The FCC this week banned all new "foreign-produced advanced robotic devices" because of an "unacceptable risk to the national security of the United States." The government says networked robotic systems lead to vulnerabilities that allow bad actors to control the devices and collect surveillance data from Americans.
Advanced robotic devices are defined as software-controlled autonomous robots that can move, navigate obstacles, and have a sensor that can perceive the environment.
The ban isn't focused on just humanoid robots, and it includes robot vacuum cleaners too. Almost all robot vacuums are sold by companies located in China or are manufactured in China. Even Roomba maker iRobot, once a flagship American vacuum company, is now owned by a Chinese company after bankruptcy.
Companies are able to keep importing and selling robot vacuums already on the market, but new models will need to get approval from the government. As The Verge notes, getting approval requires a commitment to invest in U.S. manufacturing, but no investigation into security practices despite multiple mentions of national security concerns.
Future Matter-enabled smart vacuums that work with HomeKit from companies like Roborock and Ecovacs may not be able to be sold in the U.S., leaving few options for U.S. consumers unless the companies pledge to move manufacturing to the United States.
Along with robot vacuums, the FCC has banned new humanoid and quadruped robots, plus foreign-made power inverters.
Note: Due to the political or social nature of the discussion regarding this topic, the discussion thread is located in our Political News forum. All forum members and site visitors are welcome to read and follow the thread, but posting is limited to forum members with at least 100 posts.
Apple CEO Tim Cook today said Apple would be making a donation to support earthquake relief efforts in Japan.
A magnitude 6.8 earthquake (per the USGS) hit the Kumamoto prefecture on Kyushu island on Tuesday, collapsing buildings and killing at least 34 people.
Japan has a very special place in my heart. We're thinking of everyone as they continue to face the effects of the Kumamoto earthquake and aftershocks. We're grateful to the first responders helping those in need. Apple is making a donation to support relief efforts.
— Tim Cook (@tim_cook) July 30, 2026
Aftershocks continued on Wednesday and Thursday. Kyushu is the third largest of Japan's four main islands, and it has the second-highest population.
Apple often donates to the Red Cross for relief efforts during natural disasters, but donation amounts are not shared. Last night, Cook said Apple was donating to wildfire relief efforts in France, Spain, and other countries.
Kumamoto was previously hit with a deadly earthquake in 2016, and Apple collected donations for Japan through iTunes.
Spotify today announced a new Running Mode that turns playlists into structured running sessions built around workout type, tempo, and listening habits. It's launching on iOS first.
Located in the app's Fitness Hub, the feature lets runners choose from 25 presets that can be tweaked to fit workout type (interval, steady, or pyramid, for example), with options for duration, beats per minute, and the preferred kind of music. Spotify then matches track selection to the chosen tempo and moves through songs as the session progresses.
Optional audio cues can be enabled to guide users through their run, although these are English-only for now.
Spotify suggests the feature grew out of its fitness-based "Prompted Playlists," a natural-language playlist feature that has seen a lot of fitness prompts directed its way.
Running Mode sits alongside the fitness content Spotify added in April, when it began featuring Peloton classes and creator workout videos in the app.
Strava discontinued its in-app Spotify integration late last month, and removed the music controls that had lived in Strava's workout display since 2023, so Spotify's new mode could be a timely salve for runners who want to keep listening.
Spotify says the new Running Mode is available to premium subscribers in the U.S., Canada, the U.K., Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, and Sweden, starting today.
Apple's AirTag 2 is available for the all-time low price of $89.00 this week, down from $99.00. This sale is on the 4-Pack of the AirTag 2, and it's a match of the record low price first seen during Prime Day.
Note: MacRumors is an affiliate partner with Amazon. When you click a link and make a purchase, we may receive a small payment, which helps us keep the site running.
We're also tracking a smaller deal on the AirTag 2 1-Pack, available for $27.00, down from $29.00. This one has been down to a slightly lower price in previous weeks, but it's one of the best deals around right now for anyone shopping for the new AirTag model.
The new AirTag is equipped with a second-generation Ultra Wideband chip, enabling the Precision Finding feature to work up to 50% farther away from an item compared to the previous-generation model.
If you're on the hunt for more discounts, be sure to visit our Apple Deals roundup where we recap the best Apple-related bargains of the past week.
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Tim Cook will participate in his final Apple earnings call as the company's CEO today. The call begins at 2 p.m. Pacific Time / 5 p.m. Eastern Time.
