Apple announced the upcoming iOS 26 software for iPhone back on June 9, 2025, with a revamped Liquid Glass look and a host of new features. Those additions include live translations, AI-powered visual search, a new Games app, and better security, and you can read about those new features here.
Almost straight after the update was announced, Apple started a beta program for developers and early adopters. Since then, we’ve seen even more upgrades added to the iOS 26 that weren’t mentioned during the announcement.
With a full rollout of iOS 26 expected in September, to coincide with the iPhone 17 launch, here are all the significant new features Apple has added during the beta phase—and which will soon be coming to your iPhone.
CarPlay wallpapers: CarPlay is an extension of iOS that extends the familiar phone interface to your car’s head unit, and Apple has used the iOS 26 beta to roll out CarPlay wallpapers that match the new-look iPhone wallpapers.
Control Center: Among the Liquid Glass refinements added to iOS 26 during the beta program, the various elements in the Control Center have been made more legible as the company continues to strive for balance between aesthetics and functionality.
Drafts in Messages: Before now, if you started a text you didn’t finish in the Messages app, it wasn’t easy to find again. iOS 26 fixes this by introducing a dedicated Drafts folder.
Dynamic wallpaper: like iOS 18 before it, iOS 26 has added a dynamic wallpaper option during the beta, so the color of your iPhone’s backdrop can slowly change during the day.
Liquid Glass tweaks: iOS 26 looks a lot different to iOS 18, and this look has been continually tweaked during the beta, including more transparency on the lock screen.
Live Radio widget: Widgets don’t miss out with the iOS 26 update, because there’s a new Live Radio widget attached to the Apple Music app for you to put on your home screen.
Low battery alert: It’s always useful to know when your iPhone’s battery is low, and iOS 26 adds a redesigned low battery alert to the Dynamic Island at the top of the screen.
More wallpapers: As well as adding a dynamic wallpaper option (see above), the betas have also added more color variations for the new default wallpaper for iOS 26.
New ringtones: A bunch of new ringtones give you more options for incoming calls, including variations on the default Reflection ringtone, and a new one called Little Bird.
Notification summaries: Notification summaries for news and entertainment apps were pulled back in January while Apple fine-tuned them, but they make a return in iOS 26.
Performance improvements: iOS 26 has continued to get better and feel snappier over time, which means you shouldn’t notice any slowing down when you get it installed.
Personalized weather: You can now choose to give the Weather app access to the list of places you often visit stored by your iPhone, for more personalized weather forecasts.
Redesigned Apple Watch blood oxygen monitoring: Apple is bringing back blood oxygen tracking to the Apple Watch, but this time the feature will run mostly on the iPhone. You can get this feature back in the US with a Series 9, Series 10, or Ultra 2 watch.
Restore your iPhone: Apple has now made it easier to restore your iPhone without the need for a Windows or macOS computer, to streamline the troubleshooting process.
Silence unknown callers: When calls from unknown numbers reach iOS 26, they can be silenced by default, or allowed to ring as normal, or the caller can be prompted for more details before the call is put through. It’s part of Call Screening in the Phone app.
Add in all the bug fixes that Apple has rolled out over the last couple of months, and iOS 26 is just about ready to go. Expect an announcement about wide availability when the iPhone 17 launch happens, which should be in the first or second week of September.
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