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

Oliver Schusser, who now heads up Apple Music, recently sat down with Billboard to give some insight into how ‌Apple Music‌ works and his plans for ‌Apple Music‌'s future. Schusser, who has been with Apple for 15 years, was promoted to Head of Global Operations for ‌Apple Music‌ back in April 2018, reporting directly to ‌Apple Music‌ chief Eddy Cue. At a time when there was internal...

After first announcing plans to launch a standalone streaming service back in January, Comcast and NBCUniversal today have revealed that this service is set to launch in April 2020 (via The Verge). The news was given during the company's earnings call today, where CEO Steve Burke also confirmed that the streaming service will be built on a similar platform to Sky's Now TV streaming service...

Apple this week released a new ad for the Powerbeats Pro, which launched in May in the United States in Canada. The new commercial spotlights the accessory by showing how seven runners from the Paris Running Club joined a 280km relay in Iceland. Called the "Zero Dark Project," the ad explains how each runner used the ‌Powerbeats Pro‌ to stay motivated through music during the lengthy relay...

Best Buy has introduced its Black Friday in July sale this week, beginning with early access for My Best Buy members and expanding wide tomorrow. The sale includes Apple products like the Apple Watch Series 3 and 4, iPad, MacBook Pro, and more. Note: MacRumors is an affiliate partner with these vendors. When you click a link and make a purchase, we may receive a small payment, which helps us...

Apple started underlining its privacy stance earlier this year with a billboard marketing campaign that began in Las Vegas and later came to Canada, and this week the company has extended it to Europe. Brought to our attention by Macerkopf.de, the new billboards in both Hamburg and Berlin play on their location, while emphasizing how much importance Apple attaches to user privacy and data...

Apple Music has invited DJ Khaled to be its first "Artist-in-Residence," Khaled announced today on his Instagram account (via Billboard). Khaled says that as Artist-in-Residence, he will be taking over "the biggest playlists on the platform" every month while also debuting new artists. Khaled called on record labels and artists to "hit him up" to collaborate, and he announced his first...

Costco recently updated its iOS app to add a Digital Membership Card for the first time, allowing customers to enter the store and make purchases without the need to have a physical card. Costco has long had an iOS app, but the app did not include support for adding a digital version of the Costco membership card, instead requiring customers to present their actual cards for purchases....

Powerbeats Pro wireless earphones offer up to nine hours of listening time and up to six hours of talk time on a single charge. Apple's Beats-branded buds also charge very quickly -- you can get one and a half hours of listening time by putting them in their case for just five minutes, or leave them in for 15 minutes and you'll get four and a half hours' worth. The PowerBeats Pro case itself ...

Apple has doubled down on its privacy features in iOS 13, giving iPhone and iPad users a more granular view of how apps access their location information. On Apple devices, the location services that apps can tap into use GPS, Bluetooth, and crowd-sourced Wi-Fi hotspot and cellular mast locations to determine your approximate location. The good news is that iOS 13 makes you more aware of how...

7-Eleven has announced that it will offer a free pair of second-generation AirPods with a wired charging case to the first 500 customers who place a $50 order through its 7NOW delivery app for iOS and Android on Thursday, July 25. 7NOW app users will receive a push notification revealing when the flash deal begins, and it will also be announced on 7-Eleven's social media accounts, according...

OpenTable, a popular online platform for making restaurant reservations, today announced that it has partnered with Caviar, Grubhub, and Uber Eats to offer delivery and pick-up options at thousands of restaurants. When searching for a restaurant or visiting a restaurant profile page in the OpenTable app, users will now see a "get it delivered" button, which will direct them to the...

Lockdown, a new app launching today, is designed to be an open source firewall, letting users block any connection to any domain, including those that use ad tracking services and analytics platforms to monitor device usage. Lockdown is free to download and use, and because it operates on device, it collects no user data. Lockdown uses Apple's VPN setup to function, though it is not a VPN and...

Tennessee State University last week launched the HBCU C2 Presidential Academy, a new initiative that's designed to expose students of color to coding and app development, reports The Tennessean. The HBCU C2 Presidential Academy invited students from 14 historically black colleges and universities to learn from Apple. The program is designed to make sure that TSU and other HBCUs remain at the...

Apple Maps vehicles will begin surveying Germany next week, through mid-September, according to the Frankfurter Allgemeine. The data collected, such as road details, signage, and landmarks, will be used to improve ‌Apple Maps‌ as part of Apple's efforts to revamp the app. The 360º imagery will also likely be used for "Look Around" when Apple eventually expands its new Street View-like feature...

In iOS 13 and iPadOS, the Find My app replaces the ‌Find My‌ Friends and the ‌Find My‌ iPhone apps of old and brings their features together in a unified interface that allows you to find whatever it is you need. For example, like ‌Find My‌ Friends, the ‌Find My‌ app lets friends share their location with you and vice versa. If your friend allows it, it also lets you receive notifications...

Since its introduction with iOS 7, AirDrop has become the favored means for iPhone and iPad users to instantly share photos, videos, documents, and more to nearby Apple devices over Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. Using it to transmit content from apps like Photos and Safari couldn't be simpler, thanks to its top-level location in the iOS Share Sheet, accessed via the ubiquitous Share icon. AirDrop is...

The team behind Pixelmator Pro today released a major update for the photo editing app, introducing useful new capabilities that make it easier than ever to edit your photos. There's now a Pixelmator Pro editing extension for the built-in Photos app on the Mac, which includes all of the tools and features from the full Pixelmator Pro app. With the extension, you can make edits to your...

Television maker LG says that updates will soon arrive that make HomeKit and AirPlay 2 available on supported TVs. LG's Australian support account on Twitter responded to a customer query by revealing that the updates would start rolling out to users in one week, which points to next Monday as the earliest possible arrival. Users will need to be running iOS 12.4 on their iPhones and iPads ...