Cook and CFO Kevan Parekh will discuss Apple's earnings results for the second quarter of the 2026 calendar year on the live-streamed conference call. While the call is primarily intended for Apple shareholders and Wall Street analysts, anyone can listen live for free on Apple's Investor Relations website, with no registration required.
The call should last around one hour. Cook and Parekh will read their prepared remarks, and then they will take questions from analysts.
If you miss the call, a recording will be available for replay on the page later in the day.
Apple's hardware engineering chief John Ternus is taking over as CEO on September 1, so Cook will no longer be CEO when the next earnings call occurs.
In a post on Wednesday, Apple CEO Tim Cook said Apple will be donating to relief efforts on the ground in Europe following devastating wildfires in France, Spain, Greece, and other countries.
Apple has donated to the Red Cross for relief efforts in the past — it does not disclose the amounts.
For the better part of two decades, an iPhone's alarm volume has matched its ringer. In other words, if you slide the ringtone volume down to silence your iPhone overnight, you're also turning your alarm's volume down with it. That's no longer the case in iOS 27.
Settings now includes an "Alarms and Timers" section with its own Match Ringtone Volume toggle. If you toggle it off, a dedicated slider appears that allows you to drop the ringer volume to nothing, and you'll still be woken at whatever alarm volume you choose.
How to Set a Separate Alarm Volume
Open Settings on your iPhone.
Tap Sounds & Haptics.
Under "Alarms and Timers," toggle off Match Ringtone Volume.
Drag the slider that appears to set your alarm and timer volume.
That's all there is to it. Alarms and timers now have their own level, regardless of how quiet or loud your iPhone's ringer is set at.
Bear in mind that alarms carrying their own volume control – like any wake-up alarm you have selected in your Sleep schedule – will keep the level you set for them individually. To go back to the old behavior, simply toggle Match Ringtone Volume back on, and the slider will disappear.
A Second Toggle for Alerts and System Sounds
You may notice that directly below the "Alarms and Timers" controls sits a second Match Ringtone Volume switch in a separate section. This covers alerts and system sounds, like incoming texts, keyboard clicks, and suchlike. Toggle off this setting and you'll get a similar independent slider. It's a neat fix if, say, you've ever wanted a loud ringer without a loud keyboard.
iOS 27 is currently available in public beta and is expected to be generally available this coming September.
July is nearly over, meaning that Apple's annual iPhone event is fast approaching. Below, we look back at when Apple typically announces iPhone events.
This September, Apple is expected to unveil the iPhone 18 Pro, iPhone 18 Pro Max, and an all-new foldable iPhone that will reportedly be named the iPhone Ultra. The regular iPhone 18, a lower-end iPhone 18e, and the iPhone Air 2 are not expected to be announced until around March 2027, as part of a new split-up launch strategy.
We are still waiting for Apple to announce the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone Ultra event. In his newsletter last month, Bloomberg's Mark Gurman said September 8 or September 9 are the most likely dates for the event. If that proves to be accurate, then the most likely dates for Apple to announce the event would be Tuesday, August 25 or Wednesday, August 26, as the company typically provides two weeks' notice.
Since 2020, iPhone event videos have been pre-recorded, but in recent years Apple has invited select reporters to the Steve Jobs Theater to watch the video in person. Afterwards, attendees receive hands-on time with the new devices.
The table below provides an overview of dates for the last six iPhone events, with 2020 and 2021 being outliers due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
If you've never been a fan of Liquid Glass – Apple's glass-like interface effect introduced in iOS 26 – then there's some good news in iOS 27. Apple has added a setting that lets you finely adjust the level of translucency, giving you more control over the look and feel of your iPhone.
Perhaps you find notifications too see-through, or you want to see more of your wallpaper through Control Center. Fortunately, iOS 27 includes a dial that can help with that. Apple has swapped the two-option Clear and Tinted setting for a continuous slider that puts translucency anywhere between barely-there glass and a heavy frost.
The earlier presets arrived in iOS 26.1 and gave you two positions on a spectrum, whereas iOS 27 gives you the whole spectrum. It also locates the control in "Appearance" – a new section in Settings that gathers up interface options previously scattered through Display & Brightness, including Light and Dark mode and text size.
Not only that, Apple has also tweaked the default look, and says that Liquid Glass now diffuses complex content behind it more effectively while drawing a clearer separation between layers.
How to Change the Liquid Glass Effect
When you first install iOS 27, you'll be presented with the slider to change the Liquid Glass effect, but it's good to know how to get to it later if you want to switch up the look.
Open Settings on your iPhone.
Tap Appearance.
Tap Liquid Glass.
