The Visual Summary — WWDC23 Part II: OS updates
A sketchnote summary of Apple’s WWDC23 OS updates
In this second post of my Visual WWDC23 summary, we’ll go over all the OS updates Apple presented: iOS, watchOS, iPadOS, macOS, and tvOS.
If you like this overview, make sure to check out the other parts of The Visual Summary:
As usual, let’s kick it off with the summary sketchnote:
Key takeaways
- common: interactive widgets, mood tracking, the Journal app, and stickers!
- iOS 17: Stand By allows you to dock your iPhone and make it an alarm clock, desk calendar, or home control device. Messages get some major updates, including Check In to make sure you get home safe and stickers. Keyboard autocorrect gets AI improvements. AirDrop has become more user-friendly.
- iPadOS 17: overall small updates, widgets are now interactive, lock screen includes widgets and new wallpaper options (slow-mo pictures). There’s better support for PDF annotations and collaboration, and the Health app makes it entry to the iPad!
- watchOS 10: a redesign that makes better use of the screen. Cycling and Hiking workouts get more features; health focuses on mental health and eye strain. Also: there’s a Snoopy watch face!
- macOS Sonoma: Widgets move to the desktop, helpful video conferencing features to share content and your camera, Safari privacy improvements, and Web Apps (Dock and Notification support). Better gaming support to provide CPU and GPU priority and offer low-latency input and audio.
- tvOS: Facetime on Apple tv!
iOS 17: Stand By, Journal, AirDrop & Stickers
One of the main new features of iOS 17 version is Stand By, which turns your iPhone into an alarm clock, a calendar, a music controller, a home automation remote, etc. It can be activated by charging your phone, locking it, and putting it at an angle. At night, it uses low light mode with a red tone, just like we saw on the Apple Watch Ultra last year.
Stand By turns your iPhone into an alarm clock, a calendar, a music controller or a home automation remote.
AirDrop also receives some noteworthy enhancements. Now, you can activate AirDrop by holding two iPhones together. NameDrop allows you to share your contact card quickly, and sharing files and photos is much easier now. An extension, coming later this year, allows transfers to continue seamlessly over the Internet, when you step away.
Messages, too, receives a host of improvements. Search filters, a more calm app integration interface, and voice message transcripts are included in iOS 17. But, the real stars of the iOS update are Stickers, and Check In. The former allows you to use stickers anywhere that you can use emoji and create custom ones from live photos. The Check In lets your friends and family know whether you have arrived safely on your destination. iOS will share your location and phone stats like battery and cell service until you get home (all encrypted).
The Journal app can collect information from different sources like workouts, photos, music, which provides a context-aware experience for journalling.
Finally, there’s a new app called Journal, which allows you to capture and reflect on special moments. The new app can collect information from different sources like workouts, photos, or music, which provides a context-aware experience for journalling.
I am most eager to explore the Journal app, as its ability to easily integrate with various data sources sounds really promising. Furthermore, I can’t wait to try Stand By, especially since I’ve discovered that my iPhone XR is still compatible!
iPadOS 17: Lock Screen, widgets, PDF & Health
While the latest iteration of iPadOS does not offer many new unique features, there are some nice additions to Apple’s tablet operating system.
The newly designed lock screen can now be customized with fonts and colors, and features live photos, new wallpapers, live activities, and … widgets! The new wallpapers you can create with live photos also look quite nice, especially with the added slow-motion effect when you unlock your iPad.
The widgets on the iPad (and other OS’s) are interactive now, which means you can just hit an element of a widget.
The widgets on the iPad (and other OS’s) are interactive now, which means you can just hit an element of a widget to trigger an action instead of it opening the app where you have to press something again. As this provides a much more intuitive user experience, this is a very welcome change! At the same time, users will probably spend less time in some apps, which not all developers might be happy about.
After Logic Pro and Final Cut Pro in May of this year, we got a new iPad app: Health. The dedicated Health app now enables users to monitor their health graphs directly on their iPads, ensuring secure synchronization for peace of mind. Just like on the iPhone, but on a bigger screen.
Users who use their iPad for annotating PDF documents will get some significant updates this year: it becomes easier to fill out forms, sign documents, but also collaborate by annotating them using the Notes app. The entire experience seems more seamless than before.
One particularly pleasing aspect of this update is the continued support for older devices. Even my 10.5" iPad from 2017 remains compatible, bringing many new features to a wider range of users. I’m mainly looking forward to using the Health app and having interactive widgets.
