MacRumors

Apple this week launched its annual Back to School promotion for U.S. college students. This year's promotion offers a free Apple gift card with the purchase of an eligible Mac or iPad. Apple is also offering students 20% off AppleCare+ plans.

Apple is offering a $150 gift card with any new MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, or iMac, and a $100 gift card with the purchase of any new iPad Pro, iPad Air, or Mac mini. The gift card can be used towards purchases of Apple products and accessories, App Store apps, subscriptions to services like Apple Music, iCloud+ storage, and more.

The promotion runs through Monday, October 2 in the U.S., according to Apple's terms and conditions. The free gift card is in addition to Apple's standard educational discounts of around 5% to 10% off most Macs and iPads.

The offer is available through Apple's online education store and at Apple Store locations for students attending or accepted to a higher-education institution, faculty and staff of higher-education institutions, parents purchasing on behalf of an eligible student, employees of a K-12 institution, and select others.

Apple has announced the apps and games that are receiving a 2023 Apple Design Award for outstanding app design, innovation, ingenuity, and technical achievement, with winners that include Afterplace, Flighty, Any Distance, and more.

Apps have won in a range of categories such as Inclusivity, Delight and Fun, Interaction, Social Impact, Visuals and Graphics, and Innovation, with a full list of winners available below.

Inclusivity

• Universe - Website Builder
• stitch.

Delight and Fun

• Duolingo
• Afterplace

Interaction

• Flighty
• Railbound

Social Impact

• Headspace
• Endling

Visuals and Graphics

• Any Distance
• Resident Evil Village

Innovation

• SwingVision: A.I. Tennis App
• MARVEL SNAP

Links and additional information about each of the winning apps can be found in Apple's newsroom article. Winners will receive a physical award and hardware to help them continue to create apps and games.

Apple Watch band and iPhone case maker BandWerk today unveiled a series of luxury leather headbands for Apple Vision Pro – the first third-party options of their kind for the device.

The headbands come in five different color options, including gray, brown and white, cream, beige and gray, and orange and gray. They will be made of Italian leather and crafted in Germany, accompanied by a colour-matching fabric Light Seal.

Apple will seemingly not offer Vision Pro in different color options, nor will the company offer multiple headbands, meaning that third-party accessories will be the only way to achieve a more unique look with the device.

The headbands currently only exist as a concept, but BandWerk says that it plans to offer the headbands in early 2024 when Vision Pro launches. BandWerk notes that the product is still in development, so minor design details may yet change before it goes on sale. BandWerk says that the leather headbands will retail for $159 in the United States and £129 in the United Kingdom.

Apple's stock Notes app got hardly any screen time during yesterday's WWDC keynote, but one powerful addition to the app in iOS 17 is a new ability to link notes and connect related notes together.

With just a few taps, you can create links between notes, making it easy to jump from one idea to another. Long press on a space in any note, and a new "Add Link" option can be found in the pop-up menu. Tapping it lets you link to another note by searching its title or entering a URL.

You can create an optional alternative title for the link, or just stick with the original title for clarity. Once you're done, the link appears as hyperlink-style underlined text in your note, and tapping it snaps you straight into the note you linked to.

The Notes app also offers an additional, quicker way to add links: Typing two greater-than symbols (>>) into a note invokes a list containing your six most recently modified notes, and tapping one instantly adds a link to that note.

The same feature can be found in iPadOS 17 and macOS Sonoma, and it means you can now create wiki-style collections of interlinked notes, allowing you to organize your thoughts or discover new connections and associations between ideas.

iOS 17, iPadOS 17, and macOS Sonoma are available in developer beta versions now and will be officially released in the fall.

Apple is making contact and password sharing a lot easier in iOS 17 by letting users insert them into any text field they encounter in the system.

When long pressing in a text box, a new "Insert" option appears in the pop-up menu. Tapping it brings up another menu with two additional new options: "Contacts" and "Passwords."

Choosing Contacts takes you straight to your contacts list for you to make your selection, while tapping Password takes you to your passwords keychain after authentication.

The feature was tipped to MacRumors by Aaronp613. iOS 17 is available now in beta for members of Apple's Developer Program, and will be publicly released later this year.

