MacRumors

UC San Diego Health recently sent an online survey to its first 425 patients who activated Apple Health Records in 2018, and among 132 respondents, 78 percent indicated that they were "satisfied with using the feature."

96 percent of respondents said they could "easily connect their mobile devices to the platform," and 90 percent said the "smartphone solution improved their understanding of their own health, facilitated conversations with their clinicians, or improved sharing of personal health information with friends and family."

The survey results were published in the Journal of the American Medical Association this week by doctors at UC San Diego Health, one of the first hospitals and clinics to make Apple Health Records available to its patients.

Apple introduced the Health Records feature in iOS 11.3 in March 2018, allowing patients to view their medical records from multiple participating hospitals and clinics directly in the Health app on the iPhone, including allergies, vital signs, conditions, immunizations, lab results, medications, and procedures.

The journal submission cautions that, as with many new products and solutions, such enthusiasm is common from early adopters. The platform will need to "prove that it is useful, sustainable, scalable, and actually improves health outcomes," according to Christian Dameff, MD, UC San Diego Health.

As noted by CNBC's Christina Farr, hospitals have historically faced "major challenges" with getting patients to use electronic medical records because the technology "tends to be poorly designed and hard to use."

UC San Diego Health doctors believe three key developments may contribute to the success of Apple Health Records compared to earlier efforts like Google Health in 2008, including the ubiquity of mobile technology, the maturation of health data communications standards, and the widespread use of App Stores.

More than 100 institutions now support Apple Health Records in the United States, including Cedars-Sinai in Los Angeles and Johns Hopkins in Baltimore, and Apple reportedly hopes to add the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs as a partner as well, a move that would provide veterans with access to the feature.

Health records are stored in the Health Data tab of the Health app on iOS 11.3 and later.

Apple today announced that its HomePod speaker launches in China and Hong Kong on Friday, January 18. It will be available for 2,799 yuan in China and HK$2,799 in Hong Kong from Apple.com, Apple Stores, and authorized resellers.

Apple had previously announced that the HomePod would launch in China and Hong Kong in early 2019 and now we know it will be later this week. Siri on the HomePod gained support for Cantonese and Mandarin in China and a Cantonese dialect in Hong Kong in a software update last month.

Apple's press release highlights how the HomePod can stream Apple Music genres such as Mandopop and Cantopop and other audio content from any AirPlay-supported apps, including QQ Music, DeDao, iHuman Story, Dragonfly FM, and Penguin FM in China, and Spotify, KKBOX, JOOX, and Podcast in Hong Kong.

Apple's marketing chief Phil Schiller:

We're excited to bring HomePod to our customers in mainland China and Hong Kong markets. We can't wait for them to experience how great it sounds in their home, we think they are going to love it.

HomePod first launched in the United States, United Kingdom, and Australia in February 2018, followed by Canada, France, and Germany in June 2018. And in October 2018, Apple made the speaker available in Spain and Mexico.

Apple's long-awaited wireless charging mat AirPower might finally be on the horizon if the latest rumor is to be believed.

Hong Kong website ChargerLAB cites a "credible source" within Apple's supply chain who claims Chinese manufacturer Luxshare Precision has started production of the AirPower. In a conversation on Chinese messaging app WeChat, the source adds he has heard the AirPower will be released soon.

MacRumors translated the Chinese messages in the WeChat screenshot using the Google Translate app for photos on iPhone and they appear to be consistent with what ChargerLAB claims in its tweet.

Luxshare is a member of the Wireless Power Consortium behind the Qi standard and also assembles AirPods for Apple — and Lightning to USB-C cables, according to ChargerLAB. Reports had suggested Luxshare would be a primary supplier of the AirPower since as early as February 2017.

Luxshare might not be the only supplier, as a report last year said Pegatron would also be involved in production.

A few weeks ago, developer Steve Troughton-Smith said he's heard Apple may have overcome technical challenges with the AirPower and could move forward with a release. Those technical challenges included overheating and interference issues, according to Sonny Dickson, an occasional source of Apple leaks.

Back in October, in a research note obtained by MacRumors, Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo claimed that Apple may launch the AirPower by early in the first quarter of 2019, suggesting that the accessory may be released soon.

The delayed release of the AirPower is likely why Apple has yet to release its optional wireless charging case for AirPods, which remains listed as "currently unavailable" on Apple's website. Like the AirPower, Kuo said the wireless case may be released in early 2019 ahead of an entirely new pair in 2020.

AirPower is an oval-shaped mat that would be able to wirelessly charge multiple Apple devices at once, including the iPhone 8 and newer, Apple Watch Series 3 and newer, and AirPods when they are placed in the aforementioned wireless charging case that has been expected to launch alongside the mat.

