My Favorite Details & Refinements

• You can now delete all those useless stock apps!
• Raise-to-wake! Simply raise up your iPhone (6S or newer) and the screen will turn on. Another one of those features that'll shave a half-second every time you pick up your phone. Really handy for playing/pausing music while driving.
• LOVE the new keyboard sounds.
• Super quick access to the camera! Just raise-to-wake and swipe left.
• In the Camera app, the selfie toggle button is now conveniently located on the bottom-right (previously located on the top-right).
• In iMessage, you can now like and add reactions ("Tapbacks") to specific messages.
• In iMessage, invisible ink and full screen effects are so fun! Simply 3D Touch or Long Press on the Send button.
• In iMessage, links and videos are automatically loaded with thumbnail previews. (You can add invisible ink and other effects to these too!)
• In iMessage, you can drag stickers onto specific messages.
• In iMessage, you can now draw on photos and screenshots. Before sending a picture, tap the thumbnail, tap Markup, doodle as much as you want, hit Save, and send.
• In iMessage, you can enable Read Receipts for specific convos and disable them for all your side bitches.
• In iMessage, you can turn your phone to landscape and the text field will turn into a giant sketch pad.
• On an iMessage notification, you can now 3D Touch to peek into the entire conversation.
• The keyboard will suggest emojis while typing.
• If you have a Mac with macOS Sierra, iCloud Desktop actually comes in pretty handy.
• If you activate “Hey Siri” with your voice, it will respond back to you with voice. If you activate Siri by holding the Home button, Siri will respond only on screen.
• When you pause/play music, Album art will subtly change size.
• If your iPhone is almost full and you try to upgrade to iOS 10, it’ll offer to temporarily delete apps, proceed with the upgrade, and then restore the apps when it's done.
• In Apple Maps, destination suggestions will include locations previously viewed in the Yelp app.
• Apple Maps will remember where you parked!

Observations

• The new Raise-to-Wake and Push-Home-to-Open took a week to get used to. (To unlock without having to push the Home button: go to Settings > General > Accessibility > Home Button > Rest Finger to Open)
• The new iMessage apps will totally overshadow the Android-style third-party keyboards.
• The new iMessage will make you hate that one stubborn green bubble person in all your group chats.
• If you send a Tapback or full screen effect to an iOS 9 user, they will receive plain text that says something like, "(Sent with Confetti effect)" or "Mel loved your message 'Lemme touch your butt'".
• If you really dislike someone who has epilepsy, you can send them into a seizure by sending them the lasers full screen effect. (Full screen effects can be disabled under Settings > General > Accessibility > Reduce Motion)

Annoyances

• The new Lock sound is gross. You can disable it under Settings > Sounds > Lock Sound.
• Gestures for notifications & widgets get a little confusing because they look the same. Do you tap it, 3D Touch it, or swipe right on it?
• Switching between a lot of iMessage apps feels a little clunky.
• When you 3D Touch on an iMessage notification to peek into a conversation, it will mark the convo as read (i.e. send out Read Receipts).

Conclusion

The revamped iMessage is a HUGE part of iOS 10. And the best part of it is, everyone will use it, simply because it's there. No app installation needed. No registration required. It'll just work, even for your parents.

iOS 10 also hints at the future — Apple is slowly transitioning us away from the traditional idea of "apps".

Instead of constantly jumping around between apps, we will use extensions and widgets. We will slowly do more and more things from within notifications, iMessage, Siri, Apple Maps, etc.

By breaking traditional apps down into their simplest, smallest actions, not only will this make interactions quicker on the phone…

It will also make more things possible on a watch.

It's been rumored for a while that the 2017 iPhone will be an "all-glass" enclosure with AMOLED screen.

Apple just recently unveiled the new Apple Watch Edition in white ceramic:

Uniquely elegant. Brilliantly scratch-resistant. Sleek, light, and extremely durable, ceramic is more than four times as hard as stainless steel — with a pearly, lustrous finish that won’t scratch or tarnish.

