Millions of Australians who use Apple iPhones will be able to access a suite of new features after a new iOS was unveiled that involves the latest in coding and artificial intelligence.
At their annual Worldwide Developers Conference at the company’s Apple Park headquarters today new software was announced across all Apple devices from Mac to iPad and iPhone.
This year, rather than incrementing all the platforms’ version numbers by a single digit, Apple will rename all software based on the year, with 26 being the new version for all devices based on the majority of the software’s coming in the year 2026.
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iOS 26 will come to compatible iPhones later this year, normally in mid-September in line with the next iPhone.
While Apple is calling the new iOS 26 their “broadest design change ever”, it isn’t an overwhelmingly different look – instead, the new “liquid glass” look makes things like menus, button bars or borders look fresh and clean, with a literal glass-like look.
Apple acknowledged, in their own way, the criticism they’ve received in recent months about their delivery of many AI features that were announced this time last year.
Apple’s Senior Vice President Software Engineering Craig Federighi called the current “Apple Intelligence” features the “first steps on a journey to bring your intelligence that’s most useful and relevant to you”.
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Addressing the features not yet delivered, he went on to say “this work needed more time to reach a high-quality bar” saying there would be more to share in the year ahead.
Observing all the announcements today, it seems Apple is far more focused on capitalising on AI across their apps and device, rather than for the sake of being a groundbreaking feature.
An example includes the screening of calls and messages.
The new call-screening feature will allow you to set unknown numbers to be sent to call screening.
In this situation the caller is asked their name and reason for the call, which then appears on screen for you to decide if you want to take the call.
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SMS messages can be filtered so that unknown numbers don’t clutter up your message list, while intelligently still delivering messages that are timely right into your messages list.
Additionally, if you’re on hold waiting for an operator, you can put the call into a waiting mode, get back to what you were doing, and when an operator becomes available, your phone will “tell” that person you’re just a moment away, and your phone will ring so you can rejoin the conversation.
Group chats will benefit from Apple Intelligence by suggesting things like a poll when the chat is having a back-and-forth about something like what day everyone is available for dinner.
For those communicating in other languages, Apple’s iOS 26 gets a feature Samsung launched several years ago, live translation.
In a text message or phone call, you can have a conversation translated, so communication is possible in real-time in any compatible language.
A word of warning, the “Phone” app is getting a decent upgrade in design, to make finding your favourites easier, as well as showing summaries of voicemail messages. This will likely be a stark change for many long-time iPhone users.
Last year with iOS 18 Apple fundamentally changed the “Photos” app, and they were widely panned for it.
For iOS 26 many users will be delighted to know that the “Library” option is back, with “Collections” being the more versatile modern way to arrange your photos.
This new “Liquid Glass” design language will also be seen across updates to software on Mac, Apple Watch, Apple TV and iPad.
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