Apple on Monday previewed iPadOS 17, its latest operating system for the iPad. Available in beta now and launching in the fall, iPadOS 17 drops support for a couple of iPad models compared to iPadOS 16, according to Apple's website.

iPadOS 17 drops support for the following iPads:

• iPad Pro (1st generation)
• iPad (5th generation)

iPadOS 17 remains compatible with the following iPad models:

• iPad Pro (2nd generation and later)
• iPad Air (3rd generation and later)
• iPad (6th generation and later)
• iPad mini (5th generation and later)

iPadOS 17 will likely be released in October, just as iPadOS 16 was last year.

Apple today held the WWDC 2023 keynote event that saw the introduction of the Apple Vision Pro headset, the 15-inch MacBook Air, new versions of the Mac Pro and Mac Studio, iOS 17, macOS Sonoma, watchOS 10, and more.

This was an insane event that was so fast-paced it was tough to keep up with everything that was being announced. iOS 17 and macOS Sonoma only starred in a few minutes of the keynote, so there were a lot of things that went under the radar. We've recapped everything that was announced in the video up above, and we've also rounded up all of our coverage of Apple's announcements to give you a complete overview of everything that's worth knowing about.

Apple Vision Pro

• Apple Reveals 'Vision Pro' Headset and visionOS
• Apple's Vision Pro Headset Uses 'Optic ID' Iris Scanning Authentication
• Apple Vision Pro Priced Starting at $3499, Will Launch in Early 2024 in the U.S.
• Here's a First In-Person Look at the Apple Vision Pro
• Apple to Provide Developers With Vision Pro Development Kits
• Apple Vision Pro Headset Supports Prescription Inserts for Glasses Wearers

Mac Announcements

• Apple Announces New MacBook Air With 15.3-inch Display and M2 Chip Starting at $1,299
• Apple Unveils M2 Ultra Chip as Most Powerful Apple Silicon Chip Yet
• Apple Announces New Mac Studio With M2 Max and M2 Ultra Chips
• Apple Unveils New Mac Pro With M2 Ultra Chip, Extra Ports, and More
• Preorders Available for 15-Inch MacBook Air, Mac Pro and Mac Studio
• Apple Releases New 70W Power Adapter Alongside 15-Inch MacBook Air
• New Mac Pro Features Upgradeable SSD, Apple Selling 2TB, 4TB, and 8TB SSD Kits
• With M2 Ultra Mac Pro, Apple Completes Apple Silicon Transition and No Longer Sells Intel-Based Macs

iOS 17 and iPadOS 17

• Apple Announces iOS 17 With 'StandBy' View, Journal App, Siri Changes, and More
• Apple Announces New 'NameDrop' Feature for Sharing Between iPhones
• iOS 17 Includes Updated Phone, FaceTime, and Messages Apps
• Apple Announces iPadOS 17 With Custom Lock Screens and Interactive Widgets
• iPadOS 17 Drops Support for These iPads
• Apple Announces New Intelligent AirPlay Features With Hotel Room Support
• iOS 17 Compatible With iPhone XS and Newer, Available in Beta Today
• Apple Releases First Betas of iOS 17 and iPadOS 17
• iOS 17 Lets You Share AirTags With Others
• iOS 17's StandBy Mode Turns a Charging iPhone Into a Home Hub
• iOS 17 Promises to Dramatically Improve iPhone's Autocorrect
• iOS 17 Locks Your Safari Private Browsing Behind Face ID
• iOS 17 Can Automatically Clean Up Verification Codes That Clog Up Messages App
• iOS 17 Lets You Create a Voice That Sounds Like You
• iOS 17 Photos App Features One-Tap Crop Button When Zooming In
• You Can Log Your Moods and Emotions in iOS 17

macOS Sonoma

• Apple Announces macOS Sonoma With Desktop Widgets and More
• Apple Announces 'Game Mode' in macOS Sonoma for Better Mac Gaming Performance
• macOS Sonoma Drops Support for These Macs
• Apple Releases First Beta of macOS 14 Sonoma to Developers

watchOS 10

• Apple Announces watchOS 10 With Widgets, Redesigned Apps, and More
• watchOS 10 Compatible With watchOS Series 4 and Later, iPhone XS/XR or Later Also Required
• Apple Seeds First Beta of watchOS 10 to Developers

tvOS 17

• Apple Announces tvOS 17, Including FaceTime and New Control Center
• FaceTime Launching on Apple TV With iPhone and iPad Camera Support
• Apple Seeds First Beta of tvOS 17 to Developers
• tvOS 17 Lets You Use Your iPhone to Find a Lost Siri Remote

