CUPERTINO, CALIFORNIA Apple today unveiled new tools, technologies, and APIs designed to help developers create even richer experiences for their users. Widgets on the Lock Screen enable developers to surface key information from their apps in a new way, while other new APIs across Apple’s platforms help them build more unique features. WeatherKit gives developers the ability to integrate Apple Weather forecast data directly into their apps, and Xcode Cloud — Apple’s continuous integration and delivery service built into Xcode — is now available to every Apple Developer Program member to help them create higher-quality apps, faster. Metal 3 enables gaming developers to create breathtaking graphics with accelerated performance, and developing for Apple’s platforms is now even more intuitive with improvements to Swift, SwiftUI, and Xcode. And with improvements to SKAdNetwork, ad networks and developers can better measure how ads perform while still preserving user privacy.

Xcode 14 features new enhancements to further improve developer productivity. Project builds are up to 25 percent faster, thanks to improved parallelism, and the Xcode application is now 30 percent smaller to download, with downloadable simulator runtimes for watchOS and tvOS. The new multiplatform target creates a single SwiftUI interface for use across iOS, iPadOS, macOS, and tvOS. Developer code is easier to maintain yet highly customizable to take advantage of each platform’s unique capabilities. SwiftUI live previews are now interactive by default in Xcode, so changes are immediately live, and developers can create variants of each preview without writing any code, altering the color scheme, text size, device orientation, or accessibility modes. The new App Icon feature in Assets Catalog allows developers to provide a single icon size for all platforms, and Xcode automatically generates all the required assets for the app. Xcode includes language and editing enhancements with smarter autocompletion, and additional dynamic snippets get developers to the code they want to write faster.

• Widgets on the Lock Screen: With iOS 16 enabling widgets on the iPhone Lock Screen, developers can now seamlessly share the same code between their widgets on the Lock Screen and complications on Apple Watch, which are based on the same new WidgetKit API.

• Live Text: Developers can now offer users the ability to grab text straight from photos and videos found in their apps, or through a live camera feed. Live Text is processed on device for greater user privacy and performance.

• Collaboration tools: The rich collaboration features built into Messages are available to third-party apps. Developers can also highlight content that users have shared from their app in Messages in a new Shared with You section of their app, making it easier for recipients to get back to that content at a later time.

• Passkeys: Passkeys are next-generation credentials that are more secure, easier to use, and designed to work in apps as easily as they do on the web.

• MapKit: Third-party apps can include the detailed 3D city experience and Look Around for a richer user experience. New Apple Maps Server APIs offer faster and easier Maps integrations.

• Focus filters: Developers can adjust the content of their apps based on the user’s current Focus.

• Automatic Shortcuts: Developers can now use App Intents to enable their apps to be used with Siri and Shortcuts, with no user setup required.

• watchOS 9: VoIP calls are now supported with CallKit; the share sheet enables users to share content from their favorite app directly to iMessage and other popular messaging apps; and third-party apps can now access the Photos app with Photos picker and even integrate with Apple TV.

• RoomPlan: Powered by ARKit, developers can now utilize the LiDAR Scanner on iPhone and iPad to create a 3D floor plan for a room, with characteristics like dimensions and type of furniture included.

• Live Activities: Using WidgetKit, developers can keep their users up to date with the most current information for an activity or event right on the Lock Screen.²