WWDC 2024: iOS 18, macOS 15, and Apple’s major AI effort.

The yearly tech calendar includes Apple’s Worldwide Developer Conference, or WWDC, as a major highlight. Despite the name’s apparent developer focus, Apple has already shown several noteworthy new hardware lines, including Vision Pro, the HomePod, and a range of Macs, which gives the main presentation a considerable consumer-facing advantage.

Previews of the year’s major software releases are also shown during WWDC. That translates to iOS 18, a particularly important release this year because Apple reportedly aims to make a major AI push with Siri. Not only that, but it’s anticipated that the conference will unveil updates for watchOS 11, tvOS 18, iPadOS 18, and more.

Apple has stated that Monday, June 10 at 1 PM ET will be the time of the WWDC keynote. At that point, we should see what Tim Cook and the team have planned. Of course, the conference’s software announcements will primarily affect the hardware for which they are designed, such as the iPhone 16, iPad Pro with M4 chip, and Apple Watch 10.

• With Apple disclosing all of the AI features coming to the iPhone, iOS 18 should be by far the biggest announcement at WWDC.
• AI-generated emojis, summaries of papers and webpages, recommended responses to emails and texts, and a more sophisticated Siri are all coming to essential iPhone apps.
• Object removal would be possible with the Photos app’s generative AI features.
• At WWDC, Apple might potentially reveal a collaboration with OpenAI.
• A less expensive Apple TV streaming device might be released.

WWDC 2024 will be held June 10–14, with Apple having set the dates for the week-long conference. You should watch for Apple’s WWDC keynote on opening day, including all of the software previews and any new product announcements.

Anticipate a live-streamed event, with the keynote starting at 1 p.m. EDT/10 a.m. PDT.

Previous WWDC hardware announcements from Apple included the first-generation HomePod and Vision Pro. This year, we may see more hardware releases, albeit possibly in the form of generational updates rather than entirely new product lines, including new MacBooks and iMacs. However, don’t expect new slates at WWDC 2024 because Apple introduced new tablets (the iPad Pro 2024 and iPad Air 2024, exactly) during its “Let Loose” event on May 7.

Mark Gurman of Bloomberg speculated that a new Apple TV, costing $99 in the first part of the year, might be announced at WWDC.

The first developer beta of Apple’s upcoming iPhone operating system, iOS 18, is usually released during WWDC. Mark Gurman of Bloomberg reports that iOS 18 is anticipated to be “one of the biggest iOS updates — if not the biggest — in the company’s history.”

Although the RCS text protocol will be introduced as part of this update to facilitate improved connections with Android devices, artificial intelligence—the 2024 buzzword—should be the main focus of this version.

Gurman claims that Craig Federighi of Apple has issued an “edict” to the team directing them to ensure iOS 18 is loaded “with features running on the company’s large language model.” Furthermore, given that Apple is purportedly paying publishers millions of dollars for AI training, the outcomes may differ significantly in dependability from ChatGPTs.

What does that mean in real life? Code discovered in the most recent iOS 17.4 beta suggests that the AI, known as Ajax, could summarise information and respond to queries in response to human input.

Additionally, the code appears to mention iMessage integration. This makes sense because Gurman had previously said that Ajax would be used to “field questions and auto-complete sentences” in the Messages app.

Put another way, it appears like Siri’s intelligence will receive a substantial and long-overdue boost. The crucial question is whether new hardware will be required for it to work. Dag Kittlause, the co-founder of the AI business that Apple purchased in 2010, is credited with creating Siri. He thinks that Siri will be a major player in the AI market and that Apple’s assistant is a “dark horse” in the big language model market.

As per a report, even the iPhone 16 base model will have additional RAM and storage to support generative AI technologies. Therefore, a significant portion of iOS 18 is anticipated to include them.

Though the business is reputed to prefer on-device AI over cloud-based solutions, artificial intelligence may be too much for more traditional generations to handle, even though Apple has a stellar history of updating iOS on its older iPhone models. Stated differently, this may necessitate the power of the forthcoming A18 CPU.

