Earlier this week, I put iOS17 into my ‘things I hated from WWDC’ category, and I stand
by that, but after having had the week to really play around with the beta, I realise
that there’s more to this upcoming release than Apple showed in their keynote.
So in this video, I’m going to share with you the 20 iOS17 features that I’ve been
most impressed by so far.
This hopefully goes without saying but just in case, I’m using the developer beta here,
these are all features that you’ll be able to use when you update to the official release,
most likely in September of this year, please don’t message telling me that you can’t
find these features on your phone, this is just a preview of what’s coming in a few
short months.
OK, let’s get into it.
### Download map areas in Maps
A feature that people have been wanting for a LONG time now is the ability to download
maps in the Maps app - well, in iOS17 you’ll be able to, and it’s really easy.
It’s a bit glitchy in this early iOS17 beta, but it does work and will hopefully be working
without bugs by the time iOS17 launches later on this year.
### Video Messages in FaceTime
In iOS17, when you FaceTime call someone, if that person isn’t available to take the
call, they can reject it as normal.
But you, as the person who initiated the call, will have the ability to leave them a video
message.
Your phone will give you a countdown, at which point you record the message, and if you’re
happy with it, you fire it across.
That person gets a prompt letting them know that they’ve received a video voicemail,
which they can then watch when they’re ready.
### Sensitive Content Warning (privacy and security)
Bad news for weirdos who think it’s OK to send unsolicited naked pics to people, good
news for those of us who are normal, in iOS17, there’s a feature that uses machine learning
to warn you if your phone thinks that you’ve received what it deems to be sensitive content,
and you can toggle it on and off as you wish.
### Hey Siri is now just Siri
I made fun of this one in my reaction video to WWDC, Apple have dropped the famous trigger
phrase that we all know and love, and now you just say Siri when you want it to do something.
And I made fun of it, because I assumed it would mean my phone would constantly be getting
false triggers when I’m shooting videos like this, but it’s actually pretty smart,
and it does seem to know the difference between you just saying the name Siri, and you actually
wanting it to do something.
### Automated Shopping Lists
When you go to create a new list in Reminders in iOS17, it will ask you if you want to create
a regular list, or a shopping list.
If you choose shopping, the list is designed to automatically categorise groceries as you
add them to the list, which obviously is going to make shopping that little bit easier.
You can see here in this example video, I can add all kinds of different groceries,
and the app knows how to categorise them out.
You can override the category if you wish, I’m hoping that this means that any time
you add that product in the future it will automatically update, we’ll have to wait
and see.
### Sections in Reminders
Also in Reminders, in iOS17 you’ll be able to add sections.
This I guess is useful if you’ve got a project that’s perhaps working across multiple phases,
or things happening all at once, and you want a clever way of being able to better categorise
the reminders out rather than just having one big list, or being forced to use sub tasks.
You can then take that a step further, and use a column view, rather than the standard
list view, so if you tend to work with project charts, this might be a cool new feature for
you.
### Locked Private Browsing
Private Browsing is going to be more, well, private in iOS17.
When you open up a private browsing tab in Safari, it will be locked, and you’ll unlock
the feature using Face or Touch ID.
If you then lock your phone, and then unlock it, and open Safari, the private browsing
tabs you still have open will be locked again, meaning less chance of you being caught off
guard, where something you’d previously been browsing privately now shows.
Apple are also promising that they’ve made it harder for websites to use advanced tech
to track you when you’re private browsing, so whatever you use it for, enjoy the additional
privacy.
### Safari Profiles
This feature looks like it could be a genuinely useful quality of life improvement, if you
tend to use your iPhone for work and leisure, or maybe for school, in Settings in Safari
in iOS17, there’s now this feature called Profiles.
Here you can create a custom Safari profile, and your phone will automatically separate
out your history, any extensions you’re using, even down to things like favourites
and browser cookies.
I think this is going to be huge when it launches later this year, I love the idea of being
able to better separate work from home, and this function should make that much easier.
### Audio Transcribing in Messages
If you receive an audio message from someone in Messages who is also using iOS17, your
phone will automatically transcribe that message, essentially immediately, and with really impressive
accuracy from what I’ve been able to play around with so far.
So you can see here, a message that’s just been received, and without me even having
to hit play on it, I can read the content of what the person sent.
You can of course still play the audio message, but if you’re perhaps somewhere where you
can’t listen to the audio, or you’d prefer to just read it, this is a great feature.
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### Check-In function in Messages
From within Messages, in iOS17, you’ll be able to check in, which basically means at
the touch of a couple of buttons, you can have your phone automatically notify the person
at the other end that you’ve arrived at your destination, but perhaps more importantly,
automatically raise the alarm if you fail to arrive at the expected time.