Drag the slider left for a clearer, more transparent effect, or right to add tint and opacity.
The midpoint on the slider is Apple's default. The UI preview redraws in real time as you drag it, so you can watch it instead of having to back out of Settings to check. Note that the setting applies across the system, and affects everything from Control Center and Home screen folders to app overlays and Lock Screen notifications.
If the Slider Doesn't Go Far Enough
Even at the tinted end, Apple's interface retains a degree of glassiness. If you're not satisfied with the result, two Accessibility options push it further:
Reduce Transparency strips out nearly all translucency, leaving only flat, solid backgrounds.
Increase Contrast sharpens the boundaries between buttons, text, and whatever sits behind them.
You can find both in Settings ➝ Accessibility ➝ Display & Text Size.
You'll find that iPadOS 27 also offers these controls in the same place, and the same goes for macOS 27 Golden Gate (albeit in System Settings). All three software updates are in public beta now, with a general release expected in September.
We're less than two months out from the launch of Apple's premium next-generation smartphone lineup, and while we're not expecting a dramatic change in terms of functionality, there are still several enhancements rumored to be coming to the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max.
One thing worth noting is that Apple is reportedly planning a major change to its iPhone release cycle this year, adopting a two-phase rollout starting with the iPhone 18 series. That means the iPhone 18 Pro, iPhone 18 Pro Max, and the long-rumored foldable iPhone ("iPhone Ultra") will be released in September 2026, followed by the iPhone 18, iPhone Air 2, and iPhone 18e in spring 2027.
Overall Design
iPhone 17 Pro Style
Rumors suggest the iPhone 18 Pro lineup will largely retain the same design as the iPhone 17 Pro models. Most rumors suggest the rear camera system will look identical to the current generation, featuring a raised "plateau" with three lenses arranged in a triangle – although recent dummies indicate a possible thickening of the plateau and the protrusion of individual lenses. Display sizes are also expected to remain unchanged, with the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max continuing to use 6.3-inch and 6.9-inch panels, respectively (the same dimensions introduced with the iPhone 16 Pro series). iPhone 18 Pro models could drop the current two-tone look of the rear casing found on the iPhone 17 Pro in favor of a more seamless aesthetic, while Apple has apparently updated the back-glass "replacement process" to minimize the color difference between the Ceramic Shield 2 glass and the aluminum frame, resulting in a more unified appearance. More recently, rumors have suggested that the iPhone 18 Pro Max could be thicker and heavier than its predecessor, suggesting a trade-off behind the device's rumored larger battery.
Next-Level Battery Life
Thicker Chassis
The iPhone 18 Pro Max will feature a bigger battery for continued best-in-class battery life, based on Chinese regulatory findings. The iPhone 18 Pro is seemingly rated for 4,056mAh in China and 4,288mAh in the U.S., up modestly from the iPhone 17 Pro's 3,988mAh and 4,252mAh. The iPhone 18 Pro Max shows a bigger jump, rated for 5,391mAh in China and 5,567mAh in the U.S., compared with 4,823mAh and 5,088mAh on the iPhone 17 Pro Max, an increase of nearly 500mAh.According to another rumor, the body of the iPhone 18 Pro Max will be slightly thicker than the iPhone 17 Pro Max, raising the device's weight to around 243 grams. That would make the iPhone 18 Pro Max approximately 3 grams more than the iPhone 14 Pro Max, which is currently the heaviest model Apple has produced. A larger battery is the most likely cause.
Smaller Dynamic Island
Under-Screen Face ID?
Rumors continue to circulate about whether the iPhone 18 Pro models will introduce under-display Face ID, but reports remain divided on when the technology will actually arrive. The feature would move the TrueDepth camera system beneath the display, eliminating the need for the current Dynamic Island cutout.
According to Wayne Ma of The Information, Apple is targeting a design without a Dynamic Island, replacing it with a single pinhole camera in the upper-left corner of the screen. However, other sources dispute that claim. Display analyst Ross Young believes under-display Face ID is possible for the iPhone 18 Pro, but says a smaller Dynamic Island will still be present. Bloomberg's Mark Gurman has echoed this view, reporting that the new models will feature a slimmed-down Dynamic Island rather than removing it entirely. Apple is also said to be testing new camera miniaturization technology to reduce the size of the front-facing camera currently located within the Dynamic Island.
The Weibo leaker "Ice Universe" has claimed the Dynamic Island cutout on the iPhone 18 Pro models will be approximately 35% narrower than it is on the iPhone 17 Pro models. Specifically, they said it will have a width of around 13.5mm, down from around 20.7mm.
