Apple this week released the first developer and public betas of iOS 14.5 and watchOS 7.4, bringing a major change to the integration between iPhone and Apple Watch. For the first time, you can now use your Apple Watch to unlock your iPhone when you’re wearing a face mask. Here’s how it works.
If Face ID skips the Mac, it won’t be surprising. The Mac is just not a place where the company innovates anymore.Nearly every recent Apple hardware or software innovation started on the iPhone.
There are few things worth noting right off the bat. First and foremost, this requires the latest developer or public betas of iOS 14.5 and watchOS 7.4. If you don’t want to hop on the beta train, we expect iOS 14.5 and watchOS 7.4 to be released to the general public sometime in the next few months.
Unlock your iPhone with Apple Watch
- Apple claims there is a 1 in 1,000,000 chance that someone would be able to open your phone using Face ID (compared to 1 in 50,000 chance of having the same fingerprint as you.).
- Apple said it worked with thousands of people across the world and took over a billion images, and with that, it developed multiple neural networks to form its Face ID technology. Bionic neural engine.
To enable the Unlock with Apple Watch feature, open the Settings app on your iPhone, then look for the “Face ID & Passcode” setting. Once you flip this toggle, your Apple Watch will be able to authenticate your iPhone as long as the following conditions are met:
- Face ID detects a mask
- Your Apple Watch is nearby
- Your Apple Watch is on your wrist
- Your Apple Watch is unlocked
- Your Apple Watch has a passcode enabled
Another thing to keep in mind here is that if you disable the Apple Watch wrist detection feature, then you will not be able to unlock your iPhone with your Apple Watch.
iOS 14.5 beta video walkthrough
Once you enable the feature, your iPhone will unlock automatically with your Apple Watch the next time you wear a face mask. When your iPhone unlocks, you’ll receive a haptic feedback notification on your Apple Watch telling you that your iPhone was unlocked by the Apple Watch. There is also the option to quickly “Lock iPhone” directly from that Apple Watch notification.
9to5Mac’s Take
The feature is similar to how the Apple Watch unlock feature works on the Mac, but it appears to be both faster and more reliable in my early testing. On the Mac, the Apple Watch can be used for a variety of different authentication tasks, including accessing controls in System Preferences, making Apple Pay purchases, and more.
On the iPhone, Apple Watch unlock is limited solely to unlocking your iPhone while wearing your mask. It does not work if your iPhone can’t detect if you’re wearing a mask, and it does not work for things like Apple Pay, credit card auto-fill in Safari, or accessing Apple Card features in the Wallet app. In those instances, you’ll still have to enter your passcode if you’re wearing a mask.
The “Lock iPhone” button is an important security step as it allows you to re-lock your iPhone if it were to be unlocked by someone else wearing a face mask. It does not appear that this feature is scanning for your face at all. Instead, it is simply looking for a face mask, and when it registers a face mask — whether it’s on you or someone else — it will use proximity to unlock with your Apple Watch.
Ultimately, what’s important to keep in mind here is that the Unlock with Apple Watch feature is not as secure as unlocking with Face or a passcode, but it is far more convenient.
Despite its limitations, support for unlocking your iPhone with your Apple Watch while wearing a mask is a huge change amid the COVID-19 pandemic. What do you think of the feature? Let us know down in the comments!
Macbook With Face Id Case
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We’ve long expected Apple to offer Face ID for Mac models, just as it does for the iPhone and iPad Pro. Bloomberg’s report on an upcoming higher-end MacBook Air has a mix of good and bad news on this front.
Another feature some have long wanted for MacBooks is the ability to connect to mobile data directly when Wi-Fi isn’t available. The report says the position is the same for both features: They are coming, but not soon …
Apple has also developed underlying Mac support for both cellular connectivity — the ability for Macs to connect to the internet via smartphone networks — and Face ID, the company’s facial recognition system. But neither feature appears to be coming soon.
‘Soon’ in this context likely means this year.
It goes on to say that Apple has actually delayed Face ID for the iMac.
Face ID had originally been planned to arrive in this year’s iMac redesign, but it’s now unlikely to be included in the first iteration of the new design.
Apple has multiple references to Face ID for Macs in various patents, going back several years.
Apple Face Id
One potential challenge in bringing Face ID to MacBooks is the depth needed for the dot projector. Both iPhone and iPad have a lot more depth to play with than a MacBook lid. But it’s unclear why that would pose a problem for the iMac unless the company plans to reduce the bezel size to a point where the height also becomes an issue; a notch is not really an option for a Mac screen.
One thing that may help is that Apple has reportedly been able to combine the dot-projector and infrared camera into a single unit. This is expected to reduce the width of the notch in this year’s iPhone lineup, and could perhaps allow Apple to fit the unit into a corner of the display, where component height is not a problem.
As for mobile data support, that likely has more niche appeal. Although some of us would like it for the convenience, many are happy to tether to their iPhone, especially since Apple made it a much more seamless experience, simply selecting it from the Wi-Fi menu-bar icon without the need to do anything at the iPhone end.
Any mobile data support now would of course have to include 5G, and the components for that still remain relatively expensive, so it’s not surprising to me that Apple is holding fire on that for now.
Macbook With Face Id Wallet
Concept image: Blagovest Dimitrov
Face Id Macbook Pro
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