macOS Monterey: 5 new features that will make your life easier

macOS Monterey: v new features that volition make your life easier

(Image credit: Apple)

macOS Monterey is Apple's official proper noun for macOS 12, and after months of speculation, we now know that the software update is coming to Macs this autumn with a slew of new and upgraded features that could make your life a little easier.

As with many major macOS updates, the list of features Apple's introducing with macOS Monterey is long plenty to make almost users' eyes glaze over. Many of these new features are also coming to iPhone and iPad in some class, reflecting Apple tree's connected efforts to make its walled garden of devices more appealing and sectional.

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Some of these new features besides help make Apple products more competitive: Safari is finally getting tab groups to rival those of Google Chrome, for example, and FaceTime's new SharePlay feature will let you simultaneously watch videos with others remotely, a la Amazon Prime number and Hulu'southward Watch Party modes.

Unless you're a programmer, you'll take to await at least a calendar month to put these new features to the exam. While the developer beta of macOS Monterey came out at the Worldwide Developers Conference, a public beta arrives in July ahead of the official launch this fall.

Once we've had time to muck nigh in the beta we'll accept a much better idea of how impactful these new features are, and what they mean for the average user. For now, here'south a brief rundown of the top features we're excited to come across in macOS Monterey.

Universal Control in macOS Monterey

Universal Command is one of the large new features of macOS Monterey, though it's but useful to those who own a Mac and at least one iPad. If yous do, Universal Control volition allow you to set them down near one another and apply your Mac'due south keyboard and mouse on the iPad by dragging the cursor from one screen to some other.

In the cursory demo Apple tree showed during WWDC, Universal Control looks like magic: when your Mac detects an iPad (logged into the same iCloud business relationship) is nearby via Bluetooth, you can elevate the cursor to the edge of the screen and, after a brief animation helps yous line up where the cursor will appear on the iPad, yous can drag the cursor off the screen and see it appear (via a Wi-Fi Direct connexion) on the iPad.

The cursor defines which device is currently the focus of your keyboard, so once you mouse over onto your iPad via Universal Control y'all tin employ your Mac'south keyboard to type on the tablet. Plus, you can utilize the cursor to drag and drop files betwixt devices, which should make it fifty-fifty easier to move media back and forth between tablet and estimator.

Apple says Universal Control currently supports a maximum of three simultaneous devices, which means you could (if you're one of the few who can afford to go on all the hardware on hand) work seamlessly betwixt an iMac, a MacBook and an iPad.

A revamped Safari

Safari is getting an overhaul aimed at making the browser a bit more than streamlined. Most notably, Safari will soon allow you to organize open up tabs into groups that are automatically updated and synced across all your devices, a feature already offered by browsers like Chrome and Edge.

You'll be able to admire your new tab groups in a redesigned sidebar which also lets you manage your bookmarks, Reading List, and whatever "Shared with Yous" links others accept sent you via the Messages app. The Shared with You list is a significant new piece of macOS 12 Monterey, and it will at present appear past default in the Safari offset page in add-on to the sidebar.

These new features arrive alongside a corrective redesign which will come across Safari'south tabs and tab bar streamlined to accept upward less space. Both volition now shift colors dynamically to lucifer the color palette of the site you're looking at, which seems like a fun party trick.

SharePlay will give you some fun new means of sharing media during FaceTime calls, similar simultaneously watching the same show on Apple TV Plus or listening to music together via Spotify. Information technology works across all Apple devices, from iPhones to iMacs, with picture-in-picture back up and dynamic audio controls which will adjust the book as people speak.

macOS Monterey features: Apple FaceTime — (Epitome credit: Apple tree)

SharePlay will too let you share your screen with others on a FaceTime call, then it should be easier to do things like shop with a friend remotely or walk your parent through a technical trouble. Apple will make a SharePlay API available to exterior developers, also, so you can look forward to more support from more than services going forward — at launch SharePlay volition support a number of pop media apps, including Disney Plus, ESPN Plus, HBO Max, and Hulu.

Quick Note and Notes in MacOS Monterey

With macOS Monterey, the Notes app is getting an upgrade that volition (among other things) make information technology easier to use collaboratively, equally Notes users will get admission to an Activity view which lets you see what changes others have made to a shared notation. You lot'll as well exist able to mention collaborators, and they can get notifications when you practise, which could make tasks similar grouping vacation planning a bit smoother.

Macs volition too get a new Quick Notation characteristic with macOS Monterey that should brand information technology easier to take notes almost any website or app y'all're currently looking at, without having to cease and burn up the Notes app.

Only Quick Notation looks to be more than just a streamlined way of writing Notes: you'll likewise be able to add links to websites or other apps, too equally highlights from Safari. These notes will be stored in the Notes app and accessible across all your devices, but what's most notable is that Quick Notes tied to specific websites and apps will appear equally thumbnails when you lot revisit those sites and apps down the road. That should brand it easier to keep rail of details across multiple apps and speedily selection up projects y'all're working on intermittently; at the very to the lowest degree, information technology should help forgetful sods like me banish sticky notes from their desks for proficient.

Focus in macOS 12 Monterey

Apple will introduce a more powerful fashion to set limits on what notifications you see and when with Focus, a new feature that's launching across macOS Monterey, iOS fifteen, and iPadOS xv.

Focus elaborates on Apple'southward established "Practise Not Disturb" mode by giving yous more command over what notifications are filtered out and when; you could fix a Family focus mode for when you've logged off for the day and don't want to run across whatsoever piece of work-related notifications or messages, for instance. And since Focus is synced across all your devices on the same iCloud account, you lot'll get the same filters on your iPhone and iPad.

Apple will transport macOS Monterey with a few Focus modes congenital in, just crucially you'll besides have the power to create your own. If Focus works on macOS the same way it will on iOS you lot'll also be able to customize which apps are shown while you lot're in specific Focus modes, which should brand it easier to blackball distractions while you're working — or stop checking e-mail and Slack when you're non.

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Alex Wawro is a lifelong tech and games enthusiast with more than a decade of experience covering both for outlets similar Game Developer, Black Lid, and PC Globe magazine. He currently serves as a senior editor at Tom's Guide covering all things calculating, from laptops and desktops to keyboards and mice.