Meanwhile, Chinese leaker Instant Digital has offered yet another version of events, saying the Dynamic Island will shrink in size, but that under-display Face ID and camera technology won't debut this year. The latest word on the subject is that Apple is weighing two options for the iPhone 18 Pro's Dynamic Island, and a final decision has yet to be made. One option apparently retains the existing screen mold from the iPhone 17 Pro, while the other introduces a significantly smaller "Mini Dynamic Island" enabled by moving the Face ID receiver and transmitter components beneath the display.
Upgraded Display
LTPO+
The iPhone 18 Pro models will reportedly use LTPO+ display technology, which should be more power efficient than the current LTPO technology in the iPhone 17 series. Such an upgrade could also contribute to longer battery life (see above), since LPTO+ enables finer control of OLED light emission, potentially allowing the display to optimize its operation based on environmental conditions. In other words, it will know better when to up screen brightness or reduce it, depending on surrounding light sources. The panels are reportedly being supplied by Samsung Display and LG Display.
A20 Pro Chip
2nm Process
The iPhone 18 Pro models will use Apple's A20 chip, based on TSMC's 2nm process for power and efficiency improvements. A move to 2nm fabrication increases transistor density, which will enable higher performance. The A20 series is expected to deliver roughly a 15 percent speed gain and about 30 percent better efficiency compared with the A19 series used in Apple's iPhone 17 models.
Apple's A20 chip will be packaged with TSMC's Wafer-Level Multi-Chip Module (WMCM) technology, suggesting at least some A20 chips will have RAM integrated directly onto the same wafer as the CPU, GPU, and Neural Engine, rather than sitting adjacent to the chip and connected via a silicon interposer. This could contribute to faster performance for both overall tasks and Apple Intelligence, and longer battery life from improved power efficiency. In June, an image of the iPhone 18 Pro motherboard leaked online, showing the A20 Pro chip will indeed use the new packaging technology.
C2 Modem
Replacing Qualcomm
It was previously expected that Apple would include its next-generation C2 modem in the iPhone 18 Pro models. The chip would succeed the C1 modem, which debuted in the lower-cost iPhone 16e as Apple's first in-house cellular modem, and the C1X modem chip in the iPhone Air, which Apple says is up to 2× faster than the C1. While the C2 would likely bring faster speeds, improved power efficiency, and support for mmWave 5G in the United States, a recent rumor has questioned its adoption there. It's possible that the iPhone 18 Pro will use different modem chips depending on the market it is sold in, with U.S. models retaining Qualcomm hardware and international models using Apple's in-house C2 modem.
Apple's modem roadmap is part of a long-term strategy to reduce reliance on Qualcomm, which currently supplies 5G modems for the rest of the iPhone lineup. The company has been working on developing its own cellular chips for years, aiming for deeper integration and greater control over power management and performance.
New Camera Sensor
Samsung-Made
Samsung is working on a new three-layer stacked image sensor, reportedly intended for the iPhone 18. The sensor, referred to as PD-TR-Logic, integrates three layers of circuitry, which would improve camera responsiveness, reduce noise, and increase dynamic range. The leak comes from a source known as "Jukanlosreve," who claims the sensor is being developed specifically for Apple's 2026 iPhone lineup. Sony has long been Apple's sole image sensor supplier, so Samsung's entry would be a big shift in the iPhone's camera supply chain.
Variable Aperture
DSLR-Style
Apple intends to equip this year's iPhone 18 Pro models with a variable aperture lens, according to reports. Weibo-based leaker Digital Chat Station claims the main rear camera – what Apple calls the 48-megapixel Fusion camera – on both iPhone 18 Pro models will offer variable aperture, which would be a first for the iPhone. A variable-aperture system physically adjusts the lens opening, letting more light in for low-light shots or narrowing the opening for brighter scenes and deeper depth of field.
The main cameras on the iPhone 15 Pro, 16 Pro, and 17 Pro all use a fixed ƒ/1.78 aperture, where the lens is permanently set to its widest setting. With a variable lens, the iPhone 18 Pro would allow users to manually shift the aperture, similar to on a DSLR camera. This would mean more control over depth of field, enabling sharper focus on subjects or smoother background blur. Industry analyst Ming-Chi Kuo said in November 2024 that Apple's iPhone 18 Pro models will get the feature.
5G Satellite Internet
Non-Terrestrial Data
According to a report by The Information, Apple plans to add support for 5G networks that operate via satellites rather than Earth-based towers as early as next year. This advancement would allow future iPhones to gain full internet connectivity through satellite, not just limited emergency features.
