According to Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman, Apple has big plans for iOS 18.
According to Gurman, iOS 18 could be the “biggest” software update in iPhone history, as he stated in the Q&A section exclusive to subscribers of his Power On newsletter.
“I’m told that the new operating system is seen within the company as one of the biggest iOS updates — if not the biggest — in the company’s history,” he said.
As mentioned below, Gurman stated that he will provide more information about specific iOS 18 features and changes that are in the works in the future. However, already know about two new features that are probably going to be included in the update.
September will see the release of iOS 18, and in June, during Apple’s annual developers conference, WWDC, the first developer beta will be made available.
RCS Assistance
Based on Apple’s announcement in November 2023 that it would support the cross-platform messaging standard RCS in the iPhone’s Messages app “later” in 2024, it is likely that iOS 18 will include this feature.
Enhancements to the standard messaging experience between iPhones and Android devices should come from RCS support:
improved quality images and videos
audio communications
Typing cues
Examine the receipts.
Wi-Fi texting between Android and iPhone devices
Better group chats, with iPhone users being able to exit a discussion involving Android users
better encryption than that of SMS
Many of these contemporary features are also present in third-party messaging apps like WhatsApp and Telegram, and they are already available for use in blue bubble conversations between iPhones via iMessage. Green bubbles in the Messages app will get additional features when the iPhone is equipped with RCS support.
A more intelligent Siri
According to Gurman, generative AI technology will be included in iOS 18, which “should improve how both Siri and the Messages app can field questions and auto-complete sentences.” According to him, Apple has also looked into generative AI capabilities for a number of other apps on its platforms, such as Xcode, Pages, Keynote, and Apple Music.
Apple reportedly intends to integrate deeper with the Shortcuts app in order to enable users to automate complex tasks through the use of large language models in Siri, according to The Information. According to the report, iOS 18, or the next iPhone software update, is anticipated to include this feature in 2024.
When OpenAI introduced ChatGPT, a chatbot that can react to queries and other cues, in 2022, generative AI saw a sharp increase in popularity. As more businesses rush into the chatbot market, Google and Microsoft released comparable chatbots last year. Due to their extensive training on large language models, the chatbots can react human-like.