The craftsmanship behind the case. The process of creating the Apple Watch Edition case begins with a high-strength zirconia powder that’s combined with alumina to achieve its rich, white color. Each case is then compression molded, sintered, and polished using a diamond slurry, which results in a remarkably smooth surface and an exquisite shine. With this precise level of workmanship, every Apple Watch Edition case takes days to make.

Active Quora user, Brian Roemmele, theorizes Apple has pushed Aluminum to its limits and is now looking to master Zirconian Ceramics at scale:

Why is Apple moving to Zirconia Ceramics?

1. Strength
2. Radio Transparency
3. Heat Dissipation
4. Scratch resistance
5. Ease of manufacturing

With that said, here is his theory:

In September 2017, Apple will be releasing the 10th Anniversary iPhone 8. It is my view Apple will use this moment to present a completely new iPhone design that will be revolutionary in many ways. I assert the design language will be based on a more organic shape and design. There will be ergonomic curves that will mold into the new AMOLED display being driven by video chips that simply could not have thermally operated in such a small space [without] heat efficiency of Zirconia ceramics. The iPhone 8 will not just be water resistant but water proof and dust proof to a level never seen before on a smartphone. The lightning port will look more like the Mag-Safe system used on the MacBook Pro devices and mostly use inductive charging. Of course there will be no 3.5mm audio jack.

While critics will be too busy shouting, "Android's had AMOLED and wireless charging for years!" Apple will be putting their industry-leading customized chips into devices that are stronger, lighter, and more durable than everyone else's glass and aluminum-based devices.

John Paczkowski:

A tentpole feature of the new iPhones are improved camera systems that are larger than the cameras in the devices that preceded them. The iPhone 7 now has the optical image stabilization feature previously reserved for its larger Plus siblings. And the iPhone 7 Plus has two complete camera systems side by side — one with a fixed wide-angle lens, the other with a 2x zoom telephoto lens. At the top of both devices is something called the “driver ledge” — a small printed circuit board that drives the iPhone’s display and its backlight. Historically, Apple placed it there to accommodate improvements in battery capacity, where it was out of the way. But according to Riccio, the driver ledge interfered with the iPhone 7 line’s new larger camera systems, so Apple moved the ledge lower in both devices. But there, it interfered with other components, particularly the audio jack.

So the company’s engineers tried removing the jack.

In doing so, they discovered a few things. First, it was easier to install the “Taptic Engine” that drives the iPhone 7’s new pressure-sensitive home button, which, like the trackpads on Apple’s latest MacBook, uses vibrating haptic sensations to simulate the feeling of a click — without actually clicking. [...]

Second, there was an unforeseen opportunity to increase battery life. So the battery in the iPhone 7 is 14% bigger than the one in its predecessor, and in the iPhone 7 Plus, it’s 5% bigger. In terms of real-world performance gains, that’s about an additional two hours and one hour, respectively. Not bad.

Even better, removing the audio jack also eliminated a key point of ingress that Riccio says helped the new iPhone finally meet the IP7 water resistance spec Apple has been after for years (resistant when immersed under 1 meter of water for 30 minutes).

Chuq Von Rospach breaks down the logic behind Apple reportedly removing the headphone jack from the next iPhone:

First, how many users use the port? Think about how usage breaks down:

• Users using the supplied earbuds
• Users using bluetooth headsets or speakers
• Users using the built-in speaker
• Users using headphones or speakers via the headphone jack

What’s the mix of these? I couldn’t find concrete data, but we can make some intelligent guesses. You see Apple’s earbuds everywhere: a large percentage of users seem to be quite happy with them (I don’t know why, I find them incredibly uncomfortable, but they’re free). This implies that if/when Apple releases the new iPhone they’ll likely release it with earbuds that work without the headphone jack, and that will solve the problem for these people. What percentage of users is this? 30%? 40%?

People who listen via the built-in speakers don’t care.

People who listen via some bluetooth device also don’t care. How many of these are there? Marco Arment on one of his podcasts made a comment that his analytics show that as many as half of the listens going through Overcast are to bluetooth devices (or perhaps bluetooth/speaker; I couldn’t find it to verify).

