iOS 18.3 beta just arrived — here's what's changed

(Image credit: Apple/Shutterstock)

The iOS 18.3 beta has just been released, bringing us our first look at what the upcoming update will have to offer. It’s certainly not as exciting as iOS 18.2, which offers many upgrades to Apple Intelligence, but there are some significant changes that you should be aware of.

The update is part of the public and developer versions of the iOS 18.3 beta, meaning anyone signed up to Apple’s beta program can install the update right now. As for when the final version of the update will arrive, that’s anyone’s guess. Apple is usually pretty coy about exact release dates, so it’ll happen when it happens. Hopefully, it won’t take too long.

Here’s everything that’s changed in the iOS 18.3 beta.

Changes to Notification Summaries

ios 18.3 beta screenshots — (Image credit: Future)

Apple has been under a lot of fire for the way its Notification Summaries features treats news. In some cases, the AI is straight up making things up, which is the last thing we need in an age where misinformation is more prevalent than ever. With that in mind, changes are being made as of iOS 18.3.

The first change is that news summaries have been disabled for any apps in the News and Entertainment category, and will remain switched off until Apple has fixed the problem at a later date. The Notifications Summaries section of the settings app will also make it clearer that this is a beta feature, and mistakes may happen. Similarly, the setup process will encourage users to “double check important information” since “Summarization may change the meaning of the original headlines.”

So Apple is putting the onus on the user to fact check, rather than its AI for making stuff up in the first place. Summarized notifications will be italicized, to differentiate them, and they can be disabled on an app-by-app basis from the lock screen.

Renamed Camera Control toggle

iPhone 16 owners will find a slight change in the Camera Control section of the settings app. The toggle for AE/AF has now been changed to “Lock Focus and Exposure”, which should make it significantly easier for non-photographers to understand exactly what the toggle does.

Genmoji comes to Messages

Tapping the + button in any Messages conversation has long been used to open up the sidebar, which has a bunch of different features and options. Genmoji, which lets you create custom emojis using generative AI, is now among them — giving you another way to write your own prompts to create your own, fresh new emojis.

PDF Editing warnings

Anyone editing a PDF through the screenshot interface will now get a warning if they try and crop content out. The warning points out that cropping the document won’t actually remove any data, and some PDF viewers may still be able to see what you cut out.

Repeating Options in Calculator

iOS 18 actually saw a slight downgrade to the official calculator app, with repeating operations disappearing. Essentially this would let you repeat the last command you put into the calculator when hitting the equal sign. So typing in 2x2=4, then pressing the equal sign again would multiply the answer by 2 — giving you 8.

That feature is back in the iOS 18.3 beta, giving you one more way to calculate on your phone.

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Tom is the Tom's Guide's UK Phones Editor, tackling the latest smartphone news and vocally expressing his opinions about upcoming features or changes. It's long way from his days as editor of Gizmodo UK, when pretty much everything was on the table. He’s usually found trying to squeeze another giant Lego set onto the shelf, draining very large cups of coffee, or complaining about how terrible his Smart TV is.