What are the new features for iOS 15?

The new iOS 15 update includes the following features:

FaceTime

• Spatial audio makes people’s voices sound like they’re coming from the direction in which they’re positioned on the screen on Group FaceTime calls (iPhone XS, iPhone XS Max, iPhone XR and later)

Notifications

• A new look displays contact photos for people and larger icons for apps
• Notification summary delivers a helpful collection of your notifications daily, based on a schedule you set
• Notifications can be muted from any app or messaging thread for the next hour or for the day

Maps

• Detailed city maps display elevation, trees, buildings, landmarks, crosswalks and turn lanes, and 3D views to navigate complex interchanges, and more in San Francisco Bay Area, Los Angeles, New York, and London, with more cities coming in the future (iPhone XS, iPhone XS Max, iPhone XR and later)
• New driving features include a new map that highlights details like traffic and incidents, and a route planner that lets you view your upcoming journey by choosing a future departure or arrival time
• Immersive walking directions show step-by-step directions in augmented reality (iPhone XS, iPhone XS Max, iPhone XR and later)
• Updated transit experience provides one-tap access to departures near you, makes it easy to see and interact with your route using one hand, and notifies you when approaching your stop
• Interactive 3D globe shows enhanced details for mountain ranges, deserts, forests, oceans, and more (iPhone XS, iPhone XS Max, iPhone XR and later)
• Redesigned place cards make it easy to learn about and interact with places, and a new home for Guides editorially curates the best recommendations for places you’ll love

Safari

• Bottom tab bar is easier to reach and helps you move between tabs by swiping left or right
• Tab Groups help you save and organize your tabs and easily access them across devices
• Tab overview grid view displays your open tabs
• Start page can be customized with a background image and new sections like Privacy Report, Siri Suggestions, and Shared With You
• Web extensions on iOS help you personalize your browsing and can be downloaded through the App Store
• Voice search lets you search the web using your voice

Wallet

• Home keys let you tap to unlock a supported home or apartment door lock (iPhone XS, iPhone XS Max, iPhone XR and later)
• Hotel keys allow you to tap to unlock your room at participating hotels
• Office keys allow you to tap to unlock your office doors for participating corporate offices
• Car keys with Ultra Wideband help you unlock, lock, and start your supported car without having to take your iPhone out of your bag or pocket (iPhone 11 models or later)
• Remote keyless entry functions on your car keys allow you to lock, unlock, honk your horn, preheat your car, or open your trunk on your supported vehicle

Photos

• New look for Memories with a new interactive interface, animated cards with smart, adaptive titles, new animation and transition styles, and multiple image collages
• Apple Music can be added to your Memories for Apple Music subscribers, and personalized song suggestions combine expert recommendations with your music tastes and what’s in your photos and videos
• Memory mixes let you set the mood by selecting from different songs and a Memory look to match
• New memory types include additional international holidays, child-focused memories, trends over time, and improved pet memories
• Info pane now displays rich information about the photo like which camera and lens, shutter speed, file size, and more
• Visual Look Up recognizes art, landmarks around the world, plants and flowers, books, and dog and cat breeds in your photos so you can learn more about them

Health

• Sharing lets you choose health data, alerts, and trends to share with people important to you or those who are caring for you, including your healthcare provider
• Trends lets you see how a given health metric is progressing over time and can notify you when a new trend has been detected
• Walking Steadiness is a new metric that can assess your risk of falling and notify you if your walking steadiness is low (iPhone 8 and later)
• Verifiable health records enable you to download and store verifiable versions of COVID-19 vaccines and lab results
• Lab results can now be pinned for quick access and include highlights that show how your labs have changed over time

Weather

• A new design shows the most important weather information for that location and includes new maps modules
• Weather maps can be viewed in full-screen and show precipitation, temperature and air quality in supported countries
• Next-hour precipitation notifications alert you when rain or snow is about to start or stop in Ireland, U.K., and US
• New animated backgrounds more accurately represent the sun position, clouds, and precipitation (iPhone XS, iPhone XS Max, iPhone XR and later)

Siri

• On-device processing means audio of your requests does not leave your device by default, and means Siri is able to process many requests while offline (iPhone XS, iPhone XS Max, iPhone XR and later)
• Share items with Siri lets you send on screen items like photos, web pages and Maps locations to any of your contacts
• Onscreen context can be used by Siri to refer to contacts on screen to send them a message or place a call
• On-device personalization allows Siri speech recognition and understanding to improve privately (iPhone XS, iPhone XS Max, iPhone XR and later)

Privacy

• Mail Privacy Protection protects your privacy by preventing email senders from learning about your Mail activity, your IP address or whether you've opened their email
• Safari Intelligent Tracking Prevention now also prevents known trackers from profiling you using your IP address

Accessibility

• Image exploration with VoiceOver allows you to get even more details about people and objects, and learn about text and table data in photos
• VoiceOver image descriptions in Markup let you add your own image descriptions that can be read by VoiceOver
• Per-app settings allow you to customize display and text size settings only for the apps you want
• Background sounds play balanced, bright, or dark noise, ocean, rain, and stream sounds continuously in the background to mask unwanted environmental or external noise
• Sound actions for Switch Control enable you to control your iPhone with simple mouth sounds
• Audiograms can be imported in Settings so you can customize Headphone Accommodations based on your hearing test results
• New Voice Control languages include Mandarin Chinese (China mainland), Cantonese (Hong Kong), French (France), and German (Germany)
• Memoji options including a cochlear implant, oxygen tubes, or a soft helmet

For a complete list of iOS 15 features, please visit https://support.apple.com/kb/HT201222.