iOS 16 for iPhone: Every major new feature you need to know

This story is part of WWDC 2022complete CNET news from Apple’s annual development conference.

Apple unveiled every major new iOS 16 feature earlier this week in WWDC, its annual development conference. In fact, there are quite a few new things for your iPhone. On paper, iOS 16 looks fresh and modern, with new features that improve the way you communicate, new tools to personalize your iPhone, and even a clever way to use Apple Pay to buy something now and pay later.

The IOS 16 Developer Beta is currently out, the public beta will be released in July. iOS 16 will be launched this fall, probably along with about the iPhone 14, which is talked about a lot. The new software will work on iPhone 8 and later models.

Here are all the iOS 16 features you should know about.

iOS 16 allows you to edit and “cancel” messages

“Annoying typos are a thing of the past,” said Apple’s senior vice president of software engineering, Craig Federighi, when he introduced the top three features for the News app.

First in iOS 16 you will be able to edit sent messages. Therefore, if you notice a typo after the message, you will be able to edit the message. A small “edited” will appear in the status below the message.

Next – and this may be my favorite new feature – you can retrieve the sent message immediately. If you’ve accidentally sent an unfinished message, you can use the Undo tool to prevent it from being read, and we hope it doesn’t look so messy for your friends and family.

Finally, you can mark messages and threads as unread. This can be a great tool when you don’t have time to reply to a message, but you want to be sure you’ll be back later.

Your iPhone gets a new customizable lock screen

One of the things you look at most often on your iPhone is the lock screen, especially if your iPhone has a Face ID. iOS 16 brings the most significant update to the iPhone lock screen yet. Touch and hold to adjust the lock screen. You can try several different styles by swiping. Each style changes the color filter for the background photo and the font on the lock screen, so everything complements each other. It sounds a bit like Apple’s view of Google’s Material You, which was launched with Android 12.

You can also customize fonts for time and date and add widgets to the lock screen, such as temperature, activity rings, and calendar. Widgets are similar to the complications of the Apple Watch lock screen.

You can even set up multiple customized lock screens with different widgets and easily swipe between them. There’s even a photo shuffle option that automatically changes the pictures on the lock screen.

We were hoping that Apple would add one feature was always on display. It’s something that almost all Android phones have; even the Apple Watch. Hope it works out iPhone 14.

Announcements and live activities

Sometimes notifications can obscure a photo on the lock screen, so iOS 16 moves the notification to the bottom of the screen. When you receive them, instead of being listed, they look like a vertical carousel. Not only does it look better, but it should be a great help when using your iPhone with one hand.

iOS 16 also has to solve another notification problem. Sometimes you get a lot of notifications in a row from one app, such as a basketball game score. A new developer tool called Live Activities makes it easy to keep track of what’s happening in real time on the lock screen, instead of a series of interruptions.

Live activities should make it easier to follow sporting events, training or even driving through the Uber.

Wallet and Apple Pay later

Multi-state IDs will be available in your Wallet app, along with more security and privacy features. You can also protect your identity and age in iOS 16. Therefore, instead of displaying your exact date of birth, Wallet will display your ID and information that you are over 21 years old.

iOS 16 makes it easy to share keys with apps like Mail and Messaging. When your friend receives the key, they can add it to the Wallet app on their iPhone. Apple said it was working to make shared keys an industry standard and free for others.

Apple Pay will support new types of payments and adds a new feature called Apple Pay later, a service similar to Klarna, which allows you to split the cost of purchasing Apple Pay into four equal payments spread over six weeks, with zero interest and no fees. Upcoming payments are managed through Wallet, making it easy to track data and payments.

But that is not the end of Apple Pay. The new feature will also help you track Apple Pay orders and allow merchants to deliver detailed receipts and tracking information. This should make it easier to keep all your orders current.

Click and drag to view photos using Visual Lookup

In iOS 15 Visual Look Up, it analyzes your photos and can identify objects such as plants, landmarks, and pets. iOS 16 takes it to the next level. When you touch the subject of a photo, such as the dog in the picture above, you can lift it from the background and add it to applications such as News. Basically, it’s a click-and-hold tool that removes the background of a photo.

Apple sometimes makes excessive use of the word “magic,” but that is what it really looks like.

SharePlay comes into the news

SharePlay, which debuted on iOS 15, allows you to share experiences while connecting with someone through FaceTime. You can watch TV, listen to music in sync, and more. iOS 16 adds the ability to discover other applications that support SharePlay from FaceTime.

But perhaps one of the best things Apple did for SharePlay was that it worked in the News app. Apple said it was one of the biggest demands from application developers. Now, if you want to share a movie on Disney Plus, you can run SharePlay with a friend while chatting in News.

Safety Check aims to help people in violent relationships

Security control is a new feature that is meant to help people in violent relationships. It lets you check and reset who has access to location information, as well as passwords, messages, and other apps on iPhone.

Focus mode updates and focus filters

Focus mode receives several updates. The first applies the Focus behavior to the widgets and the appearance of the lock screen. So you can have one lock screen set for when your work focus is on, and another for exercise.

Apple has added specific Focus filters that apply your iPhone’s Focus mode to applications. For example, in Safari you can limit which tabs appear depending on which focus mode you have active.

Apple Maps add fare cards

The maps will receive several updates. Along the way you will be able to plan trips with up to 15 different stops. If you start planning a trip with Mac Maps, you’ll be able to share it on your iPhone.

And in something similar to what Google announced for Google Wallet on Android 13, you’ll be able to see fare estimates and also add extra money to the fare card from Apple Maps.

Checklist for the iCloud family

iCloud gets several new features. One of the more interesting is the ability to quickly set up a new device for your child. When Quick Start appears, you have the option to select users for the new device and use any existing parental controls that you have previously selected and configured. However, many of us still don’t want that: the ability to set up separate users for the same device.

There’s a new family checklist with tips for updating your child’s settings as they age, such as a reminder to check your location sharing settings or share your iCloud Plus subscription.

For more, check out everything Apple announced on WWDC 2022.