Amazon is offering pre-order discounts of up to $49 on Apple's new Mac mini and Mac Studio, launching September 22, 2026. The M5 Max Mac Studio is discounted to $2,449.99, while select Mac mini models with M6 chips are also on sale, promising up to 40% faster CPU performance and 4× faster AI task performance.
Apple's iOS 27.2 beta includes a redesigned Health app powered by Apple Intelligence that transforms Apple Watch data into personalized health guidance. New features include readiness scoring, longevity tracking, health age assessment, and at-home health tests using the iPhone camera, with some capabilities rolling out later in the year.
Apple is launching a photo verification feature for iPhone 18 Pro that cryptographically signs sensor data to prove authenticity and prevent deepfake tampering. The system uses a secure camera mode that signs pixel data at capture, processes it through Apple's Private Cloud Compute with quantum-resistant encryption, and produces a verifiable digital certificate for the final image.
macOS 27 Golden Gate marks Apple's first major upgrade to Apple Intelligence in two years, making the AI features mandatory and non-disableable. The release addresses design issues from the previous version and adds incremental improvements, though it drops support for all Intel Macs. The update combines significant AI-focused changes with understated system refinements.
Horace Dediu analyzes Apple's foldable iPhone Duo as a shift toward gestural computing, where variable surfaces and mechanical interactions create new gesture languages beyond traditional touch. The folding mechanism represents a departure from two decades of static glass rectangles, introducing a paradigm comparable to the flip phone era, though now centered on enabling new user interactions and form factors across Apple's product line.
Apple released an iOS 27.2 beta to developers instead of iOS 27.1 to avoid leaking iPhone Duo details in code, since the device will ship with iOS 27.1. The two codebases are expected to converge eventually. iPhone Duo launches October 23.
Apple released iOS 27.2 beta 1, expanding Siri AI support from English to five additional languages: French, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, and Spanish. The expansion comes just days after Siri AI's initial launch with iOS 27.
T-Mobile offers an iPhone 18 Pro for free with any trade-in condition or up to $1,200 off the iPhone 18 Pro Max for new customers who activate a line. The devices feature Apple's new variable aperture Fusion camera, A20 Pro processor, and Siri AI, available in multiple colors including new glacier blue and burgundy options.
Apple released the first iOS 27.2 developer beta for iPhone, skipping iOS 27.1 to focus iPhone Duo-specific features closer to the device's October launch. The update includes a redesigned Apple Health app and expanded Siri AI support with multilingual capabilities rolling out over the coming months.
A project maintainer rejected AI-generated contributions, so developers forked the project and used AI assistance to develop Apple Video Decoder acceleration for H.264, HEVC, and VP9 on M-series Macs in 21 hours, merging 29 PRs and fixing multiple codec bugs and stability issues.
Apple released a new Apple Watch Magnetic Fast Charger (model A3277) that delivers 10W of power, double the previous 5W limit, enabling faster charging for the new Series 12 and Ultra 4 models. The $29 charger can add 12 hours of battery life to the Series 12 or 18 hours to the Ultra 4 in just 15 minutes, but requires both the new watch hardware and new charger to achieve these speeds.
iOS 27's Weather app introduces rain and wind forecast views that bring previously hidden data to the home screen. Users can now tap icons to switch between Conditions, Precipitation, and Wind views, with both hourly and 10-day forecasts updating instantly for each option.
iOS 27 introduces a rebuilt Siri AI that answers questions and performs device actions, enhanced proofreading with grammar checking powered by Apple Intelligence, and an overhauled Spotlight search with better indexing also applied to Photos and Mail apps.
Apple Watch Series 12, arriving this Friday, features larger bezels around its display compared to previous models, a design change Apple did not highlight in its announcement. Despite maintaining the same case height, the Series 12's width increased while the display size remained unchanged, resulting in more noticeable bezels—a reversal of Apple's typical trend toward bezel reduction. The larger case accommodates new internal upgrades including the Health Sensing System and S11 chip.
macOS 27 Golden Gate marks Apple's first major upgrade to Apple Intelligence in two years, making the AI features mandatory and impossible to disable. The release combines significant AI-focused changes with incremental system improvements and design refinements. Golden Gate also drops support for all Intel Macs, requiring Apple Silicon processors.
The Apple Watch Ultra 4 launches September 18 at $799, offering improved health sensing, more memory, and better battery life compared to the Ultra 3. For existing Ultra 3 owners, upgrading is generally not worthwhile unless recovery tracking or extended battery life are priorities; new buyers should prefer the Ultra 4 unless the Ultra 3 is significantly discounted.
Apple's M5 Ultra chip achieved a 6x multi-core performance increase compared to the original M1, with a 36-core configuration scoring 52,516 in Geekbench multi-core tests. The M5 Ultra Mac Studio, priced at $10.8K for the tested configuration, represents the company's continued success with Apple Silicon despite industry concerns about talent retention.
Apple released iOS 27 on September 14, bringing new features including Siri AI beta, Safari website monitoring, enhanced Photos editing tools, and system performance improvements. The update supports iPhone 11 and newer, though Apple Intelligence features require iPhone 15 Pro or iPhone 16 models.
Apple is considering developing an AI server using M8 chips and Nvidia networking hardware for external customers, potentially returning to the server market it exited in 2011. The system would target companies running AI inference workloads, with a potential 2029 release date, though the project remains unfinalized and could be canceled. The initiative reflects growing AI hardware demand and signals a closer working relationship between Apple and Nvidia.
Apple Hong Kong's online checkout system contained a security gap that bypassed one-time password verification, enabling scammers to commit HK$25 million in fraudulent charges during a smartphone launch, with over 700 complaints filed in the first two days. The company allegedly omitted standard two-factor authentication to streamline user experience, potentially shifting fraud liability from banks to the merchant.