Apple first previewed the AirPower at Steve Jobs Theater in September 2017, shortly after introducing the iPhone X, and indicated that it would be released at some point in 2018 in a press release. Apple failed to deliver on that promise, however, and hasn't commented on the AirPower for many months.

Following its September 2018 event, Apple removed all but a few mentions of the AirPower from its website. The mat was, however, still referenced in the iPhone XS, iPhone XS Max, and iPhone XR user guides, in some recent Apple job listings, and in a few recent Apple patent applications.

Apple's silence regarding AirPower has led some to believe the product has been canceled, but today's report offers renewed hope.

Last month, based on documentation obtained from Made for iPhone program members, ChargerLAB accurately reported that third-party Apple-certified Lightning to USB-C cables would be available in early 2019. Right on cue, Belkin and Griffin among others introduced Lightning to USB-C cables at CES 2019 this week.

ChargerLAB did, however, inaccurately report that the iPhone XS, iPhone XS Max, and iPhone XR would be bundled with a faster 18W USB-C power adapter from Apple. The website did show an accurate render of the charger, but it ended up being for the 2018 iPad Pro, so the rumor wasn't entirely off base.

Update: In a follow-up tweet, ChargerLAB cites another source who claims a second Apple supplier Pegatron is set to begin mass production of the AirPower on January 21. The alleged Pegatron employee claims the AirPower has three layers of coils in an 8-7-7 configuration from bottom to top.

Apple is United Airlines' biggest customer at the San Francisco International Airport, according to signs the airline has available that were shared on Twitter today.

According to United, Apple spends $150 million on airline tickets each year, and purchases 50 business class seats on flights to Shanghai every day.

Apple has many suppliers in China, which explains why the company sends so many employees to the Shanghai Pudong Airport.

Apple spends $35 million each year on flights from SFO to Shanghai, which is the number one flight the company purchases. Other routes are also popular, with Apple employees flying between these top 10 locations frequently:

1. Shanghai (PVG)
2. Hong Kong (HKG)
3. Taipei (TPE)
4. London (LHR)
5. South Korea (ICN)
6. Singapore (SIN)
7. Munich (MUC)
8. Tokyo (HND)
9. Beijing (PEK)
10. Israel (TLV)

Apple has more than 130,000 employees across its retail and corporate locations, and its headquarters is located in Cupertino, California. The San Francisco International Airport, located near Millbrae, California and south of San Francisco, is the closest major airport for international flights.

This statistic accounts solely for the flights taken from SFO. Apple has campuses in other locations around the world, and the San Jose International Airport is also nearby, so this is likely just a fraction of the airline travel that Apple funds.

As The Verge's Nilay Patel points out, statistics like these are a reminder of the huge number of employees that Apple has working behind the scenes on the devices that we use every day.

Apple is by far the biggest United airline customer in the Bay Area, and its $150 million spending total far outranks Facebook, Roche, and Google, companies that each spend over $34 million on United flights annually.

Following in the footsteps of Huawei and likely Samsung, Apple is widely rumored to release at least one new iPhone model with a triple-lens rear camera in 2019. That model is now believed to be the next generation of the iPhone XS Max.

A render of the alleged triple-lens design has even surfaced this week, complete with what would surely be a polarizing design:

If the rumor proves to be accurate and depending on the implementation, there are several potential advantages of the third lens, including advanced 3D sensing, increased optical zoom, improved low-light performance, and improved photo quality in general thanks to the collection of more light and color data.

Advanced 3D Sensing

Apple has repeatedly expressed a profound interest in augmented reality. The release of ARKit instantly made augmented reality accessible to hundreds of millions of iPhones and iPads, but Apple is just getting started in this area.

A third lens would likely result in significantly improved 3D spatial recognition on the iPhone, with a report last year suggesting that the rear-facing sensing capabilities will be even more advanced than the front-facing TrueDepth system on the iPhone X. This would open the door to several augmented reality use cases.

The same report claimed the triple-lens camera array will be capable of stereoscopic imaging, in which two of the sensors would be able to capture images of a single object from different angles. A triangulation method would then be used to obtain the distance between the iPhone and the object.

Back in 2017, Bloomberg News reported that Apple aimed to include rear-facing 3D sensing capabilities in its 2019 iPhones. But, at the time, the report said Apple was evaluating a time-of-flight approach that calculates the time it takes for a laser to bounce off surrounding objects to create a 3D image of the environment.

Whichever implementation Apple uses, the third lens would no doubt improve the iPhone's augmented reality capabilities. And that, in turn, could lay the foundation for the rumored launch of augmented reality Apple Glasses in 2020.

Increased Optical Zoom

A third lens would likely enable 3x optical zoom on an iPhone for the first time, enabling users to magnify the image in the viewfinder by up to 3x without a blurry reduction in quality like digital zoom.

