Apple Maps

Instagram has extensive tools built in for creating and editing posts and Stories, but there could always be more. Third-party apps can help you add photo and video effects for even more visually stimulating content, as well as create announcements, text-based images, and ever ...more

In this jam-packed October, the Huawei Mate 20 Pro has flown under the radar in the US. Due to Huawei's lack of presence in the States, many are unfamiliar with the second largest OEM in the world. Huawei has continuously put out amazing mobile devices, and this year they rele ...more

Performance and stability improvements, as well as new features, are just some reasons to install iOS 12, but new changes mean new battery health challenges. It can be difficult to boost battery life while taking advantage of everything this update has to offer. Luckily, there ...more

With iOS 12, your iPhone's Messages app has more features than ever to enhance iMessage and FaceTime. Included in these changes are the new camera effects, which allow users to add fun and unique customizations to their photos and videos with the in-app camera in Messages. Sti ...more

Right before the Labor Day weekend, Apple issued iOS 12 developer beta 12, which comes four days after dev beta 11 and public beta 9, and just one day after announcing the Sept. 12 event. This update primarily fixes a bug where you would be continuously prompted to install a n ...more

Apple released iOS 12 beta 9 to public beta testers on Monday, Aug. 27. The update comes at the same time as the release of dev beta 11. This is surprising, as Apple typically releases developer betas at least a few hours before the public version. Then again, everything Apple ...more

Apple released the eleventh developer beta for iOS 12 to registered software testers on Monday, Aug. 27, only four days after the company unexpectedly released both dev beta 10 and public beta 8. Apple has ramped up its beta release schedule as of late, offering minor updates ...more

Apple released the tenth iOS 12 developer beta unexpectedly Thursday afternoon, Aug. 23. The update comes only three days after the release of iOS 12 developer beta 9, a surprising move for Apple, even with the irregular releases the company has made in recent weeks. Dev beta ...more

The spirit of Google's Tango augmented reality platform lives on at Vivo, a China-based company that has developed its own 3D sensor for mobile devices. Presented during this week's Mobile World Congress in Shanghai, the smartphone maker revealed its new the time-of-flight (T ...more

There are more ways to finding your missing iPhone than using Apple's own "Find My iPhone" tool in iCloud. If you just need help tracking down your iPhone in your home or at a friend's house, Find My iPhone isn't necessarily the most convenient thing to do when you've got thes ...more

The augmented reality cloud and multi-user experiences are shaping up to be one of the hotter areas of augmented reality, and now Google is the latest entity to back these emerging branches of AR. GV (formerly known as Google Ventures), the investment arm of Google parent com ...more

Face ID is one of the big selling points of the iPhone X, and the reception has been fairly positive so far. It's pretty impressive to watch the iPhone X magically unlock just by looking at it, but it's even more impressive to see how Face ID works its magic. Apple gave us a ...more

Your iPhone has a lot of personal information contained within it, so of course you want your device to be secure. You don't want that information getting into the wrong hands — or any hands other than your own, for that matter. This guide breaks down the new privacy settings ...more

When Gboard was released on iOS in May of 2016, it gave iPhone users more control over their mobile keyboard experience. Unlike the stock Apple keyboard, Gboard lets you customize the look of your keyboard and search Google directly from the keyboard itself. Now, Google has ad ...more

There are a lot of exciting improvements in store for Siri in iOS 11. Apple showed off some of the highlights at WWDC, but there are five changes in particular that you don't want to miss. From a new voice to a cool on-device learning feature, this Siri update could have a pr ...more

Whether it's a chaotic family day meetup at the beach, barhopping with buddies, or getting stranded in the middle of nowhere with a dead car battery, being able to share your exact location with others using your smartphone makes life easier and less stressful. Apple is makin ...more

The year 2020 was a pivotal span of time during which the word "virtual" took on a brand new meaning. Instead of referring to VR or augmented reality, the term was hijacked to describe meeting across long distances through a variety of software tools, most often through video. ...more

With many office workers in the US being asked to work from home if their job allows, Magic Leap's customary updates for the Lumin OS and Lumin SDK brings some help to keep distributed workforces connected. Chief among the new features arriving with Lumin OS version 0.98.10 a ...more

3D Touch is a new feature on the iPhone 6S and 6S Plus that's reinventing the way we interact with our smartphones. With just a little bit of added pressure when tapping on the display, you can perform Quick Actions from an app's home screen icon, "Peek" at emails, stories, an ...more

People like to cite the iPhone as the device that started the smartphone craze, but the truth is, smartphones had existed for years by the time Apple got into the game. The real groundbreaking feature that this device brought to the table was a multi-touch screen to go along w ...more

