Apple launches iOS 10

Wow! Apple just surprised us the launch of iOS 10 at its annual developer conference. Apple is releasing the beta version of the tenth operating system for iPhones and iPads to the public next month. 

 “It is the biggest iOS release ever for our users,” said Craig Federighi.

Here's what is new:

Apple redesigned the lock screen with iOS 10. With “Raise to Wake” you can see your lock screen without touching your phone. Your phone wakes up. This move was needed as Touch ID had become so fast with the iPhone 6s that you wouldn’t see your notifications on your lock screen. 

Now, you can also preview notifications with 3D touch. You deep press on a notification and it loads a tiny window with your message conversation for example. Third-party apps like Uber can take advantage of that as well. You deep press on the Uber notification and you can see where your car is right now. 

On your lock screen, you can swipe right to launch the camera, and swipe left to see your widgets, directly on the lock screen. If you swipe from the top or the bottom, you get the notification center and control center as usual. 

The notification center is completely redesigned as well and looks more like the notification screen on your Apple Watch. Control Center is now made out of two panes. When you swipe right, you can see another control center with your music player only.
3D Touch shortcuts on the home screen are much more useful now as apps can put live information directly in the 3D Touch popup. Similarly, you can deep press on a widget in the Today View to see this baby version of your apps. 

Siri is also one of the new top features in iOS 10. Federighi showcased WeChat in Siri. You can ask Siri to send a WeChat, and Siri opens the same kind of tiny version of your app to send a message to the right person. There are many other use cases — calling a ride in Uber or Lyft, starting a workout in Runtastic and Runkeeper, paying back your friends in Number26, Venmo, calling using Skype or Viber 

Siri suggests answers in Messages now too, like your current location or contact information. And it looks like the keyboard is getting more powerful with multilingual support. 

iOS 10 uses deep learning locally on the iPhone to do face recognition. It lets you build albums based on your family members and friends. iOS now detects objects in your photos, like water, a mountain, etc. You can now search for “mountains” and find all your mountain photos now. 

It looks like the Photos app is getting a huge upgrade and now looks more like Google Photos. The big difference, obviously, is that Apple handles everything on your device and doesn’t collect data about you. Photos build memories from a vacation together with a good looking cover photo. You can jump from memories to memories. iOS 10 also puts together videos with a soundtrack. You can make these videos shorter, change the mood, etc. macOS will also get these features in the Photos app. 

Maps is also receiving a big update with Proactive suggestions. Maps know when you’re going to work for instance, and can suggest you to enter the itinerary to your work. Talking about turn-by-turn directions, Apple has redesigned this screen to make it more useful. Finally, Apple is opening Apple Maps to third-party developers. For instance, Foursquare could build an extension for Apple Maps. Uber could let you book a ride from Uber. 

Apple Music has been completely redesigned from the ground up. The Connect tab is gone, but Connect is still available. The Now Playing screen is new. It looks more like Rdio to be honest. It seems much less cluttered. When you open up the Music app, you start with your library tab. If you scroll down, you see new music added to your Apple Music account. 

In the Now Playing screen, you can scroll down and see the lyrics. At the top of For You, there’s a Discovery Mix. This is exactly like Discover Weekly on Spotify. Then you see the good old curated playlists and then Connect. This screen still feels very cluttered with a bunch of different things. The Radio tab features Beats 1, featured shows with on-demand streaming.