If Apple meets the 2026 target, the first devices to feature 5G satellite internet would likely be the iPhone 18 Pro, iPhone 18 Pro Max, and the long-rumored foldable iPhone. Apple partners with Globalstar for its iPhone satellite features, but there is currently no service that delivers full 5G satellite internet directly to a smartphone. That said, Amazon and Globalstar announced in April a definitive merger agreement under which Amazon will acquire the satellite operator. Amazon's Leo satellite network will power existing iPhone features – with scope for additional feature support as part of a forthcoming infrastructure upgrade.
Simplified Camera Control
New Design
Apple is reportedly working to simplify the Camera Control button's design on iPhone 18 models in order to reduce costs. The current Camera Control button on iPhone 17 models uses both capacitive and pressure sensors beneath a sapphire crystal surface. The capacitive layer detects touch gestures, while the force sensor recognizes different pressure levels for taps, presses, and swipes.
However, according to the Weibo-based account Instant Digital, Apple will remove the capacitive sensing layer and retain only pressure sensing recognition in the second iteration to achieve all Camera Control functions on the iPhone 18. The simplified version is not about reducing functionality in the button, but about saving money. The current solution is said to be very expensive for Apple and is generating costly after-sales repairs.
We don't expect Camera Control to go away anytime soon – Apple apparently sees it as a key feature, so much so that it has reportedly made deliberate engineering compromises to ensure that the first foldable iPhone features the button.
New Colors
Three in Testing
In February 2026, Bloomberg's Mark Gurman reported that Apple is testing a deep red finish for the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max. Rumors of purple and brown finishes have also circulated, but Gurman believes those are just variants of the same red idea. Since then, we've seen aligned rumors that the devices will come in light blue, dark cherry, dark gray, and silver.
The iPhone 14 Pro and iPhone 14 Pro Max were previously available in Deep Purple, and Apple has never released an iPhone in a genuinely brown color. According to a Chinese leaker, Apple's iPhone 18 Pro models won't come in black this year. If the rumor is true, it will be the second consecutive year Apple has ditched what was arguably its most classic color option for the Pro lineup.
iOS 27
Smarter Siri
The iPhone 18 Pro will ship with iOS 27, which brings the biggest Siri shake-up in the assistant's history. Apple introduced Siri AI at WWDC in June – a rebuilt, more conversational version of Siri with onscreen awareness, personal context understanding, and broad world knowledge that lets it pull up-to-date answers from the web. It also gains its own standalone app for revisiting past conversations, an expanded Visual Intelligence mode, and writing tools that work across email, messages, and documents. Like the iPhone 17 Pro, the iPhone 18 Pro is expected to carry 12GB of RAM, so it should run the full range of Siri AI and Apple Intelligence features.
Apple's 20th anniversary iPhone is expected to arrive in the fall of 2027 with the most significant redesign the device has seen since the iPhone X.
The first iPhone was announced in January 2007 and went on sale that June, meaning the device's 20th anniversary technically falls on June 29, 2027. Apple rarely launches new high-end iPhones outside of its September timeframe, and the anniversary models are still expected to arrive in the fall of that year, just as the iPhone X did in 2017 despite marking the 10th anniversary of a device that launched in June.
The 2027 model has been rumored for well over a year, with reports pointing to an all-glass design, new display technology, and a series of upgrades Apple has been working toward for several generations. Much as the iPhone X set the template for the years of iPhones that followed, the anniversary model is likely to define the device's design direction for some time.
Apple could skip the name "iPhone 19" in the same way it skipped "iPhone 9" ahead of the iPhone X in 2017, with rumors so far variably referring to the device as the "iPhone 20" and the "iPhone XX." Here is everything that has been rumored for the device so far:
Curved all-glass design with edge-to-edge display: Apple is reportedly aiming for a new design with curved glass generously wrapping around the front and back, described by Bloomberg's Mark Gurman as a curved iPhone without cutouts in the display. Facilities in Apple's supply chain have reportedly finished renovations ahead of production, with manufacturing quality said to be around that of the first-generation iPhone Air. The panel is said to curve down around all four edges for a borderless effect, going beyond the curved displays used by other manufacturers. Rather than the aggressively curved "waterfall" edges seen on some Samsung panels, Apple is said to be seeking an equal-depth quad-curved design with very shallow "micro-curves," which could make edge swipes feel more natural and reduce distortion of on-screen content. Bending the display circuitry around every edge reportedly requires an ultra-thin film encapsulation layer to protect the OLED panel from moisture and air, and one leak claims a bezel of 1.1mm, compared to approximately 1.44mm on the iPhone 17 Pro.
