Apple is making its platforms even more accessible this year

Apple (Nasdaq:AAPL) has spent decades making sure everyone can use its hardware, which is why the company regularly celebrates Global Accessibility Awareness Day with news about upcoming improvements in its operating systems. This year’s collection is particularly compelling, including a tool to let you read real-time Live Captions of conversations taking place around you using your Apple Watch, enabling people with poor hearing to engage more actively during meetings.

The company announces a raft of new accessibility features in the weeks prior to WWDC each year. This year is a bit of a feature jamboree, with a host of new accessibility tools promised in Apple’s devices when iOS 19 and macOS 16 ship later this year. The company has invested in accessibility for 40 years, ever since 1985.

What Apple said

“At Apple, accessibility is part of our DNA,” said Apple CEO Tim Cook. “Making technology for everyone is a priority for all of us, and we’re proud of the innovations we’re sharing this year. That includes tools to help people access crucial information, explore the world around them, and do what they love.”

“Building on 40 years of accessibility innovation at Apple, we are dedicated to pushing forward with new accessibility features for all of our products,” said Sarah Herrlinger, Apple’s senior director of Global Accessibility Policy and Initiatives. 

Accessibility Nutrition Labels on the App Store

The big new addition this year, Accessibility Nutrition Labels, are similar to the Privacy Nutrition Labels Apple introduced some years ago but focused on accessibility. These labels will show you which of Apple’s accessibility tools (including Voice Over, Reduced Motion, and many more) the app supports. The idea is to help consumers identify those apps most suitable for their needs. “These labels will give people with disabilities a new way to easily make more informed decisions and make purchases with a new level of confidence,” said Eric Bridges, the American Foundation for the Blind’s president and CEO.

Apple

A Mac surprise

In a really interesting use of iPhone Continuity Camera, Apple is bringing the Magnifier app to the Mac. Magnifier has been available on iPhones since 2016; it helps users zoom in, read text, and detect nearby objects. Now it works with the Mac using Continuity Camera to take images from the iPhone or using an attached USB camera. You might use this feature to read a whiteboard during a presentation, or to read documents using Desk View. The tool lets you adjust brightness, contrast, color filters, and even perspective to make text and images easier to see.

New tool: Accessibility Reader

The all-new Accessibility Reader tool takes text from the world around you, digitizes it and makes it available to you in a legible on-screen format. It’s a new system-wide reading mode designed to make text easier to read for users with a wide range of disabilities, such as dyslexia or low vision, and it can speak the content. You can launch Accessibility Reader from any app, and you’ll find it in the Magnifier app.

Apple

Live Captions on Apple Watch

Given we recently learned Pope Leo XIV wears an Apple Watch, it’s not inconceivable he might use Live Captions with watchOS 11. It’s based on Live Listen on your iPhone, which uses your microphone to stream conversation directly to AirPods and Made for iPhone hearing aids. Live Listen controls will now be available on an Apple Watch when a session is active on iPhone, meaning users can view Live Captions on their watch of what their iPhone hears while listening along to the audio. You can also start and stop Live Listen sessions or jump back in a session to pick up on something you missed.

The idea here is that you’ll be able to place your iPhone near the person/people you need to listen to and then hear, read, and control the Live Listen session from across the room. This will be invaluable for students with hearing problems, or anyone with a memory that favors written words above spoken speech.  They are particularly invaluable when used with Assistive Touch.

Braille Access

Apple’s new tools for braille turn any Apple device into a full-featured braille note taker. There’s a built-in app launcher, which makes it easy to open any app by typing with Braille Screen Input or a connected braille device. Once you’ve opened it, you’ll be able to take notes in braille and perform calculations using Nemeth Braille, a braille code often used in classrooms for maths and science.

Braille Access will also open Braille Ready Format (BRF) files, unlocking books and files previously created on a braille note-taking device. But perhaps the most interesting feature is that, thanks to Live Captions, it’s possible to transcribe conversations in real time directly on braille displays.

Brain Control

This will become more important in down the road. For users with severe mobility disabilities, iOS, iPadOS, and visionOS will add a new protocol to support Switch Control for Brain Computer Interfaces (BCIs), an emerging technology that allows users to control their device without physical movement. The neural link is getting closer.

Apple

Vision Pro

There’s some interesting accessibility features coming for visionOS. These include the capacity to magnify everything in view, including surroundings. For VoiceOver users, Live Recognition uses on-device machine learning to describe surroundings, find objects, read documents, and more. There is one more thing, ostensibly only available to accessibility developers: a new API will enable approved apps to access the main camera to provide live, person-to-person assistance for visual interpretation in apps like Be My Eyes, giving users more ways to understand their surroundings hands-free.

My take? The digitization of daily life is accelerating.

Many more features

There are more than a dozen improved accessibility features on the way. For example, the setup period for Personal Voice has been reduced to just one minute, rather than overnight; Sound Recognition can also now alert users when their name is called; and Voice Control introduces a new programming mode in Xcode. There are lots of smaller improvements, including a new way to temporarily share your own accessibility settings with another device.

Apple Services

Apple is also celebrating Global Accessibility Awareness day with a range of initiatives across the company. Apple stores will offer displays and training on accessibility features while Apple TV+ shares a behind-the-scenes look at the making of the new Apple Original film Deaf President Now!, which premieres on Apple TV+ May 16. Apple Books, Apple Podcasts, Apple TV, and Apple News will spotlight stories of people with disabilities and those who are working to make the world more accessible for everyone. The company has also published new how to videos for some of its existing features on YouTube.

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