Apple iOS 14-5 Update 📱 The Best New Features in 2021

Apple has released iOS 14-5, officially to the public.

I am going to go over everything that you need to know in iOS 14–5.

Apple iOS 14-5 New Feature’s

The biggest new feature out of this update is the ability to unlock your iPhone when wearing a mask using your Apple Watch.

Unlock iPhone with Apple Watch With New iOS 14-5 Update

There is now an unlock with the Apple Watch option that lets the iPhone use an unlocked and authenticated Apple Watch as a secondary authentication method when face ID cannot see your entire face due to a face covering.

I can say that this method of unlocking your phone generally works pretty well.

It is a little delayed compared to standard face ID when your face isn’t covered, which is obviously to be expected.

But for the most part, I have rarely had any moments where it just flat out didn’t work.

Unfortunately, you cannot use this feature when authenticating passwords or using Apple Pay, which is for security reasons and I understand that.

But I’ve kind of wish Apple gave you the personal choice for us to toggle that on or off because it would be very handy to use face ID again in conjunction with Apple Pay at the store.

iOS 14-5 also brings us Air Tag support, allowing them to be tracked within the find my app on the iPhone 11 and iPhone 12.

There’s a precision finding feature in iOS 14-5 that takes advantage of the U1 chip to provide visual, audible, and haptic feedback to guide you to a lost item.

Apple Maps is getting away like crowdsourcing feature for reporting accidents, hazards, and speed checks along a route when getting directions you can do this by tapping on the report button.

Then from here, you can report an accident as a hazard, or if a police officer is out checking your speed.

Crowdsource information provided by Apple Maps users will be displayed in the Apple Maps app, offering an earlier heads up at accidents and hazards that need to be avoided.

There’s also an option to send an ETA to someone through messages when either cycling or walking.

iOS 14-5 also brings support for the airplay for your fitness plus subscribers out there allowing users to display workouts on a bigger screen via airplay to enabled smart TVs or set-top boxes.

Unfortunately, Apple Watch metrics will not be displayed on the TV along with activity rings, your workout time, calories burned, etc.

iOS 14-5 Dual Sim Support

There’s also new dual sim 5g support, which is available for iPhone 12 models that support dual sim and In USA TMobile customers and now have standalone 5G network support options inside of the voice and data section in the Settings app.

Improvements to smart data mode offer optimizations on 5g networks to improve data usage and extend battery life and 5g International roaming has also been enabled for supported carriers on iPhone 12 Models.

iOS 14-5 Several New Emoji

There are also new several emoji characters in this latest update, like a heart on fire, mending heart, exhaling Face Face with spiralizing face in the clouds, and different gender options for people with beards.

Apple also removed the blood from the syringe emoji to give it a more neutral look so that it can now be used for things like vaccinations.

And the headphone emoji now resembles air pods Macs.

There is now an option to select a preferred streaming service when asking Siri to play songs.

Siri will use that choice now whenever you request to play a music podcast or an audiobook.

Now, this is technically not a default music setting.

And there is no toggle to select a service that you want to continually use.

But the hope is this feature is where Siri will learn your preferences and adapt to them.

And since there is no toggle, Siri will occasionally re-ask you for your preferred services to keep everything up to date.

Now speaking of Siri, there are also new voices available to choose from.

So feel free to check those out along with Siri now being able to announce incoming phone calls.

And the last biggest feature that we’re going to talk about here are the changes to the podcast app that Apple introduced with a new smart button that replaces the prior Play Button along with an updated interface that makes it easier to find and follow as well as listen to new podcasts.

Podcasts under shows are now more prominently listed with episode descriptions and easier access to a Resume button.

Plus the search tab lets you browse through different categories to find exactly what you’re looking for.

There is also an option to save and download podcast episodes automatically adding them to the library for quick access and download and notification settings can be customized on a show-by-show basis.

Now when you want to follow a podcast, you have the option to pay to help support the creators of your favorite podcasts.

These are just some of the major changes and features in iOS 14-5.

Thanks so much for reading and I hope to see you around in the next article.