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

Apple today seeded the fifth beta of an upcoming watchOS 4 update to developers, two weeks after seeding the fourth beta and two months after introducing the watchOS 4 update at its 2017 Worldwide Developers Conference. Once the proper configuration profile has been installed from the Apple Developer Center, the watchOS 4 beta can be downloaded through the dedicated Apple Watch app on the...

Apple Maps has been updated with transit data in Queensland and Western Australia, enabling iPhone users to navigate with public transportation directions in large cities such as Brisbane and Perth, and surrounding areas. In Brisbane, supported vehicles include TransLink buses and Queensland Rail trains, with routes extending to, from, and within the Gold Coast and Sunshine Coast suburbs....

Eros Group, a movie production company based in India, is said to be looking at potentially selling its entire media library to Apple, further boosting the Cupertino company's foothold in the Indian smartphone and entertainment markets. The $1 billion deal is said to also include interest from companies like Amazon and Netflix as potential competitors to win Eros Group's library of films and...

In July, KGI Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo made the claim that the OLED iPhone 8 will come in fewer color options than LCD models of the iPhone 7s and iPhone 7s Plus, in a bid by Apple to maintain the iPhone 8's "boutique image." Kuo never made it clear exactly how many colorways that might entail, and a few new images today provide a glimpse into one potential possibility, although their...

LEDVANCE's HomeKit-compatible Sylvania Smart A19 Full Color LED Bulb is now available for pre-order, with deliveries expected to start in September. First introduced late last year, Sylvania's new bulb connects to a HomeKit setup over Bluetooth, so no hub or WiFi connection is necessary. It's a multicolored bulb, so it can be set to several different shades of white or a range of different...

Apple customers looking to purchase AirPods or an Apple Watch Nike+ have some offers available to consider this weekend. Apple is also running a "Back to School with Apple Pay" promotion on the App Store in the United States. In the United States, Verizon is offering a free $50 Visa prepaid card to customers that purchase $200 or more in accessories, before taxes and after any discounts....

Awesome things have been happening over at TouchArcade this week, as we picked up not one but four additional writers. This has significantly increased our game review output, making our top reviews page really worth having bookmarked to keep up on all of the best iOS games that have come out recently. We've awarded top marks to Layton's Mystery Journey, Linelight, Miracle Merchant, and The Elder ...

For this week's giveaway, we've teamed up with BlackPods to offer MacRumors readers a chance to win a pair of AirPods that have been custom painted black. Apple only offers the AirPods in white, a color that doesn't go well with the Jet Black and Matte Black iPhones, leading BlackPods to come up with a solution for customers who want unique black AirPods at a slightly higher cost....

Each week, Apple chooses an "App of the Week" to highlight, which means it can be downloaded for free. This week's pick is an iMessage app called Checkmate, able to be played with friends using Messages. Checkmate is one of the first iMessage apps to be named App of the Week, and it is normally priced at $0.99. With Checkmate, you can play a game of chess with a friend entirely over iMessages. ...

In a new 45 page report by Mark Schaffer of Repair.org, Apple, Sony, and other tech industry companies have been targeted as the reason behind lagging green electronics standards in the United States, which are meant to establish an overall set of environmental leadership specifications for the design, usage, and end-of-life phases of electronic devices. According to Repair.org, Apple and...

Late last month Apple revealed it had partnered with hearing aid company Cochlear to launch the first Made For iPhone Cochlear implant, which can stream audio from an iOS device directly to a surgically embedded sound processor. Now, in a new Wired article titled "How Apple is Putting Voices in Users' Heads – Literally", the company has offered up a few more details on how it was able to...

Apple today uploaded three short 15 second ads in its "The Rock x Siri" series, with content that's primarily been pulled from the main three minute "The Rock x Siri Dominate the Day" video, which was originally released on July 23. Each video features The Rock interacting with Siri to set a reminder, take a selfie, and set a timer. The reminder video is new, while the selfie and timer videos...

iDevices was one of the first companies to announce plans for producing HomeKit-compatible products, focusing primarily on switches and outlets but also branching out a bit with a thermostat. Earlier this year, iDevices was acquired by major electrical equipment manufacturer Hubbell, but the iDevices brand and product lineup lives on. I've been using a number of iDevices products, including...

In May, Lyft launched a "Round Up and Donate" program where riders can opt in to have the app round up their fare to the nearest dollar, and automatically donate the difference to one of a few participating organizations like the Human Rights Campaign and the ACLU. This week, Lyft announced that it's going to match donations made by riders when they pay for their trips using Apple Pay...

Microsoft appears to be working on a Touch Cover smart keyboard for at least one iPad model, according to battery information for products containing lithium-ion batteries shared on its website earlier this year. Microsoft's Surface RT with Touch Cover The documents were published in April, but they were only discovered now by German blog WinFuture, which tipped its information to The Verge....

Google Earth for iOS today received a major update that brings a collection of new features to the interactive mapping app, as well as introducing 64-bit app support so it can run on iOS 11 devices. Apple reminded developers over the summer that once iOS 11 launches to the public, it will cease support of 32-bit apps altogether and only allow 64-bit apps and app updates to be submitted to the App ...

Two months after rolling out Plex Live TV to iOS and Android TV devices, Plex today announced that its live streaming TV feature is now available for users on Apple TV. In addition, on any app where Plex Live TV is available, Plex Pass users will be able to use a new "Time Shift" feature, meaning they can scrub back and forth through any live broadcast, as well as pause it. We’re...

Skype today announced that users across 22 countries can now send money with PayPal in its mobile app for iOS and Android. Skype said the person-to-person payments feature is rolling out today in the United States, United Kingdom, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Cyprus, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Portugal, San Marino,...