Mobile Devices, Tablets & Phones News - Page 1

Apple has today finally made the iOS 17.5 software available for download by everyone who has a compatible iPhone after weeks of beta testing. The app update is of course free to download and it brings with it a number of new improvements. We'd suggest that everyone downloads the new update sooner rather than later, too.

Apple made the update available alongside other software updates for the iPad, Mac, and the rest of its platforms, and this one, in particular, brings with it some interesting changes. The most notable change, albeit one that only affects people in the European Union, means that users can now download apps directly from the websites of individual developers for the very first time. The change comes as part of Apple's attempts to comply with the EU's Digital Markets Act. Other changes that have already been applied include the allowance for third-party app stores and more.

Other changes of note in iOS 17.5 include the new Cross-Platform Tracking Detection system that will alert people if a compatible Bluetooth item tracker is moving with them but is not owned by them. It doesn't matter which device that tracker is paired with - meaning those paired with Android devices will still alert iPhone users and vice-versa.

Last week Apple announced the brand-new iPad Pro complete with a super-fast new M4 chip and an OLED display that is brighter than anything the company has put into a tablet to date. It's the best tablet that Apple has ever made, and it also has one other accolade to go with all of that - it also happens to be the thinnest device that Apple has ever made, too.

Apple made quite the big deal about the new iPad Pro's lack of thickness when it was announced at the Let Loose event alongside the new M2 iPad Air. The 11-inch iPad Pro measures 5.3mm while the 13-inch iPad Pro is even thinner, coming in at just 5.1mm thick. That's incredibly thin and it makes the new tablet even thinner than the iconic iPod nano. But when you make something that thin - especially something as physically big as the 13-inch iPad Pro - there is one obvious problem that needs to be overcome. How do you make sure that something like that won't bend in the middle? Apple, it says, has the answer.

The news came via someone who really should know the correct answer, too. Apple SVP John Ternus told YouTuber Arun Maini that Apple has redesigned the iPad Pro's internals to try and make sure that it's as rigid as possible. One of the changes includes a new metal cowling that sits above the logic board and then runs down the middle of the tablet to essentially form a sort of rib. That rib then adds additional rigidity to a device that could otherwise flex in ways that would be problematic.

If you're waiting for May 15 to roll around so that you can get your hands on a hot new M4 iPad Pro or M2 iPad Air, you won't have to wait too much longer, thankfully. We're just a couple of days away from the big release, and there's yet more good news for people who are concerned that they might have to deal with a huge fee should they accidentally damage their new device.

The displays on the new iPad Pro and iPad Air are big and look stunning, especially the OLED display found on the 13-inch iPad Pro. So the thought of accidentally breaking one would be enough to give anyone the cold sweats. Thankfully, MacRumors reports that Apple has extended its $29 iPhone screen repair program to the iPad Pro and iPad Air for the first time. The move means that it will be cheaper than ever to get a new display installed. The catch? You'll need to be an AppleCare Plus subscriber to benefit from the reduced pricing. Unfortunately, breaking the rest of the iPad will still result in a $99 fee.

All of this makes the AppleCare Plus subscription a no-brainer if you're someone who tends to drop things or is likely to take the iPad on trips. It's easy for something to bang into a bag and accidentally damage what's inside, and replacing the display on one of Apple's new tablets is a very expensive experience. Without AppleCare Plus, a new display will cost between $449 and $999 which is a huge sum of money.

Apple last week announced a flurry of iPads during the Let Loose event, adding the M4 chip and an OLED display to the iPad Pro and an M2 chip and all-new 13-inch display size to the iPad Air. But there was no mention of updating the iPad mini and the beloved mature tablet hasn't received any attention since it was last refreshed in 2021. That will surely change soon enough, but how soon that will happen is a matter for debate. Now, a new report suggests that while a new iPad mini is indeed part of Apple's plans, we shouldn't expect it to debut any time soon.

Writing in the paywalled version of the Power On newsletter that was reported by MacRumors, Bloomberg's Mark Gurman noted that the updated iPad mini isn't something that is likely to be announced within the next couple of months. In fact, the way Gurman was speaking, it seems possible that the new iPad mini might not arrive until 2025 although there remains hope it could debut before then.

When answering a reader's question about when the new iPad mini would debut, Gurman said that they would likely have to wait until the end of this year at the earliest, perhaps hinting that Apple could choose to hang fire on the new launch until 2025. It's absolutely clear that there won't be any iPad mini news at the WWDC event that is set to take place on June 10, however.

When the European Union allowed third-party app stores onto the iPhone as a result of the Digital Markets Act earlier this year it meant that Apple would be forced to allow people to install apps from somewhere other than the App Store for the first time/. While the EU's DMA only applies in the European Union, it's a change that brings real opportunity for companies that want to compete with Apple. And Microsoft is one of those.

Microsoft had already confirmed that it intended to launch a store that would allow users to download content onto their iPhone and now we know when it will arrive. According to a Bloomberg report, Microsoft says that it intends to launch its new mobile game store in July, and it's being run by the Xbox portion of the business. And notably, it won't be an app as such but rather a website instead.

