There are some transliteration keyboards for major Indian languages as well with iOS, iPadOS, macOS. IOS 17 brings new transliteration keyboards across major Indian languages such as Tamil, Telugu, Kannada and Malayalam.These keyboards can be useful for bilingual users who move between English and another language while talking to their contacts. These follow the release of keyboards for Urdu, Hindi, Punjabi, and Gujarati introduced in iOS 16.4, Bengali and Marathi introduced in iOS 16. There are also now built-in dictionary in Punjabi so users can get definitions of words and phrases from a variety of sources.

The dual-SIM experience has been improved with iOS 17. Users can see Messages sorted by their primary as well as secondary sim to be able to sort personal messages from work messages. They can also set different ringtones for each SIM, to understand if their iPhone is ringing because someone is calling a work phone number or personal phone number. If a user misses a call from a number that is not yet saved to their device, they can choose to call this number back from either SIM card.

There are a few India-specific features under what Apple terms ‘quality of life’ . For instance users can sign into their Apple ID using a phone number instead of an email address. Users can now see a more extended call history in Recents within the Phone app, including phone and FaceTime calls, as well as calls received on WhatsApp. Also on the communication front messages can be filtered by parameters such as unread, known senders, and unknown senders on iPad, in addition to the iPhone.

There are several hundred changes brought in with the new system upgrades. Among the more interesting features that aren’t limited to India is iOS 17 is a change made to AirDrop. Now, you merely have to bring your iPhone close to someone else's to share a Contact Poster, photos, videos or start \ a shared activity using Share Play - depending on what you choose. This ‘Name Drop’ feature may specifically interest business users at meetings and conferences. The feature hasn’t been unknown as it existed in some form with ‘Bump’ and on Android through third party apps and other means.

If you’re a light sleeper, try the Standby mode for the iPhone. With this, the device placed in landscape mode and charging with the MagSafe charger will turn its display into a night clock and calendar. You can see notifications and activities from whatever widgets you consider important. Everything is optional, so you’re free to turn it all off or customise to your liking. A night mode warms the light from the display, but of course some users are bothered by the slightest bit of light.

Feature collections will be explored in upcoming articles.

Apple WatchOS 10

India-specific, new features for Apple devices are here