What's Cool in the New iPhone, iPad, and macOS Sequoia Betas

Apple beta season is getting up to full speed, and now you can test out some of the neatest new features.

More and more, Apple's betas are integrated across its platforms in a way that makes talking about the Mac, the iPad, and the iPhone redundant. These devices now exist as parts of a cloud-based platform, and they all work together in different ways. It's fantastic for Apple users who have multiple devices, as we shall see in a moment. But before we get started, there's one thing you're not going to be testing out any time soon. Not before the final OS launches in the fall, and maybe not even this year, and that's the new AI features.

"The more we see of generative AI in consumer-facing roles, the more we see that most tech companies are working with the same flawed product. Apple doesn't want to be associated with that kind of bad press, and they aren't going to add those features until they're sure that they're ready," Soumya Mahapatra, CEO of medical device company Essenvia, told Lifewire via email.  

Mirror Mirror

The biggest new feature added to the second beta of iOS 18 is iPhone mirroring. This super-handy feature puts a virtual version of your iPhone onto your Mac's screen, and you can interact with it using the mouse. Say your iPhone is in a different room, and you want to check something. Just open it up on your Mac. This also lets you do cool things like having a WhatsApp conversation on your phone, via your Mac.

For this, you'll need to be running both the iOS 18 beta 2 on your iPhone, and the macOS Sequoia beta on your Mac.

Green Bubbles

Also ready to test in iOS 18 beta 2, at least for US users, is RCS messaging, where carriers are already switching on support for the features. RCS is the successor to SMS, and supports images, replies and emoji responses, encryption, and typing indicators. Yes, your green-bubble friends will still have green bubbles, but at least they will, otherwise, now integrate smoothly with the rest of your conversations and group chats.

"Typing indicator, read receipts, and reactions are all working between my work iPhone 13 and personal Pixel 8 Pro. Also very happy to report that video taken on iPhone and sent over RCS is not compressed anymore and playing back in HDR on Pixel 8 Pro," writes beta tester and iPhone user Arthurgd3 in a MacRumors forum thread participated in by Lifewire.

Photos App

This one might prove controversial, as Apple has completely redesigned the Photos app this summer. Instead of a list of tabs on the left side, everything is now in a kind of soup, and you get to different sections by scrolling. This might be annoying for some users, but for others, used to scrolling in social media apps, this might be ideal.

Also, the new view is highly customizable, which means you can reorder sections, and hide the ones you don't want. This is definitely going to be a case of "try it, you might like it."

Messages

Everyone likes new emojis, but how about being able to roll your own emoji? Genmoji are AI-based emoji that you generate yourself, just by describing what you want. Strictly speaking, Apple's new Genmoji are just images, but as they show up exactly like regular emoji for other iMessage users, the distinction doesn't really matter. Apple's examples include "squirrel DJ" and "smiley relaxing wearing cucumbers." You can see the result in this image.

I like this one, as I'm often looking for the right emoji for a situation. On the other hand, there's an art to creating a megamoji (yes, we're coining that name) by combining several existing emoji into a pictorial sentence.

Customization

Perhaps the most obvious change will be the new home-screen customizations, which finally let you lay things out how you want them and even change the colors of app icons to an extent. Instead of forcing icons and widgets to stack one by one from the top of the screen, like a wall built of helium balloons, now you can park those icons anywhere you like.

You could leave gaps to show the faces of any people (or pets) on your home screen wallpaper, or you could group apps like you can group icons on a Mac or PC desktop, although they will still snap to a grid to keep things tidy. Or perhaps you just want to keep all those icons at the bottom of the screen so you can reach them with a thumb.

The other change here is that you can tint app icons, although right now, only dark-mode icons can be tinted. They look a bit odd, to be honest, but then again, you don't have to use them if you don't like them. You can also choose to hide the app names for a minimal look.

Another great change is that the Control Center can be customized just like the home screen by dragging around the icons. In the future, developers will be able to provide control-center widgets for you to use.

Odds and Ends

For European iPad users, Apple is also testing the changes mandated by the EU's DMA. This means that you can now use alternate app stores on the iPad, including game emulators. Previously, non-Apple app stores were only supported on the iPhone.

You'll also be able to record phone calls, and the other participant will be notified that you are doing so. And those recorded calls can be transcribed.

Finally, perhaps my favorite change is that you can now change the flashlight and camera icons on the lock screen to do something else. You could, for example, choose to launch a different camera app.

Apple's WWDC keynote announcement was dominated by all the AI stuff coming either later this year or sometime in 2025, but the rest of this year's OS updates are more than welcome, adding polish and customizability throughout the system.