iOS 18.4 innovations from the beta – First information on German Apple AI
The first pre-release version of iOS 18.4 for developers finally arrived at the end of last week. It is particularly exciting for German users.
iOS 18 overview: 18.4 also brings many new features.
(Image: Apple)
After a longer wait than usual, Apple released beta 1 of iOS 18.4 for download on Friday, initially for developers. Despite the late product version, – is bringing a number of new features to the iPhone with the update, particularly due to Apple's gradual launch of Apple Intelligence –. Here is an overview of the features that have already been announced, plus initial information on the practical use of the Apple AI system in German.
What Apple Intelligence can now do
Apple has now released the so-called Sketch Style for its Image Playground image generation, which was previously only available to Image-Wand-Funktion in apps such as Notes. Apple still does not allow photorealistic images and is unlikely to do so at a later date. The new priority notifications have also been activated in Apple Intelligence. This allows the AI to recognize particularly important notifications itself and deliver them to a special area of the lock screen so that they are not overlooked.
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Unfortunately, the email categories function – is not really perfect – is landing on the iPad for the first time (with iPadOS 18.4 – and also on the Mac under macOS 15.4). It had already come to the iPhone with iOS 18.2. Siri has some new voices for Australian, and completely new Apple Intelligence languages have been added in German, French, Italian, Spanish, Brazilian Portuguese, Japanese, Korean and Chinese (short character format). There is also adapted English for India and Singapore. Meanwhile, the first tests with Apple Intelligence in German have been mixed: The summaries of emails and iMessage messages sometimes work quite well, but are also unintentionally funny from time to time. Whether this problem can be solved at all – Summary based on very small amounts of data – remains to be seen.
Further new features in iOS 18.4
Another fresh feature in iOS 18.3 is the support for "Ambient Music" in the Control Center – where you can select and play different soundscapes for relaxation, productivity or sleep. Apple has made a change to the display points for accessing privacy-relevant features such as the camera or microphone: These are now easier to recognize thanks to a black background.
You can now select a preferred language in Apple Maps and the Control Center shows the current reception value for mobile connections. In Japan, you can store the so-called My Number Card, a kind of electronic ID card. The Vision Pro app allows you to install apps directly on the headset and manage it from your iPhone.
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