MacRumors

Apple today seeded the release candidate versions of upcoming iOS 15.4 and iPadOS 15.4 updates to developers for testing purposes, with the new software coming one week after Apple seeded the fifth betas of iOS 15.4 and iPadOS 15.4. The RCs represent the final versions of the updates that will be released to the public next week.

Developers can download iOS 15.4 and iPadOS 15.4 through the Apple Developer Center or over the air after the proper profile has been installed on an iPhone or iPad.

iOS and iPadOS 15.4 introduce some of the most significant changes we've seen in an update since iOS 15 launched. On the ‌iPhone‌ 12 and 13 models, there's now an option to use Face ID while wearing a mask with no Apple Watch required for authentication. It works just like Face ID, but it scans the area around your eyes when you're wearing a mask.

On ‌iPad‌, iPadOS 15.4 brings the long awaited Universal Control feature. Paired with a Mac running macOS Monterey 12.3, Universal Control allows multiple Macs and iPads to be controlled with a single cursor and keyboard. It's a feature that works seamlessly after installing the updates, and it is simple and intuitive to use.

There are 37 new emojis with the addition of Emoji 14 characters, so you can now use emojis that include melting face, biting lip, heart hands, bubbles, beans, face with diagonal mouth, palm up hand, eggs, troll, low battery, coral, lotus, and more.

The second beta added support for the "Tap to Pay on ‌iPhone‌" feature that is designed to allow NFC-compatible iPhones to accept payments through Apple Pay, contactless credit and debit cards, and other digital wallets, without requiring additional hardware.

Tap to Pay on ‌iPhone‌ is enabled in the iOS 15.4 beta, but it does require third-party providers to add support, so it is not yet available for use.

In the fourth beta, Apple added a new Siri voice for American users and support for AirTag anti-stalking features announced in February. When setting up an AirTag or a Find My accessory, there is now a warning that the device is locked to an Apple ID and that using it to track someone without consent is a crime.

"You can locate this item using the ‌Find My‌ network," reads the setup screen. "Using this item to track people without their consent is a crime in many regions around the world. This item is designed to be detected by victims and to enable law enforcement to request identifying information about the owner."

There are also signs that Apple may be planning to roll out support for digital IDs and driver's licenses in iOS 15.4. There isn't a ton of evidence for this at the current time, but there was a mention of the feature in the PassKit code in beta 2. "Find out when your driver's license or state ID is ready to use and get important updates about your ID," it reads.

Other new features include full 120Hz ProMotion support for app animations on ‌iPhone‌ 13 Pro models, EU vaccine certificates in the Wallet app, the ability to turn off notifications for Shortcuts automations, keyboard brightness controls in Control Center on the ‌iPad‌, an Apple Card widget, iCloud Keychain notes, support for adding custom email domains to ‌iCloud‌ Mail right on device, and a SharePlay option in the share sheet.

We have a full list of all of the features introduced in iOS 15.4 and iPadOS 15.4 in our dedicated guide highlighting everything new in the update.

Apple has also seeded RC versions of watchOS 8.5, tvOS 15.4, and macOS Monterey 12.3. All of the updates are expected to be released next week.

Update: The updates are now also available to public beta testers.

Apple today introduced the Mac Studio, an all-new Mac that's a hybrid between a Mac Pro and a Mac mini, with the new machine equipped with M1 Max and M1 Ultra chips.

Priced starting at $1999 for the ‌M1 Max‌ version and $3999 for the ‌M1 Ultra‌ version, the ‌Mac Studio‌ can now be ordered from Apple's website.

Alongside the ‌Mac Studio‌, Apple introduced the new 5K 27-inch Studio Display, which is also available to be ordered starting today. Adding nano-texture glass will cost $300, while the adjustable tilt display that Apple described is priced at $400.

Both the ‌Mac Studio‌ and the Studio Display will begin arriving to customers on Friday, March 18.

Preorders for the new iPhone SE and the new iPad Air will begin this Friday, and those products will also begin shipping on March 18.

Following the launch of the new Mac Studio and Studio Display, Apple has discontinued the 27-inch iMac.

The 27-inch ‌iMac‌ had remained in the ‌iMac‌ line alongside the smaller 24-inch ‌iMac‌ with Apple silicon and was one of just a few Macs that still featured an Intel processor.

