5 new features for your iPhone in iOS 18.3

Apple plans to release iOS 18.3 next week. This update includes improvements to Apple Intelligence features, new features for iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 16, and a number of bug fixes.

While not as feature-rich as some previous versions of iOS 18, iOS 18.3 offers features that are aimed at making your iPhone smarter and more intuitive.

Here are five key features that will be available with this update:

Adding events to Calendar from images

iOS 18.3 brings a new feature to iPhone 16 models — Visual Intelligence support, which allows you to quickly add events from posters or flyers directly to the Calendar app.

To use this feature:

1. Open the camera on your iPhone 16 and point it at a poster or flyer.
2. Press and hold the camera control button to activate Visual Intelligence.
3. After recognizing the event, select the Add to Calendar option.

This feature provides a convenient way to schedule events without having to enter information manually.

Real-time plant and animal recognition

With iOS 18.3, Apple is expanding the capabilities of ‌Visual Intelligence‌, allowing you to quickly identify plants, animals, and insects directly from the camera in real time.

How it works:

1. Open the camera on your ‌iPhone‌ and point it at a plant, animal, or insect.
2. Press and hold the camera control button to activate Visual Intelligence.
3. You will receive information about the object that you can view immediately.

This feature works similarly to the capabilities of the Photos app, but now you can get the data you need instantly, without saving the image.

Simplified notification summary management

With iOS 18.3, Apple simplifies the management of ‌‌‌Apple Intelligence‌‌‌ Notification summaries, which group multiple notifications from a single app into a convenient summary.

What's new:

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Control directly from the lock screen: Swipe left on a summarized notification to quickly turn off the summary for a specific app.

Restore settings: Enable summary for the app again in Settings ➝ Notifications ➝ Summarize notifications.

This feature provides greater flexibility in configuration notifications, allowing you to quickly adapt them to your needs.

Improved notification summary recognition

In iOS 18.3, Apple has introduced visual improvements to ‌‌‌Apple Intelligence‌‌‌ Notification summaries:

• Italic text: Summarized notifications are now displayed in italics, making them easy to distinguish from regular notifications.
• Temporary changes for News: Notification summaries for apps in the News category have been temporarily disabled due to the need to further improve their accuracy.

These updates improve the experience with notification summaries, making them more understandable to users.

Performing repetitive operations in Calculator

The iOS 18.3 update adds a useful feature for Calculator app users:

• Repeat last operation: Now, tapping the equal sign twice will cause the app to repeat the last math operation.
• Example: If you enter 10×10 and tap equal to get the result of 100, tapping the equal sign again will give 100×10, continuing to multiply by 10 with each by pressing.

This makes it easier to perform repetitive calculations, such as complex percentage operations, and greatly improves the usability of Calculator.