Yesterday, at the start of Apple's WWDC conference, Apple gave the first public preview of iOS 15 and iPadOS 15. These updates will be available this Fall, and they bring a large number of new features to the iPhone and iPad that lawyers will love – as will others who use their devices to get work done. I cannot possibly discuss everything that is new — Apple's full lists of the new features for the iPhone and iPad are huge — but here are some of the highlights that I think will be very much appreciated.
Widgets on the iPad home screen
iOS 14 brought widgets to the iPhone home screen, and folks have come up with lots of great ways to use them. But the problem is that there is only limited space on an iPhone screen. The iPad is just the opposite — there is tons of space. And because you can put your 15 favorite apps in the Dock, the apps that do appear on your home screen are likely of lesser importance, making it easy to justify moving them aside to make way for widgets. That's why I think that widgets are going to be vastly more useful on the iPad in iPadOS 15.
I can foresee potentially using only widgets on the first page of my home screen so that, with a quick glance, I can see a large amount of information that is important to me — my calendar, my to-do items, the weather, the news, and more.
Quick Notes on the iPad
The Notes app is a great place to store little tidbits of information. For example, I have a list of my most active file numbers, which I find useful almost every day. It is a great place to jot down quick information, such as a phone number. And I use it for so much more.
In iPadOS 15, you can simply swipe from the corner and immediately start writing a Quick Note, without having to first launch the Notes app. Thus, it's a quick way to capture a note, no matter what else you are doing on the iPad. Better yet, Quick Note is aware of the app that you are using and can easily incorporate information from that app. For example, if you are looking at a web page in Safari, you can swipe from the corner to create a note and then tap one button to paste a link to the website that you are viewing. You can also easily take text from a website and place that in a Quick Note. In the future, when you look at that note, you can tap to go right back to where that text is located on the website.
Based on the demonstration yesterday, this looks like a very useful way to keep track of information.
Easier multitasking on the iPad
Although it has been possible to use multiple apps on the iPad at the same time since iOS 9 was introduced in 2015, the feature can sometimes be confusing to use. And worse yet, sometimes it can be triggered unintentionally.
In iPadOS 15, Apple is adding a new multitasking menu at the top of the screen (three small dots) to make it easier to use multitasking. You can even have two apps open on the left and right and then have a third app in the center. Each of those windows has its own set of three dots at the top to control multitasking.
When you have multiple instances of an app opened at once, iPadOS 15 has a new Shelf feature that can display small thumbnails of each of those windows at the bottom of the screen. The Shelf appears when you first open the app and then fades away as you start to use the app. This should make it much easier to keep track of and use different windows in the same app.
Has Apple finally figured out the best way to use multitasking on the iPad? Time will tell, but I'm encouraged that Apple has recognized that there is room for improvement and is taking a new approach.
A new Safari interface
There is a new interface for Safari on both the iPhone and iPad that is designed to let you see even more of a webpage on the screen and that is designed to make it easier to work with different tabs. For example, on the iPad, there is no longer one bar devoted to the address and a second bar below it devoted to different tabs. In iPadOS 15, there is just a single bar with tabs and the address space is part of the currently active tab.
You can also save a set of related tabs in a Tab Group, and a Tab Group syncs to your other Apple devices.
Photos improvements
Sometimes I take a photo because I want a picture. But other times I take a photo because I want to remember some information — like a photo of the front of a store to remember the name of the store, or a photo of a sign to remember the information on that sign. In iOS 15 and iPadOS 15, the Photos app has a new feature called Live Text to recognize text in a photo. And then you can quickly take action on that text, such as select the words to paste them into an email. Or select a phone number in a picture to dial that number. You can even translate the text. And this activity takes place on the device itself, so you can do it even without an Internet connection. It even works with handwriting.
Another new feature in Photos is called Visual Look Up. With this feature, you can take a picture of something, and then your iPhone or iPad will understand what is in the picture and provide you information on that topic. Take a picture of the Golden Gate Bridge, a famous painting, a plant, or a dog and get information about the bridge, the painting, the type of plant, or the breed of dog. This is another one of those features that I cannot wait to try. Even if it only works part of the time, I can see this being very useful.
Until now, if you wanted to change the date, time, or location of a photo, you needed to use a third-party app. (The one I use is called Metapho.) But in the new Photos app, you can adjust these from within the Photos app itself. Finally!
