Despite the fact that the world has turned a little crazy out there, Apple’s annual World Wide Developer Conference (WWDC) will still unfold in 2020. Every year, Apple holds this event to give developers an early look at what it has planned for the coming year for iOS, iPadOS, watchOS, tvOS, and macOS. This year will take place over the internet thanks to COVID-19.
Apple has just announced that they will hold the Keynote address as usual though. The Keynote will kick off WWDC 2020 Monday, June 22 at 10AM PDT. I’ll be watching at home, and will have updates for you soon after. So make sure you check in during the week.
Still, here are some things that I would love to be shown off at WWDC 2020 in regards to the iPhone and devices that connect to it. This week, I’m focusing on the Keynote itself, the iPhone, and things that attach to the iPhone.
So here’s what I’d love to see from WWDC 2020 for the iPhone, Apple Watch, HomePod, and Apple TV.
WWDC 2020 Keynote
The biggest mystery surrounding this years Developer Conference, is how will Apple deliver the Keynote? The Keynote sets the stage for developers on what’s to come. Normally, Tim Cook and Craig Federighi come out on stage to tell the live audience what they have in store for all of their operating systems in the coming year. But without people in the stands will they still do that?
I highly doubt that they will come out on stage and talk to an empty sea of seats. The announcement even mentions that the Keynote “will stream directly from Apple Park.” My bet is that they will have more recorded videos like the one that came out after the Magic Keyboard launched. I’m imagining a movie like reveal for everything this year.
Maybe everything will be streamlined. Instead of introducing a feature, talking about it, and then moving to a device on the side of the stage demonstrating it, they will cut out some of that. Just announce a feature and then show how it works and move on to the next one.
It will have a different feel than any year before. That is exciting and nerve-racking at the same time.
iPhone
The iPhone is usually the star of the show. Apple makes most of its money off of the device, so it’s no wonder why it spends so much time on it. It also usually sets the standard for everything else. If something new comes to the iPhone, it usually shows up on the iPad too. Many times it comes to the Mac too, just a little later.
I’ve been very happy with my iPhone 11 Pro Max. Besides getting annoyed when FaceID wouldn’t unlock when wearing a mask, I wouldn’t change anything. I can’t even complain about that anyway, because Apple fixed that quickly. The love I have for the iPhone made it one of the hardest categories to figure out what I wanted. But I did come up with a few things that I expect or would like some focus on at this year’s event.
IR Sensor/AR
I do expect the next iPhone to get the IR camera that the new iPad Pro got this year. It won’t be unveiled until the iPhone event later in the year though. I would anticipate a lot of time focused on AR because of the new sensor. It is rumored to be coming to the iPhone later this year.
AR is interesting, but there hasn’t been a feature to get me to dive in. I’ve said that I would jump into AR when there is a headset. Currently, holding up your phone and having to flick things on the screen doesn’t make the system easy to use. So I don’t see much buy-in from users.
I hope Apple uses this sensor to improve photography though. On the iPad, they haven’t integrated IR into the camera at all. Now, the iPad isn’t normally used as a great camera, but it does have a great viewfinder. Apple could work on using the IR sensor on the iPad for now and then bring it to the iPhone when the new phones come out. With IR in the camera app, I would expect portrait mode to improve greatly since it helps determine depth. Portrait mode is already pretty great, but the IR could help make it much better.
Stop Taking Over My Screen
One thing I don’t like about my phone is when I get a phone call. I have to stop what I’m doing because the entire screen has been taken over by the interface. The same thing happens when you invoke Siri. It gets even more frustrating if you have a HomePod nearby. When you try to wake up the HomePod with the magic words while using your phone, the phone screen will get taken over by Siri. I’m not sure why this happens at all anymore. Siri could work just as well in a small form on the phone screen, and it would allow me to continue to do what I was doing. This smaller size would make it a true assistant since I wouldn’t have to stop what I was doing.
I’d love for phone calls and Siri to become notification sized banners that you can swipe to dismiss. I’m not sure why Apple still uses the entire screen for a voice assistant. Maybe if you asked for photos I could see why Siri takes over the entire screen, but I’d like to see a rethinking of how the Assistant works on the phone.
Default Apps
To that point, I think it’s time that Apple allows the user to determine which apps they would like to use for things. For example, if you use Chrome on your phone instead of Safari, you’d like your own web browser to open. Apple doesn’t really allow this, although they have been improving things with Shortcuts and the Share Sheet.
But it’s time that Apple allowed people to choose which app they’d like to use. I think the hardest part is finding a way to make this user friendly on iOS. They could stick the options behind the Settings app, or maybe even the long-press menu on the app button.
