Another year, another update

Apple takes the wraps off iOS 14 and iPadOS 14 at WWDC 2020

Here are all the new features coming to iPhones and iPads later this year.

Samuel Axon and Jeff Dunn – Jun 22, 2020 5:06 PM | 97

"Intelligently curated categories."

Apple on Monday announced iOS 14 and iPadOS 14, the latest versions of its mobile operating systems for iPhones and iPads, respectively. As has become tradition, the company detailed the new software at WWDC, its annual developer conference.

At the forefront of iOS 14 is a redesign for the home screen on iPhones. A new feature called "App Library" sits at the bottom of home screen pages and automatically organizes various apps into groups. The idea is to cut down on the amount of pages you need to scroll through to get to a specific app—instead, all the apps are available from one screen, not unlike an Android phone's app drawer. Apple says the App Library will know to curate your apps into specific categories, such as "Apple Arcade" for games from that service or "Social" for social media apps. There's a search field located at the top of the App Library, with all your apps organized alphabetically in a list view underneath it.

The update also brings the ability to resize widgets and drag them from their usual place in the iPhone's "Today" view over to the home screen, much like how you would with a dedicated app. You can also pull up a list of widgets to quickly customize and add them to your home screen at your discretion. A "Smart Stack" feature, meanwhile, can create a stack of widgets that will automatically display info relevant to the current time of day; you might see an Apple News widget in the morning, for instance, or a summary of your daily activity in the evening.

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iOS 14 also brings system-wide picture-in-picture support for iOS videos. If you start up a video in a particular app, then close that app to return to the home screen, that video will keep playing in a smaller adjustable window, which you're free to dismiss with a swipe off the screen.

Apple's Siri voice assistant is also getting a makeover. Instead of taking up the entire screen when activated, Siri will now show up as a smaller animated icon at the bottom of the display. From a functionality standpoint, the assistant can now record and send audio messages alongside simple dictated messages.

Translate, Messages, Maps, and more

The update introduces a new built-in app called Translate as well. Much like Google Translate, this will give you a centralized place to translate text or voice-dictated messages into different languages. Apple says the app will support 11 languages to start: English, Spanish, French, German, Italian, Arabic, Russian, Korean, Japanese, Mandarin Chinese, and Portuguese.

iOS 14 brings a few changes to Messages, too. You can now pin important conversations and contacts to the top of your message list, make in-line replies to specific messages in a threaded conversation view, and use "mentions" to direct a message (and notification) to a specific person in a group chat. Apple says you'll be able to make it so you're only notified about a group conversation when you're specifically mentioned.

Apple Maps, meanwhile, gains curated "Guides" from sources like Zagat or The Washington Post in an effort to provide better recommendations for places to visit. The app now features dedicated cycling directions for a small handful of major cities, including New York City, Los Angeles, and the Bay Area in the United States. An EV routing feature helps electric vehicle drives see their car's current charge and what charging stations are available near your route and compatible with your car. The company hasn't yet specified which cars will work with this feature, though.

Beyond that, iOS 14 brings the ability to start and unlock certain cars with an iPhone over NFC. Apple says the 2021 BMW 5 Series will be the first car to support this feature. You'll be able to share an NFC pass via Messages if you wish to give others access to your vehicle, as well as disable access through iCloud. The feature will also be available on iOS 13. In general, Apple's CarPlay platform also gains support for custom wallpapers and new app categories such as parking, EV charging, and fast-food takeout.

Over on the App Store, iOS 14 adds an "App Clips" feature that lets you access a small part of an app without having to install the full thing. These come in the form of small cards that can be discovered and launched from the Web, Messages, or Maps and quickly dismissed when you no longer need them. If you needed a specific app to pay for a parking meter, for instance, you could quickly do so through that app's "clip" instead of waiting to fully download it for that one occasion. Apple has created a new QR code-style format that uses NFC and visual codes to access App Clips—though they can also use QR codes and NFC tags—and the company says App Clips will support Sign In With Apple and Apple Pay. They'll also be accessible through the App Library.

iOS 14 will also require app to obtain user permission before tracking personal data. At some point later in the year, app pages in the App Store will have self-reported summaries of that app's privacy policies and what personal data it collects.

Apple says iOS 14 will be available in the fall for iPhones from the iPhone 6s and later. A developer beta is available starting today, with a public beta scheduled for next month.

What’s new in iPadOS 14

Moving over to iPadOS 14, the next iPad update brings a handful of iPad-specific design changes alongside many of the features mentioned above. Apps like Photos and Apple Music now feature a sidebar that organizes navigation in one place, while others like Files and Calendar add new pull-down menus and top-mounted toolbar controls. These don't appear to be massive redesigns, but they should make it quicker to access the various functions in several first-party apps.

iPadOS 14 also shrinks down notifications for incoming FaceTime, phone, and third-party VOIP calls, presenting them as smaller banners that appear at the top of the display instead of taking over the whole screen. This comes in addition to the redesigned Siri interface mentioned above and will be a part of iOS 14 on the iPhone.

Similarly, Search has been redesigned to be more compact and appear over the top of whatever app you already had open. In addition to that, Apple says Search has been "rebuilt from the ground up" to be more useful: it can now be used to launch apps, search within specific apps such as Files, Messages, and Mail, find specific documents and contacts, and answer "common questions" about people or places.

The update aims to improve Apple Pencil support though the "Scribble" feature that lets the tablet convert handwriting into typed text in any text field in the OS. This will support English and Chinese writing to start, and Apple says this whole process will occur on-device in an effort to keep it secure. The iPad will be able to distinguish handwriting from drawings and automatically convert any drawn shapes into geometrically perfect versions.

Finally, a slide toward the end of Apple's iPadOS 14 presentation briefly noted that the update will allow users to "set default browser and email apps." The company did not detail exactly how this will work—which is to be expected, since it acknowledges that people may not want to use its own software—but it likely means that iPad users will no longer have to keep Safari or Mail as their default options, further bringing the tablet closer in functionality to the Mac. This will be an option with iOS 14 as well.

iPadOS 14 will be available for the following tablets: iPad Air 2 and later, all iPad Pro models, iPad 5th generation and later, and iPad Mini 4 and later. Again, Apple says a developer preview is out today and a public beta will be available next month.

Samuel Axon and Jeff Dunn Senior Editor

Samuel Axon is a senior editor at Ars Technica, where he is the editorial director for tech and gaming coverage. He covers AI, software development, gaming, entertainment, and mixed reality. He has been writing about gaming and technology for nearly two decades at Engadget, PC World, Mashable, Vice, Polygon, Wired, and others. He previously ran a marketing and PR agency in the gaming industry, led editorial for the TV network CBS, and worked on social media marketing strategy for Samsung Mobile at the creative agency SPCSHP. He also is an independent software and game developer for iOS, Windows, and other platforms, and he is a graduate of DePaul University, where he studied interactive media and software development.

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Translate, Messages, Maps, and more

What’s new in iPadOS 14

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