All the New Safari Features Apple Announced at WWDC
During Apple’s WWDC 2024 keynote, the company announced that Safari on macOS 15 Sequoia will receive several intriguing updates, such as hiding distractions while watching videos and summarizing articles as you read them. Read on to learn about other new Safari features coming to your Mac later this year.
View mode hides video distractions
Just like Reading Mode hides all the clutter on a webpage so you can focus on reading in Safari, Apple announced a new Viewing Mode that does the same for online videos. Once Safari on macOS 15 Sequoia detects that you’ve played a video on a webpage, it will hide everything else on the page. The video will expand to take up as much space as is available in the Safari window.
The moment you click the mouse button, the video automatically switches to picture-in-picture mode, according to a demo Apple showed during a keynote at WWDC 2024. It’s worth noting that just like Reading Mode doesn’t work well with every web -site, the browsing mode may also encounter problems depending on the video player that your favorite websites use. Some of these may be custom players that block view mode, and it remains to be seen how well this feature works.
Save time with article summaries
When you read a long article, Safari also offers a summary to help you save time. A summary is certainly not a substitute for reading the entire article, but it can highlight the most important points when you are in a hurry.
Machine learning improves your browsing experience
Safari will also use machine learning to highlight important information on a web page. If you’re browsing a website that mentions a hotel, Safari will be able to show you a map of the location with a button to help you navigate there using Apple Maps. For example, when reading an article about a movie, Safari might also display a card with information about the movie.
This is a developing story. Apple’s WWDC keynote is currently ongoing, with WWDC continuing until June 14th. Lifehacker will update this story with relevant information as it is announced.