So I expect a major point from Apple will be that for most of us, the speaker jack is already unnecessary. What percentage is that? My guess is it’s around 70%, but it’s pretty clear that well over half of the audio emitted by an iPhone is already handled without using the jack, or will be with the new Earbuds in the box with the iPhone 7.

There's been a lot of speculation on why Apple wants to remove the headphone jack, including conspiracy theories that they want to take a short-term PR hit now so next year's all-new iPhone will be all glowing reviews.

I don't buy that.

I think it's simple and exactly what Chuq breaks down. Next week, I expect Apple will give us stats that'll show us the headphone jack has been dying a slow death anyway.

One of Galaxy Note 7's hallmark features this year is the iris scanner. I've personally had a hard time envisioning iris scanners as a better solution than fingerprint scanners, especially when companies (including Apple) are racing to build fingerprint scanning right into the touch screen.

This review by Steve Kovach — which is only one of many that came out today — validates my concern:

The iris scanner doesn’t work well in bright sunlight (it failed on me at the beach last weekend), and it’s not as convenient as clicking the home button and resting your fingerprint on the sensor to unlock the device. With the iris scanner, you have to power on the phone, swipe to unlock, and awkwardly hold the phone close to your face while staring into an interface that looks like something out of a sci-fi movie. Not exactly seamless.

Kovach's review overall gives a lot of credit to the Galaxy Note 7's beautifully-crafted hardware. But he also shines a light on Samsung Galaxy's biggest weakness:

If there’s one big weakness to the Note 7, it’s the software powering it. Samsung likes to make big modifications to Android, which often gums up the experience. That said, the interface is definitely a lot cleaner in the Note 7 than it’s been in previous Samsung phones. Still, Samsung has a horrible record of keeping its phones updated with the latest software, and there’s no guarantee you’ll be getting the new Note features a year from now.

On top of that, the Note 7 also comes bogged down with extras from carriers here in the US. I tested the T-Mobile version, and had to spend the first few minutes clearing away all the T-Mobile branded junk from my home screen. Plus, Samsung has its own suite of apps for email, calendar, etc. on top of all the Google versions of those apps. I’m not a fan of making users juggle two different apps for all the same tasks.

The redundant app solutions on Samsung devices definitely hinder the user experience. The other day I paid for my groceries with Apple Pay and the cashier told me she's been wanting to do that with her Samsung for the longest time.

She's just never been able to figure it out because when she holds up her phone to the credit card terminal, "some Android app pops up instead of Samsung Pay."

The software isn’t a deal breaker, but compared to the consistency and of iOS and its rock-solid ecosystem of apps and updates, it’s enough to still give the iPhone a very slight edge over the Note 7.

"The software isn't a deal breaker" to people who value hardware over software. But to people who value software and ecosystem more, this is a deal breaker.

Overall, the Note 7's biggest weakness is its software. It's not great, but it's good enough. Aside from that, when it comes to hardware and design, Samsung has cemented its position as the leader in the smartphone world. The Note 7 is the best phone the company has ever made, and one of the first you should consider buying.

Hardware-wise, the Galaxy Note 7 is the best & most exciting device Android has to offer. The S Pen is a key differentiator that provides a lot of value to certain types of consumers.

Software-wise, it still falls short of the streamlined iOS user experience and the iPhone ecosystem. And Samsung's S Pen advantage can be dampened with Apple Pencil support on future iPhones.

So, depending on which camp you are in — specs-oriented vs. experience-oriented — one product line will be an obvious winner over the other.

Anecdotally, everyone I know who switched from Samsung to iPhone switched mainly because of one reason — they got tired of Samsung's software.

Craig Federighi:

Yeah. Messages is the most-used app on iOS, period. So, it's used a lot. And certainly, we saw that every time we'd add a couple new emoji, it would be the biggest thing. We work all year on, like, a new file system or something…

And it turns out the rest of the world outside this room was more excited about the two new emoji! So, we figured, y'know, if there's one place we can make a tremendous difference in how people experience iOS fundamentally, they're spending a lot of time in Messages.

