Apple Previews iOS 18 Features for iPhone

Apple today released a preview of upcoming iOS 18 features for iPhone including Eye Tracking, Music Haptics, and Vocal Shortcuts.

iOS 18 will make its official debut at WWDC 2024 in June, but Apple’s announced some of the operating system’s new features ahead of the big reveal.

The announcement revolves around accessibility and it comes just a day ahead of Global Accessibility Awareness Day.

The features for iPhone, which will also come to iPad users via iPadOS 18, include:

• Eye Tracking
• Music Haptics
• Vocal Shortcuts
• Vehicle Motion Cues

The company says these features combine the power of Apple hardware and software, harnessing Apple silicon, artificial intelligence, and machine learning to further Apple’s decades-long commitment to designing products for everyone.” iOS 18 is expected to be an AI-centric update.

Apple also says its popular CarPlay feature will get Color Filters, Sound Recognition, and Voice Control.

Voice Control will let users navigate CarPlay and control apps with just their voice. For drivers or passengers who are deaf or hard of hearing, Sound Recognition lets them turn on alerts to be notified of car horns and sirens.

And for users who are colorblind, Color Filters make CarPlay’s interface visually easier to use, with additional visual accessibility features like Bold Text and Large Text.

iOS 18 Eye Tracking

Apple says Eye Tracking will let users with physical disabilities to control iPad or iPhone with their eyes:

Powered by artificial intelligence, Eye Tracking gives users a built-in option for navigating iPad and iPhone with just their eyes.

Designed for users with physical disabilities, Eye Tracking uses the front-facing camera to set up and calibrate in seconds, and with on-device machine learning, all data used to set up and control this feature is kept securely on device, and isn’t shared with Apple.

Eye Tracking works across iPadOS and iOS apps, and doesn’t require additional hardware or accessories. With Eye Tracking, users can navigate through the elements of an app and use Dwell Control to activate each element, accessing additional functions such as physical buttons, swipes, and other gestures solely with their eyes.

iOS 18 Music Haptics

Music Haptics will give users who are deaf or hard of hearing a new way to experience music using the Taptic Engine in iPhone:

Music Haptics is a new way for users who are deaf or hard of hearing to experience music on iPhone. With this accessibility feature turned on, the Taptic Engine in iPhone plays taps, textures, and refined vibrations to the audio of the music. Music Haptics works across millions of songs in the Apple Music catalog, and will be available as an API for developers to make music more accessible in their apps.

iOS 18 Vocal Shortcuts

With Vocal Shortcuts, iPhone and iPad users can assign custom utterances that Siri can understand to launch shortcuts and complete complex tasks:

Another feature, Listen for Atypical Speech, will give users an option for enhancing speech recognition for a wider range of speech:

Listen for Atypical Speech uses on-device machine learning to recognize user speech patterns. Designed for users with acquired or progressive conditions that affect speech, such as cerebral palsy, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), or stroke, these features provide a new level of customization and control, building on features introduced in iOS 17 for users who are nonspeaking or at risk of losing their ability to speak.

iOS 18 Vehicle Motion Cues

And Vehicle Motion Cues for iPhone and iPad can help reduce motion sickness for passengers in moving vehicles:

Research shows that motion sickness is commonly caused by a sensory conflict between what a person sees and what they feel, which can prevent some users from comfortably using iPhone or iPad while riding in a moving vehicle. With Vehicle Motion Cues, animated dots on the edges of the screen represent changes in vehicle motion to help reduce sensory conflict without interfering with the main content. Using sensors built into iPhone and iPad, Vehicle Motion Cues recognizes when a user is in a moving vehicle and responds accordingly. The feature can be set to show automatically on iPhone, or can be turned on and off in Control Center.

Other iOS 18 Features

Apple has also outlined several other features coming to iOS 18 and other operating systems later on this year:

• For users who are blind or have low vision, VoiceOver will include new voices, a flexible Voice Rotor, custom volume control, and the ability to customize VoiceOver keyboard shortcuts on Mac.
• Magnifier will offer a new Reader Mode and the option to easily launch Detection Mode with the Action button.
• Braille users will get a new way to start and stay in Braille Screen Input for faster control and text editing; Japanese language availability for Braille Screen Input; support for multi-line braille with Dot Pad; and the option to choose different input and output tables.
• For users with low vision, Hover Typing shows larger text when typing in a text field, and in a user’s preferred font and color.
• For users at risk of losing their ability to speak, Personal Voice will be available in Mandarin Chinese. Users who have difficulty pronouncing or reading full sentences will be able to create a Personal Voice using shortened phrases.
• For users who are nonspeaking, Live Speech will include categories and simultaneous compatibility with Live Captions.
• For users with physical disabilities, Virtual Trackpad for AssistiveTouch allows users to control their device using a small region of the screen as a resizable trackpad.
• Switch Control will include the option to use the cameras in iPhone and iPad to recognize finger-tap gestures as switches.
• Voice Control will offer support for custom vocabularies and complex words.

iOS 18, iPadOS 18, macOS 15, watchOS 11, and other software launch on June 10th ahead of their final release in the fall.