Productivity & Shortcuts

Turn your Mac into a powerful transcription machine using the same AI that powers OpenAI's ChatGPT. With just a few Terminal commands, you can convert audio and video files into accurate text in minutes.

If you're in the US, your iPhone lets you set default apps for emailing, messaging, calling, web browsing, and even contactless payments and access. With iOS 18.4 and iPadOS 18.4, Apple also lets you pick a new default translation app.

Apple expanded its Food topic in Apple News into a full-blown section with recipes, restaurant reviews, kitchen tips, and more with the iOS 18.4 and iPadOS 18.4 software updates. The new Food section is exclusive to Apple News+ subscribers, but nonsubscribers can still view select stories and recipes.

Safari on iOS just got a little nosier — and it could unintentionally expose more than you'd like. With Apple's latest update, your recent searches appear front and center whenever you open a new tab or tap into the address bar.

Safari on iOS is more powerful than it looks, especially when you know the hidden gestures that can make your browsing faster and more productive. These shortcuts quietly transform how you navigate the web, manage tabs, and share content across devices. Once you know them all, you'll wonder how you ever lived without them.

Safari has a hidden feature for your iPhone that will change how you share, receive, and interact with links — and barely anyone knows about it. The feature works on the latest iOS software, as well as the latest iPadOS and macOS versions. Still, you won't find any information about it in Safari's app or settings, so it's pretty hidden if you haven't seen it by accident yet.

Chromebooks offer multiple ways to share files with other devices, whether you're transferring to another Chromebook, an Android phone, or even a Windows PC. Each method has its own advantages, depending on whether you want something quick and built-in or a more feature-rich third-party option.

Your days as an ordinary Muggle are over — as long as you have an iPhone. With just a word or two, you can use your iPhone and newfound Muggle-born powers to cast spells or utilize charms just like Harry Potter and team. Only your "wand" is from Apple, not Ollivanders in Diagon Alley.

Although your iPhone does not offer an option to upgrade internal storage space using a memory card, as some Android phones do, there are plenty of things you can do to clear up storage so you can put everything you want on your device and stop getting those Storage Almost Full alerts.

Apple Intelligence has followed a predictable path so far, bringing plenty of AI features designed for everyday users. But even with new AI updates in every iOS release since iOS 18.1, iPadOS 18.1, and macOS Sequoia 15.1, there's still plenty of room for growth — especially in generative AI (gen AI). And Apple seems to be leaning into that, as shown by its recent updates enabling Apple Intelligence by default and expanding language support.

Staying connected with the people who matter most is easier when you can instantly distinguish their calls or messages — even without looking at your iPhone. That's where custom vibration patterns for alerts come in handy. They're perfect when you need a tactile way to identify who's calling or texting while your iPhone is on silent or in your pocket.

One of the coolest aesthetic features of iMessage is its animated message effects. If you're like many users, you might even have discovered them by accident, where wishing your friend a "Happy Birthday!" or congratulating them on a promotion unexpectedly flooded your screen with balloons or confetti.

Apple Maps keeps getting better and better for all the hikers in the world. With iOS 18, iPadOS 18, or macOS Sequoia 15, you can access thousands of detailed trail maps within U.S. national parks and topographic views, but you can also create your own walking and hiking routes.

Night Shift, Dark Mode, Reduce White Point, and Zoom's Low Light Filter all help reduce the harmful effects on your body's clock that bright iPhone and iPad screens have at night. But there's another option on iOS and iPadOS that turns your entire display red, and it's useful for so much more than just late-night browsing in bed.

Voice Control has long been a cornerstone of hands-free convenience on iPhones, but for users with unique speech patterns or atypical speech, standard recognition systems often fall short. Apple's solution? Vocal Shortcuts. While this innovation is a game-changer for those with speech differences, it's also a versatile tool for anyone looking to streamline tasks.

If scrolling through your phone during a car ride makes you feel queasy, you're not alone. Motion sickness often occurs when your inner ear senses movement but your eyes focus on something stationary — like your iPhone's screen. Apple's Vehicle Motion Cues feature aims to alleviate this discomfort with subtle, dynamic on-screen visuals that sync with your vehicle's movements.

Growing up, I was told that hard work could get me anything I wanted. But with Apple's Image Playground, I can create almost any illustration or drawing imaginable just by typing or selecting a suggestion. This groundbreaking feature in Apple Intelligence lets you generate images from simple prompts, opening up exciting possibilities for creativity.