Other Announcements

• AirPods Pro 2 Gaining 'Adaptive Audio' Feature That Dynamically Adjusts to Your Environment
• Apple Shortening 'Hey Siri' to 'Siri' Across iPhone, Mac, and Other Devices
• Apple Now Accepting Trade-Ins of Mac Studio, 13-inch M2 MacBook Air, and 13-inch M2 MacBook Pro
• Apple Releases Beta Firmware Update for AirPods
• Apple Releases Studio Display 17 Firmware Beta

Rewatch the Keynote

If you missed something and want to rewatch the keynote, a replay is available in the Apple TV app, on Apple's Events website, and on YouTube.

Stay Tuned to MacRumors

Make sure to stay tuned to MacRumors this week because we're going to be sharing in-depth videos and articles highlighting all of the new features in the hardware and software that Apple showed off today.

We'll also be publishing roundups, guides, and how tos on everything that you need to know about the new products, and we'll have coverage of each new feature as we delve further into the updates and the new hardware offerings.

Starting with iOS 17, interactive widgets are now available on the iPhone across the Home Screen, Lock Screen, and the new StandBy mode. Apple gave some examples of what interactive widgets can be used for, including marking a reminder as completed, playing or pausing a song or podcast, and controlling accessories in the Home app, and there will be many more possibilities as third-party apps are updated with support.

Introduced with iOS 14, Home Screen widgets offered limited functionality until now, as Apple did not allow developers to include interactive elements, such as scrolling, buttons, or animated transitions. Home Screen widgets were only allowed to present read-only information, and tapping on a widget would simply open the corresponding app. Now, users will be able to interact with widgets directly for some actions.

Interactive widgets are also available on the iPad's Home Screen and Lock Screen with iPadOS 17, and on the Mac's desktop with macOS Sonoma. All of the software updates are currently available in beta and will be released to the public later this year.

The iOS 17 Health app introduces a new feature that allows you to keep track of your emotions and moods over time, so you can get an idea of your overall mental wellbeing.

With the iOS 17 Health app, you can quickly make a note of your state of mind each day. There's an option to choose a feeling ranging from Very Unpleasant to Very Pleasant, and then a list of words that you can use to hone in on your general mood.

From there, you can select a reason for the way that you're feeling, such as work, partner, hobbies, money, health, family, and more. Logging a mood takes just a few seconds, and the Health app will aggregate the data over time.

Mood logging can also be done on an Apple Watch running watchOS 10 through the Mindfulness app. On the watch, if you open up the Mindfulness app, there's a new "Log State of Mind" option. Tapping it lets you log how you're feeling right now or how you've felt throughout the day.

Apple says that it also plans to link your mood reports to your activities like Workouts and sleep so you can see what might have an impact, plus the company plans to provide standardized mental health assessments so you can see your risk for anxiety or depression.

With the iOS 17 Photos app, Apple is making it easier to crop your photos to your specifications. When you zoom into an image, there's a new "Crop" button that appears in the upper right.

Tapping the Crop button brings up the crop interface with the zoom level that you've selected, so you can crop into the part of the image that you prefer with just a couple of taps. If you like your crop, tap on Done, and if you want to change anything, the full editing interface is available.

In iOS 16, cropping involves tapping into the Edit interface, choosing the crop tool, and adjusting the crop from there with either pinch zoom gestures or by dragging the corners of the cropping tool. You can still edit images in this way, but it's quicker to use the new zoom crop feature.

