Apple’s iOS 7 to launch on Wednesday, 18 September

10 Sep 2013

Apple’s next-generation mobile operating system iOS 7 will be available to download on Wednesday, 18 September, the company announced today.

The new OS comes with 200 new features including Control Center, Notification Center, improved Multitasking, AirDrop, enhanced Photos and introduces iTunes Radio, a new free internet radio service that boasts over 200 radio stations and a catalogue of music from the iTunes store.

iOS 7 will be available as a free software update starting on Wednesday, 18 September for iPhone 4 and later, iPad 2 and later, iPad mini and iPod touch (fifth generation).

The OS comes with a redesigned Photos app that introduces Moments, a new way to automatically organise your photos and videos based on time and location

It also features full-screen browsing with Safari’s new redesigned user interface, the new smart search field helps simplify searching, and there’s a new view for your bookmarks and your Safari tabs.

Additional new iOS 7 features include a new Find My iPhone Activation Lock, that requires your Apple ID and password before you can turn off Find My iPhone, erase data or re-activate a device after it’s been remotely erased.

The new OS also features Siri with new male and female voices, a Twitter search engine, Wikipedia integration and Bing web searching.

“iOS 7 is completely redesigned with an entirely new user interface and over 200 new features, so it’s like getting a brand new device, but one that will still be instantly familiar to our users,” said Craig Federighi, Apple’s senior vice president of Software Engineering.

“Next month we’ll be shipping our 700 millionth iOS device, and we’re excited about what our hundreds of thousands of iOS developers are doing to bring great new features to their apps.”

64-bit computing arrives on the iPhone

iOS 7 has been engineered to take advantage of the advanced 64-bit technologies in the iPhone 5s, including a native 64-bit kernel, libraries and drives – that’s pretty much desktop class.

iOS 7 also provides deep integration with the new Touch ID sensor in the iPhone 5s to enable new features like automatic image stabilisation, Burst Mode and Slo-Mo video with 120 frames per second.

Combined with the new Camera App in iOS 7, iPhone 5s provides up to two-times faster auto-focus, faster photo capture and better dynamic range. iOS 7 is designed to complement the gorgeous exteriors of iPhone 5c, with matching wallpapers and translucency that carry the colour through the entire experience.

The OS comes with a redesigned Photos app that introduces Moments, a new way to automatically organise your photos and videos based on time and location

It also features full-screen browsing with Safari’s new redesigned user interface, the new smart search field helps simplify searching, and there’s a new view for your bookmarks and your Safari tabs.

John Kennedy is a journalist who served as editor of Silicon Republic for 17 years

editorial@siliconrepublic.com