iBooks Textbooks Appear Ahead of iOS 7 Launch

The early addition of a textbooks area to the iBookstore application, could be best indication yet that Apple is preparing to release iOS 7 following its presentation next Tuesday.

The new category began appearing in the iBookstore of beta iOS 7 Developer Beta Program users yesterday. Those users can get access to the new Textbooks area by navigating to the Education category of the iBookstore. Current categories range from the Humanities to Life Sciences. Each of those categories are user sortable based on name, release date and featured textbooks.

Currently, the area isn’t populated with any actual textbooks, however it does already feature many of the promotional headers and images that are native to other Apple-ran digital marketplaces like the iTunes Store.

While browsing the leaked category, a 9to5Mac user may have also stumbled on to confirmation that Textbooks support is coming to all iOS devices. According to the screenshots of a Requirements section for textbooks, users must have iBooks 3.0. In order the get that application user’s devices must be running iOS 5.1 or have a Mac running iBooks 1.0 on MaC OS X 10.9 Mavericks.

While iPad users can access textbooks already, iPhone users haven’t been able to access them from their devices.

Read: iBooks Comes to the Mac on OS X Maviercks Great for Education

According to a small chart, the application will be compatible with iPhone, iPod touch iPad and optimized for the iPhone 5.

Apple initially launched the iBooks application and the iBookstore along its first iPad. Since then the company has made the native iOS ebook reader available on all of its devices running iOS. Earlier this summer the company announced that it would be bringing iBooks to Mac OS X users with Mac OS X Mavericks.

With Apple scheduled to hold an event this Tuesday, September 10th, this leak is the best sign yet that the company is preparing to launch iOS 7 during or soon after its event in San Francisco. In addition to adding support for iBookstore textbooks, it is possible users could see a new cheaper-priced iPhone 5C and the iPhone 5S, a follow-up to last year’s device with slightly enhanced specifications.