Apple’s iOS 18 update has been available to all users since September 16. Leading up to the release of Apple Intelligence, major new features include the ability to customize Home screen icons, swap app shortcuts on the Lock screen, a redesigned Control Center, support for RCS, and the new Passwords app.

But there are many more small and nice changes that might be useful.

We’ve compiled a list of some of our favorite, lesser-known features that you may have missed.

Institutions

• Instead of listing all apps on the main page of the Settings app, which can lead to a lot of scrolling for people with a lot of apps installed, Apple now has a separate Apps menu dedicated to your apps. This clears up the busy settings screen and makes it clearer where to find the controls for individual apps.

Photos

• The Photos app now you can View your photo library without screenshots. You can tap the sort icon in the bottom left corner and uncheck Screenshots under ‘Display options’ to hide your screenshots.
• The Utilities collection in the Photos app has new content types such as documents, receipts, handwriting, illustrations and QR codes to make it easier to find specific information in your photos. Plus, you can view recently added, edited, and shared media items.
• The Photos app automatically suggests photos suitable as background.
• You can now copy operations from one photo to another, including aspect ratio for cropping, exposure and white balance.
• The Photos app too automatically organizes your trips in a Trips section And groups people and pets, For example, you can find photos that include both your partner and your cat.
• A new one video speed control function This allows you to create slow motion video effects.

Camera

• One of the biggest complaints from users was that music playing through earbuds would pause when they took a photo or video. iOS 18 fixes that problem, as The music continues to play via Bluetooth connections while you take a photo or video.
• The Camera app also gets a new 5-second timer together with existing 3 and 10 second timers.

Control Center

• You can Customize your Control Center with widgets and buttons on iOS 18.
• In addition, one of the most important changes in the new view is that you now have a power button in the top right corner. This means that you no longer need to hold down the power button and volume down to turn off the device. Instead, you can operate the device via the Control Panel.

To inform

• The Messaging app let you finally schedule messages for later, but this option is hidden in the + menu, rather than as an option tied to the submit button, which can make it difficult to find.

• iMessage now let me send you toomages in full resolution up to 100 MB in size.
• Text Effects lets you add animated effects to any letter, word, or sentence, such as Explode or Ripple, making conversations more visually interesting. You can also add text formatting such as bold, underlined, italic, and strikethrough.
• When you are not on the grid, you can: messages via satellite if you otherwise have no reception.
• You can now “Tapback” with an emoji or sticker and multiple Tapbacks are spread out so you can more easily see which three were added most recently.

Safari

• Safari now has a function to Remove distracting elements from a web page. This feature won’t remove ads, but it can help you clean up parts of the site that you don’t need or want to see. For example, if a site requires you to sign up for their email newsletter, you can hide the sign-up box. (The Browser Company’s Arc browser implemented a similar feature last year.)
• Highlights summary lets you read a summary of an article before reading the entire article.
• Other highlights refers you to useful information about people, music, movies, or TV shows.

Weather

• The Weather app now has a widget that prominently displays costs such as temperature merged with the actual temperature in the detailed view. This way you can easily compare both.
• The Weather app will also display wind speeds, gusts and wind directions more prominent.
• You can now Set home and work locations from contacts in the Weather app.

Siri

• AirPods let you now rRespond to Siri message announcements by shaking or nodding your headThis means you can accept or reject calls with just a few gestures.

Podcasts

• The new Podcasts app allows you to jump to a specific chapter via the progress bar if a podcast has defined them.
• The Podcasts app will also gain the ability to reorder and delete episodes in the listening queue.
• You can share a specific part of a podcast use of the podcast transcript.

Maps

• Cards has new topographic maps, walks added, and route creation, which competes with popular third-party tools like AllTrails.
• The Maps app will let you Save hikes available in all US National Parks offlineIn addition, you can also save your own walking and hiking routes.
• Apple is making the Maps app more useful for discovery by giving you the ability Compare locations by viewing photos, reviews and price points.

Notes

• Notes now support foldable sections so you can create structured documents within the app.
• The app has also added support for audio recordingwhich means you can record an audio session directly from your note, so you can keep the audio along with your comments, checklists, and documents. You can even edit the note while you record.
• The Notes app also supports PDF inline search and different colored highlighting.
• Both notes and calculator Support in solving mathematical equations.
• You can also add various graphs and variables related to equations.

Mail

• The Mail app has finally found a way to group emails by senderYou can perform quick actions with it, such as marking emails as read, deleting and archiving them.
• A new category Transactions helps you more easily find order confirmations, receipts, shipping and travel information.
• In the meantime, an Updates category collects your newsletters, news stories and social updates in one place, similar to Gmail.
• From Transactions, Updates and Promotions, which Items that are time-sensitive will still appear in the Primary section. (They will also be provided with a category icon so you can easily find them.)
• There are new cleanup tools available via the Mail app, via iCloud.com, and via the iCloud Mail settings.

Utilities and keyboard

• The keyboard now supports multiple languages ​​on one keyboardIt also detects the last language you used in apps like Messages and switches automatically.
• Apple also has a uniform selector for emojis and stickers into the keyboard and made them both searchable.
• The calculator can now evaluate expressions, assign variables, and create graphs.
• You can ask permission to remotely control a friend’s device when providing technical support.
• The flashlight interface on select phones has a nice new makeover for iOS 18. You can control the variable brightness and a way to adjust the width of the beam.

Magazine

• The Magazine app lets you register your vote.
• The time you spend writing in the diary will logged in attentive minutes.
• The app also supports audio transcriptions and printing your input.
• You can add reminders to write and prompts to your home screen via Widgets to get into the habit of keeping a diary.

Calendar and Reminders

• With iOS 18, Calendar will Show timed remindersand you can create new items or edit them directly in the app.
• The calendar also has new views for days, weeks and monthsso you can easily browse through your schedule.
• Separately, the Reminders app now has multilingual shopping lists And recently deleted lists.
• Apple now offers you the ability to quickly new items for family lists, such as shared calendars, shopping lists, and password lists.

Files

• With the Files app you can: save specific iCloud files or folders on your phone, always downloaded and synced.
• iPhones running iOS 18 now support more file formats, including APFS, exFAT or MS-DOS (Fat32)while formatting external drives. You can also erase these drivers via the Files app.

Apple TV app

• The Apple TV app now has Amazon Prime Videos An X-ray-like feature called InSight that displays information about the actors and the music in a show or movie.
• A new ‘Improve the dialogue function helps you hear what is being said better, even during scenes with loud effects and music.

At home

• With the Home app update for iOS 18, you cannlock connected doors handsfree.
• You can also Add up to 29 guests to give them time-based access.
• You can Unlock smart locks compatible with Ultra Wideband (available next year) without taking your phone out of your pocket.

Accessibility

• iOS 18 has nnew accessibility features including eye tracking to operate your phone’s interface.

• Plus, Users can set custom utterances to invoke actions such as going to the home screen, opening the camera, activating a shortcut, or invoking a Siri request.

• iOS 18 also has vehicle movement cues in the form of dots on the edges from the screen to help you against motion sickness. These dots give you an indication of the vehicle’s movement. You can turn it on, off or in auto detection mode.
• Music Haptics will match the iPhone Taptic Engine with the rhythm of songs so that deaf and hard of hearing people can enjoy Apple Music.

Additional reporting: Sarah Perez