Apple has reportedly begun developing operating systems for its devices next year. The report comes just a month after the Cupertino-based tech giant unveiled iOS 18, macOS Sequoia, watchOS 11 and visionOS 2 at the Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) 2024. iOS 18, which will be publicly unveiled this fall, is coming home. screen tweaks, Control Center improvements, RCS support, and more. While little is known about what iOS 19 might bring, the company is said to have codenamed it Luck.
Apple is reportedly starting development on iOS 19, macOS 16, and more
The information comes from Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman in his Power On newsletter, which mentions that the company has officially begun development of the main operating systems of 2025. These include iOS 19 for iPhone, macOS 16 for Mac devices, watchOS 12 for Apple Watch, and visionOS 3 for Apple Vision Pro.
Citing unnamed sources, Gurman claims that Apple has also allocated special code names for each of the aforementioned operating systems. While iOS 19 is called Luck, macOS 16 is codenamed Cheer. Internally, watchOS 12 is called Nepali, while visionOS 3 gets the internal name Discovery. Notably, these code names do not imply anything about new features that the OS may have.
The report highlights that the company’s work on next year’s operating systems begins at the same time it is also tweaking the current year’s OS, which will be rolled out in the fall. However, this is not unusual for the tech giant, which usually starts the software development process around this time of year. Gurman also says the company has also started developing hardware products for next year and will need software to test the devices.
Since the software development cycle is very early, new features or changes are not known at this stage. However, the leaks are expected to arrive in the coming days. In addition, Apple is also preparing to publicly launch iOS 18 later this year. The company recently released iOS 18 Developer Beta 2 with iPhone mirroring, a new toggle for RCS messaging (currently not activated), and a new dark-themed icon for the App Store.
