I have been using iOS 15 for a while now as I was using the beta version before the official release on both the iPhone and iPad. There are a couple of features that I really like that are across both device which are the Schedule Summary Feature and Focus Mode which I will go into in more detail in the sections below.
Scheduled Summary:
This feature allows you to schedule when you want to receive your notifications rather than getting them as soon as they arrive and distracting you. I have two summary scheduled for the day, one is first thing in the morning and then again in the evening. You can selected which apps go into these summary’s so I have selected the ones that I don’t need to know about throughout the day and that generally would distracted me from other more important tasks. You can add more summaries to appear throughout the day if you want or you can delete them so that you only have one that comes up.
Focus Mode:
This is a great feature which again is shared across all your apple devices. You can set up a number of different focus modes for different scenario’s e.g. sleep or work. Within each of the mode you can customise them to allow notifications from certain apps or people. You can also schedule a time for the focus mode e.g. work to come on automatically. Another cool feature is that you can customise you Home Screen do that it is set up for that particular focus mode to remove distraction for instance so you only see the apps applicable whilst in that mode.
the next couple of features are specifically for the iPad and I think that they are great additions.
Multi Tasking:
Multi-tasking had been on the iPad for a while but it was not always the easiest to use or at least I didn’t find it easy to use. The changes that have been made to this feature in iOS 15 makes it so much easier to use all the multi-tasking features which makes the iPad a productivity machine. Previously you would need to swipe from certain places on the screen whereas in iOS 15 at the top of the screen you will now see three dots which you can pull down and it will give you the options for multi-tasking e.g. spilt screen. I like this so much because it takes the thinking out of it, you simply pull down and choose, you don’t need to remember the specific actions.
Quick Notes:
This is not the only improvement to apple notes but i think that this is one of the best ones. You can now swipe up a quick notes from the bottom right of your screen and just start typing or writing using your apple pencil. No need to open up the notes app if you just want to capture something quickly and it will store that note in a quick notes folder in the apple notes app. I think that this makes apple notes a much more attractive notes taking app and there are lot out there but this just makes it some much easier to take notes that will be sync across all of your apple devices.
Safari:
There have also been some updates to safari. I like the fact that you can now add extension on Safari across your devices, I haven’t added many to date but I have added a dark mode extension for all websites which I really like. The other change to Safari on iOS 15 is that the Tab bar is now at the bottom of the screen, this did take a bit of time to get used to but I do quite like now. You can also organise you tab now and save them in groups to better organise them, however I have not really used this feature mainly because I don’t really have need to.
These are just a few of the features that are available as part of iOS 15 but from my perspective these are the most useful (or at least the main ones that use). So if you haven’t downloaded the latest iOS hopefully this gives you an idea of some of the great features that you could benefit from.