iOS 18 New Features and Enhancements – the biggest update yet

iOS 18 NEW features – Awesome things YOU HAVE TO KNOW about!

The biggest iPhone update is here: iOS 18! And it’s different to iOS17 (read about what’s different here) It’s packed with new home screen customization, voice commands, and even a brand-new control panel. In this blog post, I’ll walk you through everything new coming to your iPhone. If you want to install it earlier you can see which devices support iOS 18 here and even install the Beta version here, which is the pre-release packed with all the features if you enable developer mode by reading our article here

Eye Tracking Control

One of the most mind-blowing iOS 18 new features you just have to try for yourself is that you can now control your iPhone with just your eyes. It is so clever! To do this, head into your settings, scroll down to accessibility, and scroll down again until you see Eye Tracking. Just toggle this on, then place your phone down onto something like a phone stand. It’ll ask you to follow these dots with your eyes so it can learn their movement. It’s super simple and doesn’t take very long at all. Now, you can literally look at anything on your screen, and it’ll snap to it and then select it for you. If you want, you can go back into the settings and turn off Snap to Item. Instead, you’ll see a cursor that follows your eye movement. This is just so cool

Music Haptics

Another new music feature you just have to try is Music Haptics. Head back into accessibility, then scroll down to the hearing section. You’ll see this option called Music Haptics. Head in here and turn this on. Now, whenever you play music through Apple Music, your iPhone will literally vibrate to the beat. This lets you really feel the music, and it’s such a unique feature. If you’re not a fan, you can also turn it off right here. So far, it only works with Apple Music, so Spotify listeners will have to wait a bit longer.

Home Screen Customization

Moving on to customization, there’s a lot of good stuff here. Firstly, you’ll notice that whenever you press any side button, you’ll see a little press animation. It’s the attention to these little details that really make the iPhone stand apart. It’s about time, but we can finally tap and hold down onto any app and drag it anywhere on the screen. Previously, icons would always snap back to the top, limiting customization a lot. With this new update, you can go with literally any layout that better suits your wallpaper and design. Besides moving app icons, if you tap on the edit button, you can now customize the app icons by making them smaller or larger. The most exciting new thing here is changing their tint color to basically any color you’d ever want. Now, if you want orange icons, you can have orange. If you want blue, purple, or something minimalistic like plain white, you can have that too. There’s also a dark mode for app icons, which makes the icons a bit darker in color while keeping their main color scheme. For now, this only works with native apps and not any other apps.

Lock Screen Shortcuts on iOS 18

The lock screen also got a tiny but substantial update. You can now change the corner app shortcuts to literally anything from a super long list of different shortcuts. Personally, I like the Pin My Watch option because if you ever misplace or lose your watch, you can find it quickly. There’s even an Open App shortcut where you can choose from all the different apps on your phone, like YouTube, WhatsApp, or Spotify, and open them straight from the lock screen.

Control Center Customization

The new control center is kind of like it’s on steroids. The first thing you’ll notice is that it now splits into different pages: a main page, a music/media page, home controls, and a connectivity page. If you tap on the plus icon in the top left-hand side, you can swipe down and add your own pages. At the bottom of every page, you’ll see an “Add Control” button. Once you tap on it, you can choose from many different controls. After adding a control, you’ll notice a little handle that you can tap and drag to resize the entire icon. You can choose to have a boxy control panel, one with a bunch of different small icons, or a horizontal design. You can really customize it a lot now. Just like with home screen apps, you can tap and drag these icons to anywhere on the control page to customize it the way you want. You can also change the order of your pages. Tap and hold, then select the entire box and drag it down, then let go where you want it to be. You’ll notice your media page is now at the bottom. Pretty cool! You can also completely remove a control page by tapping the little minus icon in case you want things a little less cluttered and neat. To navigate pages, you can just tap and hold down on the side, then swipe down, or tap on the pages icon to jump to it.

Lock and Hide Apps

If you want to lock any of your apps, the first thing you’ll have to do is go inside settings and Face ID, and make sure your passcode is turned on. Once you’ve done that and set up your password, I’d also suggest having Face ID turned on as well. Now, go to the home screen, tap and hold down on any app like Photos, and you’ll see a new Require Face ID button right at the bottom. Just tap on that, then tap on Require Face ID again. Bam! The app will scan your face and lock itself. Now, anytime you open that app, it’ll automatically try to use Face ID or ask you to use your passcode. If you want to hide an app, it’s the same process. Tap and hold down onto it and select Face ID again, but this time you’ll notice you can choose Hide and Require Face ID. Tap on Hide App again, and you’ll now notice it’s completely vanished from your home screen. The only place you’ll find it is inside this hidden app folder. To open this up, you’ll need either Face ID or your passcode, and then all your secret apps will be revealed. Just keep in mind that for now, you can lock any app, but you can only hide apps you’ve downloaded from the App Store that weren’t already pre-installed on the phone.