Unbundled System Apps
If Apple does allow users to change the default apps, it would make sense for them to also let their own apps be unbundled from iOS updates.
Right now, apps like Music, Mail, News, Safari, only get updated when there is a system update. Apple doesn’t update them on their own, so if there is a flaw, the entire operating system has to be updated. I would like Apple to break these apps out of the system and build them on their own. Make them as good as they can, and increase the rate of improvement. They used to on the Mac, but they have rolled them all into system updates there as well.
Of course, we don’t want to be updating apps every week, but I also don’t want to be waiting months for a .1 update to iOS either. Users can already download the app from the App store if they are deleted from a phone, why not let us get updates through the App store as well?
Widgets
Another thing I’d like added to the iPhone is something that my Android friends have had for a long time: widgets on the home screen.
iPhone users do have the today view, the screen if you move to the left of the home screen, that hosts the current implementations of widgets. I’d like to see those widgets on my Home Screen.
It would be nice if you could embed some widgets on the home screen that could take up some space of a few app icons. Imagine if there were a weather widget that took up a 2×2 app icon space. If you placed those widgets at the top of the screen, you could get all the info at a glance instead of a static app. It would also save users having to reach up to push a button high on the screen to open an app. On a larger Max sized phone, it would make it so that users didn’t have to reach up to the top corners which can be hard to reach one-handed.
HomeKit improvements
As I mentioned in my post last week, I’m currently planning out my Smart Home. I’ve been happy with HomeKit, and it keeps improving. But there are some simple things that are missing.
When I first started with my Hue Light Bulbs, my favorite feature was the ability to slowly turn on the bulbs. I set the lights to slowly come on at sunset. It was a gradual process that made the transition very pleasant.
But there’s no ability like that in HomeKit. You can only set bulbs on or off. You can’t have a light fade out or on. I would love for that ability to come to HomeKit. HomeKit was designed to be an app that you could use to control all the Smart Home things in one app, but if I can’t get that ability inside the app then I have to use the Hue app. That defeats the purpose of having one app. When you start setting schedules in many different apps, things can go crazy or not work.
I’m sure there are other granular aspects that others might want inside the HomeKit app that I’m missing. So I hope that Apple spends a few minutes on stage to discuss how they are going to push HomeKit further.
Shortcuts
Finally, I’d like to see more support for Shortcuts. I don’t have many shortcuts set up, but that’s because I seem to run into some roadblocks. Either the app that I want to use doesn’t support Shortcuts or I can’t make the thing happen that I want.
I was trying to create a shortcut the other day that would trigger if I came home to an empty home. The shortcut would move my music automatically to my HomePod. While you can set a home automation to detect if you are the first to arrive you can’t set up a shortcut to do the same. So I could get the HomePod to start playing if I was the first to get home, but I couldn’t get it to transfer what was currently playing on my phone.
I really like setting up Shortcuts and automations and I hope they continue to push the system forward. Shortcuts can be pretty easy to create after all.
Apple Watch
Once again, I’m not sure where I’d like the Apple Watch to go. I’m happy with what my Apple Watch can currently do. I can definitely see a day where my Watch does everything that I use my phone for, maybe paired with a set of AR glasses. That day could be coming soon, but we aren’t there yet.
Right now, my watch does everything I want it to: tells time, monitors my activity, and alerts me to new notifications. Apple has added an always-on screen and a compass, so what else could I want?
Continue to Refine
I want Apple to continue to refine watchOS. The watch is pretty easy to use, but my mother still struggles. She doesn’t struggle with her iPhone or iPad. I think it can be hard to get around watchOS, but I’m not sure how to fix it. I’m glad that Apple has allowed users to get a list view of apps instead of the honeycomb, but how many people know about this? If you push the dial on your watch to see your apps, then force press the screen and you get view options.
Are there other places that the Watch could be refined? Let me know in the comments below.
Rest Days
Closing activity rings can be an addictive way to motivate yourself. I always try to get a streak going when I really get after my fitness. But trying to close those rings every day can be exhausting. Closing rings can be tougher Apple doesn’t allow for rest days. Instead, I probably have my goal set at a lower goal than I should, just so that I can still close that ring on my rest day. Rest is good and needed. After six days of hard work, I don’t want to have to get up and get my heart elevated for thirty minutes. I’m tired. This has caused me to use a different app for a leisurely walk because I know that it will give me more credit than the Apple app will.