For all intents and purposes, Google could have called its 2023 developer conference A/I instead of I/O. Capitalizing on the artificial intelligence hype, Google devoted most of its keynote address to AI research, experiments, and developments. But there's some substance behin ...more

Apple's Wallet app lets you store boarding passes, concert tickets, gym memberships, vaccination cards, movie stubs, rewards cards, insurance info, student IDs, and more in one place on your iPhone, and you just double-click the Home or Side button to access them. Unfortunatel ...more

The new iPhone 12, 12 mini, 12 Pro, and 12 Pro Max may seem like minor updates to the iPhone 11 lineup, but there are quite a few features that make them worth the upgrade. Apple has done a good job of highlighting all of those features, but some didn't get all of the love the ...more

The wait wasn't so long this time. Apple released public beta 3 for iOS 13 on Thursday, July 18, just one day after the release of developer beta 4. For context, Apple took five days to seed public beta 2 after releasing dev beta 3, so it's a pleasant surprise that the latest ...more

We're pumped for iOS 13 and all of the fresh features and changes that come with it. Developer beta 3 came with new features in the double digits, including AR eye contact in FaceTime and mouse cursor size customization. Developer beta 4, released today, has a few more additio ...more

The third developer beta for iOS 13 has been out since July 3, and while devs have had fun exploring all the new features, those of us on the public beta have sat on the sidelines running the public version of dev beta 2. But we don't need to wait any longer, as Apple just rel ...more

On July 3, Apple pushed out iOS 13 developer beta 3 for iPhone, and there's a lot found hidden within. A new FaceTime setting, more Arcade details, full-page scrolling screenshots everywhere, a noise cancellation option in the Control Center, and a new markup tool — and that's ...more

If you've been getting that "Please update from the iOS 12 beta" alert continuously in iOS 12 public beta 9, Apple just issued a fix for it Friday, Aug. 31, with iOS 12 public beta 10 — just in time for Labor Day weekend. This marks the second update this week as dev beta 11 a ...more

In a surprise twist, Apple released iOS 12 public beta 8 to software testers on Thursday, Aug. 23, right alongside iOS 12 dev beta 10. The release comes as a bit of a shock, as the company released iOS 12 public beta 7 just three days earlier. The official build of iOS 12 now ...more

The iPhone vs. Android debate is almost as old as smartphones themselves. While there are a number of reasons to skew towards one operating system or the other, the Samsung Galaxy S9 models have a ton of great features that help set them apart from Apple's iPhones. The coolest ...more

You may be tempted to install the iOS 16 developer beta on your iPhone to try all the exciting new features it has to offer, but it may be a good idea to wait if you only have your personal iPhone that you use every day. If you watched WWDC 2022, you know that Apple came up w ...more

If you're not planning to upgrade to a new iPhone 13, the new version of the iPhone operating system will breathe some new life into your iOS device. Last year, the migration of widgets to the home screen stole the show for iOS 14. This time around, Apple has made some big ch ...more

Apple released the second beta for iOS 15 on Thursday, June 24. The update includes FaceTime's "SharePlay" feature for the first time, a new Maps icon, updates to Focus mode, in addition to many other changes and bug fixes. SharePlay, one of iOS 15's most ambitious new featur ...more

Apple's iOS 14 is here. With it, you'll see over 200 new features and changes hit your iPhone, including home screen widgets, inline replies in Messages, and cycling routes in Maps. Here's how you can get your hands on the brand new update. Apple released iOS 14 to compatible ...more

Augmented reality and drones already go together like turkey and stuffing, but a new iOS app adds some spice to the combination with a new kind of flight path automation. Available now in Apple's App Store, the Vermeer Beta app displays a 3D map of the intended drone flight a ...more

Now that the iPhone XS is officially available for pre-order, Verizon and Apple are giving Snapchat users the opportunity to win the device through an augmented reality scavenger hunt rather than forking over $1,000 for one. Starting on Friday and ending Sept. 17, Snapchat us ...more

Badges? We don't need no stinkin' badges! That is, unless they have augmented reality content embedded in them and give us full access to Facebook's annual F8 developers conference — in that case, yes, we'll take all the badges. The event kicked off on Tuesday, and continued ...more

Augmented reality headsets with depth sensors, like the HoloLens, offer a much more immersive experience than the average smartphone at present, and one app demonstrates that in a uniquely entertaining fashion. ZOOO, currently available on the Microsoft Store for $4.99, uses ...more

Sure, Blippar was first to market with an AR navigation app for iPhones (and iPads) compatible with ARKit, but does it know how to party? Hotstepper does. Released on Tuesday on Apple's App Store, Hotstepper boasts a novel approach to navigation, employing an eponymous avatar ...more

