Probably the last big updates we'll see before the next versions appear at WWDC.
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iOS, macOS, and iPadOS 26.5 updates arrive with encrypted RCS messaging and more
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Not that you will be able to really know, but have they ripped out the age verification crap for UK where no such laws actually exists?
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Liquid Glass and enlarged radiuses will continue until morale improves.
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Good to see encrypted RCS coming along nicely, especially in light of all the FUD and complaining about RCS when Apple first added support for it at all.
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That's exactly the feature everyone is waiting for. More ads in places that shouldn't have them. Thanks for the premium experience apple! Wish there was a way to get rid of them if possible. Google maps ads have been becoming more egregious lately and I had mostly shifted to apple maps.
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Cool.
Overall I am mostly happy with where iOS 26 and MacOS 26 ended up, though I do suspect a large part of why I don't hate them is because I had the newest (or new enough) hardware to run them without them running into the resource hogging issues they are seemingly running into on phones and laptops even a few years old, that were otherwise perfectly functional prior to this update. Hopefully Apple does something about getting those devices up and running properly, as they should be.
And while they are at it, maybe they can also add long overdue and promised features to their OS's too, I don't particularly care for AI, but Apple advertised it as a core pillar for over a year, it shouldn't just be allowed to disappear without them delivering on it.
And yes, good functional updates like this one are always appreciated as well (though they are also simultaneously continuing enshittification, it seems. Ads in Apple Maps, really? Who asked for that?)
Overall I am mostly happy with where iOS 26 and MacOS 26 ended up, though I do suspect a large part of why I don't hate them is because I had the newest (or new enough) hardware to run them without them running into the resource hogging issues they are seemingly running into on phones and laptops even a few years old, that were otherwise perfectly functional prior to this update. Hopefully Apple does something about getting those devices up and running properly, as they should be.
And while they are at it, maybe they can also add long overdue and promised features to their OS's too, I don't particularly care for AI, but Apple advertised it as a core pillar for over a year, it shouldn't just be allowed to disappear without them delivering on it.
And yes, good functional updates like this one are always appreciated as well (though they are also simultaneously continuing enshittification, it seems. Ads in Apple Maps, really? Who asked for that?)
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There is really only one Siri feature I want. Sometimes, when I ask it to play a particular song/playlist/album, I get something completely random, no matter how clearly I enunciate or repeat myself. I want:
- An option to jump into a log and see if Siri identified what I said correctly
- If it didn't, provide a correction in text
- If it did, then the ability to specify what I actually bloody wanted to happen. An interface similar to the Shortcuts interface would work nicely.
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The online safety act does exist and the verification crap was put in due to pressure from ofcom over the that legislation. To get it ripped out this act needs to be repealed which would require different politicians.
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Here is hoping that one of the options is "none of the above". So far we've been able to turn some of the AI features off, which limits the space usage by them but it's not uniform.
E.g., installing "cleanup" in the photos app on iOS is a one-way street: once installed, you are stuck with it. I installed it to see if it would help me with a specific problem on a photo. It did not help at all and I have not used it since. I also have to live with this extra option on the bottom of the edit page in the photos app.
In macOS, the stub for the "image playground" app is not uninstall-able unless you disable the system integrity protection. I'm not begrudging Apple for making it, but why isn't this an optional app? It's hardly something critical to the functioning of the operating system.
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[snipped away parts i'm not replying to, hope that's okay]
Overall, I think my 13 Pro Max has settled into iOS 26 in terms of performance, and I think I've gotten used to the odd case of hitching and apps randomly freezing. The one big problem I still have with 26 is that it definitely uses a lot more disk space than iOS 18 did, and it continues to be a source of nearly-constant frustration with my now-paltry 128 GB of on-board storage.
Case in point: I can't take the 26.5 update because my storage is full. Barely even four gigabytes of space is available, and the updater wants more than thirteen. (My attached screenshot was hastily stitched together to simplify uploading and viewing.)