Now with the 27-inch Studio Display that can be connected to any Mac, Apple has seemingly felt there is no need for a large-sized all-in-one desktop computer. The 24-inch ‌iMac‌ is now the only all-in-one desktop computer offered by Apple.

Apple today unveiled the 27-inch 5K "Studio Display" external monitor, alongside the new, high-end Mac Studio desktop computer.

The Studio Display features an all-screen design with narrow borders in a slim, all-aluminium enclosure like the 24-inch iMac. The display can be tiled up to 30 degrees thanks to its built-in stand.

To customize the display, customers can choose a more versatile, height-adjustable stand with a counterbalancing arm for an additional $400, or opt for a VESA mount adapter option, and there is also the option of nano-texture glass for an additional $300.

The screen itself features a 5K retina resolution with over 14.7M pixels. It also has an anti-reflective coating, up to 600 nits of brightness, P3 wide color, support for over one billion colors, and True Tone.

The Studio Display also contains the A13 Bionic chip to support its camera and audio system. It features a 12MP Ultra Wide front camera like the iPad, with Center Stage for the first time on the Mac.

With a high-fidelity six-speaker setup, the display contains four force-cancelling woofers that minimize distortion and two high-performance tweeters, featuring support for Spatial Audio with Dolby Atmos. The Studio Display also includes a studio-quality three-mic array that is optimized for calls and voice recordings.

The rear of the Studio Display features three USB-C ports and a Thunderbolt port to connect peripherals. The display can deliver 96W of power to a notebook, and can fast charge the 14-inch MacBook Pro. Up to three Studio Displays can connect to a single MacBook Pro.

The Studio Display starts at $1,599. Alongside the Mac Studio, the Studio Display is available to order today and orders will begin to arrive on March 18.

Apple today at its "Peek Performance" event announced a new Mac Studio desktop computer with a companion Studio Display monitor.

With a 3.7-inch tall enclosure, the Mac Studio looks like a larger Mac mini, but it is far more powerful. The computer can be configured with the same M1 Max chip as found in the 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro or the just-announced M1 Ultra chip, which features a 20-core CPU, up to a 64-core GPU, and a 32-core Neural Engine. The computer can be configured with up to 8TB of SSD storage and up to 128GB of unified memory.

On the back of the Mac Studio, connectivity options include four Thunderbolt 4 ports, two USB-A ports, one HDMI port, one 10-Gigabit Ethernet port, and a 3.5mm headphone jack with support for high-impedance headphones. On the front, there is an SD card slot (UHS-II), along with two USB-C ports for M1 Max configurations or two Thunderbolt 4 ports for M1 Ultra configurations. The computer supports Wi-Fi 6 and Bluetooth 5.0.

Apple says the Mac Studio remains "incredibly quiet" under the "heaviest workloads," with over 4,000 perforations on the back and bottom of the computer's enclosure guiding air through the internal components to help cool the high-performance M1 Ultra chip.

Key features of the Studio Display include a 27-inch screen size, a slim all-aluminum enclosure, 5K resolution, up to 600 nits of brightness, support for the P3 wide color gamut and over one billion colors, a built-in stand that allows the user to tilt the display up to 30 degrees, an A13 Bionic chip that powers advanced camera and audio features, a 12-megapixel Ultra Wide camera with Center Stage, a six-speaker sound system, and more.

Studio Display has three USB-C ports and a Thunderbolt 4 port that delivers 96W of pass-through power to charge a connected MacBook Air or MacBook Pro.

Customers can order the Mac Studio and Studio Display starting today through Apple's online store, with availability starting March 18. In the U.S., pricing starts at $1,999 for the Mac Studio with M1 Max and at $3,999 with M1 Ultra. The Studio Display is priced at $1,599 with a tilt-adjustable stand and at $1,999 with a tilt- and height-adjustable stand.

"We couldn't be more excited to introduce an entirely new Mac desktop and display with Mac Studio and Studio Display," said Greg Joswiak, Apple's senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing. "Mac Studio ushers in a new era for the desktop with unbelievable performance powered by M1 Max and M1 Ultra, an array of connectivity, and a compact design that puts everything users need within easy reach."

