iOS 17.3 Added New Feature That Every iPhone User Should Know About (2024)

FAQs

What is unique about iOS 17? ›

iOS 17 includes a Journal app that lets iPhone and iPad users record their daily thoughts and activities. The Journal app brings in information from your iPhone like your photos, music you've listened to, workouts, and more, and it suggests topics for you to write about.

Stolen Device Protection prevents the person from performing critical device and Apple ID account operations (like changing your device passcode or Apple ID password) by requiring biometric authentication with Face ID or Touch ID with no passcode fallback.

The keyboard will add explicit language that you use to your personal vocabulary list and will learn this usage for each different app. Explicit language that is learned is used for autocorrect, QuickPath, suggestions, and predictive text. Updated text cursor.

But the tech giant gave all iPhones a new security feature with the release of iOS 17.3 in January. The feature is called Stolen Device Protection, and it aims to protect your data if your phone is stolen or falls into nefarious hands.

iOS 17.0.3

This update provides important bug fixes, security updates, and addresses an issue that may cause iPhone to run warmer than expected.

Correcting Autocorrect

Tapping the blue line shows the original word that you typed, and you can tap it to choose that instead. If there are other possible autocorrect options for what you typed, those will also be displayed.

This is the first major revision of the iPad Pro's Magic Keyboard since its launch in 2020. It keeps the cantilevered double-hinged design and single USB-C port (power only), upgrades the palm rest to aluminum from plastic, and adds a larger glass trackpad with haptic feedback.

With iOS 11, Apple introduced Smart Punctuation. By default, this feature automatically converts ambidextrous straight quotes to curly quotes, in addition to converting two hyphens (–) to an em dash (—). In the case of quotes, it also replaces the straight apostrophes and quotes with language-specific glyphs.

iPhone Secret Codes are the USSD codes that provide certain information and dial-up to the specific person or place when typed on the keypad. Every smartphone comes up with its own set of acquired secret codes that help customers in emergencies.

You can find out how to tell if spyware is on your iPhone by watching out for the signs, like an overheating phone, poor performance, unfamiliar apps, and strange pop-ups. You can also download apps that search for malware and detect suspicious connections being made to your phone.

What is the new malware on iPhone? ›

The iPhone spyware—described as a “sophisticated iOS implant,” was first reported in 2020 amid rising political tensions in Hong Kong. The latest iteration of LightSpy has more extensive spying features than the first, the researchers said.

According to Apple's release notes, the iOS 17.3. 1 and iPadOS 17.3. 1 update contains "bug fixes for your iPhone," specifically addressing an issue where "text may unexpectedly duplicate or overlap while typing." Personally, I had not encountered this bug, so I'm unclear about its prevalence.

Updated security and privacy.

Bottom line: If your phone is compatible, you should almost certainly update to iOS 17. There's very little downside, and you get a lot.

While the previous update included new features, like the Journal app and Contact Key Verification, iOS 17.2. 1 seems to be an incremental update focused on bug fixes and patches. To download the update, go to Settings > General > Software Update, tap Install Now and follow the onscreen prompts.