Table of contents for #740 in AppleMagazine

As 2025 winds down, Apple's faithful can exhale… sort of. The year brought Liquid Glass interfaces that mesmerized, an iPhone Air that redefined slimline elegance, and M5 chips that signaled AI dominance. Yet, it wasn't without thorns: Siri's delays, executive churn, and tariff tremors tested the Cupertino faithful. What comes next? 2026 is just around the corner. LOOKING AHEAD There’s no denying that 2025 was a great year for Apple. Indeed, revenue crested at $216 billion, but the innovation gap with AI frontrunners like OpenAI loomed large. Now, eyes turn to 2026, a year insiders dub "pivotal." Bloomberg's Mark Gurman forecasts at least 15 new products, from a crease-free foldable iPhone to AI-infused smart home hubs, all amid regulatory storms and a Siri renaissance. With Tim Cook's steady hand potentially…

The arrival of Apple’s M5 silicon marks one of the most cohesive upgrades across its core product families in years. The company’s new processor has been introduced on the iPad Pro, MacBook Pro, and Vision Pro, a rare synchronized refresh that redefines performance across three very different product categories. THE M5 CHIP The focus this time isn’t on environmental progress or corporate milestones, but purely on performance, how much faster, more efficient, and capable these machines have become. Each now relies on the same foundation: a chip designed for AI computation, graphics acceleration, and seamless multitasking at the hardware level. The result is a generation of devices that look familiar but feel dramatically more advanced when put to real workloads. The M5 is Apple’s first processor designed entirely with generative…

The Apple Vision Pro is a powerhouse machine, and its latest upgrade features the powerful M5 chip, a redesigned Dual Knit Band for all-day comfort, and visionOS 26, loaded with AI smarts and immersive features, all designed to take spatial computing to a whole new level. M5 CHIP At the heart of this upgrade is Apple's M5 chip, a beast built on third-generation 3-nanometer process tech. For Vision Pro users, it translates to a "leap forward in performance," as Bob Borchers, Apple's VP of Worldwide Product Marketing, put it during the announcement. The chip's 10-core CPU efficiently handles multithreaded tasks, significantly reducing app load times and making web browsing feel buttery smooth, even when juggling multiple spatial windows. But the real magic happens on the graphics side. The upgraded 10-core…

Since their debut in 2016, the tiny marvels that are AirPods have become synonymous with seamless audio integration, transforming how we listen, move, and connect. However, with the launch of the AirPods Pro 3, the company has orchestrated what might be its most ambitious upgrade yet, featuring cutting-edge tech that delivers a significant leap forward in personal audio. UPGRADE TIME At a time when wireless earbuds are ubiquitous, the AirPods Pro 3 stand out by addressing real-world pain points: the frustration of a loose fit during a sweaty run, the distraction of urban noise on a commute, or the isolation of language barriers in a globalized world. Powered by a redesigned chassis, advanced sensors, and AI-driven features, these earbuds promise to elevate everyday experiences into something extraordinary. Having spent the…

macOS Tahoe 26 marks a significant milestone in the evolution of the Mac. With a visually stunning redesign, enhanced Continuity features, the most transformative Spotlight update to date, and expanded Apple Intelligence capabilities, the update promises to make the Mac more capable, productive, and personal than ever. INTRODUCING LIQUID GLASS At the heart of macOS Tahoe 26 is a breathtaking redesign that introduces Liquid Glass, a translucent material that dynamically reflects and refracts its surroundings. This aesthetic overhaul enhances the Mac’s visual appeal while preserving the familiarity that users love. The desktop, Dock, sidebars, and toolbars have been refined to emphasize content, with a fully transparent menu bar that makes the display feel expansive. Personalization takes center stage with new customization options. Users can now tweak the Control Center and…

In September, Apple introduced the Apple Watch Series 11, “the ultimate health and fitness companion.” While it doesn’t reinvent the category with radical design changes, the Series 11 features improvements in health monitoring, durability, connectivity, and battery life. It reflects Apple’s transformation from a luxury accessory into a vital part of everyday life. HEALTH-FIRST The headline feature of the Series 11 is its ability to deliver hypertension notifications. Using the optical heart sensor, the Watch now passively analyses vascular responses across thirty-day periods to identify potential signs of chronic high blood pressure. If such patterns are detected, the device issues a notification, urging users to confirm results with a traditional blood pressure cuff and share them with their healthcare provider. Apple trained this system using data from more than 100,000…

A new chapter in cinematic history is unfolding. Generative artificial intelligence has moved from experimental novelty to mainstream production tool, reshaping the way movies are made, consumed, and valued. AI-generated cinema is no longer a distant concept; it is here, challenging both the creative process and the business model of modern entertainment. THE ETERNAUT ON NETFLIX Netflix has been one of the first major players to embrace AI in content creation. The streaming giant made headlines when its co-CEO, Ted Sarandos, confirmed that the company used generative AI to create final visual effects in The Eternaut, an Argentinian sci-fi series based on a beloved graphic novel. Sarandos revealed that a complex scene featuring a collapsing building in Buenos Aires was completed with AI technology. Traditional production methods would have made…