iOS 15.4 is now available in its first Beta and brings many new features, some of which have been surprising because they were unexpected and very interesting, such as the possibility of unlocking your iPhone using Face ID even when wearing a mask. We show you all.
15.4 iOS Beta 1
At the moment we only have the first Beta of iOS 15.4, so some of these new features may undergo some changes between now and the final version, but we will inform you of all of them in a timely manner. This First Beta is available for iPhone (iOS 15.4) and iPad (iPadOS 15.4), in addition to the rest of the versions for other Apple platforms. It is a version limited to developers but we hope that the Public Beta will be released soon and anyone registered in the program can use it. If all goes well, the normal thing is that at the end of next February or the beginning of March at the latest, the final version will be available to everyone.
Unlock Face ID with mask
It is without a doubt the main novelty and of which we had not heard or read anything. Apple has caught us by surprise and has updated its facial recognition system so that we can unlock our device or make payments through Apple Pay even if we wear the mask, and it is not necessary to wear an Apple Watch for this. This system now scans more hotspots around the eyes, so on a smaller face surface it finds more hotspots, and thus the system maintains its security, something fundamental. We can wear glasses, although the compliment system warns us that it is important that we analyze our face with the glasses on. What it doesn't work with is sunglasses.
Contrary to what happened with the system that combined our Apple Watch with Face ID, now with this new system yes we can use it to pay through Apple Pay or to enter applications that use Apple's facial recognition as a security system. So it is not a half solution like the Apple Watch, which we all appreciated at the time but which was far from ideal to solve the problem of masks. The only pga of this long-awaited novelty is that it is only compatible with the iPhone 12 and later models. We don't know exactly why, but it probably has to do with facial recognition hardware.
COVID Certificate in Health and Portfolio
We could already add the COVID certificate to the Wallet application through a somewhat laborious method that we told you about here a long time ago. But now Apple makes it completely easy and it is something as simple as scanning the QR code of your COVID certificate and the option to add it to the Health application and to the Wallet of your iPhone will automatically appear, so that you will always have it at hand to show it wherever it is necessary.
Notes in iCloud Keychain
iCloud Keychain makes it much easier for us to access web services, applications, etc., thanks to the fact that it stores our access data and they are synchronized between all our devices. now also we can add to that stored data any note that we think may be useful when using that data, such as answers to security questions, for example.
New Emoji
What would an iOS update be without new emoji? A total of 37 new emoji of all kinds: new faces, new characters, new objects such as the slide, the x-ray or the empty battery. Remember that to use them you will have to wait until the person who receives the emoji also has them on their iPhone or Android, or else you will see a weird symbol that has nothing to do with it.
Shortcut notifications
Now the Shortcuts app will not notify us when you automatically run any personal shortcuts, something that could not be configured before and that many users of this function have been claiming for a long time.
Other changes
We have more changes, such as the use of the 120Hz screen by third-party applications, Universal Control (which deserves its own video that we will publish soon), the possibility of modifying the brightness of the iPad keyboard, improvements in the compatibility of the controls, etc.