Apple’s latest World Wide Developers Conference (WWDC) kicked off this week and their keynote gave us some interesting insights into the latest updates and changes across all things Apple. Here’s a quick look at some of the most important takeaways that publishers should be aware of.
#1. iOS now lives in the dark
One of the most anticipated features from iOS 13 is Apple’s new ‘dark mode’. The iOS can be changed between light and dark mode via Settings, or users can choose to enable them based on the time of day or a custom schedule. Apple have already created dark mode versions of their existing apps; third party app suppliers and publishers might look to offer dark mode options in the near future.
#2. Speed
We know that speed is always a hot topic and highly valued by users of apps. In this release Apple has tackled that with claims that launch speeds of apps will be almost twice as fast! Publishers should keep an eye on how to leverage this for their apps in the future.
#3. Single purpose apps
Apple announced that we will soon see the end of iTunes, and the rise of dedicated apps more intuitive and fit for purpose. iTunes is essentially being split into three single purpose apps with Apple Music, Apple TV and Apple Podcasts each taking a slice. This reminds us of the move Facebook made back in 2014 when they split messenger from the Facebook app to provide more focus. This is an important trend for publishers as well as we see more and more newspapers also creating dedicated apps for different products.
Apple Podcasts will bring a dedicated podcast experience to the Mac (which already exists on iOS). Apple also announced that they will be using machine learning to analyse the spoken words within a podcast and make them searchable – which has the potential to be a very interesting feature.
#4. Sign in with Apple
Apple users will soon be able to ‘Sign in with Apple’, using their Apple ID as a credential instead of typing in an email address. This is very similar to the existing ‘Sign in with Facebook/Google’ options and will give users another quick and easy way to create accounts across websites and apps.
Publishers may not be too keen to give Apple access to all of the data that comes with creating a new account, although Apple have specifically stated that they will not be monetizing the data and focusing heavily on security and privacy, which could help to change some minds. Curious to see how this will evolve.
#5. iPad gets its own OS
iPads have historically run on the same OS as iPhones, but will now be getting their own tailor made ‘iPadOS’. Whilst this isn’t likely to immediately change too much for publishers, it does show that Apple are willing to make an investment in iPad users, which could see more and more news being read on the devices. Additionally, iPadOS will be bringing along some new gestures, cursor updates and improvements to selecting and copying text.
However this can bring additional complexity to publishers as another new operating system to be managed.
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