Amazon Ends Wallet App Beta Program, but Still No Sign of Apple Pay Loyalty Rewards Program
Amazon today ended the beta for its Amazon Wallet app, approximately six months after the company launched it last summer. The company began sending emails last night to those signed up for the beta, announcing the company would be shutting it down and removing the Wallet app from Google Play and Amazon's own Appstore (via CNET).
Unlike Apple's new Apple Pay payments service that ties directly to credit and debit cards, Amazon Wallet focused on gift and loyalty cards that users could manage and store within the app for use in physical stores or online. Amazon did not confirm whether the Wallet app might be revived in the future, but did mention it was a learning experience for the company as a whole.
"We have learned a great deal from the introduction of the Wallet and will look for ways to apply these lessons in the future as we continue to innovate on behalf of our customers," Amazon spokesman Tom Cook said in a statement.
The company has been far more than an online marketplace for a few years now, throwing its hat into the ring of everything from streaming devices to personal voice assistants. But it hasn't been clear sailing either, especially with the Fire Phone, which debuted last summer. The phone received mediocre reviews and has seen a series of price drops in an attempt to sell more units.
Loyalty programs are currently one aspect missing from Apple Pay, but the company has been rumored to be planning a rewards-focused loyalty program for the service. Reports late last year hinted at a holiday launch date for the service, though the rumors failed to come true.
Apple's loyalty program is rumored to see Apple partner with various companies, from retailers to major hotel chains, to provide customers who use Apple Pay at their locations with various rewards. Though Apple Pay is still a fairly new service, its continued growth amongst both customers and partners mean a rewards-style program could quickly prove valuable for consumers and help drive even more usage.
Popular Stories
2026 could be a bumper year for Apple's Mac lineup, with the company expected to announce as many as four separate MacBook launches. Rumors suggest Apple will court both ends of the consumer spectrum, with more affordable options for students and feature-rich premium lines for users that seek the highest specifications from a laptop.
Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel for more videos.
...
Apple's iPhone development roadmap runs several years into the future and the company is continually working with suppliers on several successive iPhone models at the same time, which is why we often get rumored features months ahead of launch. The iPhone 18 series is no different, and we already have a good idea of what to expect for the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max.
One thing worth...
In a statement shared with CNBC today, Apple confirmed that Google Gemini will power the next-generation version of Siri that is slated to launch later this year.
"After careful evaluation, we determined that Google's technology provides the most capable foundation for Apple Foundation Models and we're excited about the innovative new experiences it will unlock for our users," the statement...
Elon Musk today expressed concern about Apple and Google partnering on a more personalized version of Siri powered by Google's generative AI platform Gemini.
"This seems like an unreasonable concentration of power for Google, given that [they] also have Android and Chrome," wrote Musk, in a post on X.
Musk serves as CEO of xAI, the company behind Gemini competitor Grok.
It is unlikely...
Apple today seeded the second beta of iOS 26.3, nearly a month after the first beta. So far, the update includes a couple of new features for iPhones.
iOS 15.3 through iOS 18.3 were all released in late January over the years, so it is thereby likely that iOS 26.3 will be released towards the end of this month as well. The update is compatible with the iPhone 11 series and newer.
Below,...
Apple and Google today announced that Google Gemini will help power not only a more personalized version of Siri, but a range of future Apple Intelligence features.
"Apple and Google have entered into a multi-year collaboration under which the next generation of Apple Foundation Models will be based on Google's Gemini models and cloud technology," the companies said, in a statement. "These...
The Unicode Consortium has published a draft list of emoji that could come to smartphones and other devices in the future. The list shared by Emojipedia outlines 19 emoji candidates under consideration for Emoji 18.0, which is expected to be finalized in September 2026.
Among the proposed additions are a squinting face emoji, left- and right-pointing thumb gestures, a pickle, a lighthouse, a ...
iOS 26.3 will likely be released to the public later this month, but it appears that Apple is preparing to push out another software update in the interim.
Apple's software engineers have started testing iOS 26.2.1, according to the MacRumors visitor logs, which have been a reliable indicator of upcoming iOS versions. The update will likely be released at some point this week or next week.
...
