MacRumors iPhone and iPad Blog: Apps, News, and Rumors

Bose this week quietly announced AirPlay 2 support for its line of "BoseSmart" smart speakers. The audio company revealed the added functionality via its official Twitter account and separately in a post on its community support forums. Introduced late last year, the BoseSmart range of speakers support Wi-Fi and Bluetooth connectivity, and Alexa voice activation. Models in the range that now ...

Earlier this week, rumors suggested Amazon would launch a free, ad-supported music service, and today, Amazon indeed announced the debut of a free music option for Amazon Alexa users. Alexa device owners in the United States who do not have a Prime membership or a subscription to Amazon Music Unlimited are now able to listen to an ad-supported selection of top playlists and stations at no cost ...

BlackBerry Messenger, aka BBM, is set to shut down on May 31, 2019, BlackBerry announced today. Prior to when the iPhone launched and for several years afterwards, BBM was a key communication method on BlackBerry phones. As BlackBerry devices fell out of favor, BlackBerry aimed to keep BBM alive with an iOS app that's been available since 2013, but with Messages, WhatsApp, WeChat, and other...

Instagram has considered hiding the like count on images uploaded to the social network, which would prevent people from seeing how many people have tapped the "heart" icon on each photo. The feature was found by Jane Manchun Wong, who often hunts down features in testing in Instagram and Twitter. As depicted in an image shown by Wong, the like count on a photo is hidden by default and visible ...

Apple has expanded mobile phone billing to additional countries and carriers, according to an updated support document on its website. As of this week, the feature is now supported by Movistar in Chile, and dtac and AIS in Thailand. Elsewhere, Vodafone and O2 has been added to the list of supporting carriers in Netherlands and Czech Republic, respectively. The payment method allows Apple ...

After previously only existing as an "Easter Egg" setting, Facebook in April 2019 added a Dark Mode theme as an official display feature of its standalone Messenger app. Facebook says that ‌Dark Mode‌ is designed to provide less harsh brightness in situations where ambient lighting is lower while maintaining contrast and vibrancy. If you have an OLED iPhone, such as an ‌iPhone‌ X, ‌iPhone‌...

Facebook harvested the email contacts of 1.5 million users without their knowledge or consent and used the data to build a web of their social connections, it emerged today. Business Insider reports that Facebook began collecting the contact lists in May 2016 when new users opened a new account on the social network. Image via Business Insider The harvesting occurred when users were offered...

Ahead of the annual New York International Auto Show, several automakers have announced new vehicles with first-time support for CarPlay, including the 2020 Toyota Highlander, 2020 Nissan Versa, and 2020 Hyundai Venue. 2020 Toyota Highlander with wide 12.3-inch touchscreen in Platinum model ‌CarPlay‌ will be a standard feature in the 2020 Toyota Highlander, equipped with a wide 12.3-inch...

Amazon Echo devices have been able to use Alexa-based voice commands to control Apple Music since December, but the feature has been limited to Amazon's own devices until today. Sonos One and Sonos Beam owners in the United States, United Kingdom, and Ireland are now also able to use Alexa to control ‌Apple Music‌ after adding the ‌Apple Music‌ skill to the Alexa app. In the US, UK, and ...

Apple Pay is now available as a payment option in the Uber Eats food delivery app for the first time, allowing users who make food orders to pay with a credit or debit card stored in the Wallet app. The addition of ‌Apple Pay‌ will make food ordering through Uber Eats a more streamlined process as payments will be able to be approved with Face ID or Touch ID instead of through full billing...

Sleep tracking has become a popular activity for many people, since the practice can result in major benefits to your daily wellbeing, restfulness, stress levels, and mental health. There are many ways you can go about tracking your sleep, and Apple itself sells a few products that can help, including the Apple Watch (paired with a third-party app like Pillow) and the Beddit Sleep Monitor....

Apple has removed TikTok from its App Store in India to comply with a government demand to block downloads of the video sharing app over child safety concerns. TikTok, developed by China-based Bytedance Technology, lets users create and share short-form videos enhanced with digital effects, a formula that has proved a huge hit in India. The app has been downloaded more than 240 million times ...

United States Justice Department staff members told Sprint and T-Mobile that their planned merger is unlikely to be approved as it is currently structured, reports The Wall Street Journal. The merger agreement between the two companies hinges on approval from the Justice Department's antitrust division, which has been exploring whether the deal would result in a major threat to competition. ...

Twitter today confirmed plans to begin experimenting with a "Hide Replies" feature starting in June, which will provide Twitter users with more control over the replies that are visible following a tweet. As TechCrunch points out, this has the potential to be controversial because the original person who tweets will be able to control which replies are visible in a conversation thread. The...

Amazon is discounting the 2018 iPad Pros this week to notable new low prices, including both the 11-inch and 12.9-inch models. These are the ‌iPad‌ Pros that Apple updated last fall, with a new edge-to-edge display, slimmer bezels, Face ID, and support for Apple Pencil 2. Note: MacRumors is an affiliate partner with Amazon. When you click a link and make a purchase, we may receive a small...

Japanese electronics maker Yamaha has announced that it will be rolling out AirPlay 2 support to 15 of its current home audio products, including a sound bar, wireless speakers, and receivers, starting later this month. The rollout will begin in late April and includes the following products: MusicCast 20 and MusicCast 50 wireless speakers MusicCast BAR 400 sound bar RX-Ax80 series AV...

Huawei said on Tuesday it has not held talks with Apple about supplying 5G chips for future iPhones, just a day after its founder admitted it was "open" to doing so (via Reuters). "We have not had discussions with Apple on this issue," Huawei's rotating Chairman Ken Hu said on Tuesday, adding he looked forward to Apple's competition in the 5G phone market.Last week we covered a report...

Facebook will discontinue its peer-to-peer payments feature for Messenger users in the United Kingdom and France on June 15, the company announced on Tuesday (via TechCrunch). The social network sent out notices to users of the service in the two countries informing them of the decision, adding that they would continue to be able to make charitable donations through Facebook itself. A note...