According to research firm Gartner, smartphones running Android consumed 74% of worldwide smartphone shipments in the first quarter, while Apple’s iOS only made up 18%.
On June 10, Apple is expected to announce its iOS 18 operating system during the company’s WWDC 2024 event. One of the largest updates in the company’s history, the iOS 18 update is expected to bring with it a number of new features based on generative AI, as well as a planned transformation for Siri, the voice assistant, and major improvements to the Messages, Apple Music, iWork, and Settings apps.
iOS 18 features to expect:
According to recent sources, Apple may have partnered with OpenAI, the company that makes ChatGPT, to include generative artificial intelligence (AI) features in iOS 18. It’s important that rather than depending on the cloud, the majority of these AI functions actually operate on-device. Meanwhile, Apple appears ready to work with Google to build Gemini into iOS 18 in an effort to lessen its dependency on OpenAI.
‘On-device’ AI has several clear benefits, such as improved privacy, off-line operation or in locations with limited internet access, and faster response times. On-device large language models (LLMs) are, however, frequently less intelligent or powerful since they are not supported by massive servers with billions of parameters, which are the brains behind the majority of commercial chatbots like ChatGPT or Gemini.
Among other apps, Apple is probably going to release an AI-powered upgrade for Siri, Messages, Notes, Safari, and Spotlight. The launch of AI-driven photo editing features, which are expected to give consumers legendary freedom and creativity to improve their visual content, may be a major feature of the upcoming iOS 18 upgrade.
Expected release date of iOS 18:
Typically, the CEO of Apple announces the newest version of iOS during the WWDC headline speech, with the first developer beta following hours later. According to a 9 to 5 Mac story, the first public beta of iOS 18 is scheduled for release one month following the keynote, which puts the release date somewhere in the middle of July.
Also, a few days after the publication of its most recent iPhone series reveal in September, Apple typically rolls out a stable version of the upgrade to all of its current smartphones.