It’s pretty clever from what I’ve seen, I’ll reserve full judgement until I’ve
been able to try this in a real life situation, but I like what I’ve seen thus far.
### Stickers in Messages
OK, I titled this video 20 awesome features, and I’ll be honest I’m not a sticker user,
but if you are, this feature is pretty awesome.
In Messages, you can tap to add a sticker, and what’s nice about this is that your
phone will look through your photos, to find photos that you could pull a sticker from.
Once you’ve done that, you can apply visual effects, like putting a border around the
sticker, or making it look like a comic book.
You then just tap to send it or drag it onto a message, or whatever it is that you’re
meant to do with stickers.
### Set multiple timers
I love that at the same time as Apple announce the dawn of spatial computing, they also have
finally cracked setting multiple timers on the iPhone.
In iOS17, you’ll be able to create a timer as normal, but you can now label your timers,
and you can create multiple timers, finally making the iPhone’s timer function as useful
as the one we’ve had on Watch for years.
What a time to be alive.
### Standby Mode
When your iPhone is plugged into power and not being used, and horizontal, it will be
able to enter standby mode in iOS17.
This feature turns your iPhone into a kind of mini smart screen, displaying all kinds
of relevant information, which you as a user can customise.
It’s a bit limited right now, I’m hoping that when iOS17 properly launches, developers
will have had a chance to really make the most of this.
### Interactive Widgets!
Another ‘finally’ moment coming in iOS17, widgets can now be interactive.
So the most obvious example of this, is when you’ve got a Reminders widget showing on
your home screen, you’ll be able to tap to complete a reminder right from the widget,
rather than having to head into the app itself, or turning lights on or off from a widget
instead of having to go into the Home app.
Yes, we should have had this a long time ago, but I’m still glad it’s finally, almost
here.
### More detail in the Weather app
The weather app had been drastically improved in the previous iOS, this time around there
seems to be more information, but the devs have done a good job of tidying everything
up, and grouping relevant information together, it’s a much neater, nicer experience now.
You can see that there’s even a whole section dedicated to the moon, which is never not
gonna be interesting.
### Translate App has had a facelift
The translate app doesn’t appear to have had much in the way of new features added,
but it has had a facelift, as you can see here when we compare with the previous iOS16.
It was always a little bit confusing and cluttered in iOS16, iOS17 does appear to have tidied
everything up a bit, so if this is an app you use, hopefully this will be of use to
you.
### Shortcuts App facelift
Another app that appears to have had a bit of a lick of pain in iOS17 is the Shortcuts
app, although it’s much less liberal here, only seeming to impact some of the first-party
shortcuts like Books, Clock and FaceTime.
### AutoCorrect improvements
Apple talked about this one in the iOS17 keynote, autocorrect has had a tweak in iOS17 and you’ll
kind of have to trust me on this one, overall my experience of using it this past week is
that it all seems way more intuitive and intelligent overall, but the other nice thing is that
when your phone corrects something, you now get a line underneath the corrected word to
let you know it’s been corrected, and you can tap on that to quickly teach your phone
what you’d like the word to be, rather than having to constantly go back and re-type it.
### Visual LookUp is improved
If you’re using a compatible iPhone, you’ll be pleased to know the visual look up has
seen some improvements in iOS 17.
Here, for example, with a photo of our dog, you can see down at the bottom of the screen,
a small dog logo, indicating what visual look up has identified in the photo.
Tapping on that icon gives you the usual visual look up options, but you can also see this
kind of Halo effect that’s created around our dog showing you specifically which part
of the photo has been identified.
You then have the usual visual lookup options, interestingly it never gets her breed correct,
she’s a working cocker, but it does get this correct in the similar web images.
### Photos now recognises pets
For a while now, you’ve been able to tell your iPhone who people are in your photo library,
and it uses machine learning to then identify them in pictures, helping to create memories
in the photos app, or making searching for photos of specific people easier.
Well this now extends to pets as well.
I don’t know quite how far-reaching the ‘pets’ category is going to be, it works
with our dog and I have it on good authority it works with cats as well, it may or may
not work with your redknee tarantula, set your expectation accordingly here.
### Bonus - Family Passwords
This is technically feature 21, I’m including it anyway, you’ll be able to share passwords
quickly and easily with family in iOS17.
Here in the passwords section of iOS17, you can see that we have the ability to create
a whole section of passwords that are both visible and usable by the other members of
your family.
### End
So there you go, that’s 20, well technically 21 features that I’ve been really impressed
by in iOS17.
What do you think, what would you use here, or are there other features that you think
should have made the cut?
Drop me a comment and let me know.
And as ever, if you found this video useful, do please consider leaving me a like, and
subscribing to my channel for more content like this in the future.
See you on the next video.