More advanced display: Apple is reported to be adopting a Samsung-made panel using Color Filter on Encapsulation, which removes the polarizing film and applies the color filter directly onto the encapsulation layer. The technique reduces the thickness of the display stack and lets more light through, improving brightness while reducing power draw, and the panel is said to be paired with next-generation 16nm display driver chips. Apple is also said to be employing a crater-shaped light diffusion layer designed to even out brightness so the display appears uniformly lit across all areas, including at the curved edges.
Two size options: Unlike the iPhone X, which launched in a single 5.8-inch size, Apple is planning two anniversary models roughly matching the iPhone 18 Pro and Pro Max at 6.3 and 6.9 inches, although the larger model could be marketed as a 7-inch device owing to its slimmer bezels and all-screen design.
Custom Apple image sensor: Apple is reported to be developing its own stacked image sensor to replace the Sony sensors used across the iPhone lineup, having already built a working prototype. The sensor is said to use LOFIC technology, allowing each pixel to store varying amounts of light and potentially reaching up to 20 stops of dynamic range.
Solid-state haptic buttons: Apple is rumored to be reviving "Project Bongo" to replace the mechanical Side button, volume buttons, Action button, and Camera Control with haptic equivalents integrated into the frame. The buttons have reportedly passed tests for use with gloves, wet hands, extreme temperatures, and with a case fitted. An ultra-low energy microprocessor is claimed to keep the solid-state buttons functional even when the handset is powered off or the battery has run out.
A21 chip: Both anniversary models are expected to use a second-generation 2-nanometer "A21" chip, shared with the second-generation foldable iPhone.
High bandwidth memory: Apple is reported to be considering mobile HBM, a form of DRAM that stacks memory chips vertically and connects them using through-silicon vias to increase signal transmission speeds. Connecting the memory to the iPhone's GPU is said to be a strong candidate for improving on-device AI performance, and Apple has reportedly discussed the plan with memory suppliers Samsung and SK Hynix, both of which expect to begin mass production after 2026.
Apple modem in the United States: Apple is aiming to have modems that outperform Qualcomm's on speed and AI functionality by 2027, following the C1 and C1X used in the iPhone 16e and iPhone Air, and the C2 on the iPhone 18 Pro outside the United States only. With the 20th anniversary iPhone, an Apple-designed modem should come to the high-end devices for the first time in the United States, delivering an efficiency boost for better battery life.
Pure silicon battery: Apple is said to be pairing the new display with pure silicon battery technology for improved power efficiency, which offers higher energy density than conventional lithium-ion cells and could allow greater capacity in the same physical space. One leaker has claimed a 6,000mAh battery could come to the device, though it is unclear where that figure comes from.
Reverse wireless charging, under-display audio that eliminates the earpiece slit, and a next-generation Ceramic Shield have all been mentioned by one leaker, but it is unknown whether these claims are based on supply chain information.
With the device still more than a year away, the final 20th anniversary iPhone could still change considerably from the current picture provided by rumors. A two-stage rollout has been reported for the curved panel itself, with the 2027 implementation said to introduce some distortion and brightness loss at the edges before a more advanced version follows in 2028.
Apple is expected to launch the 20th anniversary iPhone in the fall of 2027 alongside a second-generation foldable iPhone, following the iPhone 18, iPhone 18e, and iPhone Air 2 in the spring.
Qualcomm expects its Apple revenue to decline faster than it previously anticipated, Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon told Reuters in an interview following the company's earnings call for the third fiscal quarter of 2026.
Amon chalked up the loss to supply constraints, which will reduce the share of Qualcomm components used in the next iPhone launch well below its earlier 20 percent estimate. Qualcomm expects the drop in Apple revenue to start in the fourth quarter.
Qualcomm is raising its prices starting September 1 to improve its margin because of increasing costs across the supply chain. "We're just passing through big cost increases that we have," said Amon.
In fiscal 2027, Qualcomm is expecting most of its chip sales to come from categories other than smartphones, and growth in its data center business will replace the Apple-related revenue it collected in fiscal 2026.
Apple developed its own modem chips, which have been used in the iPhone 16e, iPhone 17e, and iPhone Air. Rumors suggest Apple could transition to using more of its own chips starting with the iPhone 18 lineup. Apple is working on a C2 modem chip rumored to deliver faster speeds and better power efficiency than Qualcomm modems.
