Apple says iOS 16.3 coming next week

The iOS 16.3 update is coming next week, according to details from a recent Apple press release.

Apple noted in a recent press release the several ways it plans to celebrate Black History Month that iOS 16.3 would be “available next week” and would be required to enable some of the Black History Month features.

For the Black History Month features, these include the Unity 2023 watch face and Unity iPhone wallpaper for the lock screen. Both will become available next week and requires iOS 16.3 and watchOS 9.3.

Beyond that, several other features are coming to iOS 16.3, albeit not any crazy big ones. These include security keys for Apple ID, changes to ‘Call with Hold’ for EmergencySOS, and a guide for using Handoff to transfer playing music from an iPhone to a HomePod.

Security keys for Apple ID is probably the biggest feature — it enables the use of physical hardware security keys to act as a second layer of authentication for someone’s Apple ID. This will be a nice security bump for people’s Apple ID (as an aside, if you don’t have a hardware security key, it might be worth getting one).

As for Call with Hold, the update brings a minor change to how the feature works. Now the iPhone will wait until users release the buttons to call emergency services through Emergency SOS, even after the countdown. Previously, the feature would initiate a call after counting down, even if users were still holding the buttons.

Finally, the Handoff guide is exactly what it sounds like — it’s a short animation that pop-ups to show how Handoff works. Users with a HomePod set up on their Apple account should expect to see the guide appear after updating to iOS 16.3.

You can learn more about the Black History Month features here.

Via: 9to5Mac