New Passwords App

Speaking of apps, you’ll also notice a brand-new app called Passwords. This app is so nifty, I’m pretty sure all of you are going to use it. With this app, you can find the passwords of any Wi-Fi you’ve ever connected to. If you tap on the password, you can quickly and easily copy it. There are even security codes that regenerate every 30 seconds. The best part is you can tap on “All,” then the little plus icon in the bottom right, and add whatever password you want to save. This app will also tell you if any of your passwords have been compromised and need to be changed ASAP.

Vocal Shortcuts

Back inside settings, then accessibility, you’ll find this Vocal Shortcuts option. This is such a cool feature! How it works is you set up a vocal shortcut. Tap on Continue, then select exactly what you’d like your shortcut to be, like taking a screenshot. Type in the phrase you’d like to use, like “snappy snap,” and repeat that phrase three times. Now, if you say “snappy snap,” your phone will take a screenshot for you without you doing anything else. Pretty cool, huh? You can do this for basically anything, like “louder” to turn the volume up or “controls” to open the control center.

Flashlight Adjustments

The flashlight has a brand-new look. Of course, you can adjust the brightness, but if you swipe left or right, you can adjust how wide or narrow you want the flashlight to be. You can see exactly what a difference it’s making. It’s pretty impressive! Another feature is that the flashlight will now dim down instead of just switching off, which is a nice little touch.

Vehicle Motion Cues

Back inside accessibility and motion, you’ll see Show Vehicle Motion Cues. This is something I’ve never seen before. If you’re in a car with your phone, you’ll now notice little dots appear on your screen, specifically made to help get rid of motion sickness. It even works on a flight and, I haven’t tested it yet, but I’m pretty sure it’ll work on a boat too.

Texting Enhancements

Texting on the updated Messages app is actually kind of next level now. To begin with, reactions are now a lot better. You get a few extra ones you can react with, but if you tap on this little icon, you can pick from any emoji you’d like. If you’re typing out a message, then highlight part of it and press this little “A” icon, you’ll find brand-new text effects. These give your messages a little extra pizzazz and make them stand out. You can also apply those text effects to your entire message instead of just a word if you want. If you send text effects with send effects, you can get some pretty funky chats. Inside the Messages app, if you now press the plus icon, you’ll notice this epic feature called Send Later. You can now choose a specific time or date to have this message sent out. Besides the obvious, like using this to send birthday messages, you can use this feature to send messages to your future self. You can even do this with photos, using a funny gif to lift your mood or a video to remind you of something important. Apple also released RCS, so you can finally text between Android and iPhone over Wi-Fi.

Calculator Enhancements

The calculator app looks the same, but it’s got some sick new features. If you tap on the calculator icon, you’ll see a bunch of new things. First up is Math Notes. When you start a new note, you can give it a title, then start calculating sums in this note. Your iPhone will solve them for you as you’re typing, which is so cool. Even more mind-blowing is if you start writing down your sum using the markup tool, your iPhone will still answer them and even use the same handwriting as yours. It works for really long complicated sums as well. Besides Math Notes, there’s a new conversion calculator. You can quickly convert something from kilometers to miles, for example. As you type it in, it instantly converts it. I especially love the currency converter that has so many currencies and is kept up to date with the current exchange rate.

Notes App Updates

The Notes app also got a few updates. If you tap on the attach icon, you can now record audio directly in your notes. It works just like the Voice Memo app. Once you’re done, you’ll see your voice note, and it’s even inscribed. The Voice Memo app is still there if you need it, but having everything in the Notes app is just a bit more tidy. Another new trick you can now do in Notes is if you highlight something, then go into the format tab, you’ll see a new text recolor option that changes the color of your text. A simple and small feature, but I’ve been wanting this for ages.

Photos App Redesign

The biggest iOS 18 new features update that a lot of us will have to get used to is the new Photos app. It’s been completely redesigned. If you scroll to the bottom, you’ll notice a customize icon. Once you tap on this, you can deselect different albums. I like to keep People, Pets, and Utilities. This makes navigation a lot easier and less cluttered. The search function also got a major update. You can type in exactly what you’re looking for, like “monkey,” and your iPhone will show you all the photos and videos you have of monkeys. If you tap on the three little dots in the top right-hand side and tap on “Show in All Photos,” it will take you to all the photos taken at the same time as that original one. You can also search for specific dates or type in something like “6 months ago” to find whatever you’re looking for. I really like the new utility section, where your iPhone will automatically categorize all your photos and videos into specific albums. If you go into a picture of your pet and tap the info icon, you’ll notice a little icon of their face with a question mark. If you tap on it, you can name your pet. In the People and Pets collection, you’ll find all your pet’s photos nice and organized.

Action Button Features

If you have an action button, there are a few new things you can do with it with the iOS 18 new features. Inside settings, under the Action Button section, if you swipe right, you’ll find a new setting called Controls. These controls are the same control shortcuts you’ll find in the new control panel. You can turn on a Time mode with just the action button, turn on Do Not Disturb mode, airplane mode, or basically do anything you can do inside the control panel straight with the action button. Because the action button is likely to be on future iPhones, this feature opens up a lot of customization options.

iOS New Features in Conclusion

iOS 18 has a ton of cool features. If you want to see my video on Apple intelligence and the new Siri, make sure you subscribe. I’ll see you in the next one. Toodles!