IOS 10
iOS 10 is the tenth major release of the iOS mobile operating system developed by Apple Inc., being the successor to iOS 9. It was announced at the company's Worldwide Developers Conference on June 13, 2016, and was released on September 13, 2016. It was succeeded by iOS 11 on September 19, 2017.
iOS 10 incorporates changes to 3D Touch and the lock screen. There are new features to some apps: Messages has additional emojis and third-party apps can extend functionality in iMessage, Maps has a redesigned interface and additional third-party functions, the Home app manages "HomeKit"-enabled accessories, Photos has algorithmic search and categorization of media known as "Memories", and Siri is compatible with third-party app-specific requests, such as starting workouts apps, sending IMs, using Lyft or Uber or to use payment functions. In iOS 10.3, Apple introduced its new file system, APFS.
Reviews of iOS 10 were positive. Reviewers highlighted the significant updates to iMessage, Siri, Photos, 3D Touch, and the lock screen as welcome changes. The third-party extension support to iMessage meant it was "becoming a platform," although the user interface was criticized for being difficult to understand. Third-party integration in Siri was "great," although the voice assistant was criticized for not having become smarter than before. Reviewers were impressed with the image recognition technology in Photos, although noting it was still a "work in progress" with a higher error rate than the competition. 3D Touch "finally feels useful" and "works in almost every part of the OS." The lock screen was "far more customizable than before," and reviewers enjoyed that notification bubbles could be expanded to see more information without needing to unlock the phone.
A month after release, iOS 10 was installed on 54% of iOS devices, a "slightly slower migration" than for the release of iOS 9, speculated as being caused by an early release issue that may have "put some users off downloading the update." User adoption of iOS 10 steadily increased in the following months, eventually totaling 89% of active devices in September 2017.
iOS 10 is the final version of iOS that supports 32-bit devices, including the iPhone 5, iPhone 5c, and the fourth-generation iPad, as its successor, iOS 11, drops support for those models. iOS 10 is also the final iOS version to support 32-bit applications.
Overview
iOS 10 was introduced at the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference keynote address on June 13, 2016. The first beta release was made available to registered developers following the keynote. Apple released the first public beta release on July 7, 2016.iOS 10 was officially released on September 13, 2016. The initial release was problematic, with reports of people having their devices in recovery mode after updating.
System features
The Control Center was redesigned and split into three pages: one for general settings, such as quick toggles for airplane mode and orientation lock, one for audio controls and one for controlling HomeKit appliances, if used. 3D Touch capabilities were added to several toggles. Apps showed a widget when their home-screen icon was accessed with 3D Touch. 3D Touch also allows users to prioritize certain app downloads.Most default apps included with iOS devices can now be hidden from the home screen and 're-downloaded' from the App Store. Upon doing this, the sandbox of the respective app would be removed, which contains user data, settings and caches. The app was also hidden from other places, such as the "Today" view, the Settings app and "Share Sheets", through which the user could interact with the app from within another app. This feature was first hinted at during an interview in September 2015, in which Apple CEO Tim Cook stated that Apple was "looking at" allowing customers to remove unused stock apps.
The update added QuickType virtual keyboards, which, by word-completion capabilities, could predict likely responses to questions and suggest relevant information based on location, calendar availability or contacts. The "Define" feature in previous iOS versions was replaced by "Look Up," and was expanded in utility from just providing definitions to retrieving information from locations, web browsing history, downloaded apps, suggested websites, and more. The QuickType keyboard allowed the user to type in multiple languages, while the ability to change keyboard settings specifically for physical keyboards was also added.
The "slide to unlock" mechanism on the lock screen was removed in favor of pressing the home button. Similar to the feature on the Apple Watch, the "Raise to Wake" function, which requires a device with an M9 motion coprocessor or newer, wakes up the device when the user lifts it. The "Today" view of Notification Center was replaced by widgets, accessed by swiping from left to right. On the iPad, widgets could be displayed in a two-column layout.
The Notification Center's "Today" view was removed. Notifications, now larger, could expand to display more information; all unread notifications could be cleared at once using 3D Touch. Apps that need to be updated frequently were able to have notifications that update live. A Spotlight search bar was added to the notification center.
A new Magnifier setting was added which allowed users to triple-click the home button to launch the Camera app with magnification enabled. There were also new "Color Filters" settings to compensate for a user's color blindness. Color Filters options included grayscale, red/green filter for protanopia, green/red filter for deuteranopia, and blue/yellow filter for tritanopia.
Users could turn on Low Quality Image mode in the "messages" application, which saves "your poor iPhone from stuffing itself full of images" based on new animated stickers and GIFs that can be sent in iMessage. The Wi-Fi menu in Settings showed warnings about the security of a network and whether a network lacked Internet connectivity. This was shown to the user as small subtext under the Wi-Fi's network's name.