Apple's amazing Memories feature is also improved this year. Memories has always done a good job of intelligently selecting and reminding you of photos and stitching them together into movies in which the photos change with the beat of the music. These features are enhanced in iOS 15 and iPadOS 15. During a Memories movie, there are better features for pausing and going back to a photo. And there is a new interface that makes it easy to remix one of those movies to give it a different feel. And instead of working with a small selection of songs for background music, Memories movies now have access to the entire Apple Music library (if you subscribe). There have been many times when I have been working on an intense project in my office when I notice that Memories has suggested a new picture or set of pictures or a Memories movie for me. I take a pause, sometimes just for a few seconds, to enjoy the memory, and then I return to my work with a smile on my face. It's a small thing, but it often gives me just the jolt of energy that I need. I love the Memories feature, and I'm glad to see these updates coming this year.
Universal Control
Last year, I reviewed the Logitech MX Keys keyboard and noted that it is useful to be able to press a button to have the keyboard switch between working with a computer and working with an iPad. In iPadOS 15, Apple has a new feature called Universal Control. With it, you can use a single mouse and keyboard to work with both an iPad and a Mac that are next to each other. You can move your cursor to the end of the Mac screen and have it show up on the iPad screen and vice versa.
Keyboard improvements on the iPad
When you use an external keyboard with an iPad, you will be able to do even more. There are new global shortcuts, including shortcuts for multitasking and contextual menus. And there is a new interface for viewing keyboard shortcuts organized into categories like File, Edit, and View ... yet another example of the iPad borrowing good ideas from computers. App developer Steve Troughton-Smith explained that you can "hold down the command key, and you can then touch a menu item or scroll to see all of the app's menus hierarchically."
Maps
Apple has added significantly more details to maps — although, at first, it will only be for a few major cities. Apple also added immersive walking instructions for some cities so that you can hold up your iPhone and see an augmented view of the world around you with big arrows that appear on top of an upcoming street to show you where to take a left or right.
iCloud+
If you pay for any additional iCloud storage, even just the $0.99/month 50GB plan, you will be upgraded this Fall to iCloud+. It includes many new features, but one interesting one is called iCloud Private Relay. It provides you with additional privacy when you are using Safari and other web services by concealing your IP address. That way, the website cannot see your IP address, location, and browsing activity.
Use 5G instead of Wi-Fi when it makes sense
Have you ever been in a situation in which your iPhone or iPad was connected to a Wi-Fi network, but the network was so slow that you find it faster to just switch to a cellular connection? If you have a newer iPhone or iPad that supports 5G, this will now happen automatically. As Apple describes it, your device "now automatically prioritize 5G when Wi‑Fi connectivity on networks you visit occasionally is slow, or when you are connected to captive or insecure networks, so you can enjoy faster, safer connectivity."
And so much more
And that is really just scratching the surface of the new features. There are significant improvements to FaceTime that will make it far more attractive to folks who are currently using Zoom or other videoconferencing services, including a grid view, the ability to schedule a FaceTime call, the ability to work with folks using Windows or Android, and the ability to isolate your voice and reduce background noises. There are tons of improvements to the Messages app that make it easier to see photos and other content shared with you. A new Focus feature takes the idea of Do Not Disturb and makes it more advanced so that you can customize notifications that you receive at work, at home, or while doing other activities. And you can use Find My to locate your missing AirPods Pro or AirPods Max.
Another new feature is that Siri requests are processed on the device. This allows Siri to work faster, and it also enhances privacy because the audio of your requests is processed on the device. I know that a lot of attorneys, and others who discuss confidential information, will appreciate the idea that audio recordings do not leave the iPhone or iPad to go to some server for Siri to analyze the audio.
And finally, as we spend the rest of 2021 getting used to the idea of traveling again, later this year you will be able to add your driver's license to the Wallet app on the iPhone and a paired Apple Watch and present them securely at TSA checkpoints.
Conclusion
The smart engineers at Apple may not have been able to work in their offices in Cupertino and elsewhere since early 2020, but they have clearly been very busy while they were working at home. I'm impressed by the large number of new features in iOS 15 and iPadOS 15. We are now about four months away from these updates being finished, and I can't wait.