Apple wants to add several new features to the iPhone and the iOS operating system next year.
While 2023 is drawing its last breaths and 2024 is ready to sit, it is not a bad idea to take a look at the previously announced or rumored features that will make their way to the current and future versions of Apple’s mobile operating system, iOS 17 and iOS 18, next year.
Among the features that we should expect to see on iOS next year, according to MacRumors, we can mention the following: group music playlists in Apple Music, AirPlay for hotel TVs, sideloading apps in the European Union, the next generation of CarPlay, the ability to help Satellite-based roadside assistance outside the US, RCS support in the Messages app, and generative AI for Cupertino’s voice assistant, Siri.
Group music playlists in Apple Music
The new “Group Playlists” feature in Apple Music allows different people to add, remove, or change the order of songs in a shared playlist.
It is worth considering that this feature was originally supposed to reach users this month with the iOS 17.2 update; But for unknown reasons, Apple decided to remove it at the last minute of beta testing. Now, the iPhone manufacturer’s website has promised the return of the mentioned feature in one of the iOS 17 updates in 2024.
Airplay on hotel TVs
Following the release of iOS 17.2, Apple updated its website to announce the delay of the AirPlay feature on hotel TVs until next year.
The company under the leadership of Tim Cook had initially announced the arrival of the mentioned feature “late this year”; But now we have to wait until “it arrives in an update in 2024”. No specific time was specified from the side of this company; however, it is not unlikely that iOS 17 will receive it in the first half of 2024.
With the help of the discussed feature, iPhone users will be able to connect with AirPlay by scanning a QR code on hotel TVs and wirelessly stream videos, images, and music from their Apple phones. Of course, users of the Google operating system can now stream content from their Android phones to the TVs of some hotels thanks to the Chromecast feature.
The spread of this feature is first of all due to the will of hotels to use it in their equipment; Apple announced some time ago that the multinational company IHG Hotels & Resorts is one of the first names that will use this feature in its collections.
Sideload applications in the European Union
It was last year that Mark German, a well-known Bloomberg analyst, announced that Apple was preparing to provide the ability to sideload apps on the iPhone to comply with the Digital Markets Act (DMA) of the European Union.
With this feature, which is expected to be available only in European countries at first, users can install apps on their Apple phones from a source other than the Apple Store. Garman recently predicted that the app sideloading feature will arrive in the first half of 2024 in one of the iOS 17 updates.
The next generation of Carplay
At WWDC, Apple showed off the next generation of CarPlay to attendees, promising deeper integration with vehicle features like air conditioning and radio, support for multiple screens across the dashboard, and increased personalization.
Apple’s website still announces “late 2023” as the time to introduce the first cars equipped with next-generation CarPlay; But with just under three weeks to go until the end of the year, it’s unlikely that Apple’s timeframe will be right. Finally, the next generation of CarPlay probably won’t be available until next year.
Satellite roadside assistance capability outside the United States
Since the release of iOS 17, iPhone 14 and iPhone 15 users in the United States have been able to call AAA, a roadside assistance company, even outside of cellular and Wi-Fi coverage, thanks to Apple’s satellite-based roadside assistance feature. get help
When Apple announced the feature, it said it would be available “initially” in the US; Therefore, we expect that from 2024, users of other countries will also have access to it.
Apple announced in November that it would bring support for the RCS cross-platform messaging standard to the iPhone’s Messages app by “late next year“; The time frame announced by the company will probably coincide with the release of iOS 18.
RCS support
Apple announced in November that it would bring support for the RCS cross-platform messaging standard to the iPhone’s Messages app by “late next year”; The time frame announced by the company will probably coincide with the release of iOS 18.
Support for the RCS standard will bring the following improvements to the default messaging experience between iPhone and Android phones:
- High-resolution images and videos
- Voice messages
- Writing status indicators
- Message read report
- Messaging over Wi-Fi between iPhones and Android devices
- Improved group chat functionality, including allowing iPhone users to leave a conversation that includes Android users
- Improved encryption over SMS
These updated features are now available in iPhone-to-iPhone communications via blue iMessages and other messaging platforms such as WhatsApp and Telegram; The addition of RCS support on the iPhone also brings these features to the green bubbles in the Messages app.
Smarter Siri
In his other predictions, Mark German announced the addition of productive artificial intelligence capabilities to iPhones that would lead to “improved Siri answering questions and better sentence completion in Messages.” According to him, Apple is also considering adding AI-based features to other apps on its platform, such as Apple Music, Pages, Keynote, and Xcode.
Information previously reported that combining large language models (LLMs) with Siri will allow users to automate more complex tasks through deeper integration with the Shortcuts app. The report also predicted that the feature would be added to iPhones next year through a software update, likely to be iOS 18.
The addition of artificial intelligence capabilities to iPhones should be seen as the result of the sudden popularity of this technology after the release of OpenAI’s ChatGPT chatbot. It was then that technology giants such as Google and Microsoft revealed their different perceptions of productive artificial intelligence in the shortest possible time.
Previously, Google released the Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro phones with a strong focus on AI-based features; It is expected that in the near future, starting with the Galaxy S24 series, future models of Samsung phones will also be equipped with these features. It seems that Apple will have no choice but to board the train of this high-profile technology in order to keep up with its competitors.