As part of its press release announcing the new iPad Air with the M1 chip, Apple has confirmed that macOS Monterey 12.3 will be released next week. Ahead of time, Apple has seeded the macOS 12.3 Release Candidate to developers for testing.

A key new feature of macOS 12.3 is Universal Control, allowing a single mouse or trackpad to control multiple Macs and iPads placed side by side. macOS 12.3 also introduces several new emoji, deprecates kernel extensions used by cloud storage providers Dropbox and OneDrive, eliminates Python 2 as a preinstalled scripting language, and more.

Apple's press release:

With next week's release of iPadOS 15.4 and macOS 12.3, Universal Control will enable users to work with a single mouse and keyboard and move between Mac and iPad for a seamless experience, with no setup required. Users can even drag and drop content back and forth between devices — great for sketching with Apple Pencil on iPad and placing it into a Keynote slide on the Mac.

Apple also confirmed that iOS 15.4 and iPadOS 15.4 will be released next week.

Apple today announced the M1 Ultra chip, the third iteration to the M1 family, and it represents the next "breakthrough" for Apple Silicon.

‌M1 Ultra‌ consists of two M1 Max chips connected with die-to-die technology called "UltraFusion." The new highest-end chip of ‌Apple Silicon‌ features 114 billion transistors, with higher support for bandwidth memory at 800GB/s.

"M1 Ultra is another game-changer for Apple silicon that once again will shock the PC industry. By connecting two M1 Max die with our UltraFusion packaging architecture, we're able to scale Apple silicon to unprecedented new heights," said Johny Srouji, Apple's senior vice president of Hardware Technologies. "With its powerful CPU, massive GPU, incredible Neural Engine, ProRes hardware acceleration, and huge amount of unified memory, M1 Ultra completes the M1 family as the world's most powerful and capable chip for a personal computer."

UltraFusion allows two ‌M1 Max‌ chips to connect together across more than 10,000 signals, offering 2.5TB/s of bandwidth, according to Apple.

‌M1 Ultra‌ has a 20-core CPU, with 16 high-performance and four high-efficiency cores. ‌M1 Ultra‌ supports up to 128GB of unified memory, an increase from the up to 64GB memory supported by the M1 Pro and ‌M1 Max‌.

In graphics, ‌M1 Ultra‌ has a 64-core GPU, which offers 8x faster graphics than ‌M1‌. ‌M1 Ultra‌ has a 32-core Neural Engine, which can operate 22 trillion operations per second and has two separate media engines.

As is common with ‌Apple Silicon‌, Apple claims that ‌M1 Ultra‌ offers "unprecedented" power efficiency with equally unprecedented power.

It delivers 90 percent higher multi-threaded performance than the fastest available 16-core PC desktop chip in the same power envelope. Additionally, M1 Ultra reaches the PC chip's peak performance using 100 fewer watts.2 That astounding efficiency means less energy is consumed and fans run quietly, even as apps like Logic Pro rip through demanding workflows, such as processing massive amounts of virtual instruments, audio plug-ins, and effects.

The first Mac to feature the ‌M1 Ultra‌ is the Mac Studio, which is aimed at creative professionals. The ‌Mac Studio‌ is available for order today.

Apple announced a new iPad Air today at its "Peek Performance" event, featuring Apple's powerful M1 chip previously found in the iPad Pro, as well as optional 5G connectivity, a new front camera with Center Stage, and even faster USB-C connectivity.

Available in a new array of colors, ‌iPad Air‌ features Apple's Ultra Wide front camera with Center Stage for a more natural video conferencing experience, a USB-C port with up to 2x faster transfer speeds, and 5G on the cellular models.

In terms of the ‌M1‌'s pure performance, the 8-core CPU delivers up to 60% faster performance, and the 8-core GPU delivers up to 2x faster graphics performance compared to the previous ‌iPad Air‌. That makes it faster than the fastest competitive tablet, and 2x as fast as the best-selling Windows laptop in its price range, according to Apple.

The USB-C port is now up to 2x faster than the previous generation, with data transfers up to 10Gbps, enabling it to support a range of USB-C accessories, including cameras, external storage, and displays with up to 6K resolution. Lastly, the new ‌iPad Air‌ supports the second-generation Apple Pencil.