Apple today announced the Apple Vision Pro, a wearable augmented and virtual reality headset. Because of the way the headset fits against the face, it does not accommodate glasses, but Apple has a solution for those who need prescription lenses.

Apple is partnering with Zeiss to offer Zeiss Optical Inserts that can be customized to each person's vision prescription. The inserts will attach to the Vision Pro lenses magnetically, allowing for precise viewing and eye tracking.

There is no word yet on what the Zeiss prescription inserts will cost, but Apple says that vision correction accessories will be sold separately.

Glasses wearers will need a valid prescription to get the inserts, and not all prescriptions will be supported, so there will be some limitations that might prevent some people from using the headset.

The Vision Pro headset will be available in early 2024 and it will be priced starting at $3,499.

Apple's Vision Pro headset is the company's first new product category since the Apple Watch, and it is unlike any other Apple device. It runs an operating system called visionOS, and developers will need to create augmented and virtual reality apps specifically for the headset.

To ensure that there are a wide selection of experiences available at launch, Apple plans to provide Apple Vision Pro developer kits to developers at some point in the future.

Apple says that developer kits will be offered to help developers bring their creations to life on Vision Pro, and that they will offer the ability to quickly build, iterate, and test on the headset. Developers will be able to apply to get a kit, but Apple hasn't offered details on when the kits will be made available.

The last developer kit that Apple offered was a Mac mini with an Apple silicon chip inside in 2020, and it was provided to developers to help them transition from Intel to Apple silicon. Apple sold the Mac mini machines for $500, but developers had to return them at the end of the testing program.

Apple will likely require developers to purchase an Apple Vision Pro headset to create apps for it, but the purchase price will include access to beta software, developer labs, discussion forums, technical support, and other resources if the ‌Apple Vision Pro‌ development kit is similar to the Apple silicon development kit.

Along with ‌Apple Vision Pro‌ developer kits, Apple says that it will offer ‌Apple Vision Pro‌ compatibility evaluations for existing apps and opportunities for developers to visit a Vision Pro developer lab that provides demonstrations of visionOS, iPadOS, and iOS apps running on the headset. Labs will be available in Cupertino, London, Munich, Shanghai, Singapore, and Tokyo.

More information on these tools for developing content for the Vision Pro headset will be available in July. The visionOS SDK will be available later this month.

With the first iOS 17 beta, Apple has introduced a new accessibility feature called Personal Voice. First highlighted earlier this year, Personal Voice is designed to allow you to use artificial intelligence to create a replica of your voice.

The feature is aimed at those who are at risk of losing their ability to speak, with Personal Voice offering these individuals the chance to "create a voice that sounds like them" for communication purposes.

Personal Voice is available in the initial iOS 17 beta, so developers can begin testing it right away. It can be found under Accessibility > Personal Voice. Creating a Personal Voice is process that takes around an hour. Recording requires a quiet place with little to no background noise, with Apple instructing users to speak naturally at a consistent volume while holding the iPhone approximately six inches from the face.

If there is too much background noise in your location, Apple will warn you that you need to find a quieter place to record.

Personal Voice requires you to read a series of sentences aloud, after which your ‌iPhone‌ will generate and store your Personal Voice. The Personal Voice can then be used with the Live Speech feature, which allows users to type-to-speak in FaceTime, the Phone app, and other communication apps.

Personal Voice will be available to the general public when Apple releases the first public beta of iOS 17. Apple has said that iOS 17 will be available to public beta testers next month.

If your Messages app often becomes cluttered with one-time verification codes that you need to manually delete, it's going to get a lot easier to clean them up in iOS 17.

The iOS 17 update includes a new option to delete verification codes in Messages (and Mail) after they've been inserted into an app or website through the Autofill feature.

"Clean Up Automatically" can be toggled on for verification codes in the Passwords app under Password Options.

Note that autofill verification codes are new to the Mail app in iOS 17, and work the same way as the verification code autofill feature for the Messages app. When you get a one-time code emailed to you, the Mail app can detect it and use it in Safari automatically without you having to swap over to the Mail app.

Apple says that one-time codes sent to both Mail and Messages can be deleted automatically if the delete feature is turned on.