Apple and Qualcomm have a patent licensing agreement that lasts through March 2027, and it is not clear if Apple will extend it again or move to using its own modem chips across its entire product lineup.
Apple said new UK App Store rules would give regulators a "highly intrusive" role dictating how it runs its business, reports Reuters. Apple submitted feedback to the UK's Competition and Markets Authority as it considers forcing Apple to change its App Store rules around steering.
The CMA wants Apple to let developers link to payment options outside of the App Store, which the CMA says will cut fees and boost competition. Developers in the UK are not currently able to direct customers outside of the App Store, even though that's allowed with the current U.S. App Store rules and the EU App Store rules.
UK regulators said Apple can charge developers a fee, but it must be fair and reasonable, and below existing App Store commissions, so developers can pass savings to customers or reinvest them in innovation.
According to Apple, the CMA's proposed rules would undermine innovation and investment, and would amount to price regulation because of the restriction on fees. Apple claims there is no evidence that allowing developers to direct users to purchase options outside the App Store would result in savings for customers. Apple said the App Store facilitated over £46.5 billion in UK billings and sales in 2025, and commissions accounted for less than 3.5 percent of the total.
The CMA denied that its proposal is price regulation. "Our consultation proposes principles to ensure that the fees Apple and Google charge for steering are fair and reasonable, not to directly set prices," a CMA spokesperson told Reuters.
The CMA is assessing feedback before making a final decision on the proposal. The changes are also applicable to Google, as both Apple and Google were designated with strategic market status (SMS) in the UK last year. Under the designation, the CMA can impose requirements meant to open up the platforms to greater competition.
Note: Due to the political or social nature of the discussion regarding this topic, the discussion thread is located in our Political News forum. All forum members and site visitors are welcome to read and follow the thread, but posting is limited to forum members with at least 100 posts.
Like prior versions of Pastebot, Pastebot 3 records everything you copy so that it's easy to find and paste when needed. You can store links and other content that you often paste, and organize the snippets by category in Custom Pastebins.
There are also rule-based Smart Pastebins for automatic organization, like every link or image copied from Safari. Smart Pastebins can be filtered by clipping size, type, file extension, creation date, text, text length, and more. Multiple parameters can be combined for detailed filtering, and custom notes can be added to clippings to make them easy to find via search.
You can create more powerful custom filters and apply them to text you've copied before pasting it. You can do things like convert to plaintext and remove smart punctuation, wrap what you're pasting in paragraph tags, convert to upper or lowercase, nix emojis, find and replace, extract URLs or phone numbers, remove empty lines, sort, and translate. Multiple filters can be combined and keyboard shortcuts can be assigned to the filters you use most often.
A quick paste menu can be activated with a Shift+Command+V keyboard shortcut for bringing up your most frequently used clippings in any app, and there's a Stack function for copying multiple items and pasting them one after another.
You can add apps to Pastebot's blacklist, and content copied from the apps on the list is never saved to Pastebot, which is useful for protecting passwords. All Pastebot content and filters sync across Macs with iCloud, and there are options for customizing how many clippings are saved. You can keep up to 1,500.
Tapbots says Pastebot 3 was built to work with Apple's Universal Clipboard feature, and when enabled and active, anything you copy on your iPhone is saved in Pastebot automatically. Clippings saved in Pastebot can also be pasted on iPhone. Pastebot 3 supports Apple Shortcuts and CLI access for automating clippings.
Pastebot 3 requires macOS Tahoe or later. It can be purchased directly from Tapbots for $39, with a year of updates included and the option to buy another year of updates for $19. There's also a Mac App Store purchase option with a $24.99 per year or $2.99 per month subscription. Pastebot customers who enter a Pastebot 2 license key can get a $12.99 upgrade discount on the direct purchase option. New customers can try the app for 14 days.
Apple today released a new update for Safari Technology Preview, the experimental browser that was first introduced in March 2016. Apple designed Safari Technology Preview to allow users to test features that are planned for future release versions of the Safari browser.
Safari Technology Preview 249 includes fixes and updates for Accessibility, Animations, CSS, Editing, Forms, HTML, JavaScript, Media, Rendering, Spatial Web, Web API, Web Audio, Web Inspector, WebAssembly, WebDriver, and WebRTC.
The current Safari Technology Preview release is compatible with machines running macOS Tahoe and macOS Golden Gate, the newest version of macOS.
The Safari Technology Preview update is available through the Software Update mechanism in System Preferences or System Settings to anyone who has downloaded the browser from Apple's website. Complete release notes for the update are available on the Safari Technology Preview website.