"Whether it's a college student taking elaborate notes, a content creator working on their latest project, or a gamer playing graphics-intensive titles, users love iPad Air for its amazing performance and versatility in such a portable design," said Greg Joswiak, Apple's senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing. "With the breakthrough M1 chip, Ultra Wide front camera with Center Stage, and ultra-fast 5G, iPad Air is now more powerful, more capable, and simply more fun than ever."

The new ‌iPad Air‌ is priced from $599. It is available in 64GB and 256GB configurations, and comes in space gray, starlight, pink, purple, and blue colors. The new ‌iPad Air‌ will be available to pre-order on Friday, March 11, and will be available from March 18.

Apple today said iOS 15.4 and iPadOS 15.4 will be available to all users next week, following weeks of developer and public beta testing.

iOS 15.4 includes major new features for iPhone users, with the most notable perhaps being the ability for users to unlock their ‌iPhone‌ using Face ID while wearing a mask. Apple said that it's been able to update the ‌Face ID‌ system to uniquely identify the area around a users eye and can use that information to unlock the device even while wearing a mask. The feature is only available on the ‌iPhone‌ 12 and later.

On iPadOS 15.4 and macOS Monterey 12.3, the most notable new feature is Universal Control. ‌Universal Control‌ was originally demoed in WWDC 2021, and despite Apple's promise to get the feature out of the door before the end of 2021, it had to delay it to Spring 2022. ‌Universal Control‌ lets users use one mouse and keyboard across multiple Macs and iPads for a seamless user experience.

Apple has said macOS Monterey 12.3 will also launch next week.

iOS and iPadOS 15.4 also include other new changes and features, such as 37 new emojis and laying down the foundation for "Tap to Pay on ‌iPhone‌." The updates also include enhancements to AirTags, the option to add custom domains to iCloud Mail right on device, and tons more. The release notes for all of the updates will be released once the updates go live next week.

Apple and Major League Baseball today announced that a weekly "Friday Night Baseball" doubleheader is coming to Apple TV+ for the 2022 season, which is currently postponed due to a labor dispute between the MLB and the MLB's Players Association.

"Friday Night Baseball" will provide MLB fans with two marquee games to watch live on Friday nights each week during the regular season, complete with pregame and postgame shows. In the United States and Canada, Apple TV+ subscribers will also have access to a new 24/7 livestream with MLB game replays, news and analysis, highlights, classic games, and MLB-themed original content and programming on demand.

"Friday Night Baseball" will be available on Apple TV+ in the United States, Canada, Australia, Brazil, Japan, Mexico, Puerto Rico, South Korea, and the United Kingdom, without any regional blackouts, and will expand to additional countries at a later date. "Friday Night Baseball" will not require an Apple TV+ subscription for a limited time at launch.

"Just like all baseball fans, we can't wait for the season to open," said Peter Stern, Apple's vice president of services. "Baseball has a special place in the heart of so many Apple customers — not just in the United States, but in many countries around the world. We're proud to make Apple TV+ the home for great baseball moments throughout the season."

At its "Peek Performance" event, Apple today announced the third-generation iPhone SE, featuring the A15 Bionic chip, improved battery life, 5G connectivity, a new camera system, and more, all for a starting price of $429.

The new iPhone SE features the same 4.7-inch display as the current model, but now offers the toughest glass in a smartphone on the front and back — the same as on the back of the iPhone 13 and iPhone 13 Pro.

The device's new 12MP Wide camera system offers a range of improvements and computational photography features including Deep Fusion, Photographic Styles, Portrait Mode, and Smart HDR 4.

The new iPhone SE contains the same A15 Bionic chip from the iPhone 13 and iPhone 13 Pro. With a 6-core CPU, the A15 Bionic means that the iPhone SE is 1.8x faster than the iPhone 8. The 16-core Neural Engine, aimed at machine learning tasks, performs 15.8 trillion operations per second, making it 26x faster than iPhone 8. The 4-core GPU delivers 2.2x faster speed than the iPhone 8.

The A15 Bionic also gives the new iPhone SE longer battery life than the previous-generation and older 4.7-inch iPhone models despite having a compact form-factor and 5G connectivity. It continues to support fast charging and be compatible with Qi-certified chargers for wireless charging.

