Malcolm Owen
Apple has made its updates to iOS 15.5, iPadOS 15.5, watchOS 8.6, tvOS 15.5, and Studio Display update 15.5 available to download by the public, with the releases largely consisting of bug and performance changes.
The updates for iOS 15.5, iPadOS 15.5, watchOS 8.6, and tvOS 15.5 arrive after a month of beta testing for the operating systems, which involved a total of five beta builds being issued to developer testers.
Apple has also made the Studio Display update 15.5 available to the public. It can be downloaded as a separate update via the macOS System Preferences.
As an update released in the month ahead of WWDC 2022, Apple isn't really including any major changes in its operating system updates. It is more likely to want to save big features for its milestone announcements, which will occur during the WWDC keynote.
What was uncovered in the betas for iOS 15.5 include references to an "Apple Classical" app, as well as an update to the Home app showing Wi-Fi signal indicators for the HomePod, and Request and Send buttons for Apple Pay Cash in the Wallet app.
Apple lists the following in the iOS/iPadOS release notes:
- Wallet now enables Apple Cash customers to send and request money from their Apple Cash card
- Apple Podcasts includes a new setting to limit episodes stored on your iPhone and automatically delete older ones
- Fixes an issue where home automations, triggered by people arriving or leaving, may fail
iOS and iPadOS 15.5 are compatible with all devices that are currently compatible with iOS 15. Likewise, tvOS 15.5 works on all tvOS 15-compatible Apple TV units, and watchOS 8.6 on compatible watchOS 8 Apple Watch models.
Charles Martin
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5 Comments
Everything went fine with the updates EXCEPT my S7 Apple Watch (my S4 updated fine). The S7(fully charged and on a charger) downloaded and seemed to install ok, but then towards the end my iPhone advised that it could not pair with the S7. The watch face went black and then bricked - showing only the time and a small icon indicating that the watch was charging (green). All attempts to reboot the watch failed. I finally unpaired the watch via my iPhone and set it back up as a new watch, which is time consuming. All that went well but my watch battery got drained into the red, despite being on a charger the entire time.
It is now re-paired and restored from backup and charging. I will re-attempt to update to WatchOS 8.6 once it is fully charged again.
Anyone else have a similar problem?
Safari is significantly more responsive in iPadOS 15.5 (6th gen, 2018). I’ve had quite bad performance on Javascript-heavy news sites with autoplay videos, lately, and this update is a step in the right direction.
Thank you Apple for fixing the Frequently Visited bug in Safari. The feature is now working correctly on all of the devices that I've updated so far. My Favorites bookmarks also seem to be syncing correctly across all devices. Woo hoo. Well earned BZ for the Safari team.
... and HomePodOS 15.5 ...