News

In a significant shift in its augmented reality strategy, Apple suddenly discontinued development of its lightweight AR glasses project this week, according to a new report Friday. This marks another adjustment in the company’s pursuit of mainstream wearable technology. The project, known internally as N107, aimed to create normal-looking glasses with built-in displays that would connect to Mac computers.

The CalDigit Element 5 Hub includes four Thunderbolt 5 ports. That puts it ahead of all directly competing hubs, as these include only three ports with the latest super-fast networking standard.

And that’s not all. CalDigit’s latest includes nine ports in total, and offers up to 90W of power.

Health care leaders from 10 countries gathered in San Diego Thursday to explore Apple’s Vision Pro for surgery and other medical uses, and especially how it can further transform medical procedures and patient care, according to a new report.

The 300-person summit, hosted by Sharp HealthCare, marks another milestone in the device’s adoption by medical institutions since its 2024 launch, almost exactly a year ago. While broader public discussion of the headset tends to pine for a cheaper version, health care pros seem over the moon about how cheap $3,500 per unit is compared to their usual gear.

Apple’s rollout of Apple Intelligence has been slow. The AI suite debuted with iOS 18.1 but initially launched in only a limited number of markets and languages.

Since then, the company has expanded support to more regions and languages, but there is still significant ground to cover. This April, the company will further accelerate its efforts and expand Apple Intelligence’s availability to more languages.

We went through Apple CEO Tim Cook’s earnings call with investors on Thursday, and found some genuine surprises during the discussion of the financial results of the holiday 2024 quarter. We also turned up impressive figures showing just how well the company is doing.

Financial details don’t have to be boring. Here are the high points from the call as quickly and as interesting as we can make them.

Wall Street analysts set an ambitious goal for Apple to beat by predicting the iPhone maker’s revenue had increased 4% during the critical holiday shopping season. No problem — Apple met or exceeded those expectations.

“Today Apple is reporting our best quarter ever, with revenue of $124.3 billion, up 4 percent from a year ago,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO. “We were thrilled to bring customers our best-ever lineup of products and services during the holiday season.“

Noise on Super Bowl Sunday (February 9 this year) increases throughout the United States, almost everywhere, according to new Apple Hearing Study research findings this week from Apple and the University of Michigan.

The findings highlight the importance of being mindful about noise exposure during major sporting events, even when watching from home. Even those not at the big game get exposed to higher levels of noise, often for several hours, and all the more so at boisterous public viewings in bars or at parties. And that could factor into hearing loss for some, researchers indicated.

Financial analysts predict Apple revenue increased 4% during the all-important 2024 holiday quarter versus the same period of the previous year. Wall Street also expects a jump in Apple’s earnings per share. We’ll find out whether the iPhone maker met these expectations when Apple reveals its Q1 2025 financial results after the U.S. markets close Thursday afternoon.

When companies talk about quarterly earnings, executives often deploy language designed to puff up, excuse or obfuscate their companies’ recent performance. The goal is to excite investors over implied future success. And ultimately to give the company more money. Always. More. Money. The Apple quarterly earnings call takes place Thursday afternoon.

But when you’re the iPhone giant — with a mind-blowing market cap and a seemingly never-ending supply of hit products, including ongoing growth in services — you typically don’t need to craft hopeful-yet-non-material statements or deflect questions designed to get at the true bottom line.

So CEO Tim Cook and new CFO Kevan Parekh will report on all the numbers (former CFO Luca Maestri stepped down January 1, 2025). Analysts predict a 4% revenue increase year-over-year. But some predictions for the quarter are mixed, considering recent analyst downgrades of Apple stock over perceived disappointment about the performance of Apple Intelligence. Note that Apple starts its fiscal year with Q1 in the previous year’s holiday season.

A featured MLS game each week will appear on Apple TV+ in a new series billed as Sunday Night Soccer.

This is a similar arrangement to Friday Night Baseball that the streaming service began offering several years ago.

In a remarkable display of sustained corporate excellence by a certain iPhone giant, Fortune magazine named Apple the world’s most admired company for the 18th year in a row on Wednesday. The winning streak began in 2006 — a year before the iPhone first came out, and went on to dominate the market, propelling Apple to new heights.