The new iPhone SE is available in two new colors, Midnight and Starlight, alongside PRODUCT(RED). The new iPhone SE starts at $429, up from $399 on the 2020 model, and is available with 64GB, 128GB, and 256GB of storage. Preorders begin on Friday, March 11, with the first devices shipping on March 18.

Apple debuted two new iPhone 13 colors at its "Peek Performance" digital event today, offering the ‌iPhone‌ 13 and ‌iPhone‌ 13 mini in a new "green" and the ‌iPhone‌ 13 Pro and ‌iPhone‌ 13 Pro Max in "alpine green."

"People love the design of iPhone 13 Pro and iPhone 13, and we're excited to unveil the stunning new alpine green and green finishes, which join the wide range of beautiful colors on the iPhone 13 lineup," said Bob Borchers, Apple's vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing. "These new colors give customers even more options when choosing their iPhone, and we can't wait for them to take advantage of all the iPhone 13 lineup offers, including unmatched performance with A15 Bionic, our best camera systems, massive improvements to battery life for everyday needs, fast 5G, incredible durability, and so much more."

Apple says it will offer a new dark, forest-type green for the ‌iPhone‌ 13 and ‌iPhone‌ 13 mini, and a lighter Alpine Green for ‌iPhone‌ 13 Pro and ‌iPhone‌ 13 Pro Max.

‌iPhone‌ 13 Pro and ‌iPhone‌ 13 Pro Max will be available in the new alpine green in 128GB, 256GB, 512GB, and 1TB storage options, starting at $999 and $1,099, respectively. Meanwhile, the ‌iPhone‌ 13 and ‌iPhone‌ 13 mini will be available in the new green in 128GB, 256GB, and 512GB storage options, starting at $799 and $699, respectively.

Customers in Australia, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Japan, the UK, the US, and more than 30 other countries and regions will be able to pre-order ‌iPhone‌ 13 Pro and ‌iPhone‌ 13 Pro Max in alpine green, and ‌iPhone‌ 13 and ‌iPhone‌ 13 mini in green, beginning at 5 a.m. Pacific Time on Friday, March 11, with availability beginning Friday, March 18.

Apple's virtual "Peek Performance" event kicks off today at 10:00 a.m. Pacific Time, where we're expecting to see new iPhone SE and iPad Air models, as well as at least one new Mac model.

Apple is providing a live video stream on its website, on YouTube, and in the company's TV app across its platforms. We will also be updating this article with live blog coverage and issuing Twitter updates through our @MacRumorsLive account as the keynote unfolds. Highlights from the event and separate news stories regarding today's announcements will go out through our @MacRumors account.

As usual, Apple's online store is currently down in advance of the event.

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Last-minute rumors leading up to Apple's "Peek Performance" event have cast doubt on long-running expectations that Apple will reveal a new or updated MacBook model with an M2 chip on Tuesday.

Last month, Bloomberg's Mark Gurman reported that Apple was preparing to launch at least one new Mac at its March 8 event, and at the time Gurman speculated that it would likely be a high-end Mac mini and/or a refreshed low-end 13-inch MacBook Pro.

That was before we heard of the "Mac Studio" rumors, which appeared only over the last few days. 9to5Mac on Friday reported that Apple is working on a "Mac Studio" device that seems to be a cross between a Mac Pro and a Mac mini.

Fast forward to Monday, and YouTuber Luke Miani shared renders of a new Mac allegedly called the "Mac Studio," which he said will be introduced on March 8. Gurman has also since confirmed that a "Mac Studio" machine that is a "smaller ‌Mac Pro‌/more powerful ‌Mac mini‌" is "ready to go" and could launch at the spring event.

With a redesigned MacBook Air not expected until later in the year, that leaves a refreshed 13-inch MacBook Pro with a new M2 chip as the other obvious potential reveal during Apple's event. However, Miani has said he doesn't expect any Mac notebooks to be introduced at all at Tuesday's event, and Gurman has also since poured cold water on the likelihood that an M2-powered Mac will be announced alongside an M1-series "Mac Studio," suggesting it would be an "odd" thing for Apple to do.