And so, we put a ton of creative energy into it, and ultimately, through opening up to developers, I think the collective energy that will go into making Messages great is going to be phenomenal.

I've seen stubborn slow adopters resist software and hardware upgrades until Apple released new emojis and new iPhone colors. And iMessage is one of those features that everybody loves.

This is a no-brainer to me so I'm calling it now — iOS 10 will see the fastest iOS upgrade adoption ever.

Jason Snell:

You may not remember this, but before the Apple Watch came out, there were many rumors that it wasn’t able to get through a day without a charge. It’s clear that Apple made battery life a top priority, perhaps even the top priority: This thing better last all day. And so everyone was incredibly conservative with power and memory.

The result: They overshot. Most of the people I know now report that they end their day with their Apple Watches reporting 40 or 50 percent of remaining battery life. Fegerighi admitted that there was a lot of extra memory and battery life available to them when building watchOS 3, because they overshot so much. And that’s why watchOS seems almost impossibly better than watchOS 2, given that it’s running on the same hardware.

Classic approach by Apple — starting too restricted but loosen up over time instead of starting too open and tightening up over time.

Huge props to Apple for showing their ability to correct course.

John Gruber:

This dramatically changes the economics of the App Store. Until now, productivity apps could charge up front as paid downloads and that was it. Updates had to be free, or, to charge for major new versions, developers would have to play confusing games by making the new version an entirely new app. Twitter clients like Tweetbot and Twitterrific, for example, did this, to justify years of ongoing development. Now, apps like this can instead charge an annual/monthly/etc. subscription fee.

This could be the change that makes the market for professional-caliber iPad apps possible. On the Mac, there has long been a tradition of paying a large amount of money for a pro app, then paying a smaller amount of money for major updates. The App Store has never allowed for that sort of upgrade pricing — but upgrade pricing is what enabled ongoing continuous development of pro software. Paying for each major new version, however, is arguably a relic of the age when software came in physical boxes. Subscription-based pricing — “software as a service (SaaS)” — the modern equivalent. That’s the route both Microsoft and Adobe have taken.

I don't see this affecting most mainstream consumers very much; most people really only use five apps, and those apps are usually the free, popular and cross-platform ones.

But what I am excited about is how this helps power users and productivity apps. Currently, most people would never take a chance on a $20 app. But with the new subscription-based pricing and free trials, that barrier is greatly lowered. Less commitment for consumers and more sustainability for developers.

I'm optimistic about real desktop-class apps coming to iPads and iPhone.

John Kirk:

One of the barbs most frequently hurled at Apple by its critics is that no new Apple product — whether it be Apple Music or Apple Watch or the iPad Pro, etc. — is, or has any chance of being, as big as the iPhone.

No [shit] Sherlock.

Of COURSE no new product is going to be as big as the iPhone — because there is NOTHING BIGGER THAN THE IPHONE. And that’s the point.

The iPhone dominates the most dominant tech sector of our time.

You can’t have it both ways. You can’t criticize Apple for not surpassing the profits of the iPhone without acknowledging the profits of the iPhone or the fact that no one has been able to surpass the success of the iPhone.

Saying that Apple’s success is “limited” to the iPhone is like saying:

• Henry Ford’s success was “limited” to cars
• John D. Rockefeller ‘s success was “limited” to oil
• Andrew Carnegie’s success was “limited” to steel
• Cornelius Vanderbilt’s success was “limited” to railroads

Being limited to a product with limitless potential, ain’t such a bad thing and if you have to be dependent upon something, it’s best to be dependent upon the most dependably profitable product of your time. [Emphasis mine]

Tomorrow's workforce is today's kids who grew up on smartphones and tablets as their primary computers.

When these kids grow up, a "real computer" to them will not be a traditional laptop with disc drives, removable batteries, or user-upgradeable RAM/storage. Tomorrow's "real computer" will be more like today's Microsoft Surface, iPad Pro, or controversial MacBook.

Today's smartphones still have headphone jacks. The next iPhone reportedly will not.

Some will look at it as a step backwards. Apple sees it as a step forward.