On Tuesday, Apple released the iOS 18.2 Public Beta 1 update for the iPhone. It comes almost two weeks after the release of the developer beta. The latest update expands the range of features offered based on Apple Intelligence, the company’s artificial intelligence (AI) suite. This includes Image Playground, Genmoji, ChatGPT integration in Siri and other additions. It also includes some exclusive features related to camera controls for Apple’s latest iPhone 16 series.
iOS 18.2 Public Beta 1 Update: What’s New
In June 2024, at the Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC), Apple introduced a number of AI additions, but only a few of them were published. Image Playground and ChatGPT integration into Siri were announced as the most anticipated features, but both have been left out of Apple’s public beta updates until now.
iOS 18.2 Public Beta 1 adds Image Playground, a standalone app that lets users create AI images based on descriptive clues using generative AI. They can choose a reference person from their Photos app for inspiration and choose from a variety of art styles. The app also includes a Genmoji feature that does everything Image Playground does except create your own emoji. Apple says the images you create can be shared in apps like Messages, Notes, and Keynote.
Another notable addition is the Image Wand feature, which can turn a rough sketch into a related image in Notes using Apple Intelligence.
Apart from the features related to image and emoji creation, another notable feature of iOS 18.2 Public Beta 1 is the integration of ChatGPT into Siri. iPhone users can now take advantage of OpenAI’s large-scale language model (LLM) to get more detailed answers to queries and information about photos and documents from Siri, Apple’s voice assistant. ChatGPT also becomes part of the authoring tools in the Apple Intelligence suite. It can now modify the text even more based on text hints or create new text altogether by analyzing what the user has written before.
Apple says that using ChatGPT as part of Siri on iPhone requires an additional login. iPhone users with a paid ChatGPT account can use their account to access more powerful OpenAI models without any daily limits.
For iPhone 16 users, the Camera Control button gets additional features thanks to Visual Intelligence. It’s said to be Apple’s own version of Google Lens, which allows users to point the camera’s viewfinder at an object, search for it on the web, or ask ChatGPT for more information.
Other features of the update include a revamped email app with an on-device categorization system and expanded availability of Apple Intelligence for more English-speaking countries such as English (Australia), English (Canada) and English (New Zealand).