Xbox President Sarah Bond confirmed the news and the company intends to make its own games available for download initially. However, the company also apparently intends to open the doors to other publishers who want to distribute their wars via the Xbox store as well, and that could be pretty huge.

In the build-up to the announcement of the new OLED iPad Pro earlier this week, we started to see some rumors that the company was planning to not give the device an M3 chip as was previously expected. Instead, there was a suggestion that Apple would move to something all-new, giving us our first glimpse at the M4. That ultimately happened of course, and early benchmark results suggest that buyers of the new tablet can expect something that will be very capable indeed.

Those benchmarks have started to appear online as people start to put the tablet through its paces ahead of the review embargo that will likely drop early next week. The figures produced by the M4 chip show scores of around 3,700 for its single-core CPU score and around 14,500 in the multi-core test.

To put that into perspective, the M3 MacBook Air wasn't released all that long ago and it managed to score around 3,100 in the single-core test and 12,000 in the multi-core tests. With that in mind, it's clear that the M4 is notably faster than the M4, making the new iPad Pro not only the fastest iPad Pro ever but also one of the fastest devices that Apple currently offers for sale.

Apple announced the M4 iPad Pro alongside the refreshed M2 iPad AIr earlier this week and the high-end tablet immediately went up for preorder, giving people the chance to place an order ready to receive their new computer on May 15. But as we get closer to the big day of release, it's going to prove more difficult for people to buy the iPad Pro for the big day.

While those who placed an order quickly were able to guarantee that they would be among the first to receive a new iPad Pro, a check of the Apple Store online right now suggests that people placing an order today are going to have to wait a good while before their tablet will be delivered.

Right now buying an iPad Pro in many configurations, including the cheapest one, will see buyers wait for either three or four weeks before taking delivery. Apple could well be able to get your tablet to you sooner than that, but its online delivery indicator right now suggests that might not be the case. Thankfully, it wouldn't be the first time that Apple has shipped devices sooner than the expected window suggested.

The last few weeks have been full to the brim with rumors of impending AI improvements coming to the iPhone and other Apple platforms. Those improvements have so far revolved around new features coming to existing apps like Messages, Notes, and others. But now a New York Times report hints at a big improvement coming to one aspect of the iPhone that really does need it.

Siri has been around since 2011 but it has proven to be lacking in a variety of ways, especially when compared with more modern alternatives like ChatGPT from Open AI and Google's Gemini generative AI. Apple is rumored to be nearing a deal with the former to bring its technology to the iPhone, and now the New York Times claims that the technology will help give Siri a big shot in the arm.

The report claims that Apple has been aiming for Siri improvements since executives Craig Federighi and John Giannandrea spent weeks testing OpenAI's new chatbot, ChatGPT. The executives found that while Siri often struggled to respond to requests properly, and even when it did it could only do it to one request at a time, ChatGPT and similar tools are completely different beasts. Generative AI tools can understand subsequent requests and use the context of the existing conversation when responding.

All of the rumors ahead of Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference next month point to some big new AI features coming to the iPhone and other Apple platforms, likely including the Mac and iPad. We've been hearing a lot about what those features might be as well as how they'll actually work, and a new report suggests that Apple might finally have found itself an AI partner to handle some of the more complex AI features.

Previous Bloomberg reports had Apple in discussions with OpenAI about using the generative AI technology behind the popular ChatGPT to power futuristic AI features on the iPhone. The same reports also suggested that Apple was having similar discussions with Google, potentially choosing to use its Gemini chatbot technology instead. Now, Bloomberg has added an update to those reports, saying that Apple now appears to be within touching distance of agreeing a deal with OpenAI.

The report from Bloomberg's Mark Gurman cites unnamed sources familiar with the matter when saying that Apple has closed in on an agreement. It's believed that the OpenAI technology could be just part of the AI push that Apple is about to undertake, too.

While the iPhone 15 Pro might have only been on sale for a few months, Apple and its supply chain partners are already likely gearing up for what comes next. For Apple, that's thought to be the iPhone 16 Pro and the larger iPhone 16 Pro Max and we've been hearing l;eaks relating to the two phones for a few months now. The latest leak suggests that buyers can look forward to a big display upgrade.

That leak, which comes via the Weibo leaker known as Instant Digital, suggests that Apple intends to make a change to the display that is used in its best iPhones later this year. The leaker says that the new iPhone 16 Pro models will feature a display that is 20% brighter than the previous models when displaying SDR content. That means that when using the phone normally, using apps, and sending messages, the display will be notably brighter when required. Such a feat would be useful for a variety of situations, not least using the iPhone outside in strong sunshine.

The Weibo post, seen by MacRumors, claims that the iPhone 16 Pro will be capable of a brightness of 1,200 nits when showing SDR content. That's a 20% increase over the iPhone 15 Pro while the peak HDR brightness is expected to remain the same at 1,600 nits. Apple hasn't increased the SDR brightness of the iPhone's display since the iPhone 13 Pro arrived in 2021 so this improvement would be a significant one.