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Apple’s iOS 26.1 Public Beta 3 Drops – Hidden AI Tools & Colorful New Icons Revealed

October 15, 2025
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Apple’s iOS 26.1 Public Beta 3 Drops – Hidden AI Tools & Colorful New Icons Revealed
  • Apple has just seeded iOS 26.1, iPadOS 26.1 and macOS Tahoe 26.1 Public Beta 3 (released Oct 14, 2025) to beta testers [1]. These builds arrive a day after developer Beta 3 and ahead of a late-October public launch [2].
  • Apple Intelligence (the system-wide AI suite) gains support for many new languages: Danish, Dutch, Norwegian, Portuguese (Portugal), Swedish, Turkish, Traditional Chinese and Vietnamese [3]. At the same time, AirPods Live Translate adds Japanese, Korean, Italian and Simplified/Traditional Chinese support [4], broadening Apple’s real-time translation features.
  • A surprise “Local Capture” setting now appears in Settings → General, letting users record call audio or video to their Files app. The menu even has a new “Audio Only” toggle and lets you change the save location for recordings [5] [6]. This matches Apple’s focus on voice/video productivity (e.g. podcasting).
  • The Apple TV app icon has been revamped with bright, rainbow-like colors across iOS, iPadOS and tvOS [7] [8]. This aligns with Apple’s rebranding of Apple TV+ simply to “Apple TV,” as confirmed in an Oct 13 press release [9] [10]. Internally, though, references to “Apple TV+” still linger in the app.
  • In Accessibility, a new “Prefer Single-Touch Actions” toggle appears (under Accessibility → Touch) that lets certain UI elements be activated with one tap instead of a slide [11]. This likely relates to Apple’s new alarm/timer gestures: Clock app alarms now require a slide-to-stop gesture instead of a tap (making accidental dismissals harder) [12].
  • User interface tweaks: Control Center animations are now bouncier/“springier” [13]. Settings app icons and home screen folder names have been left-aligned for a cleaner look [14] [15]. Other small changes include swipe-to-skip gestures in Apple Music and an improved video scrubber in Photos [16] [17].
  • macOS Tahoe 26.1 Beta 3 also dropped with its share of tweaks. Notably, Apple tried again at redesigning the internal SSD icon (previously a hard-drive icon). In Beta 3 the icon is now just a plain silver box (no vents or slots) [18] – but critics say it still “looks nothing like” a real SSD [19]. Apple even updated the network icon with a sleeker design [20].
  • Under the hood, iOS 26.1 Beta 3 hints at deeper changes. Apple is laying groundwork for third-party AI model integrations in built-in apps (beyond ChatGPT), according to code strings spotted by analysts [21] [22]. The update also reworks notifications: iOS 26.1 introduces a new Notification Forwarding feature (allowing you to mirror iPhone alerts to non-Apple smartwatches) and even hints at native “mercenary spyware” alerts to warn if your device is targeted [23].

In short, iOS/iPadOS 26.1 Beta 3 is mostly a refinement update ahead of the final release – adding language support, UI polish, and the much-talked-about “background security” toggle for automatic updates [24], plus a few fun surprises. Macworld’s Roman Loyola quipped about one of the more visible changes, the new Mac SSD icon: “There are so many things wrong with this icon, but here’s my main problem: it’s inaccurate. The internal Mac SSD looks nothing like that,” he wrote, noting that Apple “can use its design savvy to make it look good” [25]. Meanwhile, AppleInsider editor Marko Zivkovic observed that apart from the Local Capture toggle, “most of the changes in the software update are related to in-development features or are cosmetic in nature” [26].

These beta releases also apply to watchOS 26.1 and tvOS 26.1 (which get the Apple TV icon change), but no user-visible watchOS news has surfaced yet. Public beta testers can download the updates now via Settings (or the Apple Beta Software Program site) [27]. Apple’s official word is minimal, so most of this scoop comes from digging into the betas by journalists and developers.

Expert Commentary: Industry writers see this as Apple finalizing the iOS 26.1 release. Juli Clover of MacRumors notes that Apple seeded these public betas “for testing purposes” a day after the dev betas, signaling we’re days away from the finished update [28]. Tech columnist Roman Loyola (Macworld) wryly critiqued the new SSD icon, saying it’s an improvement “in one sense (no hard drive image), but it still looks wrong” [29] [30]. And Marko Zivkovic (AppleInsider) points out that most of the Beta 3 tweaks are minor polishing – the bulk of iOS 26’s work (Liquid Glass UI, new Phone screening, etc.) shipped already with iOS 26.0 last month.

What’s Next? Apple is expected to release iOS/iPadOS 26.1 (and corresponding tvOS/watchOS/macOS 26.1) to all users by late October [31]. In the meantime, public beta testers will likely see another beta or two as Apple irons out bugs. The new Security Improvements toggle in Settings is especially noteworthy: it effectively revamps Rapid Security Responses into an automatic background update feature [32]. Consumers should enable this once 26.1 arrives. Otherwise, the update mostly ensures Siri/AI features work in new languages and that the flashy Apple TV branding rolls out everywhere consistently.

Sources: Reports from MacRumors [33] [34], 9to5Mac [35] [36], AppleInsider [37] [38], Macworld [39] and related coverage. These outlets quote Apple’s release notes and beta code findings to detail every visible change. Each highlight above is documented by their investigations.

20 Mind-Blowing iOS 26 Shortcuts with Apple Intelligence!
Watch this video on YouTube.

References

1. www.macrumors.com, 2. 9to5mac.com, 3. www.macrumors.com, 4. www.macrumors.com, 5. 9to5mac.com, 6. appleinsider.com, 7. 9to5mac.com, 8. appleinsider.com, 9. 9to5mac.com, 10. www.macrumors.com, 11. appleinsider.com, 12. www.macrumors.com, 13. 9to5mac.com, 14. www.macrumors.com, 15. www.macrumors.com, 16. www.geeky-gadgets.com, 17. www.macrumors.com, 18. www.macworld.com, 19. www.macworld.com, 20. www.macworld.com, 21. appleinsider.com, 22. appleinsider.com, 23. appleinsider.com, 24. www.macrumors.com, 25. www.macworld.com, 26. appleinsider.com, 27. www.macrumors.com, 28. www.macrumors.com, 29. www.macworld.com, 30. www.macworld.com, 31. 9to5mac.com, 32. www.macrumors.com, 33. www.macrumors.com, 34. www.macrumors.com, 35. 9to5mac.com, 36. 9to5mac.com, 37. appleinsider.com, 38. appleinsider.com, 39. www.macworld.com

Mateusz Brzeziński

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