When Google announced its ARCore augmented reality toolkit for Android as its answer to Apple's ARKit for iPhones and iPads, the question from many observers was, "What about Tango?" For at least one app Tango app developer, ScapeHop, the answer is to move to ARCore, and don' ...more

Augmented reality developer Blippar has created a new visual positioning service based on computer vision that is two times more accurate than GPS in urban locales. Positional accuracy has significant implications for location-based augmented reality experiences. With less ma ...more

The Chinese government's tight restrictions on gathering data by foreign firms for 3D mapping, the lifeblood of machine-taught driverless systems, could at least slow down access to the market by Waymo, Tesla, General Motors (GM), Ford, and other players hoping to make inroads ...more

One thing you don't see often in the driverless industry are partnerships. When automakers are in the news together, it usually means drama. However, an important partnership between Nissan and Mobileye was announced today. One that has the potential to make driverless cars on ...more

Now that iOS 7 has rolled out to the general public, with an overwhelming fit of mass hysteria, it's only custom for people to start bitching about battery drain—and I don't blame them. I was experiencing some rapid battery drain after first updating my iPhone 5, as well. Not ...more

Apple added a great new feature to its Measure app in iOS 14, but it only works on the iPhone 12 Pro and 12 Pro Max models as of right now. If you have one of those models, you can now measure a person's height with accuracy within a few centimeters, whether they're standing o ...more

Widgets have been available on the iPhone for a while now, but they were tucked away in the Today View or hidden in the quick actions menu for app icons on the home screen. Android had always had a leg up on Apple in the widget department because they were so much more versati ...more

One core theme with each new iteration of iOS is the introduction of at least one or two features that fans have been hoping to see for years. With iOS 13, that feature is swipe typing, a first for the native iOS keyboard. While some of us have been getting our glide-typing fi ...more

You can almost detect the collective breath-holding of the augmented reality industry as it waits for Apple's inevitable entry. A new Apple wearable built with augmented reality technology is likely the device that will finally make the smartphone take a backseat. Apple's for ...more

Arthur van Hoff, former CTO and co-founder of Jaunt, is taking his immersive content talents to Cupertino. As Variety reports, van Hoff began working at Apple as a senior architect this month, after ending a handful of technical advisor commitments listed on his Linkedin prof ...more

So, you're on the way back from a restaurant and realize you left your iPhone there, but you're late for a meeting and can't go back yet. You may as well kiss that iPhone goodbye, right? Not yet, as long as the right person gets their hands on it first. But that potential do-g ...more

Although Apple's Animoji game is strong, as recently exampled by its Ariana Grande collaboration, Google isn't slacking either, unleashing a far more immersive music experience for smartphone users. Released on Friday, the new Childish Gambino augmented reality Playmoji chara ...more

If there's one company that is a fan of the TrueDepth camera on Apple's iPhone X devices, it's the popular eyeglasses retailer Warby Parker. Last year, the company introduced the ability to measure customers' faces using the depth-sensing front-facing sensor on the original i ...more

Over the years, Magic Leap's long-cultivated shroud of mystery led some onlookers to buy into the company's dream before even trying the device, while for others, the secrecy seems to have stoked the kind of resentment and overcorrecting critique usually reserved for the might ...more

After the spectacular rise and fall (and rebirth) of Glass, Google is taking another run at augmented reality smartglasses. Citing documents from companies involved in the project, WinFuture reports that Quanta will serve as the contract manufacturer for the wireless headset, ...more

Ramadan, the Islamic holy month of fasting and prayer, is underway, and Google has rolled out several tools to help Muslims commemorate the event, including an augmented reality app. Last year, Google launched Qibla Finder, an augmented reality web app that points users in th ...more

The world of gaming has never been cooler thanks to Apple's ARKit. From AR arcade games to giant god battles to Pac-Man, we've seen our fair share of awesome and innovative games. Now, ARKit developer NK has created a location based gaming platform that molds aspects of the g ...more

We've all been there. Lost in the supermarket for what feels like hours trying to figure out where the hell the macaroni and cheese is and why it isn't with the rest of the pasta items. The labels at the top of the aisles aren't always helpful or accurate, and items often get ...more

Apple promised at WWDC to release the iOS 11 public beta by the end of June, and they've just followed through on their promise. Available Now: Download the iOS 11 Beta Starting today, anyone with a supported iPad, iPhone, or iPod touch can test out Apple's upcoming mobile o ...more

It looks like Apple is coming straight for Facebook with their new Business Chat functionality, built into iMessage. "Business Chat is a powerful new way for businesses to connect with customers directly from within Messages," Apple says. "Using Business Chat, your customers ...more

While the world is only recently becoming aware of its existence, augmented reality has been around in some form or another since the '90s. In the last decade, with the advancement and miniaturization of computer technology — specifically smartphones and tablets — AR has becom ...more