Apple’s annual WWDC is one of the most anticipated events in the global tech calendar. It’s the tech giant’s opportunity to connect with the faithful, update their product range and – if we’re lucky – drop another impossibly sleek and gorgeous piece of high-priced technology on the market.

However, this year’s event was remarkable low-key, with no devices on offer, but instead multiple small incremental software improvements to the Apple product range. The fan boys remained rapturous, but did the event include anything YOU need to know?

Yes. Here’s DIGIT’s round-up of the key updates.

iOS 12 – Use Your Phone Less

While this year’s WWDC didn’t drop a new iPhone or – despite the DIGIT team’s most fervent prayers – a new MacBook with actual ports and power connectors, Apple’s focus on simplicity, ease-of-use and complete device integration continues to impress. The era of jaw-dropping disruption in mobile is on hiatus (we won’t say over), so incremental changes making user’s lives easier is a good move. As more people are holding onto their phones for longer, helping them to be happy on their existing device makes a lot of sense.

Apple announced the latest version of its mobile operating system – iOS 12 – highlighting a number of features which will allow users to access their phone less often. This might seem counter intuitive, but in January 2018 Apple faced calls from two of its major shareholders to help curb the problem of screen addiction and work on ways to help people use their mobile more responsibly.

In addition to numerous optimisation updates and speed improvements, iOS 12 will now offer a new suite of options to monitor and help users understand how they use their phone and limit interruptions throughout the day. A new Screen Time feature will track and record how much time you’re spending on your device and using individual apps. It can provide breakdowns of app usage by category (games, social media, etc.) and track which apps are sending you the most notifications. Screen Time will also provide a (presumably terrifying) weekly summary of your usage habits.

Hey Siri!

Facetime EVERYONE

Tongue Detection

Mac OSX

Apple Watch – OS5

First the bad news. The first generation of Apple Watches are now officially obsolete. They will not be compatible with the new OS5.

There were a few notable updates for owners of more current watches however. OS5 will make the fitness features more social. Owners will be able to challenge friends to fitness competitions, get digital awards, and record workouts retroactively (in case you forget to press start, or if workout tracking doesn’t start automatically).

Apple’s adding WebKit for watchOS, which means users can browse optimised websites on their Watch. Podcast support will also come to OS5, as well as interactive notifications such as Siri Suggestions and Shortcuts noted above.

There’s a new Walkie-Talkie feature coming as an Apple Watch app. Permitted contacts can send you a message, directly. However unlike the full Dick Tracy wrist radio, you have to tap the watch to play the recording (which can be sent over cellular or Wi-Fi connection) instead of true push-to-talk (PTT) functionality.

Augmented Reality 2.0

Apple rolled out greater support for augmented reality apps, unveiling it’s own new proprietary format (USDZ) for digital objects that appear to live in the real world.

These digital objects will work in Apple’s Safari browser, Messages and Mail apps, meaning AR isn’t limited to stand-alone apps that people choose to download separately. The format will also get support in Adobe’s Creative Cloud suite of apps for professional photographers, videographers and designers.

The company has updated its Augmented reality development kit, introducing ARKit 2, which, according to Apple is: “a platform that allows developers to integrate shared experiences, persistent AR experiences tied to a specific location, object detection and image tracking to make AR apps even more dynamic.”

The company’s hope is to take AR from current stand-alone applications and integrate it into everything it possibly can, putting AR in front of a far larger global audience.

Apple also unveiled an app called “Measure” that measures real-world objects, simply by pointing the camera at them. Apple is also offering tools to give multiple users a different view of the same digital objects viewed from different angles.

Privacy 2.0

One significant part of the event was Apple’s new focus on privacy and security, focusing its ire on Facebook. As part of the update to it’s Safari browser, Apple stated that it will ask a user’s permission before allowing the social network to monitor their activity.

Apple also said that MacOS Mojave would combat a technique called “fingerprinting”, in which advertisers try to track users who delete their cookies. The method involves identifying computers by the fonts and plug-ins installed among other configuration details. To counter this, Apple will present web pages with less details about the computer.

Good Job Tim

The overall response to the 2018 WWDC has been mostly positive. Many Apple users welcomed the greater focus on usability and efficiency, while the company’s stance on screen time and privacy have gained approval from across the media.

If Apple follows its normal scheduled of software releases, we can expect iOS12 to roll out to users worldwide around September.