By comparison, the iPhone 7 Plus, iPhone 8 Plus, iPhone X, iPhone XS, and iPhone XS Max feature 2x optical zoom.

Huawei's P20 Pro smartphone was the first with a triple-lens rear camera system, including a 40-megapixel lens, a 20-megapixel monochrome lens, and an 8-megapixel telephoto lens with 3x optical zoom.

Improved Low-Light Performance

A third lens on the iPhone, if a traditional sensor, would draw in additional light for improved low-light performance.

Apple is certainly heavily invested in computational photography. On the latest iPhones, for example, Smart HDR results in photos with more highlight and shadow detail, while Depth Control significantly improves Portrait Mode.

Google's new "Night Sight" mode on the Pixel 3 and Pixel 3 XL sets the bar for low-light photos, however, by using machine learning to choose the right colors based on the content of the image. The result is much brighter photos in low-light conditions, without having to use the camera flash.

With a third lens, and improved machine learning, perhaps Apple can come out with a feature to rival Night Sight in 2019.

Qualcomm, Apple, and other suppliers are in court this week as Qualcomm faces off with the FTC over an antitrust lawsuit accusing the company of using anticompetitive tactics to remain the main supplier for baseband processor for smartphones.

Several Apple witnesses are testifying during the trial, which has led to the leak of some interesting, previously unknown information.

Apple supply chain executive Tony Blevins today said (via Reuters) that Apple considered purchasing 5G LTE modems from companies that include Samsung, MediaTek, and Intel for use in its 2019 iPhone lineup.

Qualcomm was Apple's sole supplier for iPhone modems from the period between 2011 and 2016, with that exclusivity ending in 2016 with the launch of the iPhone 7.

With the iPhone 7, Apple split modem orders between Qualcomm and Intel and then later phased Qualcomm out all together. Apple's most recent iPhones use modems exclusively from Intel, but today's testimony suggests Apple is working on diversifying its modem supply.

According to Blevins, during the period when Apple used only Qualcomm chips, Apple had wanted to use chips from other suppliers as well but signed an exclusivity agreement with Qualcomm because Qualcomm offered deep rebates on patent licenses to discourage Apple from diversifying.

In 2013, for example, Apple ended a plan to have Intel supply modems for the iPad mini 2 because Apple would lose Qualcomm rebates by using Intel's chips. This, said Blevins, made Intel's products "economically unattractive."

After Apple finally swapped over to multiple modem suppliers in 2016 and 2017, its legal woes with Qualcomm affected the relationship between the two companies "in a very profound and negative manner," which led to Apple using Intel chips exclusively.

Apple never wanted Intel as a sole supplier, however, and has always wanted to work with multiple companies.

"The entire concept of Project Antique was to find a second supplier. No offense to [Intel] but we don't want to be single supplier with them. We wanted both Qualcomm and [Intel] in the mix," Blevins said.

While Blevins mentioned 5G modem suppliers, he did not conclusively say whether or not Apple had decided on a 5G modem supplier nor whether a 5G modem is planned for the 2019 iPhone lineup.

Rumors have suggested that Apple does not plan to introduce support for 5G in its iPhone lineup in 2019, with the company planning to hold off on 5G technology until at least 2020.

Apple's upcoming 2019 iPhones could feature support for Wi-Fi 6, Barclays analyst Blaine Curtis said today in a CES wrap-up report.

Wi-Fi 6, otherwise known as 802.11ax, is the next-generation Wi-Fi standard following 802.11ac.

The new standard brings higher data rates, increased capacity, better performance in dense environments like concerts and sporting events, and improved power efficiency to better conserve battery on smartphones, tablets, and other battery-powered devices.

Set to be finalized in 2019, Wi-Fi 6 will also be beneficial to homes that have many internet connected smart products.

Many Wi-Fi 6 products were shown off at the Consumer Electronics show this year, including Netgear's new 802.11ax mesh Wi-Fi system.

Apple was one of the first device manufacturers to adopt 802.11ac well ahead of when it was finalized in December 2013, so the company is known to be an early adopter of new Wi-Fi technologies. There aren't a whole lot of 802.11ax routers available at the current time, but many more will likely debut next year.

5G connectivity is also on the horizon, but rumors indicate that Apple won't adopt it right away because it requires carrier implementation and may have issues during its early rollout. Apple is slower to adopt new cellular technologies and didn't implement support for 4G LTE until the iPhone 5 debuted in September 2012, even though other smartphone manufacturers began supporting it in late 2010.

Apple's 2019 iPhone lineup is expected to look similar to the 2018 iPhone lineup, with two OLED devices in different sizes and a single, lower-cost LCD device. It's likely Apple plans to introduce the faster specification in all three of its iPhones, though not guaranteed as it looks like the devices will have different feature sets.

