iOS 18 is shaping up to be a Very Big Deal

The last few releases of iOS, iPadOS, macOS, et al. have been fine, with welcome new features and interface improvements, but they weren’t exactly groundbreaking. In 2024, if the latest edition of the Power On newsletter from Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman is to be believed, that could all change.

The newsletter reinforces Gurman’s earlier reporting, both about the extent to which Apple is attempting to incorporate generative AI (and other AI advancements) in its products and the recent one-week delay to fix bugs after the first development milestone.

Gurman says the iPhone 16 hardware “won’t have any major advances next year,” which the early rumors have already suggested. You can expect Pro models to be a bit faster, cameras to be improved a little, and the Action button to come to all models, but there doesn’t seem to be a singular new “wow” feature as part of the hardware. As such, Apple is expecting to rely on iOS 18’s advancements to sell iPhones.

It’s worth wondering, then, which iPhones will get the best new features of iOS 18. Will Apple restrict some of them to the latest hardware in order to push upgrades? Or is the company more worried about giving those with 3+ year-old iPhones a reason to upgrade, allowing the new features to run on any iPhone with the RAM, Neural Engine, and processor performance to handle them?

Gurman reports that Apple senior execs have described the next-gen operating systems for 2024 as “ambitious and compelling,” with major new features and designs in addition to security and performance improvements. There have been plenty of improvements to Apple’s operating systems in the last few years, but they may be best described as “impactful” rather than “major.” Allowing users to customize their lock screens, for example, is a nice but not groundbreaking feature.

The interface design could use some significant changes as well, as it is starting to age beyond to the point where it is not just familiar, but stale. The dramatically different interface of the Action Button menu may be a hint that Apple intends to liven up the iOS interface in a big way.

The new features could also help increase lagging Mac sales assuming most are well-incorporated into macOS, too. Modern Macs with Apple Silicon all have powerful Neural Engines and are capable of impressive AI performance when well-optimized, and exciting new AI-driven features would give those hanging on to their Intel-based Macs a compelling reason to upgrade.