WWDC 2024 Post Event Impressions

Tim Cook is shouting from the roof, Craig and the exec team skydiving, Mike Rockwell in a Vision Pro, Apple video team budget at an all time high. Seat belts on folks, its a big one this year

Impressions:

visionOS 2

• 2k native apps, 1.5m compatible apps
• Photos: ML to turn 2D photos into 3D spatial photos, Shareplay
• Quick access hand gesture menu
• Mac Virtual Display supports different screen sizes including ultra wide which simulates two 4k monitors side by side
• Travel mode adds train support
• Cannon will sell a spatial lens for their cameras
• Other – rearrange home screen, mouse support, new APIs, available in 8 more countries

iOS 18

• Home Screen
  • App icons and widgets can be placed anywhere
  • Adds ability to tint all apps by color, dark mode darkens app icons
  • Lock or hide apps
• Control Center
  • Multiple pages including full screen home and music widgets
  • developers can build for control center too
• Swap lock screen controls for other actions – finally!
• Secure Bluetooth pairing for apps that looks like how AirPods pair
• Messages:
  • Tapbacks support any emoji or sticker now
  • Scheduled messages
  • Text formatting
  • Text effects
• iMessage and SMS via satellites – I feel like this would have been a huge feature any other year
• Mail:
  • On device categorization
  • AI powered digest of emails
• Photos App has been redesigned entirely with filters for screenshots, pinning, grouped people photos
• Other
  • Maps – Topographic maps
  • Tap to Cash – pay each other by tapping phones
  • Better event tickets
  • Journal app adds features like stats and streaks
  • Game mode in iPhone
  • Reminders in calendar
  • RCS support launching

AirPods

• Nod yes or shake for no to respond to Siri
• Voice isolation for Windy or loud environment

tvOS

• Insight in video to identify actors and music
• Adjust voice in video to make them clear – now we can finally know what Michael Caine said in Interstellar
• Supports 21:9 projectors for those of you with full theater set ups in this economy

watchOS 11

• Training Mode – measure intensity, duration, effort, training load
• Fitness app – cards can be reorganized
• Vitals App – check key metrics like heart rate and insights over time
• Cycle Tracking app – supports pregnancy and gestational metrics – Now Apple can sell a million watches to anxious first time parents
• Widget stack sorts itself based on context like weather changes and ongoing Uber rides
• New watch faces created by an AI selecting your good photos and reframing them

iPad OS

• Redesigned apps with a more Vision Pro like animated tab bar
• Shareplay – draw on or even remotely control other peoples screen – big day for
• HOLD THE PRESSES – CALCULATOR APP IS HERE
  • Math Notes – handwrite expressions with variables with Apple Pencil and it will automatically solve them. supports graphs as well
  • Math in Notes app too
  • Now what will this subreddit complain about anymore?
• Notes Smart Script
  • makes your unreadable handwriting look good. I know some people who need this badly
  • Spell check for handwriting
  • Automatically shifting words around as you write

macOS Sequoia

• Were not even halfway in and absolutely blowing through these platforms, hmmm I wonder what they are saving time for, what a mystery
• Continuity
  • iPhone Mirroring – a lot of Android manufacturers have been doing this for a while now and its a very welcome addition here, sometimes you just want to quickly access a thin on your phone
  • iPhone notifications can go to mac now and automatically trigger iPhone Mirroring
• Tiling and snapping to edges/corners – finally!
• Presenter preview for screens sharing, background replacement
• Passwords App – surfaces iCloud Keychain features – imo much needed as 1Password is one of my most used apps because it is surfaced
• Safari
  • Highlights – identify and surface key info from a webpage
  • Reader – summarizes websites – still no mention of AI
  • Automatic picture in picture
• Gaming
  • Metal 3
  • Game Porting Toolkit 2 with better support for Windows Games – we got a mention of MS Windows before AI
  • Coming to Mac: Frostpunk 2, Control, Assassins Creed Shadows,

Apple Intelligence

• “AI for the rest of us” – Craig
• Writing tools available across the system
  • Proofreading
  • Write emails and notes
  • Summarization for emails as well as email snippets
  • Asks you questions to generate a response
  • Inbox summaries
• Notification summaries, selective surface only important notifications to reduce interruptions
• Can use your OS for you to do tasks like pulling up apps to play music and creating folders
• Understands personal context from aggregated data across the system
• GenMoji to create a custom emoji
• Image Playground
  • Create images across the system including of people in iMessages
  • Makes it easier to create images based on traits and styles
  • Happens entirely on device
  • Image Wand can convert a rough sketch into a better image
• Can create videos based on concepts and find photos from a long time period to tell a story
• Record and transcribe audio in notes and phone
• Privacy
  • On device processing on A17 and all M chips
  • Private Cloud Compute for large server based models
  • Data is never stored or shared with Apple
  • Verifiable software for independent researchers

Siri

• Better language understanding that understands corrections and context
• Type to Siri
• Siri can help with tech support for Apple products
• On-screen awareness – can ask for things to be done based on info on the screen
• Command Siri to take photos, take notes, or search for something across the system including actions in videos
• Can do compound understanding like finding a drivers license number and typing it into a form for you or finding a persons flight number and finding its live status to determine if it works with existing lunch plans
• Rest in peace standalone AI gadgets like Rabbit R1 and Humane Ai Pin, we hardly knew ye

ChatGPT 4o

• Siri can go ask ChatGPT for things like answer general knowledge questions and generate more complex images
• Free and info not logged, chatGPT subscribers can access paid features
• Other AI models will be added in the future – sure, throw Google a bone too I guess

Whew! What a day, this was probably the most jam packed WWDC I have watched in a long time. They definitely went deeper on integration that I thought they would. Hats off to the developers working crazy hours to make the features announced a reality.