Every year, Apple introduces new operating software for its products, including the iPhone. In early June, it’s thought that Apple will unveil iOS 18, the next iPhone OS, at its World Wide Developers Conference. A new leak suggests this year’s release will be a show-stopper.
According to Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman in his latest Power On newsletter, Apple is going to make changes to one of the most important parts of the iPhone’s operating system: the home screen.
There have been plenty of changes over the years, with the all-black background on the earliest iPhones switching to colorful wallpapers and the option to add your own photos being one of the first updates.
Then there were neat visual improvements, like the cool Depth Effect which subtly makes it look like the app icons are floating above the background.
More recently, Apple added the capability for widgets to be added, something which had been available on Android phones for a long while, but were arguably more slickly realized on the iPhone.
This year, Gurman tells us in the most tantalizing of details, the home screen will become “more customizable”. Perhaps this will be along the lines of the improvements to the lock screen which landed as part of iOS 17.
Gurman has previously said that this year’s iOS update is one to look forward to, saying, “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. With that knowledge, Apple’s developers conference in June should be pretty exciting.”
More recently, it’s been reported that Apple is in negotiations with Google to bring Gemini generative AI features to the iPhone.
Along with the new home screen, Gurman says Apple will focus on “AI tools that help manage your daily life,” rather than AI features such as those from ChatGPT, for instance.
We’re still light on hard details for what the next iPhone will have, but other rumors include a significant upgrading of Siri with AI, using large-language models to revamp it into a much more advanced personal assistant with better natural conversation abilities and a greater integration with Apple iMessage. We also know, because Apple told us, that it will adopt Rich Communication Services as part of iMessage later in 2024. The groundwork for this will come in iOS 18, perhaps in one of the earliest releases. RCS will allow better interoperability between iPhone and Android messages—though there’s no expectation that Android green message bubbles will turn blue like native iMessage bubbles.
There’s plenty more to be released between now and June.
