When iOS 16.4 lands next week, there will be a few features you’ll instantly notice. But after you pore through the new emoji and set up your web app push notifications, there are a few extra features that you might not notice if you don’t know where to look.
Voice isolation for calls
A feature that popped up in the release candidate’s release notes, Voice Isolation for cellular calls “prioritizes your voice and blocks out ambient noise around you.” Already available for FaceTime, Apple says Voice Isolation can be used “when you want your voice to be heard clearly in a FaceTime call and other sounds filtered out.”
To turn the feature on, you’ll need to make or receive a call. Then you can open Control Center, tap Mic Mode, and select Voice Isolation. It won’t be quite as good as the second-gen AirPods Pro’s noise cancellation feature, but it should make a big difference when you’re making calls in a noisy room.
Apple Books page ‘curl’ animation
For some reason, Apple decided to remove Apple Books’ delightful curling animation when flipping pages in iOS 16. Good news, book lovers: it’s back in iOS 16.4. When you head over to the Apple Books settings, you’ll see a new Page Turn Animation tab with three options: Slide, Curl, and None. Tap Curl to change it from the iOS 16 default and make your iPhone feel like a tiny book again.
Duplicate detection in iCloud Shared Photo Library
When iOS 16 launched, it brought a new feature that automatically
detected duplicates and put them in their own album to let you decide
whether you wanted to merge them into one to clean up your camera roll.
However, the setting was only for individual libraries, which meant it
didn’t apply to iCloud Shared Photo libraries. In iOS 16.4 it does. To find it, switch to your shared library, then head over to the Album tab, scroll down to Utilities, and select Duplicates.