For Apple users seeking a high-capacity portable power solution for all their gear, the new CukTech 30 Power Bank packs a massive 40,000mAh battery, combined charging power of up to 300 watts for up to five devices at once and some useful features, the company said Wednesday.

T-Mobile customers don’t have to pay to enjoy the 2025 soccer season. They get a MLS Season Pass on Apple TV with their wireless service subscription at no extra cost.

The soccer season kicks off on February 22, so don’t waste time if you plan to switch carriers to take advantage of the deal.

Netflix introduced a new “Season Download” button in its app Wednesday that allows iPhone and iPad users to download entire seasons of their favorite shows with a single tap. That streamlines offline viewing for iOS users, who previously had to download episodes individually.

It’d be nice if Apple TV+ did that too, right?

Comcast just launched ultra-low-lag connectivity for Xfinity customers, improving video calls using FaceTime on a variety of Apple devices. The faster service is also available in other interactive applications.

“Xfinity Internet latency will be dramatically reduced to faster than the blink of an eye,” the company promised Wednesday.

In a response to President Donald Trump’s plan to impose tariffs on imported chips from companies like Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., Taiwan’s government defended its semiconductor partnership with the United States as a “win-win” arrangement Tuesday, according to new report.

New tariffs, meant to incentivize more U.S.-based chipmaking, could raise Apple product prices. TSMC is a primary Apple supplier.

Popular Apple TV+ gaming comedy Mythic Quest may be going to heaven — and we don’t mean cancellation. The game at the show’s core may adopt the concept of heaven, accessible only by a valiant death. The show finally returns with season four on Wednesday. And the streamer offered a sneak peek at the first four+ minutes Monday, following its recent official trailer. You can watch both below.

Update: The first two episodes of season four of Mythic Quest now stream on Apple TV+. One review called it “as delightful and dysfunctional as ever.”

As an iPhone user, Apple Photos and iCloud Photos provide a great way to view, edit and back up all your precious pictures. But as a long-time Google Photos user, I find the Apple Photos experience lacking in many respects. In the great Apple Photos vs. Google Photos debate, Apple doesn’t emerge as a clear winner.

Below are five features Apple Photos must steal from Google Photos to win me over.

iOS 18.3 adds Starlink network support to iPhones on T-Mobile’s network. A report claims Apple secretly worked with Starlink and T-Mobile to roll out the feature.

Currently, T-Mobile is providing Starlink connectivity to iPhone users on its network on an invite-only basis.

The banana-shaped iPhone case in the new Andy Warhol x Casetify collection is the most bizarre Apple accessory we’ve seen in a while. It’s gigantic, fragile and expensive. And it even comes with three stickers that look like what you’d see on an actual banana at the grocery store.

It’s only one of the many Apple accessories in the eye-catching new collection, produced by Casetify under license from The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts.

Wanna know how your favorite tech news website became a thing? Then check out the latest episode of the Apple Core podcast, featuring an interview with Cult of Mac founder Leander Kahney.

In his 30-year career, Leander has covered many pivotal moments in Apple history. Like Steve Jobs’ return in 1997 and his legendary iPhone launch keynote 10 years later.

Leander literally wrote the book on Steve Jobs, Tim Cook and Jony Ive, and he shares loads of fascinating insights in this unmissable one-hour interview.

macOS Sequoia 15.3 left beta testing on Monday, and is now ready for any compatible Mac to install. The major new feature is the ability to create Genmoji: custom emoji that can be used in Messages and other apps.

Apple also introduced iOS 18.3, iPadOS 18.3, watchOS 11.3 and more.

After more than a month of beta testing, Apple released iOS 18.3 to the public Monday. Unlike the last two point updates, iOS 18.3 is light on big additions. However, it brings minor new features and some usability improvements. Check them all out below.

Newly added soccer tournaments, smoother navigation among favorites and game-broadcast information come to the Apple Sports app in update 2.4, the iPhone giant said Monday. Each of the updates should help sports fans follow their favorite teams and leagues a little more easily.

The iPhone SE 4 is right around the corner, and a new video supposedly showing off the low-cost handset reveals what it’ll look like from every angle.

If  this leaked video turns out to be accurate, then the recent rumor that the display in Apple’s next budget handset will sport a Dynamic Island isn’t correct. And that’s just one of many details shown.