iOS 27: The Best New Features Worth Knowing

You can now scan a paper receipt with your iPhone camera and split the bill automatically. Powered by Apple Intelligence, the feature reads individual line items off the receipt, works out each person s share of the tax and tip, and then routes repayment through Apple Cash, either inside Messages or directly in Wallet.

Wallet is also getting better at replacing the plastic in your pocket. You can digitize physical membership and loyalty cards by pointing the iPhone camera at a barcode or scanning a digital card, and those passes sync to Apple Watch so you can pin them to the Smart Stack for faster access.

Travelers get a bigger hotel key. Beyond unlocking rooms and amenities with an iPhone or Apple Watch at participating properties, guests can pull up trip details, activity schedules, service information, and real-time updates inside Wallet itself.

Apple Pay checkout gets a redesign

The Apple Pay checkout sheet, online and in apps, has been redesigned so you can swipe between cards more easily while seeing rewards balances, debit account balances, and pay-later options at a glance. Later this year, Apple says you will be able to add funds directly to eligible debit cards through Wallet or during checkout.

For merchants, Tap to Pay on iPhone gains a companion called Tap to Share. A single tap lets customers securely hand over loyalty accounts, shipping addresses, and contact details to participating businesses.

Find My finally gives you control over time

Location sharing has long been all-or-nothing. iOS 27 fixes that.

Beginning this fall, you can share your location for a custom amount of time, whether that is a few minutes, several hours, multiple days, or until a specific date and time. You can also temporarily pause sharing with an individual contact until the end of the day.

The use cases write themselves: a quick meetup that does not need permanent tracking, or, as Apple notes, keeping a surprise birthday party off someone s radar.

If you currently share your location indefinitely with people out of convenience, revisit those settings once iOS 27 lands this fall. Custom durations and per-contact pausing mean you no longer have to choose between always-on and off.

Apple Maps wants to keep you out of Google and TikTok

Maps picked up two notable upgrades aimed squarely at competitors.

Flyover, the immersive 3D view of cities and landmarks, has been refreshed with more detailed visuals and smoother navigation. More strategically, Apple added Local Lists, a way to discover and save recommendations for restaurants, attractions, and other spots by seeing what is trending.

That second feature reads like a direct play for the local-discovery habit people currently feed with Google Maps, Instagram, and TikTok. Keeping that browsing inside Apple Maps is the goal.

Apple Music, Podcasts, and Photos get quality-of-life wins

Apple Music is leaning harder into language. Lyrics Translation expands to seven additional language pairings, including English translations for songs in French, German, Italian, Korean, Spanish, and Japanese. A Lyrics Pronunciation feature helps you sing along in languages you do not speak by showing phonetically translated lyrics across five new pairings.

AutoMix, which builds smoother transitions between tracks, is getting more immersive mixes and is expanding beyond iPhone to Apple TV and HomePod. Apple Music subscribers also gain Hi-Res Lossless Audio on Apple TV 4K for studio-quality playback through compatible sound systems.

Podcasts get a search within show feature that lets you search across episodes of a specific podcast on iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Vision Pro, and the web. Video podcasts are coming to Mac and Apple TV, a nod to the rise of video-first shows.

Shared photo libraries improve too. iOS 27 adds full-resolution photo sharing, support for more file types, emoji reactions, better activity feeds, and per-album activity views. New temporary albums let groups collaborate on short-term events without permanently eating iCloud storage, and people without Apple devices can contribute photos through the web.

Fitness+ adds a menopause program

Fitness+ is launching Strong Through Menopause, a three-week program of guided Yoga and Strength workouts built for people navigating perimenopause and menopause, with a focus on strength, mobility, balance, and stress management. A new Time to Walk episode features actor Busy Philipps sharing her own experiences with perimenopause.

What happens next over the coming days

The timeline is the part to watch now.

Every feature above is available to developers immediately through the Apple Developer Program, which means the next 24 to 72 hours will bring a wave of hands-on impressions, bug reports, and early demos from people running the developer build.

• Expect detailed breakdowns of how well the Wallet receipt-scanning actually parses real-world receipts, since that relies on Apple Intelligence and is easy to get wrong.
• Watch for feedback on the new Find My time controls, which could surface edge cases around how pausing interacts with existing shares.
• Anticipate comparisons between Apple Maps Local Lists and the third-party apps it is trying to replace.

The public beta is the bigger milestone, and Apple has it pegged for next month. If you are not a developer, that is the moment to test these features yourself, with a full public release expected later in the fall.

Source: TechCrunch