Apple's aim with Safari Technology Preview is to gather feedback from developers and users on its browser development process. Safari Technology Preview can run side-by-side with the existing Safari browser and while it is designed for developers, it does not require a developer account to download and use.
OpenAI president Greg Brockman recently did an interview with Joanna Stern, where he commented on the lawsuit OpenAI is facing from Apple and talked about OpenAI's product plans.
Brockman reiterated what OpenAI has already said on the record, stating that the company is "plenty innovative" and uninterested in other companies' trade secrets.
I would say that we have no interest in other companies' trade secrets. We are plenty innovative. We are thinking about things from our own angle. And so that's how we operate and that's what we do.
He also said OpenAI is working on its own long-term product plans.
It's active litigation, so not something that I want to talk about, but all I can say is we're very committed to a long-term roadmap here and that we are focused on our own development and technology. That's what we're interested in.
Apple accused OpenAI of a months-long scheme to steal confidential Apple information from Apple employees interviewing with OpenAI. Apple said OpenAI has created a culture of hardware theft, and that its hardware business is "rotten to the core" because the hardware it's building relies on info stolen from Apple. OpenAI's products are being developed with former Apple designer Jony Ive, though Ive wasn't named in the lawsuit.
Brockman declined to say when OpenAI's first hardware devices will come out, but he said people should "expect them soon." Rumors suggest OpenAI's first product will be a mobile smart speaker without a display, and it has been described as a "humanlike AI companion" designed for home use. He further said OpenAI is working on a "family of devices" and is building its own chips. OpenAI wants to offer "value over time" and deliver on a device that's "built for the AI era" and "maximally useful."
He had ChatGPT answer a question about what OpenAI's first AI device would look like.
My take, something ambient and low friction, voice first but not voice only and with a clear privacy signal.
ChatGPT also answered whether the company's first device would need a screen, and it said "nope."
People haven't been thrilled with the recent merging of ChatGPT and Codex, and Brockman acknowledged that the app is "kind of a mess." He described the current app as "incremental progress towards the future," and said the separate Work tab should be gone by the end of the year, with everything molding into ChatGPT.
Brockman's full interview, which goes into more detail on ChatGPT's future, OpenAI's hardware work, and the company's ambitions, can be watched on YouTube.
Apple this month began selling certified refurbished Studio Display XDR models in the U.S. for the first time since the display was released in March. Availability extends to Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Japan, and select other countries.
A refurbished Studio Display XDR with a VESA mount adapter and standard glass is priced at $2,459, down from $2,899 for the equivalent new configuration. This amounts to a 15% discount, which is typical for Apple's refurbished products.
A refurbished model with a tilt- and height-adjustable stand and standard glass is priced at $2,799, down from $3,299, which is likewise a 15% discount.
Refurbished models with nano-texture glass are also available at a discount.
Apple says it puts refurbished products through "full functionality testing" and a "thorough cleaning process and inspection," and they are covered by Apple's one-year limited warranty and eligible for extended AppleCare+ coverage. In our view, Apple's own refurbished devices are virtually indistinguishable from brand-new devices.
The refurbished models come in a plain white box with a Thunderbolt 5 Pro cable.
The Studio Display XDR features a 27-inch screen with mini-LED backlighting, 5K resolution, peak brightness of 2,000 nits for HDR content, and up to a 120Hz refresh rate. The display has a 12-megapixel Center Stage camera, six speakers, two Thunderbolt 5 ports with one providing up to 140W pass-through charging, and two USB-C ports.
July has been a busy month for AppleCare+ news. We have recapped all the changes to AppleCare+ and the AppleCare One bundle below.
In the U.S., Apple raised the prices on monthly and annual AppleCare+ subscription plans for Macs and iPads by $0.50/month and $5/year, respectively.
Monthly and annual AppleCare+ subscription plans expanded to a wider range of Apple products in Canada and Japan for the first time this month.
AppleCare One is expanding too. Starting on Tuesday, August 4, it will be available in Australia, France, Germany, and the United Kingdom.
Introduced in the U.S. last year, AppleCare One covers up to three devices as part of a single monthly subscription, and the total cost can be lower than multiple AppleCare+ plans. In the United Kingdom, for example, Apple said customers can save up to £11.48/month vs. paying for three separate AppleCare+ with Theft and Loss plans.
Apple's first foldable iPhone, with a book-style design featuring a ~5.5-inch outer display and a ~7.8-inch inner display with a minimal crease down the middle.
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