Apple today released the fourth beta of iOS 9, and as with the previous iOS 9 betas, there are quite a few new features bundled into the release. There are some major additions, such as the promised return of Home Sharing for Music, and several other minor tweaks intended to refine the look and feel of the operating system.
With approximately two months to go until release, iOS 9 is already feeling faster, more polished, and more full featured. For those eager to know all about what's coming in iOS 9 ahead of its release, we've rounded up a complete list of the changes introduced with iOS 9 beta 4 below.
You can also check out all of the changes, large and small, that have been made in previous betas: iOS 9 beta 1, iOS 9 beta 2, iOS 9 beta 3.
Home Sharing - Home Sharing for music was removed in iOS 8.4 with the launch of the new music app and the new Apple Music service, but iTunes chief Eddy Cue said Apple was working to re-add the feature in iOS 9 and it has, in iOS 9 beta 4.
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iPod touch Support - People who purchased one of the new A8-based iPod touch devices last week can now upgrade those devices to iOS 9 beta 4. With this beta, Apple added a new installation profile for the device.
Volume Button Photos - In iOS 9 beta 3, there was a bug that prevented the volume button from working as a shutter button for the iOS camera. That's been fixed in beta 4 and it's once again possible to snap a photo using the volume buttons on your iOS device.
Notifications icon - In the Settings app, the icon that represents the Notification setting has been updated with a new red color. The Battery icon has also been fixed and now has rounded edges instead of square edges.
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Picture in Picture for Podcasts - One of the iOS 9 features on the iPad is a multitasking Picture in Picture option that lets users watch a video while continuing to complete other tasks on their iPads. As of iOS 9 beta 4, this works with the Podcasts app.
Handoff - The Handoff feature in the App Switcher has been moved to the bottom of the app-switching interface. Pull up on the new Handoff bar to open an app. Previously, Handoff was displayed in the app carousel.
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Apple Pay - There's a new option in the Settings app for Apple Pay that lets you turn off the feature that allows Apple Pay be accessed from the home screen with a double click.
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Additional feature updates in iOS 9 beta 4 will be added here as they are discovered. Apple should continue to release regular updates to iOS 9 at two to three week intervals throughout the beta testing period to bring minor performance boosts and changes ahead of the operating system's official launch. iOS 9 is expected to be released to the public in the fall.
Top Rated Comments
Oh dear. It's 2015 and Apple officials apologize for bugs in iOS betas. Betas have become mainstream. Or the amount of iOS beta installations is now higher than 'normal' iOS users 5 years ago. Either way, good!
8.4 was a public release. Nothing to do with bugs in betas!Why no public beta Apple? You give me a headache.
I saw this in another thread re: iOS 9 Beta 4; if you delete the Public Beta profile, reboot your iDevice running PB2 and go to Software Update you can download B4.https://twitter.com/v1597psh/status/623570974919802880/photo/1
Does iTunes show me the correct album art? It doesn't now. Songs bought from Apple's iTunes on Apple's hardware running Apple's OS synced with Apple's Macintosh computer running Apple's iTunes gives me the wrong artwork on my phone. Yes, I deleted all the songs and synced it again. I get AC/DC album art with a David Bowie album I bought on iTunes. That same AC/DC artwork is scattered across my library.
Try HP, Windows, Samsung, Android and Chromecast. Let us know how you go.Does it show me an accurate % of my battery, or does it still go from 20% to 0% in 15 minutes? In general, the battery life sucks. That Samsung commercial that shows iPhone users hovering around power outlets is very accurate. I just bought my third lightning cable because that connector Apple invented is so fragile (and gets loose so it's connection is intermittent).
Does Siiri have the ability to "Play Artist ..." without saying "I'm sorry but I can't connect to the Internet"? My Ford is able to take voice commands without Internet connection, why can't Siiri? Just in general, Siiri sucks. It doesn't work most of the time for me. For example, I'll say, "Call Bob on mobile" and it says "You have many numbers, which one do you want?" and one of them is labeled "mobile". Sometimes Siiri works as it should in this regard, most of the time it doesn't.
To this day, Apple Maps gives me the wrong directions or the wrong location for an address about 20% of the time. The biggest company in the world can't get this right. Allow me to select Google Maps as my map program integrated with Mail and Safari just like you let me change my search engine in Safari from Google to Duck Duck Go. Just give up on it at this point and go back to Google.
I'll assume that my iPhone's inability to hold WiFi connection or phone calls while I hold it with my hand is a hardware issue since my 3GS was the last iPhone that worked well as a phone. To be fair, I have an iPhone 5. Waiting on the 6S. I learned to go with the S products to avoid being a beta tester for Apple (4 had serious issues, 5 had serious issues, 6 had serious issues). But I just purchased Apple's $199 WiFi Airport Extreme for my house and my iPhone will drop WiFi. ALL OF MY APPLE DEVICES DO. The iPad does, the other iPhones, the Apple TV, with every single router I have used including the older Apple Airport Extreme and the one Verizon gave me. This is an iOS issue because it shows the icon for full bars of WiFi but it actually will sit there and animate the loading icon for a long time because it's not getting the connection. It tells me it has the connection, but it doesn't. Holding the phone up high in the air works. I have to do this with the iPad and other iPhones. If the iOS doesn't have a signal from the WiFi router, it should show ZERO bars.
As mentioned by someone else, Apple TV's OS is way behind the competition in regards to the user interface. Fire up Netflix on a Playstation and then fire it up on the Apple TV. The Apple TV feels like old, antiquated software. While I'm on this subject, HBO Now's user interface is a joke and it crashes my version 2 Apple TV. Apparently, this is a common problem, the crashing. This is how Apple gets you to buy new hardware. Classic Apple. The HBO Now user interface doesn't even have the ability to show me what I previously watched. How stupid is that? I know this is HBO's issue, but Apple has requirements for their UI. They shouldn't sign off on this. Binge watching Game of Thrones means you have to go back to Series:Game of Thrones:Season 4:Episode 7 MANUALLY. You can't even add the series to a list like you can in Netflix. You can add an EPISODE to the list, which is really stupid. I already watched that episode, I want to watch the next one in the SEASON.
And when is Apple going to fix Safari on Yosemite so I can simply select a menu item "Delete history" that doesn't delete my cookies and data with it? THIS IS SOOOO RETARDED. You can't do it! You have to press CMND 2 and replace your entire browser window with your history, then SELECT ALL, then press DELETE. But wait!!! It doesn't delete it all! It leaves a couple folders there and you have to select them and DELETE again.
Oh, and Notes still deletes an arbitrary entry when my Mac connects to iCloud. It's there, but blank. This issue is all over the Net.
Apple has turned into Microsoft. The quality control is crap. My guess is there are a ton of people who might have bought an iWatch but are waiting till the iWatch S comes out. Let the other people be guinea pigs.
When Low power mode is getting disabled (after you recharge the iPhone), you can swipe down this notification and Enable Low power mode again...