Recent rumors have suggested the highest-end device, the successor to the current iPhone XS Max, will feature a triple-lens rear camera, while the smaller OLED iPhone and LCD iPhone could have dual-lens camera setups.

We have a ways to go until the 2019 iPhones are released in the fall, but we've been hearing rumors about the devices for months. For more information, make sure to check out our 2019 iPhone roundup.

Today is the final day of CES 2019 in Las Vegas, where thousands of companies showed off their latest connected tech products. As usual, Apple did not have an official presence on the show floor, but there were several announcements and a wide variety of product unveilings that are tied to its ecosystem.

MacRumors attended CES 2019 and has shared numerous articles and videos on our YouTube channel about the show throughout the week. We've wrapped up some of the notable announcements from the week below.

AirPlay 2-enabled smart TVs

Without attending, Apple stole some of CES 2019's thunder by announcing this week that AirPlay 2-enabled smart TVs are coming from leading manufacturers, including Samsung, LG, Sony, and Vizio. Meanwhile, up-and-coming Chinese smart TV brand TCL told MacRumors it is "currently committed to Roku."

Smart TVs from LG, Sony, and Vizio, but not Samsung, will also support HomeKit. Samsung smart TVs are, however, getting an exclusive iTunes TV and Movies app for accessing purchased and rented content from Apple's storefront.

AirPlay 2 is also coming to Harman Kardon's new Citation Series of speakers and the popular VLC streaming app for Android.

Mophie battery cases for iPhone XS, iPhone XS Max, and iPhone XR

Apple-certified accessory maker Mophie will be releasing Juice Pack Access battery cases for the iPhone XS, iPhone XS Max, and iPhone XR for $119.95 each in the first quarter of 2019. The juice packs extend the battery life of the iPhone XS by up to 25 hours, and the iPhone XS Max and iPhone XR by up to 31 hours.

Unlike Apple's older Smart Battery Cases for the iPhone 6 and iPhone 7, the Juice Packs charge the iPhone wirelessly via the Qi standard, leaving the Lightning connector free for accessories and other uses. Apple is rumored to release a new Smart Battery Case for the iPhone XS, but has yet to do so.

HomeKit everything

Numerous smart home accessories were unveiled at CES 2019 with HomeKit compatibility either at launch or promised later this year:

• Door Locks and Doorbells: Netatmo Smart Video Doorbell, Robin Telecom ProLine Doorbell, Kwikset Premis Contemporary and Mighton Avia
  

• Lights and Switches: Nanoleaf Hexagon Light Panels, Eve Light Strip and Eve Energy Strip, Philips Hue outdoor lighting range, C by GE lights, Belkin Wemo switches, and Brilliant Control switches
  

• Miscellaneous: Arlo Ultra 4K security camera, Gardena Smart System gardening range, U by Moen smart shower system, TP-Link Kasa smart plug, Honeywell Home T9 and T10 Pro smart thermostats, IKEA Kadrilj and Fyrtur smart blinds, and First Alert's second-generation Safe & Sound all-in-one smoke and carbon monoxide detector and speaker

Apple-certified Lightning to USB-C cables

Last month, Apple informed members of its Made for iPhone program that third-party Lightning to USB-C cables are now permitted to be manufactured, and CES 2019 saw the introduction of the first options from Belkin and Griffin. The cables will be available from both accessory makers in the spring.

CarPlay receivers

CarPlay is now factory installed in well over 400 vehicle models, but some makes and models along with older vehicles do not support Apple's in-car software platform. For this, there are aftermarket CarPlay receivers, and we saw new wired and wireless options debut from Kenwood and JVC, Sony, and Alpine at CES 2019.

Pioneer also unveiled its latest receiver that turns an iPhone or Android smartphone into a car entertainment display.

Docks, chargers, and cases

• Elgato unveiled its Thunderbolt 3 Pro Dock with two USB-C ports, two USB-A ports, two Thunderbolt 3 ports, one DisplayPort 1.2, one Gigabit Ethernet port, a 3.5mm audio output, and SD and microSD card readers.
  

• Anker announced that its PowerPort Atom PD 1 power adapter, which it calls "the world's smallest Power Delivery wall charger," will be available to order later this month. Priced at $29.99 in the United States.
  

• Satechi released two new power adapters with combo USB-C and USB-A ports.
  

• ZAGG unveiled a new line of keyboards for the latest iPad and iPad Pro models.
  

• OtterBox announced a partnership with PopSockets for a new series of "Otter + Pop" cases for iPhones

Videos: Best of CES 2019 and its Unveiled, Pepcom, and ShowStoppers events