While hints of the M2 Apple silicon chip have been spotted by a developer in the latest macOS Monterey 12.3 beta, confirming that it features an 8-core CPU and upgraded 10-core GPU, that doesn't necessarily mean that an M2-powered MacBook is coming in the spring. As such, it may be wise to temper expectations that a new Mac notebook is about to be announced by Apple in the coming hours.

As for other products that could appear at the event, Apple is expected to announce a new iPhone 13 color, the next-generation version of the iPhone SE, and a revamped iPad Air. Apple is also said to be unveiling a new standalone display, which could be called "Studio Display."

There could also be some news on Apple's services, as well as dates for the public release of iOS and iPadOS 15.4, alongside macOS Monterey 12.3, which enables Universal Control.

The event tagline, "Peek performance," has also prompted suggestions that Apple may offer a peek at a future product, but that remains purely speculative.

MacRumors will have in-depth coverage of Apple's event, which kicks off at 10:00 a.m. Pacific Time, including a live blog on our website and tweets via @MacRumorsLive on Twitter. For a full rundown of everything we expect to see, be sure to check out our guide.

Firefox 98 for iOS devices introduces a new customizable mobile experience in the form of an adjustable search bar that can be set at the bottom or the top of the iPhone's display.

This brings the mobile Firefox browser in line with Safari, which gained an option to move the search bar to the top or the bottom with iOS 15. Apple in iOS 15 tweaked the design of Safari and initially made a change that put the search bar permanently at the bottom of the app, but it was unpopular and ultimately walked back, with ‌iPhone‌ and iPad users now able to choose their preferred orientation.

Firefox 98 also introduces new mobile wallpapers inspired by Disney+ movie "Turning Red," with the wallpaper available through a partnership with Disney.

Firefox for iOS can be downloaded from the App Store for free. [Direct Link]

This year's lower-end iPhone 14 models will have a display with the same bezel thickness as the iPhone 13 series, according to an unverified but increasingly plausible source coming out of Asia.

Apple is expected to release lower-end 6.1-inch iPhone 14 and 6.7-inch iPhone 14 Max models that continue to have a notch this year. According to a post from the account "yeux1122" on the Korean blog Naver, these models will share the same bezel size as last year's iPhone 13, a claim that runs counter to recent chatter on social media that Apple may be aiming for thinner bezels on all its next-generation smartphones this year.

Apple has worked to reduce the size of the display bezels on a variety of its recent products, including the Apple Watch Series 7, the iPad mini 6, and the 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro. That has naturally led to speculation that the iPhone 14, due in the fall, could be next.

In 2020, Apple did in fact trim the bezels around the Super Retina XDR displays in all of its iPhone 12 models, resulting in a slightly more expansive screen-to-body ratio compared to the iPhone 11. However, last year's iPhone 13 stuck with the same bezel size as the iPhone 12.

If today's rumor is accurate, Apple will once again keep the same bezel size on at least the lower-end iPhone 14 models and will instead focus on replacing the notch on the Pro and Pro Max models with a pill-shaped cutout and hole punch for the Face ID sensors and camera.

The Naver blog is the same source of some last-minute rumors about the iPad Air 5 and iPhone SE, and could well be the source of rumors about a "Mac Studio" machine and separate display, all of which we could see later today at Apple's "Peek Performance" event, starting at 10:00 a.m. Pacific Time.

Apple's online storefront has gone down ahead of its "Peek Performance" virtual event taking place later today, where a handful of new products are expected to be announced.

Apple is expected to announce the next-generation version of the iPhone SE, a revamped iPad Air, and at least one Mac with an Apple silicon chip, which could be the rumored "Mac Studio" machine. Apple is also said to be unveiling a new standalone display, which could be called "Studio Display."

There could also be some news on Apple's service's front, as well as dates for the public release of iOS and iPadOS 15.4, alongside macOS Monterey 12.3, which enables Universal Control.

The event tagline, "Peek performance," has also prompted suggestions that Apple may offer a peek at a future product, but that remains purely speculative.

MacRumors will have in-depth coverage of Apple's event, which kicks off at 10:00 a.m. Pacific Time, including a live blog on our website and tweets via @MacRumorsLive on Twitter. For a full rundown of everything we expect to see, be sure to check out our guide.