Top five announcements from Apple’s iPhone 16 event

Apple’s major Glowtime event was held today, revealing the iPhone 16 series alongside a slew of other great products and announcements. While the keynote was held live at Apple Park, the Glowtime event was live-streamed to audiences around the world.

If you missed the Apple keynote or are looking for a refresher on the biggest announcements made, look no further. We have all the details across some of the coolest announcements made for iPhone 16, the availability of Apple Intelligence, and a whole lot more.

iPhone 16 introduces the Camera Control

The biggest addition to iPhone 16 is the Camera Control button, built into iPhone 16, iPhone 16 Plus, iPhone 16 Pro, and iPhone 16 Pro Max. Available below the power button, Camera Control is a streamlined way to access camera function. Rather than navigate through the display and menus or Action button presets, the Camera Control lets users snap a picture by pressing the button. A press and hold initiates video recording. By lightly swiping the Camera Control, users can zoom in or out. You can also swipe to control camera features like the aperture.

Apple’s iPhone 16 Pro’s A18 Pro chip is powerful

Apple revealed more information on the iPhone 16 Pro’s A18 Pro chipset, an upgrade from the iPhone 15 Pro’s A17 Pro. Much like the base version of the new Apple silicon, A18 Pro is built to power Apple Intelligence (more on that below). To assist, the A18 Pro chipset features a 16-core Neural Engine, designed to be faster and more efficient than the A17 Pro. It offers a 17 percent increase in total system memory bandwidth, the highest featured in an iPhone. A18 Pro also features a six-core GPU and six-core CPU. Much like last year, Apple states the A18 Pro is designed with gaming in mind, supporting hardware-accelerated raytracing. However, there seems to be a bit of slowdown in AAA developer support. The gaming spotlight merely showed Tencent’s Honor of Kings: World is coming to iPhone.

Apple Watch Series 10 offers audio playback via speaker

Apple Watch Series 10 has a lot going for it. A larger wide-angle OLED display and the thinnest design yet. However, Apple Watch Series 10 is also introducing a long-awaited feature for users. The new wearable enables users to listen to music and podcasts directly through Apple Watch Series 10. Playback is now capable of being relayed through the built-in speaker system. This is great little feature for anyone who enjoys listening to a podcast while cleaning and doesn’t always want to carry their phone or doesn’t have access to a speaker.

AirPods 4 supports ANC and conversational awareness

The AirPods 4 is a major refresh for the wireless buds line. While featuring a brand new design, and a USB-C charging case, it’s the adoption of ANC that should pique the interest of users. Bringing over some of the core listening modes from AirPods Pro, the new AirPods 4 finally offers adaptive audio support and conversational awareness. Audio volume will be lowered automatically when the user begins a conversation in, for example, a coffee shop. Once the exchange is over, the audio automatically returns to its designated volume.

Apple Intelligence launches in Canada in December

Apple Intelligence is a cornerstone of its iPhone 16 reveal. The new series of iPhones have been “built from the ground up” to take advantage of its new AI-powered functionality. This is all powered by the new A18 chipset, introducing the ability to provide contextual and conversational capabilities across Apple’s core apps. This includes the power to summarize a thread in Messages or an email. Apple Intelligence can also create emojis using the Genmoji feature.  It’ll first launch in U.S. English next month, before coming to Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, and the U.K. with localized English in December. Support for Chinese, French, Japanese, and Spanish is confirmed for “next year.”

You can find all our Apple iPhone event coverage here.

Image credit: Apple