In iOS 10.2, a "Preserve Settings" feature allowed users to set the Camera app to launch with certain settings by default. Options included launching with the Video or Square mode rather than the Photo mode, preserving the last-used filter, and preserving the capture settings for Live Photos. Music added to Apple Music on one device could now be automatically downloaded to other devices using the "Automatic Downloads" setting. The Settings allowed the user the option to have routes in the Maps app avoid toll roads and/or highways. In iOS 10.3, Settings was updated to feature information relating to a user's Apple ID account in the main menu, and featured a section that allows users to see which old, unmaintained apps won't work in future versions of iOS. Additionally, users could now see a breakdown of their iCloud storage. The user could enable a setting to have Siri announce incoming callers, with options for "Always," "Headphones & Car," "Headphones Only," and "Never".
iOS 10 allowed users to rearrange and remove apps from their CarPlay display, through Settings. In iOS 10.3, Maps on CarPlay added electric vehicle charging stations.
As part of the overall Continuity features introduced in iOS 8, a new Universal Clipboard feature allowed users of Mac personal computers running macOS Sierra and iOS devices running iOS 10 to easily copy material to and from different devices through iCloud. As part of Continuity, a new "Continuity Keyboard" feature allowed users to type text on an iPhone and have the text appear on an Apple TV running tvOS 10, avoiding the Siri Remote for text input.
iOS 10 featured new sound effects for locking the device and for keyboard clicks. In the event that a device detects liquid in the Lightning port, a notice warned the user to disconnect the Lightning cable and allow the port to dry. iOS 10 also allowed TTY calls to be made without any additional hardware. It allows users to find their Apple Watch using Find My iPhone. Spotlight could search the contents of the user's iCloud Drive.
App features
iOS 10 allowed developers to buy advertisement spots in the App Store when users search for content. It also brought back the "Categories" section, which replaced the "Explore" section introduced in iOS 8. In iOS 10.3, developers gained the ability to respond to user reviews, and "Helpful" and "Not Helpful" review labels appeared.Users could now change what day of the week the calendar starts on, as well as alert settings for birthdays and events, and calendar type. Live Photos could be taken with filters. In iOS 10.1, the iPhone 7 Plus received a new depth of field portrait camera mode, using both the wide-angle and telephoto lenses on the phone to "create shallow depth of field portrait photos with blurred backgrounds".
The Clock app began to employ a dark theme. A new "Bedtime" feature reminded the user when to go to bed to get the desired amount of sleep. There was also a new stopwatch face, accessed by swiping to the left. The Contacts app in iOS 10 allows users to set default phone numbers and email addresses for contacts who have multiple numbers or addresses. The app also allows the user to add and remove contacts from the Favorite Contacts list.
Home was a new app that allows users to manage appliances compatible with HomeKit, Apple's API for home automation. In the app, users could add compatible HomeKit accessories, such as locks, lights, and thermostats, and then directly control the appliances through the app. A "Scenes" panel allowed many devices to be controlled at once to fit a mood or setting. Geo-fencing activated scheduled sequences following the user's location.
The Mail app allowed users to unsubscribe from mailing lists with an Unsubscribe button. Users could dismiss the message to unsubscribe for a particular mailing list by tapping the "X" at the top right corner, preventing the Mail app from displaying the unsubscribe button for that mailing list again later. Apple added back support for HTML5 video in Mail, which was previously stopped in iOS 8. Mail could filter messages, either by unread/read, or by categories. iOS 10 also changed how email threading works, by placing the oldest email at the top by default. An option in Settings let users revert to the previous threading system with the most recent message on top. Additionally, the new threaded conversations allowed users to tap a message to see a scrollable stream of messages inside the thread.
Apple Maps was redesigned and updated with additional features, including scanning calendar events for locations, learning from a user's typical actions, and a redesigned driving view. A marker could be automatically placed to indicate the user's parked car. The marker could also tell the user when they last parked their car, and a Notes field allowed the user to enter information, such as parking garage number, in the app.
The app began to help users find the nearest gas station, fast-food restaurant or coffee shop, by swiping up from the bottom of the screen. Maps also estimated how long the detour will take. Users can add third-party extensions to the Maps app, which enable additional functionality, such as a restaurant-booking extension can help the user reserve a table from inside the Maps app. Users can now pan and zoom while in navigation mode.
The app displays the current temperature and weather conditions in the bottom right corner. In iOS 10.3, the app also allows the user to see a weather forecast by using 3D Touch on the current temperature. This functionality allows users to see an hour-by-hour breakdown of the area that they are looking at.