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iOS 26 Includes These Five Smaller Features You Might Have Missed

While the dust is beginning to settle on the first iOS 26 beta, we continue to take a closer look at new features coming with the update.

iOS 26 on Three iPhones
Below, we recap five smaller changes that you might have missed.

Emoji Game

apple news plus emoji game
Apple News+ subscribers in the U.S. and Canada can play a new Emoji Game, which tasks players with completing words and phrases with emoji.

This is the fifth game that is available with an Apple News+ subscription. The others are Crossword, Crossword Mini, Quartiles, and Sudoku.

Weather via Satellite

iPhone Satellite Feature
iOS 26 will offer Weather via satellite, allowing you to view up-to-date weather forecast information while outside of Wi-Fi or cellular range.

This feature is referenced within the code for the first iOS 26 beta, according to MacRumors contributor Aaron Perris, but it is not live yet.

Look for this feature to be enabled in a later iOS 26 beta version.

Custom Ringtones

Use as Ringtone
iOS 26 allows you to set custom ringtones on the iPhone without using the GarageBand app.

To set a custom ringtone on iOS 26, open the Files app and tap on an MP3 or M4A audio file that is less than 30 seconds long. Next, tap on the share button in the bottom-right corner of the screen, tap on More, and tap on Use as Ringtone. Then, that audio file will be listed as a ringtone option in the Settings app under Sounds & Haptics → Ringtone.

Apple continues to sell 30-second song ringtones for $1.29 each through the iTunes Store app.

Digital Passport

ios 26 digital id passport wallet
iOS 26 lets you create a digital version of your U.S. passport on your iPhone.

After creating a Digital ID in the Apple Wallet app, based on your U.S. passport, you can present it in person at select TSA checkpoints for identity verification purposes during domestic travel. However, Apple says it is not a replacement for a physical passport, and it cannot be used for international travel and border crossing purposes.

Apple says the Digital ID feature is secure, private, and compliant with REAL ID.

The passport-based Digital ID can also be used for age and identity verification in apps, online, and in stores, according to Apple.

'Select' in Messages

Messages Select
A new "Select" option in the Messages app on iOS 26 lets you select and copy a portion of text within a message bubble in a conversation.

On earlier iOS versions, you can only copy an entire message bubble.

Related Roundups: iOS 26, iPadOS 26
Related Forum: iOS 26

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Top Rated Comments

jclardy Avatar
18 months ago
Select in messages is huge, so annoying when you are trying to grab out a piece of text and have to either copy the entire thing and use notes, or screenshot and use OCR to do text selection.
Score: 18 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Unami Avatar
18 months ago

Custom ring tones and system tones have been an option on iOS since version 4 or 5.

I always made the .m4r files then drop them on my phone via iTunes or Finder, and they show up.
Sure, but it has still been cumbersome as hell (and we all know, why):
Shorten a song to below 30sec (below 20, iirc, for message sounds. Save as m4a. Rename to .m4r. Drop to iphone via itunes. And you have to know all that, and be technical-minded. Everytime I told that to "normal" people, they didn't bother.

Compare that to my old sony-ericcson dumbphone from 2003: click options on any .mp3 on your sd-card, no matter the length. Select: use as ringtone.
Score: 13 Votes (Like | Disagree)
sos47 Avatar
18 months ago
Smaller features are nice.
Smaller iPhones are nicer.
Score: 12 Votes (Like | Disagree)
18 months ago

Custom ringtone is the one feature new in iOS 26 that would convince me to upgrade, however, because of performance degradation observed in iOS 18.x I will keep my iPhone 11 Pro Max on iOS 17.7

You will still get the best performance with the iOS version designed for your device, iOS 18 for iPhone 16, iOS 15 for iPhone 13, etc.
Not at all true!!
Score: 10 Votes (Like | Disagree)
darkpaw Avatar
18 months ago
I don't mind that users not in the US and Canada don't get those games in their News+ subscriptions, but if we're paying the same for less content we should get a discount or something else to make up the difference.

LinkedIn manages to give everyone five daily puzzles and you don't even have to be a paying subscriber to access them.
Score: 7 Votes (Like | Disagree)
WarmWinterHat Avatar
18 months ago

Custom ringtone is the one feature new in iOS 26 that would convince me to upgrade, however, because of performance degradation observed in iOS 18.x I will keep my iPhone 11 Pro Max on iOS 17.7

You will still get the best performance with the iOS version designed for your device, iOS 18 for iPhone 16, iOS 15 for iPhone 13, etc.
Custom ring tones and system tones have been an option on iOS since version 4 or 5.

I always made the .m4r files then drop them on my phone via iTunes or Finder, and they show up.
Score: 6 Votes (Like | Disagree)
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