Just in time for the arrival of the iPhone 14 line, iOS 16 is formally right here, after spending a number of months in beta. I’ve spent the final week or so testing out the ultimate model of the software program, and there are many new issues to strive, together with customizable lock screens, enhancements to the Messages app and a few smarter AI methods. Simply as importantly, it’s not buggy. The most recent version of Apple’s cellular OS works with the iPhone 8 and newer fashions, though some options, demand the comparatively current A12 chip. (Extra on that later.)
This 12 months’s model of iOS is an replace you’ll discover – one thing that was arduous to say about iOS 15, whose most notable options associated to media sharing, Focus modes and SharePlay. iOS 14, now two years outdated, added widgets to the grid of icons and shook up your homepage expertise for the primary time for the reason that iPhone launched. With iOS 16, Apple lastly tackled the lock display screen.
Execs
- Customizable lock display screen
- Visible Lookup is smarter and extra helpful
- Haptic typing
- Only a few launch bugs
Cons
- Some options demand the most recent iPhone {hardware}
- Others require third-party app help
A personalised lock display screen
The lock display screen used to function a clock and never a lot else. Issues are slightly completely different now, however let’s begin with the clock. The font is thicker and you may even select the colour of the textual content and there’s now house for widgets. You may not like how the brand new default font seems (I don’t), however the excellent news is that it’s customizable, with a number of font kinds and colours. You’ll be able to in fact select photographs for the lock display screen, which isn’t something new, and you may apply filter kinds and even select a shuffled collection of photographs to cycle by. If the photographs had been taken in Portrait mode, you can too allow a multilayered picture impact, with the picture’s topic coming out in entrance of the time. For those who do have an iPhone 14 Professional, try our full assessment for our ideas on the All the time On Show and, naturally, Apple’s new Dynamic Island.
There are two completely different widget areas you may customise. First up is a slim field above the clock that’s greatest suited to one-line textual content (assume: the date, probabilities of rain, or your subsequent calendar occasion.) Beneath that, there’s a field that may home as much as 4 completely different widgets — a mixture of 2×1 and 1×1 icons. From the lock display screen, you may faucet on these to launch into the suitable itself, however don’t count on to glean any further info by long-pressing on the icons, which looks like a really Apple strategy to broaden the data supplied by these widgets. Possibly in iOS 16.1, or iOS 17?

Mat Smith / Engadget
Much like the debut of dwelling display screen widgets on iOS 14, it’ll take time for third-party app builders to get widgets into their updates and onto your telephone, however I’m positive productiveness, health monitoring companies and others will bounce on the likelihood. Google particularly appears able to get on board: Its forthcoming Gmail widget will completely be getting a spot on my lock display screen when it turns into obtainable.
The brand new lock display screen retains some basic options, too. You’ll nonetheless see sign energy and battery icons (now with a proportion readout), and each the flashlight and digicam shortcuts are nonetheless obtainable to faucet away at. Oddly, the battery indicator solely visually replicates how charged it’s when the battery is beneath 20 p.c, which is counterintuitive if you’re at 50 p.c, for instance.
The lock display screen refresh additionally features as a renewed means of showcasing an iOS 15 function that may be fairly laborious to arrange: Focus modes. Now you can assign a Focus mode to particular person lock screens (one for private, one for work, one for sleep), every with their very own customized widget layouts and photographs. For those who not often change your wallpaper throughout weekdays, you may arrange, say, a enjoyable weekend picture of your loved ones, and assign it to your private focus mode.
Conversely, I’ve a pretentious motivational quote on a black background for once I’m crunching away on deadlines and have my telephone set to Do Not Disturb. The power to swipe between Focus modes makes them simpler to make use of in on a regular basis life. Positive, I might have completed so prior to now from the top-right drop-down menu, however I didn’t. With iOS 16, I’m already utilizing Focus modes extra typically.
A greater messaging expertise

Mat Smith / Engadget
Apple’s native messaging app will get some distinctive methods, together with new Visible Lookup options. It now handles picture copy-and-pasting, pulling topics from photographs, screenshots and extra, turning them into easy-to-share stickers. Lengthy-press on the thing / animal / individual and your iPhone (if it’s an XS or newer) will endeavor to clip it away from the background, prepared to stick elsewhere.
It’s uncannily correct for such a, effectively, lazy methodology. I find it irresistible. The Visible Lookup abilities in iOS 16 are much more expansive, with the brand new capability to carry textual content from video. Along with movies you are taking your self, it ought to work with full-screen movies in net browsers.
Messages has additionally expanded its sharing capabilities past SharePlay and stickers. Now you can ship paperwork, spreadsheets and extra, so long as they’re saved in considered one of Apple’s workplace software program file varieties. Hopefully, third-party help for Microsoft and the Google Suite will quickly comply with.
Apple is making up for misplaced time elsewhere as effectively. Lastly, you may edit and unsend messages on the Messages app – for those who’re fast sufficient. You’ll have as much as quarter-hour to edit after you first ship the message, with the possibility to vary your message as much as 5 instances. You’ll be able to see any edited messages from people additionally utilizing iOS 16, which might be grayed (blued?) out beneath the corrected message. Unsend options are just for iPhone-to-iPhone messages.
Equally, now you can undo ship and schedule emails from the native Mail app. (Lastly.) There are additionally additional fashionable options you might be in all probability already used to on Gmail, like solutions if you might need forgotten an attachment or recipient. .