Some of iOS 15’s best features will be saved for future updates.
It happens every year. Apple shows off a bunch of awesome new iOS features at WWDC, only to have a handful of them miss the initial release. We shouldn’t be surprised that the same is happening with iOS 15. Some of the delayed features are big, some are small, but inevitably they will show up—in iOS 15.1, iOS 15.2, or another update. We don’t have an exact release timeframe for any of these “missing” iOS 15 features (Apple rarely divulges that sort of thing). We only know that history tells us to expect them before the end of the year. Here are the iOS 15 features we already know will miss that first release when it arrives on September 20. Updated 09/20/21: Apple announced that expanded Find My support for AirPods won’t be included in iOS 15 until later this fall. This is one of the biggest new features of iOS 15, iPadOS 15, and macOS Monterey. It lets you use FaceTime to watch TV or movies together, share your screen, or listen to music together. It keeps playback in sync with your remote FaceTime friends, lets them control playback, and even dynamically controls volume so you can hear each other speak over the music or video. It just doesn’t work that great. Apple has officially delayed the feature, and now says it will come in a feature update after the initial launch of iOS 15 and macOS Monterey. That’s a good thing, as it’s more important to get it right than get half-baked features out to a billion users who will form a bad first impression. Apple New in iOS 15 are a pair of features to deal with access to your iCloud account. Recovery Contacts is a way to designate a trusted family member or friend (who also has an Apple product) that can get a one-time code for you, which you can use to get access to your Apple ID if you get locked out. That one is going to be there from launch. Legacy Contacts is something else. It allows you to designate contacts who will be able to get access to your iCloud data after you die. Given how many of our precious memories are stored in photos and emails and such, it’s an important thing. It was part of the iOS 15 beta releases until beta 5, when it went away. In the release notes, Apple said, “Legacy Contacts has been removed from iOS & iPadOS 15 beta 5 and will return in a future release.” We’re not entirely sure if that future release will be before the final iOS 15 launch or in a future update, but it certainly sounds like the latter.
