macOS Sonoma is here today and it brings a bunch of new features, such as desktop widgets, a new Lock Screen, Game Mode, pet recognition in Photos, Mail updates, and a lot more.
However, several features that Apple showcased at WWDC this past June won’t be available in the first release of Sonoma. Like iOS 17, some features won’t be available until a future update later this year or in early 2024. Here’s a list of features to look forward to in macOS Sonoma.
Apple Music
macOS Sonoma has plenty of Desktop Widgets you can use, but the Music widget isn’t available yet. It allows users to control playback from the Music app, as well as show a dynamic list of the top charts and recommendations.
Other Music features that will come at a later date:
- Playlist collaboration: Friends can put together a playlist and add, reorder, and remove songs. Emoji can be used to react to songs.
- Favorite Songs playlist: Just as it sounds like, a playlist of your favorite songs. You can ask Siri to play it, too.
- Favorites in Library: Your favorite songs, artists, and playlists are automatically added to your Library.
Messages
Messages as a bunch of new features, such as swipe to reply, verification code auto-delete, and enhanced audio messages. But these three features won’t be available until later:
- Stickers: A Sticker drawer will have Live Stickers, Memoji, or Animoji that you can use to react to a message.
- Catch-up Arrow: In a group conversation, an arrow appears in the top right corner. Tap it and you’ll jump to the first unread message.
- iCloud improvements: Messages in iCloud will be able to sync settings such as Text Message Forwarding, Send & Receive accounts, and SMS filters across devices.
In a later update to macOS Sonoma, group messages will have a catch-up arrow to take the user to the first unread message.
Apple
PDFs
When you open a PDF, the Intelligent form detection can automatically identify PDFs with a field that needs to be filled out. Enhanced AutoFill can sense fields such as names and addresses and quickly populate them—but not until a future update.
Inline predictive text
When using English, Sonoma can provide single and multi-word predictions for text fields, based on what you are typing. You can then accept the predictive text suggestion by pressing the space bar. Like iOS 17, the feature is delayed until later this year.
Author: Roman Loyola, Senior Editor
Roman has covered technology since the early 1990s. His career started at MacUser, and he's worked for MacAddict, Mac|Life, and TechTV.