It would make sense for Apple to have some cloud-based versions for older iPhones, though, given that the iPhone 16 isn’t expected to be released until September, and an early beta is expected in June. A rumor suggests that’s exactly what will happen, with on-device AI for the 2024 models and a cloud-based version for older iPhones. As various rumors have indicated, the last six years of iPhone models will hopefully be compatible with iOS 18.

At its Let Loose event in May, Apple quickly announced the first new products of the year: the 13-inch iPad Air 2024 powered by M2 and the iPad Pro 2024 powered by M4. Both are using iPad OS 17 right now, so it’s likely that these new computers will work better when Apple releases iPadOS 18 later this year.

Learning about iPadOS 18 has been hard, but AI will play a big role in the story. There haven’t been many hints about what AI features will be added to iPadOS 18. No matter what, the stuff with iOS 18 should be integrated into Apple’s tablet OS. Leaks suggest that iPadOS 18 might finally add a calculator app to the iPad.

The company took the time to simultaneously show off the new iPads and the Apple Pencil Pro. New features include the long-rumoured “squeeze” feature, which lets you get to a contextual menu faster and change the shape and size of the brush tools, as well as the “barrel roll” feature.

We talked about how the iPad Pro 2024 is becoming more like a laptop in our review. This makes us wonder how iPadOS18 could make iPadOS more like macOS.

There are suggestions that macOS 15 will have a significant redesign. According to the most current rumors, Safari, Voice Memos, the Notes app, the Settings app, and the calculator will all be changed. The macOS 15 Calculator app is being redesigned to resemble iOS 18 in the same way as iPadOS 18. To help with proper mathematical writing, for instance, a tool called Math Notes is being developed.

What AI features will be included in macOS 15? Siri’s capabilities are receiving less attention than ways to improve the voice assistant’s integration with the Messages app. While Siri ought to sound more natural while speaking, Apple’s assistant should be more adept at completing sentences for you. Additionally, users can now offer Siri precise commands that function across various apps thanks to Siri’s improved integration with the Shortcuts app.

Consider this: you may be able to instruct Siri to send customized emails and SMS to particular recipients upon arrival at your destination. Siri might succeed with this level of detail.

Finally, this new product’s name should be derived from a California region, in keeping with Apple’s tradition of naming its products after their locations.

It’s hard to believe the first Apple Watch came out 9 years ago. The smartwatch platform got a big makeover with watchOS 10, but watchOS 11 doesn’t look like it will have as many new features and changes. Based on what Mark Gurman says, the “watchOS 11 update to be fairly minor.”

Most of the rumors about changes coming to watchOS 11 are about redesigning one of its workouts. With watchOS 9, the company improved run metrics and added Live Activities support to its cycle and hiking workouts. If you look at how those were all updated, it shouldn’t be surprising if Apple updates another workout with watchOS 11.

Sleep tracking could come with more data tracking, which could help Apple Watch owners learn more about how they sleep. Since RCS support is coming to the iPhone this fall to improve texting between Android and iPhone users, we think this will be good for Apple Watch users when watchOS 11 comes out.

It’s still unclear whether or not watchOS 11 will encourage more developers to make stand-alone apps once more, so users won’t have to carry their iPhones around with them all the time. The YouTube Music app for watchOS, for instance, controls the iPhone app, but it can’t be used by itself to listen to music without an iPhone.

At WWDC 2024, Apple may only show off a small amount of hardware. A new Apple TV streaming box is one of these items. One interesting thing about this new product is that it might come out at a much lower price than earlier models. This new Apple TV is expected to cost $99, and it will have a chip that is faster than the A15 Bionic chip in the newest high-end models.

Aside from this possible hardware reveal, little is known about what tvOS 18 might bring to the experience. We expect iOS 18 and iPadOS 18 to work together, but there are no specific rumors about features. If AI features are added to Siri, it might be able to give better suggestions for what to watch.