WatchOS 10
WatchOS 10 brings some substantial updates to the Apple Watch. A visual redesign of the OS features better display usage. The redesign takes full advantage of the display, presenting more detailed information, interactive elements, and vibrant backgrounds. We also get two new watch faces, one of them being Snoopy and Woodstock!
The redesign takes full advantage of the display.
A standout feature in WatchOS 10 is the Smart Stack, reminiscent of the old Siri watch face but now accessible across all watch faces. By simply turning the crown, you gain access to a selection of widgets (backed by machine learning models), ensuring you have the most relevant information and actions at your fingertips.
Cycling enthusiasts will appreciate the newly added capabilities, brining cycling support to more “pro” levels. Now, you can pair bike sensors, unlocking access to new metrics (cadence and power) and enabling “power zones.” Your iPhone also becomes a valuable companion, displaying all your cycling metrics on your steering wheel-mounted iPhone, eliminating the need to lift your arm during your ride.
Hiking enthusiasts will find new features catered to their interests as well. The hiking workout gives you access to waypoints in an elevation view, and shows, for example, where you last had a cellular connection. WatchOS 17 also offers topological maps, making it easier to navigate terrain.
Furthermore, developers can now create custom workouts using the workouts API and leverage the high-accuracy motion sensors in the Watch for even more precise tracking.
With a newly added focus on mental health, the Health app introduces Mood tracking, enabling you to monitor and understand your emotional well-being better and to indicate the risk for depression. Vision health is also prioritized, taking into account your screen distance and ensuring you spend enough time in daylight to promote overall eye health. These new functionalities extend to iOS, underscoring Apple’s commitment to comprehensive health management.
The overall redesign of WatchOS 10 is aesthetically pleasing and adds some freshness to the OS. This should be the year where I update my Series 2, which has been acting rather sluggish for the past three years, so I’m definitely looking forward to this update!
MacOS Sonoma
The latest version of macOS, Sonoma, brings an array of exciting improvements, particularly in the areas of Widgets, Video Conferencing, Gaming, and Safari. A smaller addition is the new slow-motion screensaver option.
A really cool addition is the ability to add iPhone widgets to your desktop.
In Sonoma, widgets take up a more central role as they transition from the Notification Center to the Desktop. Just like on the iPad, these widgets become interactive, allowing you to trigger actions effortlessly. When working in a window, the widgets gracefully fade into the background, adopting the tint of your wallpaper. A really cool addition is the ability to add iPhone widgets to your desktop when your phone is nearby, demonstrating again the power of Apple’s ecosystem approach.
For video conferencing, Apple takes it up a notch. Presenters now have the option to overlay themselves on the presentation window, either by appearing behind it or as a circle in front. Additionally, certain gestures, such as making a heart symbol with your hands, trigger special effects that add a creative touch to your video.
Safari receives several privacy updates, enhancing its private browsing capabilities. Users now have the ability to share PassKeys with their family. Web apps are now supported in Safari, complete with Notification support and the option to add them to the Dock. Another big feature is Profiles, enabling you to keep work and personal browsing separate by maintaining distinct favorites, cookies, history, tab groups, and extensions.
Impressively, popular games like Cyperpunk, Hogwarts Legacy, GTA V, and Diablo IV have been shown to work on Macs using the Game Porting Toolkit (GPTK).
Finally, there is Gaming Mode. This special mode in macOS prioritizes CPU and GPU power for your games and significantly reduces audio and input latency. Apple also released Game Porting Toolkit (GPTK), which helps game developers port their games to Mac.
Impressively, popular games like Cyperpunk, Hogwarts Legacy, GTA V, and Diablo IV (and here) have been shown to work on Macs using this toolkit, achieving 60fps with high settings in many cases. Although this does not guarantee that all developers will port their games, the results are undeniably impressive. Many hobbyists have embraced the toolkit to make games work on Macs, expanding the gaming possibilities on the platform.
As I’ve gone through the era where Widgets were available in the old “Dashboard” overlay, and my screen is mainly filled with windows, I’m not super excited about the Widgets. If there is a new shortcut to make them visible, it could, however, pave the way for a new Desktop metaphor.
However, I’m really excited about the gaming improvements. The DirectX 12 support provided under the hood, surpassing what VMWare or Parallels offered previously, bodes well for exceptional gaming performance. Though there may be some tinkering involved in getting existing games to work optimally, it demonstrates what modern Macs can do and hopefully triggers more developers to consider the platform.