More Health Sensors
Apple has long positioned the Apple Watch as a health device. The watch has saved lives. My wife has used the Apple Watch to track her heartbeat when she had some heart issues. Her heart palpitations have returned now that she is pregnant. She has even gone to a cardiologist to make sure she has things under control. She hadn’t had any issues in a couple of days leading up to her appointment but the doctor appreciated that she used her watch to get her ECG. It let him see what was happening when it happened. He also mentioned that she could place her Apple Watch on different parts of her body to get different leads. It’s amazing that a piece of tech can help monitor something so important.
That said, I’d never say no to new sensors that could help with health issues or fitness. I know we usually get something new with each watch model, but I’ve heard that the watch can already detect some metrics that it hasn’t brought to the user’s attention just yet.
Better Connection to Devices
There have been times when I’m trying to update my podcasts on Overcasts or record a workout where the pairing between the phone and the watch just seems to disappear and the syncing breaks something. Often times, my podcast or workout just forgets everything that I had done up to that point and just starts over. That shouldn’t be happening with either of these two standout features of the watch.
When Apple introduced Unlock my Mac I was pumped. For some reason, the watch never fails on my older MacBook Pro nor on my new MacBook Air but it hardly ever works on my iMac. I have long thought it could be related to having an account on the iMac for myself and for my wife, but my wife has added an account to my Air and the watch still works great.
I would just like for everything to be tightened up. Since my iMac doesn’t have a fingerprint sensor nor a FaceID sensor, the added support of the Apple Watch would be a feature I used all the time, but it never works.
Smarter Complications
One thing that I would really like on the Apple Watch are smart complications. Right now, there are two ways to get dynamic information on your Apple Watch: The Siri watch face or a new app called WatchSmith.
I would love it if Apple could build in a Siri complication. My idea is that the complication could change based on location or time of day. Your watch learns about you the more you use it. Why can’t Apple set a complication that shows me the weather when I wake up and then my estimated time in traffic on my way to work when I leave (remember the days when we left for work)? How about popping up a reminders list when I park my car in the grocery store parking lot? The complications do a great job of showing information but I’d love it if there was a dynamic way to change them instead of having to change watch faces.
Better Coaching
Last year, Apple added Trends to the activity app. It is pretty cool to see how you are doing with your fitness compared to last year, but I would like to see them use the data in a more proactive way.
Maybe the app could see that your running pace as decreased so it would recommend a training pattern with sprints in it. How about telling the app that you are trying to lose weight and it will use the data from the health and activity apps to help you come up with a plan to lose weight?
I feel like there is a huge potential there to really tap into. The company has done a great job getting us to this point, now let’s try to push it even further.
HomePod
The HomePod is a frustrating product. It launched at a price that I laughed at. It didn’t do much either. Since its release, I’ve managed to snag a couple of them on sale. I ended up liking the personal assistant/amazing speaker. In my smaller sized home, the sound is great and two have been enough, but since I’m moving into a larger house soon, I’m going to want more.
Besides the price, Apple has been slow to push the product. Apple hasn’t advanced the speaker too far. Yes, they added multi-user support and the ability to have multiple timers going, but that just seems like table stakes for a smart speaker.
But I do hope that they push the system further.
HomePod Mini
There is still only one model of HomePod, which puts it at a disadvantage over its competitors. Both Amazon and Google offer smaller smart speakers that you can usually get for $20. The HomePod is big and comes in one size for $299. For the price, you get one of the best audio experiences but it gets tough to deploy HomePods through a home.
I would love it if Apple was able to offer a smaller HomePod that was cheaper in addition to the current one. While I wouldn’t expect Apple to skimp on sound quality, it wouldn’t need to be AS good because it would be used to deploy throughout a larger home. I would love to have a HomePod in every room, but I don’t really see that working. Amazon and Google have a good system with the smaller speakers that are just there for the assistant integration. I wish Apple would make something similar.
A smaller version could also help with the adoption of the device, which might make more people spend money on the larger one once they get their hands on the smaller one.
HomePod Sound Bar
To that effect, it would be awesome if Apple could make a HomePod soundbar, maybe one with an Apple TV built into it. Many users already pair their HomePods to their Apple TV for audio, so why doesn’t Apple try to tackle the Home Audio market too? They could compete with Sonos and make something as good as the newly released Arc soundbar.
It would save some people some space in their entertainment systems. I can just imagine a combined Apple TV/HomePod line. It would be nice to just ask Siri to play something on the TV and have it work. Right now, I’m planning to build out a Sonos system in the main living area of our home, and Apple isn’t really factoring into it.
Better Siri
But Siri needs some work.
Before you start to nod your head in agreement, hold on. I don’t have a problem with Siri, and if you look at my Smart Home post, there’s a video there comparing the smart assistants. Siri holds her own. What I want, and I think this will lead to a larger Siri bullet point later, is a more unified Siri.
