After releasing the first beta of iOS 10 at the WWDC, Apple released the iOS 10 developer beta 2 yesterday. As the name suggests, this beta is for developers only. The public beta is at least a month away, so if you’re not a developer, you’ll have to wait a bit longer.
However, there are a lot of developers out there who have already downloaded the beta and have started sharing their insights about the new changes. Here’s a list of all the exciting stuff from iOS 10 Developer Beta 2:
- HomeKit iconography gets some tweaks in the Control Centre. Same goes for Apple TV and speakers in AirPlay settings
- In Apple Music, ‘Downloaded Music’ has been replaced with ‘Downloads’. Also, that section is no longer removable.
- Maps has added the option ‘Show Parked Location’.
- You can now choose to send “Low Quality Images” in Messages. The toggle is in the Settings.
- The 3D Touch options in the Control Center now have tweaked languages and icons.
- If you use the Health App, you can register as an Organ Doner. (Not available in India)
- Music app now allows you to directly shuffle your playlist. Earlier, you had to play a song and then click ‘Shuffle’.
- There’s a new ‘Rest Finger to Unlock’ option added in the Accessibility Settings. Not really sure what it does, though.
- You can now enjoy App Store in Split View. This is only available on iPads that support Split View, obviously!
- We now have an iMessage App Store! It’s a store for third-party applications for iMessages.
- Redesigned folder animations are available for the home screen.
- Smart folder notifications — As explained by 9to5Mac: “3D Touching folders with badges now shows badges per apps, previously said ‘Unread’ per app”.
- New animations pop up when you invoke Siri.
- You can now remove Apple News. We’re still stuck with Photo Booth, though.
- The Keyboard’s click sounds have been switched back to the classic sounds.
- The Apple Watch app gets a new ‘Featured Complications’ section.
- Any connected Bluetooth/Airplay speakers will now show up in the ‘Now Playing’ section in Music.
- You can control (and regulate) the Apps refresh in the background of the Apple Watch
Here are a few screenshots of iOS 10 developer beta 2. (All images courtesy of 9to5Mac).
There are a lot of other minor changes included in the new beta. Remember that the main purpose of the beta is to find and fix errors in the code. Any new features added are always a bonus. However, we cannot be sure that they’ll all make the final version.
TL;DR?
Watch this quickfire video walkthrough of all the major changes in this beta:
Bonus
Along with the iOS beta, Apple also released the betas of all their other software. Here’s a quick summary of what’s new in those:
macOS Sierra
Auto Unlock via Apple Watch, which was missing in the first beta, is now available. For the feature to function, your Mac must be no older than 2013. Also, the iCloud account running in the Mac must have the Two-Factor Authentication enabled. Obviously, you also need to have a Watch running watchOS 3.
watchOS and tvOS
The new betas for Apple Watch and Apple TV do not add any new features. Instead, they are more of patches with bug fixes. Developers using the betas have said that the update for watchOS has made the Watch much faster, while Apple TV’s Siri, which had a lot of trouble in the first beta, has now been patched up.
There you go – all you needed to know about the developer betas Apple released over the last couple of days. You can get your hands on any one of them if you are registered as a developer with Apple. However, we strongly advise against installing these betas. These versions are usually full of bugs which have the potential to make your device go all bananas. So we urge you to wait for the public beta, or, better still, the actual release that’s due in September!
Take care!!