Audio & Home: tvOS 17, AirPods & AirPlay
Finally, there are some Home updates for tvOS 17, AirPods, and AirPlay.
As all these topics are packed into one category, which means tvOS did not receive that much attention this year. But, tvOS 17 brings a sleek redesign of Control Center, now located at the top for quick access. Control Center provides a convenient overview of important information and allows you to access different sections effortlessly. The new “Memory” screensaver beautifully shows your best photo moments on the screen.
The standout feature for tvOS 17 is the long-awaited support for FaceTime!
However, the standout feature is the long-awaited support for FaceTime! With the help of your iPhone, you can now show all participants on your tv screen while the iPhone camera captures you. While Zoom and WebEx support is on the way, Teams was not mentioned. I’m hoping this will trigger Microsoft to also move toward the tv, as this might provide an easy way to extend Teams setups for meeting rooms. Let’s see… All in all, FaceTime on Apple tv would have been great during the lockdown periods.
AirPods Pro (existing ones) will get an update with adaptive audio. This features combines noise cancellation with transparency mode to ensure that only relevant sounds filter through. Conversation awareness is a new addition that lets your AirPods auto-switch to transparency mode when they detect speech, for the duration of your conversation. Personalized volume will use the environmental conditions to determine the best volume settings. On top of that muting in calls will be possible by pressing the stem (or crown on AirPods Max). Finally, device switching should be faster and more reliable.
Finally, there is AirPlay. This feature is getting smarter by learning your preferences, to, for example, suggest playing songs on the kitchen speaker during cooking in the evening. It’s now also possible to start AirPlay sessions using HomePods, using Siri.
AirPlay will also become more useful during traveling, as hotels will have the option to offer AirPlay on their TVs. This us done by showing a QR code on the screen, which connects you instantly. And, in the car, CarPlay allows people who ride along to play they music via AirPlay on the car speakers.
In conclusion, we see some nice updates in the home area. To me, the hotel setup is the most interesting one; even though I myself rarely turn on the tv when I’m traveling, this could make it a lot easier for people to watch their content without much of a hassle.
My Thoughts
This year's WWDC was massive in terms of updates, with a notable highlight being the Vision Pro announcement. Apple didn’t hold back and delivered quite some new OS updates, with iOS and WatchOS taking the spotlight this year and iPadOS, macOS, and tvOS being more in the background.
It used to take much longer for features to trickle through the ecosystem.
This is a challenge Apple faces in presenting WWDC per Operating System. As many of the iOS updates also appear in the other OS’s, they often seem forgotten, while in reality, many of the cool features will be there present. It used to take much longer for features to trickle through the ecosystem. Control Center, for example, was introduced in the iPhone in 2013 and reached macOS in 2022. However, as I think about it, I’m unsure if the Journal app will arrive on all platforms this year. So it remains a challenge for Apple to convey what will be available when and where clearly.
We also saw Apple announce improvements to AirPods device switching. This is a very minor thing but seems to imply that the feature was not that reliable before, something very un-Apple to say. Furthermore, I expect Apple to get things like this right from the first try and maybe not present it as an update on WWDC. But hey, bugs will always be present, and they recognize it.
During this WWDC, we saw quite some cross-OS features, such as mood tracking, interactive widgets, and stickers. This, together with the emphasis on ecosystem connectivity (AirDrop, AirPlay), seems to indicate Apple keeps extending the power of its ecosystem, aiming for unprecedented levels of integration.
The Apple ecosystem makes things a lot easier for me.
This also is one of my personal arguments when people ask me why I need to work with Apple hardware: the ecosystem makes things a lot easier for me.
One of the more surprising aspects was in the gaming corner: porting games to Mac becomes easier. The Game Porting ToolKit has already allowed a community to run recent games successfully on Apple Silicon. If this takes off, we might be looking at more games entering the Mac realm…
Conclusion
This year’s WWDC was massive. I noticed as drawing my sketchnote summary took a lot longer than in other years. The main thrill came from the Vision Pro announcement, which had a once-in-a-decade vibe to it, but the OS and Mac updates themselves were really good. You can feel iOS and watchOS maturing, iPadOS is still trying to find its way, and macOS is slowly but surely evolving into a power-user version of iOS.
All in all, what we’ve seen are very solid updates. I’m looking forward to trying out all the new features in September and how they will integrate with their new product announcements. If you have any thoughts on the OS updates, please share them in the comments below!
A full-size view of the WWDC sketchnote image is available here.
