Apple Releases First Public Beta of iOS 16.1 With Clean Energy Charging, Live Activities and More

Apple today seeded the first beta of an upcoming iOS 16.1 update to public beta testers, opening up the beta testing process to the general public. Today's beta comes one day after Apple provided the beta to developers.

iOS 16
Public beta testers who have signed up for Apple's free beta testing program can download the ‌iOS 16.1‌ beta over the air after installing the proper certificate from the Public Beta website.

Apple says that iOS 16.1 will introduce Live Activities, an interactive notification feature designed to let you keep an eye on things happening in real time. Live Activities will be available on the Lock Screen and Dynamic Island, but you won't see them in the beta because developers are still working on implementing support.

The update includes a Clean Energy Charging feature in the United States that causes the iPhone to selectively charge at times when lower carbon emission electricity is available, plus it lays the groundwork for Matter, a smart home standard that Apple plans to begin supporting this fall.

Other new features include a deletable Wallet app, changes to the Lock Screen customizing interface, and more, with details available in our iOS 16.1 feature guide. Apple has also seeded a new public beta of iPadOS 16.1.

Related Forum: iOS 16

Popular Stories

New Things Your iPhone Can Do in iOS 18

20 New Things Your iPhone Can Do in iOS 18.2

Monday December 16, 2024 8:55 am PST by
Apple released iOS 18.2 in the second week of December, bringing the second round of Apple Intelligence features to iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 16 models. This update brings several major advancements to Apple's AI integration, including completely new image generation tools and a range of Visual Intelligence-based enhancements. Apple has added a handful of new non-AI related feature controls as...
iphone 16 apple intelligence

Apple Drops Plans for iPhone Hardware Subscription Service

Wednesday December 18, 2024 11:39 am PST by
Apple is no longer planning to launch a hardware subscription service that would let customers "subscribe" to get a new iPhone each year, reports Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. Gurman first shared rumors about Apple's work on a hardware subscription service back in 2022, and at the time, he said that Apple wanted to develop a simple system that would allow customers to pay a monthly fee to gain...
blackmagic vision pro

Blackmagic Debuts $30K 3D Camera for Capturing Video for Vision Pro

Monday December 16, 2024 4:17 pm PST by
Blackmagic today announced that its URSA Cine Immersive camera is now available for pre-order, with deliveries set to start late in the first quarter of 2025. Blackmagic says that this is the world's first commercial camera system designed to capture 3D content for the Vision Pro. The URSA Cine Immersive camera was first introduced in June, but it has not been available for purchase until...
mac pro creativity

Apple Launched the Controversial 'Trashcan' Mac Pro 11 Years Ago Today

Thursday December 19, 2024 7:00 pm PST by
Apple launched the controversial "trashcan" Mac Pro eleven years ago today, introducing one of its most criticized designs that persisted through a period of widespread discontentment with the Mac lineup. The redesign took the Mac Pro in an entirely new direction, spearheaded by a polished aluminum cylindrical design that became unofficially dubbed the "trashcan" in the Mac community. All of ...
iPhone 17 Slim Feature Single Camera 2 Redux

Top 5 Apple Products to Look Forward to in 2025

Friday December 20, 2024 2:22 pm PST by
It's looking like 2025 is going to be an important year for Apple, with the company planning to revamp the iPhone, push further into smart home products, and improve Apple Intelligence. There are tons of new products rumored for 2025, including new iPhones, M4 Macs, a smart home command center, and much more. We've highlighted the top five Apple products that will have the biggest impact in...
apple tv 4k yellow bg feature

New Apple TV Rumored to Launch Next Year With These Features

Tuesday December 17, 2024 9:02 am PST by
The current Apple TV 4K was released more than two years ago, so the streaming device is becoming due for a hardware upgrade soon. Fortunately, it was recently rumored that a new Apple TV will launch at some point next year. Below, we recap rumors about the next-generation Apple TV. Bloomberg's Mark Gurman last week reported that Apple has been working on its own combined Wi-Fi and...
iPhone 17 Pro Dual Tone Feature 1

iPhone 17 Pro Rumored to Stick With 'Triangular' Camera Design

Wednesday December 18, 2024 2:36 am PST by
Contrary to recent reports, the iPhone 17 Pro will not feature a horizontal camera layout, according to the leaker known as "Instant Digital." In a new post on Weibo, the leaker said that a source has confirmed that while the appearance of the back of the iPhone 17 Pro has indeed changed, the layout of the three cameras is "still triangular," rather than the "horizontal bar spread on the...
elevation lab airtag battery

Your AirTag's Battery Will Last for Up to 10 Years With Elevation Lab's New TimeCapsule Enclosure

Wednesday December 18, 2024 10:05 am PST by
Elevation Lab today announced the launch of TimeCapsule, an innovative and simple solution for increasing the battery life of Apple's AirTag. Priced at $20, TimeCapsule is an AirTag enclosure that houses two AA batteries that offer 14x more battery capacity than the CR2032 battery that the AirTag runs on. It works by attaching the AirTag's upper housing to the built-in custom contact in the...

Top Rated Comments

thadoggfather Avatar
30 months ago
Clean energy charging lol. It’s a phone not a mega yacht.

Imagine ‘caring’ about your carbon footprint for an iPhone while upgrading every single year and ignoring the carbon footprint in that device being produced and sent to you

Classic - bring on the downvotes!
Score: 48 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Tommyinnit Avatar
30 months ago
If they really cared about the environment, they wouldn’t release phones every single year…
Score: 31 Votes (Like | Disagree)
souko Avatar
30 months ago

Clean energy charging lol. It’s a phone not a mega yacht.

Imagine ‘caring’ about your carbon footprint for an iPhone while upgrading every single year and ignoring the carbon footprint in that device being produced and sent to you

Classic - bring on the downvotes!
That millions of iPhones with active clean energy charging will make difference.

And you can sell your old iPhone to offset carbon emisdions of upgrading every year. So this feature does make sense.
Score: 11 Votes (Like | Disagree)
StudioMacs Avatar
30 months ago

Clean energy charging lol. It’s a phone not a mega yacht.

Imagine ‘caring’ about your carbon footprint for an iPhone while upgrading every single year and ignoring the carbon footprint in that device being produced and sent to you

Classic - bring on the downvotes!
Multiply electrical consumption by millions of devices, and it adds up.

It's not just about your one device. Apple has over 1.8 billion active iOS devices, and this will have an even greater impact on world-wide energy grids as existing devices are updated and upgraded.
Score: 9 Votes (Like | Disagree)
ItsGavinC Avatar
30 months ago

I’m shocked they did this before the new iPhones tomorrow. There will be thousands who aren’t used to betas who will update then be confused or upset tomorrow when they have to set up their phone as new and then install the public beta profile in order to transfer their data from their old phone. They should have waited until Monday to release this as a public beta. Those of us on developer beta who are using it on our daily driver know not to upgrade this week.
That’s not how it works anymore. The phone knows to update BEFORE letting a user restore from backup. It’s slick and easy.
Score: 5 Votes (Like | Disagree)
RalfTheDog Avatar
30 months ago

And who, I may ask, are you or frequent flyer Timothy Cook to determine for anyone else what this mystical, ineffable “right direction” is?
If it reduces energy use it is the right direction. If it uses non CO2 generating energy it is the right direction. Anything that generates more CO2 is worse than anything that generates less.
Score: 5 Votes (Like | Disagree)