IOS Will Soon Become Much More Accessible

Is your iPhone, iPad or Mac a little difficult to use? Luckily for you, Apple has announced that key accessibility features will be coming to all of its devices later this year. These include Accessibility Reader, which makes small print easier to read, and Vehicle Motion Cues, which prevent motion sickness when using Apple devices in vehicles. If some of these seem familiar to you, that’s because they may already be on one or two Apple devices, but are now about to appear on others. While the company has already revealed what’s in development, expect to hear more details during WWDC 2025, scheduled from June 9 to 13 . This is where Apple usually unveils all of its annual operating system updates, and sometimes even shows off new hardware.

In the meantime, here are all the new accessibility features we know are coming to Apple devices later this year:

Accessibility Reader makes text easier to read

Many people find it difficult to use default text sizes or fonts. Accessibility Reader is a new feature designed to help with this. It allows you to customize the text on your Apple device to make it easier to read. You can change the font, color, spacing and have your Apple device read the text for you. You can think of this as a mode for reading text in any file (or even in the real world, which I’ll touch on shortly) or as an enhanced text-to-speech feature. According to Apple, this is because Accessibility Reader can be launched from any application. It can also be combined with the Magnifier app on your Apple devices, which means you can magnify text in the real world and use this feature to make it easier to read. This feature will be available on iPhone, iPad, Mac and Apple Vision Pro.

Magnifier is coming to Mac

Your iPhone comes with a built-in magnifier , the Magnifier app. It’s an important accessibility feature for many people with low vision, and now Apple says it’s coming to Mac. On a Mac, you’ll also be able to connect Magnifier to external cameras, including your iPhone if you ‘re using it as a webcam via Continuity Camera . You’ll be able to adjust brightness, contrast, color filters, and perspective to make things easier to see with Magnifier for Mac, Apple says.

Accessible nutrition labels coming to the App Store

A few years ago, the App Store added ” nutrition privacy labels ” to app listings to help you quickly see if apps are collecting your data. The App Store now adds nutrition labels to help you check if an app has the accessibility features you need. Apple says these tags will recognize whether an app supports VoiceOver, voice control, larger text, sufficient contrast, reduced motion, subtitles, and more.

However, I would really like to see Apple add better search filters to the App Store. I’d like to filter out apps that collect data and don’t support certain accessibility features, but there’s currently no real way to do that.

Improved braille support on Apple devices.

Apple also says it’s adding braille access to your iPhone, iPad, Mac and Apple Vision Pro. This feature adds a braille note-taking device to your devices and can even perform calculations using Nemeth Braille (which is often used in math and science classrooms). Braille Access can also open BRF (Braille Ready Format) files, allowing people to access books and files created on Braille note-taking devices.

Live subtitles now on Apple Watch

Live Listen is an Apple feature that makes listening easier for people who are deaf or hard of hearing. Apple says that Live Listen controls will soon be added to your Apple Watch, and the device will be able to display Live Captions in real time. It works by turning your iPhone into a remote microphone that streams directly to hearing aids made for iPhone, AirPods, or Beats headphones, and when active, you’ll be able to view subtitles directly on your paired Apple Watch, according to Apple.

The watch can start or end Live Listen sessions, allowing you to position your iPhone next to the speaker and follow the conversation from a short distance away on your Apple Watch. This can be useful for classroom teaching and other similar situations.

Vehicle Motion Cues is coming to Mac

Since it was released on iPhone last year, Vehicle Motion Cues have become a must-have for me . According to Apple, the feature works by displaying moving dots on the screen that correspond to the direction the car is moving, and it’s now available on Mac.

I have always suffered from seasickness, which makes it difficult for me to look at screens in moving vehicles. Even if I’m otherwise fine in the car or bus, I get really nauseous if I look at a screen, read a book, or try anything that requires me to concentrate on a stationary object. Since Apple released Vehicle Motion Cues last year, I’ve finally been able to use my iPhone while I’m a passenger in a car. If this feature also works well on Mac, I’ll be happy to use it to watch videos while driving in the car. The company also said it plans to give you more control over how these dots appear on your screen.

Improved accessibility features of Vision Pro.

Apple Vision Pro will have a new and improved view that will allow you to zoom in on everything in your field of view using the device’s main camera. Apple says Live Recognition will use on-device machine learning to describe your surroundings, find objects, read documents, and more. The company also plans to include a new API that will allow certain apps to access the Vision Pro’s main camera, which will help developers create apps that make the most of these accessibility features.

Other important updates

Apple also introduced a number of other smaller accessibility features. Here are some of my favorites:

• Background sounds , which let you play nature sounds or dark noise, will get more customization options, a timer to stop playing after a while, and new actions to automate with shortcuts.

• Personal Voice , which recreates the voices of people who are losing the ability to speak, will be faster and easier to use, Apple says. According to the company, this feature will be able to create a more natural-sounding voice in less than a minute using 10 recorded phrases.

• Share accessibility settings lets you temporarily share accessibility settings with other Apple devices, such as when you use iPad to place an order or borrow the device from a friend for a short time.

For a complete list of accessibility updates and content, visit the Apple website .

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