I have my HomePod set up near my living room TV. Right now, I can ask Siri on my phone to play something on my Apple TV and it will work. If I ask my HomePod, I usually get a song on Apple TV or an excuse. If Siri on one device can do it, why can’t another? The HomePod just doesn’t have the capability because it doesn’t AirPlay video I’m guessing. When you ask your phone, it brings up the video on the phone and AirPlays it to the Apple TV. It works in a pinch, but why can’t the HomePod and Apple TV work together to get the video on the screen. If nothing else, maybe it could bring up a search menu or the Apple TV app queue to allow me to pick from there.
If I try to ask my phone to start a show within range of my HomePod, Siri punts the request to the HomePod. I get frustrated. I’d love it if Apple really dug into Siri and made it the same on every device, or at least allowed devices to handoff request to a device that can handle it.
Apple TV
I feel like the Apple TV is a bit of a hot mess right now, but that it also does what it is designed to do. I’m not sure that Apple knows what it wants to do with the TV space anymore. Apple has brought AirPlay and HomeKit to new TVs from other companies, as well as the TV app and that’s a great move.
One of my favorite aspects of using Apple TV is the Up Next feature. The Up Next feature puts the shows and movies you watch in one list, as long as apps support it. Notably, Netflix doesn’t support it, so half of the content I watch doesn’t get put on there. The Up Next feature does help you organize and pick shows that you want to watch. However, I feel like the TV app has gone a little off the rails, and I wish that Apple would work to fix it.
Promotion Inside the TV App
When the TV app started, I felt like it was actually better than what we have now. When you linked your viewing app into the TV app, the For You page of the app would help to promote shows and movies to watch from within those apps. Viewers didn’t have to go through different apps when browsing to find something to watch.
Since then, Apple brought Apple TV Channels to the app. Users could subscribe to those channels inside the TV app and get the content from within. This allowed you to use just one app to view most of your content. Only, you have to pay inside the TV app with an in-app-purchase to get that content. It is a great system, but I’ve already subscribed to the apps I want, and none of them are even offered as Apple TV Channels. Now, the app seems to only promote things that are on the channels or things on the iTunes store to buy or rent.
I get that Apple is in the business to make money, but I would love if the apps that you tied in promoted more shows to you than the channels did. Or maybe, Apple needs to get more apps to come into the TV app. Maybe if the channels I wanted to subscribe to were in there, I might enjoy the app more. Right now, there’s no Netflix, Hulu, Disney+, or HBO Max channels inside the app. The only channel that I actually subscribe to is Apple TV+ which is currently free for me, and I’m not sure that I’ll continue to pay for it once my free year is over.
I wish Apple could find a way to get apps outside the TV app to play like Channels inside though. It might improve what is promoted to me inside the app and allow me to find something to watch quicker.
Cheaper Devices
I think it is great that Apple has allowed TV manufacturers to include AirPlay 2 and HomeKit inside them. It reduces the need to buy an expensive streaming box from Apple. The current Apple TV 4K runs for $180 while the Amazon Firestick costs only $50. That’s a big problem for Apple if someone has to choose between the two, most people will pay the cheaper price to get the content they want in their home.
But for a while now, there have been rumors about a Apple TV stick coming. Could Apple finally be dropping the price and size of the Apple TV and creating a cheaper streaming stick? It would be nice for those of us with older TVs that aren’t ready to upgrade, or don’t trust the new streaming TVs.
If nothing else, it feels like Apple needs to drop the price of the Apple TV. When the 2nd and 3rd generation Apple TV came out (the smaller puck shaped ones) Apple was able to bring them in for a pretty cheap price. They seemed to take off. Then Apple updated the Apple TV to the modern version and the price climbed up.
I’m pretty sure that I will continue to Apple TVs as my streaming platform of choice. It may be more expensive than other options, but I trust that Apple isn’t selling my watching data like the other companies. So I would greatly welcome a newer and cheaper system that I could bring out to all my TVs.
Wrap Up
That’s what I’m hoping to see for the iPhone and it’s peripheral devices when Apple kicks off WWDC. The iPhone has really matured over the years to a point where I’m not sure what else they can really push forward on. The same could be said about the Apple Watch.
But I’m sure that Apple will come out with some exciting and unexpected advances. The company always does a great job of finding ways to excite me when I feel like I have what I want.
Be cure to check what I want to see for the iPad, Mac, and more.
Now that the event has come and gone, see what actually got announced this year. Here’s Everything announced at WWDC 2020