At the moment, Apple has officially confirmed this year's WWDC event. It will be held at Apple Park from June 11–15, 2024 (June 10–14, 2024 Pacific Time). The event will showcase cutting-edge innovations in iOS, iPadOS, macOS, watchOS, tvOS and visionOS.
Now, as the time comes to mid-May 2024, there have been a plethora of related revelations about the upcoming iOS 18.
AI features
Today, the topic of #iPhone上或安装ChatGPT# is on the hot search list. Reports from Sina Hot Spot show that Apple is close to reaching a deal with OpenAI to apply ChatGPT to the iPhone. According to reports, Apple will apply ChatGPT features in iOS 18 and has also negotiated with Google to license the company's Gemini chatbot.
Judging from previous revelations, although Apple has been developing its own large language model, it cannot reach an approximate level in a short period of time due to the large gap with the current mainstream products. That is to say, in the upcoming iOS 18, Apple will introduce other large-scale company products for it, which is basically certain.
At the same time, the Siri voice assistant will also be upgraded in iOS 18. Apple is expected to showcase its AI efforts at next month's annual developer conference, when Apple will unveil an improved Siri that is more conversational and versatile, according to a source tip. Siri's underlying technology will include a new generative AI system. This will allow Siri to chat continuously instead of answering one question at a time.
It is reported that Apple does not have plans to release a chatbot to compete directly with ChatGPT, but is focused on giving Siri better handling the tasks it can do now, including setting timers, creating schedules, adding items to the shopping list, and more.
Apple plans to position the revamped Siri as a more private product than rival AI services, as it will process requests on the iPhone rather than remotely in a data center, according to the presentation. And in order to support the new Siri feature, Apple will also increase the memory of the iPhone this year.
Improvements
Apple is said to be planning to introduce a voice memo feature in iOS 18, which will allow iPhone users to record audio content directly and embed it in notes. iPhone users previously had to open the Voice Memos app and copy and paste it into the Notes app, but iOS 18 can skip this step.
The latest leaks show that iOS 18 will add a new audio transcription feature to the Voice Memos and Memos app, and both the Voice Memos and Memos apps will provide transcription support for audio recordings. Among other things, the memo program is also able to provide an AI-generated summary of the main points of the recording. At the same time, in addition to iOS, memos in macOS will also support these features.
iOS 18 will feature the Safari Browsing Assistant, bringing Smart Search and Web Eraser features. Apple reportedly plans to include a redesigned control menu in the Safari address bar. One of the new tools is Smart Search. The tool will be able to identify the topics and keywords in the web page and generate a snippet of the web page.
The "Web Eraser" feature allows users to remove specific parts of a web page, such as ads, images, etc. Changes made by users using Web Eraser will remain in effect. When a user visits a modified webpage again, Safari reminds the user that the webpage has been adjusted to the changes they made earlier, and provides a restore option to restore the webpage to its original state.
UI adjustments
iOS 18 will have a home screen with more freedom of customization. Allegedly, iOS 18 will allow users to place app icons anywhere on the home screen grid. This means that users are able to create spaces, columns, and rows between app icons.
At the same time, multiple messages have mentioned that Apple will bring the biggest home screen makeover in years in iOS 18. Based on this, it is expected to bring additional customization options in addition to the icon arrangement. In addition to the tweaks to the home screen app arrangement, iOS 18 will feature some visionOS-inspired design elements, bringing a design similar to the visionOS operating system, with new tweaks in design elements and UI.
Overall, the upcoming iOS 18 will bring a significant upgrade, and the overall system operation plan will be changed, which may become the "largest" product upgrade in recent years.