For the previous couple of years, Apple’s annual iOS updates have laser targeted on one function for an overhaul whereas making smaller tweaks to every thing else. Last yr, Focus was the, nicely, focus. The yr earlier than that, it was the house display.

This time it’s the lock display. You can now change fonts, add widgets, customise the knowledge displayed, and decide from a greater variety of wallpaper. Apple has additionally extra deeply built-in the lock display with the Focus modes that had been fleshed out in iOS 15. And it has laid the groundwork for one thing extra than simply notifications that third-party apps can present you earlier than you unlock your telephone.

Given the more and more iterative nature of iOS releases at this time—with many key options not arriving till months after the preliminary ship date of a brand new, whole-numbered model—we’re shifting to leaner preliminary iOS evaluations, with updates to return in extra articles over time. So at this time we’re going to have a look at the primary new function of iOS 16, however we’ll contact on a few different key options and adjustments, too.

The lock display

While iOS 16 touches most elements of utilizing the iPhone in quite a lot of small methods, it is extremely a lot “the lock screen update.” That is sensible: Apple makes plenty of noise about transport options that combine {hardware} and software program, and the iPhone 14 Pro’s new always-on show drives this emphasis on the lock display.

But there’s a lot right here for customers of different iPhone fashions that lack that always-on function. Following up final yr’s emphasis on Focus modes, and the earlier yr’s on house display customization, that is essentially the most vital transfer Apple has made on the customization entrance with the iPhone in, nicely, just about ever.

I do know what you’re going to say: aren’t these all options which were a part of Android for mainly an eternity now?

Yep, you’re proper—principally. In typical Apple trend, there are some thrives right here that Android doesn’t contact, however as for performance, that is principally yesterday’s information for Android diehards. But what was already a win for Android customers is essentially a win for iOS customers, too.

It’s simple to see the affect of the Apple Watch on this replace—the brand new widgets behave like problems, and the brand new lock display acts like a Watch face. That sentence proper there tells you nearly every thing it’s worthwhile to know concerning the new lock display. Picture the Apple Watch and all of the customizations, options, and limitations the Watch faces provide. Now make all that phone-sized. There you go, that’s the brand new iOS lock display.

To begin taking part in with these customizations, you simply long-press your finger on the lock display. This brings you to an interface with horizontally scrolling playing cards, every one representing one in every of your customized screens.

At the underside, there are three vital buttons. You can faucet “Focus” to alter the Focus mode that activates when this lock display is lively. You can faucet “customise” to alter your widgets, fonts, wallpapers, and extra. And there’s a “+” button so as to add a brand new customized lock display to the row of playing cards.

It begins with wallpapers

When you hit the + button, a panel pops as much as give you quite a lot of wallpaper potentialities. These choices fall into a couple of buckets. There are colour gradient wallpapers, the place you decide a basic colour theme and outline some attributes of a easy gradient. (It seems to be nicer than it sounds, really.)

There are collections, that are a bit like Apple’s earlier method to iPhone wallpapers: premade patterns in a couple of totally different colour choices.

You may also make a wallpaper out of emojis on a grid or in a sample throughout the display, and you’ll even decide which emojis to show. You can select as much as six emojis to incorporate within the wallpaper, utilizing Apple’s commonplace emoji-picking interface.

My private favourite bucket for wallpapers is the “Weather & Astronomy” class. These present little in the way in which of customization, however they’re fairly snazzy. The apparent one right here adjustments the wallpaper visuals to match the stay climate situations in your space—and stated visuals seem like those that already paint the Weather app.

There are additionally dynamic wallpapers for the Earth, moon, and photo voltaic system. The photo voltaic system one exhibits the precise present relative areas of the planets as they orbit the solar, whereas the Earth one exhibits your location on a globe with a inexperienced dot, amidst live-updating cloud cowl that displays situations across the globe.

The moon and Earth ones animate to totally different angles as you progress from the always-on show to an lively lock display after which swipe for the house display. It’s a enjoyable impact, and the moon wallpaper specifically seems to be wonderful on OLED iPhone screens.

But as neat as these are, I think about most individuals will select to go together with the wallpapers that use photographs out of your library within the Photos app. Tapping “Photos” provides you a alternative between particular person photographs in your telephone.

Using machine studying, the iPhone analyzes all of the photographs in your library so that you will be offered with “Featured” ideas, which I discovered to be totally on the cash. There are even subcategories for these featured ideas, together with individuals, pets, nature, and cities. And in fact, you may browse your complete photograph library and decide any picture you’d like.

There’s additionally “Photo Shuffle,” which is “a dynamic set of photos that shuffle as you use your iPhone throughout the day,” in response to the tooltip. You can set the shuffle frequency to alter on faucet, on lock, hourly, or every day. Once once more, it presents you with featured photographs, and it allows you to decide which classes to incorporate—however you may nonetheless manually choose every photograph out of your library.

This is pretty much as good a spot as any to notice that for photograph wallpapers, Apple makes use of some neat AI methods to chop out main objects within the picture, like faces or buildings, and permits them to overlay bits of the time indicator, making a neat impact. It’s surprising how nicely this works, really. Unfortunately, it doesn’t work if you add widgets beneath the time. Except for that limitation, you may toggle this on and off at will.

Once you’ve picked your wallpaper, you’re taken to the complete lock display customization view.