a completely new look that lets you quickly get information or get things done while still focusing on what you’re doing.
Siri can now help you find answers to a broader set of questions by using information from across the web.
When you want to be more expressive in your messages, you can now easily send audio messages with Siri.
iOS 14 few more minor features:
There are tons of small features that don’t get any keynote time but get unearthed by the community as soon as the beta previews start rolling out.
- Double- or triple-tapping the back of an iPhone can launch a pre-defined shortcut.
- You can now mirror the front camera so that selfies are taken as previewed.
- There are tons of emoji available in the stock iOS keyboard.
- Sound recognizer will now alert you if it detects fire/smoke alarms or sirens, cats meowing, dogs barking, appliance alerts, door bells, water running, crying babies, shouting, car horns or door knocks.
- You can now set separate alarms for each day of the week.
- There’s a new NFC Tag Reader tile available for the Control Centre.
Conclusion:
Both iOS and Android have scored troves of features from one another over the years. Swipe-able keyboards, granular app permissions, instant apps, and many, many more features were initially available on either Android or iOS but eventually became available on both platforms. iOS 14 looks like the iOS update fans have been asking for years, introducing tons of quality-of-life improvements that will certainly float the boat of long-time iOS users.
