Apple's iOS 17 Will Feature Better Autocorra New Journal App

Other improvements include live voicemail transcription, a useful standby mode, and new tools for Phone, Messages, and FaceTime

At its Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) on Monday, Apple introduced iOS 17, saying the next version of its iPhone operating system will be more personalized and intuitive than ever before. While the updates aren't as head-turning as, say, the company's new augmented reality device, they do include handy improvements from "quality of life" items like more accurate autocorrect to animated stickers in the Messages app, which are simply nice to have.

The iPhone also will get a built-in Journal app that will prompt you with things to write about based on your photos, location, music, and other info from your phone. Apple says the app is end-to-end encrypted for privacy and security.

The free download of iOS 17 will be available for iPhones this fall, with early access for developers and a public beta version coming in the summer.

Here's a quick look at some of the best features iOS 17 has to offer.

Personalized Contact Posters: With this new feature, you can have a customized image and text that you choose show up on the phone of the person you call instead of just your name and number. It looks and works similarly to the customized lock screen. Personalized Contact Posters will work with third-party VoIP apps as well as the Phone and Contacts apps.

Live Voicemail: Don't want to answer the phone unless it's an emergency? With this feature, you can let calls go to voicemail but have the messages transcribed on your phone in real time, so you can choose to answer the call or ignore it. This may come in handy for screening calls from private or unidentified phone numbers, too.

FaceTime Video Voicemail: You can leave a short video message in FaceTime if the person doesn't answer your video call.

Messages Check In: iOS 17 can automatically share your location, battery status, and cellular reception status with someone on your contact list to give them peace of mind. So, for example, if you forget to let your family know you’ve arrived home safely after a visit, the iPhone can do it for you.

Name Drop: Instead of dictating your contact information to someone who has an iPhone, the two of you can bring your phones close together and use Name Drop to share the contact info. This works between iPhones and Apple Watches, too.

A new Standby mode can show the time, weather, photos, and interactive widgets for things like smart home device controls when your iPhone is on its side charging. You can also use it with Siri to set a timer and play music. By the way, Apple's digital assistant now answers to the name Siri alone, without the "Hey" before it.

Standby adapts to low light, so at bedtime it will have a red tone for less sleep disruption.

New features are coming for the iPad, too, including interactive widgets, an overhauled lock screen with live photo effects, Apple's Health app, and the ability to store PDFs inside the Notes app for better organization and annotation.

Melanie Pinola

Melanie Pinola covers smartphones, home office products, and a wide range of other technology topics for Consumer Reports. A seasoned service journalist, her work has appeared in the New York Times, Popular Mechanics, Laptop Magazine, PCWorld, and other publications. A former IT administrator and the author of two books about remote work and software, she was a longtime CR reader before joining the company as a tech writer and editor. Follow Melanie on Twitter @melaniepinola.