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Yeah, this is definitely a fair shout out, there is no getting around how bloated iOS has gotten over the last decade in terms of file size. And I mean it makes sense on some levels, there's a lot of generalized code included in it now to make sure it can function across all the devices it supports, but I do miss the days iOS being super lightweight and snappy. Of course, it was also a lot less capable and robust then than it is now, so I realize this is all a matter of tradeoffs, but even so, I wish Apple wouldn't lose sight of the devices this OS is primarily meant for (battery powered, low specced devices with storage and memory at a premium).
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26.4.2 has been terribly buggy for me, and it seemed to intensify during travel, maybe with dual SIM/eSIM, maybe with the heat, maybe with the heavy use, but I am very not satisfied with the quality of iOS right now. A simple bug like the ellipsis menu in photos closing itself before I get to interact with it has been around since early 26 unfixed, let alone years old bugs like the screen locking while actively being touched and scrolled on the notifications shade or random LOUD keyboard. I really hope the Snow Leopard year for all the things is true, but I feel like Gurman has said this 3-4 times now for OS's that weren't really that. I guess iOS12 was good.
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I am still completely flummoxed on the logic behind the reorganization of the Music App in Mac OS.... moving the main controls to the BOTTOM of the screen, floating above your music (rendering the music below only partially readable and not clickable). It puts the primary music controls as far away as possible from the other 'controlling' elements of the App, i.e. the menu bar, and the context switching graphic makes it unnecessarily difficult to scrub through long music pieces. So frustrating when the previous modality and form worked exceedingly well for the task! But then again... this is (hopefully was with Mac OS 27) the new Apple - Form over Function please!
Sorry... That stupid controller bar has been bugging me since OS 26 release.
Sorry... That stupid controller bar has been bugging me since OS 26 release.
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Last night, I was asking Siri for the scores in the Montreal Canadiens and Anaheim Ducks games.
It gave me results from games that took place.. who knows how long ago, but certainly not the games that were actually taking place (wrong opponent)
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When I worked on RCS, it was possible to encrypt from client to server and vice versa, but wasn’t necessarily encrypted on the servers.
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I absolutely second that! It’s the only thing I use Siri for and only when I’m driving.. I’ve ended up switching the stereo off a few times when I just can’t get it to play the music I’ve asked it for (mostly politely) about 10 times
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Have you got it set to offload apps you don’t regularly use? That made all the difference on mine (also binning a load of apps that I’d forgotten about helped too!)
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Its behavior under low storage should probably also mean prompting the user well before it's actually at zero storage, as it gets sketchy and starts doing weird things well before that
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As an Android user who texts with a lot of iOS users I'm personally excited for the E2EE on RCS.
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Geronimoooooooooooooooo....................................................................
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can someone explain why I need so much damn storage to install this? I've got like 10 or 12 gigs free, the install says it's only 5ish gigs but it's telling me I need to free up space.
I'm hoping it fixes some battery issues I've been having since th elast round of major updates
I'm hoping it fixes some battery issues I've been having since th elast round of major updates
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I did just that when iOS26 made my iPad Pro unusably slow. I bought an M3 iPad Air that came with iOS 18 and turned off auto upgrade.
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There’s an open Radar about space consumption. My guess is that they have something like a log file or cache which doesn’t correctly purge because the “System Data” size category starts at like 16GB after a reboot before growing to the point where it interferes with everything else.
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My system data is only 11GB, so it seems like something is wrong there. Maybe do a full hardware reboot and see if the caches clear and leave you with enough space?
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The RCS migration has been…a letdown.
the android ecosystem is so full of workarounds, it feels like 90% of my friends get full resolution pictures, and a few others get nothing but pixelated garbage.
“Android to Android works great!”
That’s nice, and I don’t necessarily believe it. Why is Apple’s adherence to the standard breaking messaging on -some- Android phones but not others? Who knows?
What a mess.
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image playground is probably the most disappointing piece of demo ware that Apple has ever shipped.
Try putting one of their own product names into it.
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The main issue I've seen on my end for cross iOS and Android RCS (once I switched from Samsung Messages to Google Messages) is not getting read receipts from iOS. This happens on both group and 121.
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