Siri has long relied on basic sources like Google and Wikipedia for answers, but with iOS 18.2 and iPadOS 18.2, Apple is taking its virtual assistant to a new level by integrating ChatGPT. Now, you can use Siri to generate text and images with ChatGPT — and that's not all. ChatGPT is deeply integrated into Apple Intelligence and goes beyond just Siri.

Drawing in Apple Notes can be fun, but our sketches may not always turn out as polished as we'd like (cue the "my 5-year-old can draw better than that" jokes). Thankfully, Apple's new Image Wand feature in iOS 18.2 and iPadOS 18.2 aims to make creating professional-quality visuals a breeze, even if you lack artistic skills.

In a new update, the iPhone 16 lineup is finally getting Visual Intelligence, a feature that lets you instantly gather information about anything around you just by snapping a picture.

An invaluable button on your iPhone can do hundreds, even thousands, of amazing things, but most iPhone users don't even know it exists. You can't push it. You can't click it. You can't press it. But it's the largest button on your iPhone, more powerful than the versatile Side button, and it's hiding in plain sight.

Your iPhone only has a few physical buttons, buttons with a set number of default actions assigned to them, like sleeping your display, controlling volume levels, and even taking pictures. But as much as these buttons can do for you, they can do more. You're not stuck with the out-of-the-box defaults. Every push button on your iPhone can be customized in one way or another.

Safari is an excellent app for all your web browsing needs, but Apple gives you the freedom to choose a different default web browser on your iPhone to open links in. If you primarily use a third-party web browser like Chrome or Firefox on your computer or tablet, changing your default iOS web browser allows you to have a synced web browsing experience across all your devices.

Election Day is today, and Apple News is making it easy for you to stay informed with real-time results for the 2024 presidential election through a new Live Activity feature on your iPhone, iPad, or Apple Watch.

It's no secret that you can quickly toggle the flashlight and open Camera from your iPhone's Lock Screen using the bottom left and right buttons. But what you may not know is that you can customize those buttons to perform different actions on your iPhone.

There are more actions available for the Action button, but only a handful of iPhone models have that button. However, there is another button with new features you can use, and you can access all the fresh features on any iPhone model that can run iOS 18.

Recording phone calls has always been tricky due to legal, ethical, and technical considerations. With iOS 18.1, Apple brings your iPhone a native call recording feature that simplifies this process while addressing privacy concerns.

From time to time, you may need to locate the version and build number for a particular app on your iPhone or iPad, but it's not at all obvious where you can find the information. Well, there's more than one place to look on iOS 18 and iPadOS 18, but none are perfect solutions. Knowing each method will ensure you can always find any app's real version number.

Multitasking often seems like a good idea until you find yourself exhausted from all the back and forth between apps. In the latest software updates for iPhone, iPad, and Mac, Apple has streamlined the process for its Calendar and Reminders apps — making it easy to create and manage both calendar events and tasks from a single location.

Jumping right into the most captivating part of a podcast episode can make all the difference when sharing episodes with others. But this functionality has never been available in Apple Podcasts — until now.

It's no secret that Apple's Notes app supports attachments such as photos, videos, and web links, as well as other file types like PDFs, word documents, spreadsheets, locations on a map, and audio tracks. While images, videos, and document scans are simple to add on an iPhone or iPad, other file types aren't as easy — at least until you know how.

Apple Notes may not have all the bells and whistles that a more powerful word processor like Apple Pages has, but this simple text editor continues to gain helpful new features that make it more than just a basic note-taking app. One of these updates finally gives you the ability to highlight text and change font colors, adding yet another way to make important details stand out.

Still on the fence about Apple's native Notes app? The latest Notes update for iPhone, iPad, and Mac is about to change your mind. With some fantastic new features and plenty of valuable tools from previous software versions, Notes is becoming a clear winner when it comes to saving important information from your personal and professional life.

Apple Notes keeps on getting better and better on the iPhone and iPad. Since last year's big update, we have been able to add hyperlinks to text, link notes together, and add block quotes, and this year, we have another excellent way to customize notes even more — collapsible sections.

Visit a webpage on your iPhone, iPad, or Mac, and there's a good chance you'll be bombarded with distractions such as ads, fullscreen pop-ups, cookie consents, log-in requests, notifications, email signups, sticky videos, and calls to action. If you're using Safari and content blockers, "Block Pop-ups," and Reader mode can't hide the elements you need, Apple's got a new tool you should be excited about.

In the latest software updates for iPhone and iPad, there's an even easier way to view all your saved Wi-Fi networks and credentials and share them with family, friends, and others who need access.