Apple is enhancing the security of Safari in iOS 17, and private browsing now requires Face ID authentication or a passcode to access. If you open up a private browsing window in Safari, you will need to authenticate with ‌Face ID‌.

That means someone who has access to your unlocked phone and opens your Safari browser won't be able to get to your private browsing history without secondary authentication. ‌Face ID‌ or a passcode can be used to access the Safari private tabs.

Private browsing also completely blocks known trackers from loading on pages and removes tracking added to URLs as you browse, improving privacy. Websites are prevented from tracking or identifying your device with these new additions, plus Apple also offers improved extension control.

In private mode, extensions with website access are turned off, and you will need to manually re-enable them. iCloud Private Relay also uses IP address locations based on country and time zone rather than a general location.

Safari in iOS 17 is also gaining a Profiles feature so you can keep your personal browsing and work browsing separate, with different histories, Tab Groups, cookies, and favorites.

Apple today previewed iOS 17 for the iPhone, and one of the key new features coming with the update is improved autocorrect functionality.

Apple says iOS 17 includes a state-of-the-art language model for word prediction that will greatly improve autocorrection on the iPhone. Any time you type, on-device machine learning will intelligently correct mistakes with greater accuracy than ever before. In addition, you will now receive predictive text recommendations inline as you type, allowing for words or complete sentences to be added by tapping the space bar.

Autocorrection has an updated design on iOS 17 that briefly underlines an autocorrected word. Tapping on an underlined word reveals the original word that you typed, making it easy to quickly revert the change. The system will also learn your typing habits over time and avoid some corrections, which Apple's software engineering chief Craig Federighi said is designed for "those moments where you just want to type a ducking word."

iOS 17 is available in beta starting today for members of Apple's Developer Program, and will be publicly released later this year. Autocorrection can be enabled or disabled in the Settings app under General → Keyboard → Auto-Correction.

Apple in iOS 17 is introducing StandBy mode, which is a new display experience designed for a charging iPhone that's placed in a horizontal orientation. An ‌iPhone‌ in this position is able to display an array of full-screen widgets, turning it into a useful home hub.

StandBy mode activates automatically on an ‌iPhone‌ running iOS 17 that's placed horizontally on a charger. You can see information such as the time, weather, a calendar, music controls, your photos, and more.

You can swipe left or right through the available StandBy options, and long press or swipe up/down to customize. With the time, for example, you can choose from an analog view, a digital view, a bubbly font, and a solar view where the background color shifts based on the time.

There are options to add Home Screen widgets to the main StandBy view, which is the first option you see when activating StandBy. In this view, you can select two widgets to display side-by-side, so you can control your HomeKit products, see your calendar events, keep an eye on the stock market, check on device battery life, see the weather, and more.

If a Live Activity is active, it will be displayed full screen, as will results from Siri requests.

At night, StandBy mode will get darker if the room you're in is dark, so that it is not distracting at night while you're sleeping. StandBy mode is akin to Nightstand Mode on the Apple Watch, and it functions in much of the same way.

Note that having the ‌iPhone‌ continually show information requires an ‌iPhone‌ 14 Pro or Pro Max with always-on display technology. On other iPhones, a tap is required to see what's on the screen.

iOS 17 introduces a much-requested AirTag feature, the option to share an ‌AirTag‌ with another person. Since launch, AirTags have only been able to be owned and used by a single person, but that's changing in the iOS 17 update.

In the Find My app, you can select an ‌AirTag‌ and choose the "Share This ‌AirTag‌" option to invite a contact of yours. The invited person will be able to see the location of the ‌AirTag‌ just as you can, which is useful if you're lending an item with an ‌AirTag‌ attached to it to a friend or family member because it eliminates those annoying tracking alerts.

A shared car with an ‌AirTag‌, for example, will no longer send up warnings about an unknown ‌AirTag‌ when the person who doesn't own the ‌AirTag‌ is using the car. You can invite anyone to see an ‌AirTag‌, and remove the person at any time as well, so temporary sharing is possible.

Sharing also works with Find My-enabled items, so it is not limited to AirTags. A person who has access to an item or an ‌AirTag‌ can track it and play a sound.