News: Apple Releases iOS 14.5 Developer Beta 3 for iPhone

Apple released the third developer beta for iOS 14.5 today, Tuesday, Mar. 2. The company promptly pulled the update from the developer portal, before finally making it available for all shortly after. The update was surprising to begin with, since Apple released it at an unusual time, and was only available as a download from the dev portal, without any OTA option.

The update comes two weeks after the company seeded developers the second 14.5 beta, and 13 days after public testers received their second 14.5 update.

Apple initially released this developer update just past 1 p.m. PDT, not the company's standard release time for developer updates. It then pulled the update before making it available around 2 p.m. PDT. Note the word "developer" here, as this update was only for registered iOS developers. If you're a public beta tester, your update was never in question — you'll simply need to wait for the third 14.5 public beta.

One key new feature is the "Items" tab in Find My. This section now lets you keep track of non-Apple devices that are compatible with Find My. You can choose to add an item to your account, as well as identify an item someone may have lost. It's possible this feature will be used in conjunction with the rumored "AirTags," Apple's version of Tile.

Apple informs developers in beta 3's release notes that for Music, Podcasts, and Audiobooks requests, updated dialogs for app selection are now available. This is the company's first reference to a Siri feature discovered in the first beta, that allows you to choose not only the app that plays your audio requests, but your default Siri audio player.

Apple slightly changed the Maps submenu interface. There's now no line separating the time information from the rest of the options, and the illustration in the "Report" button is now black instead of white. In addition, the wording in the description for the "Unlock with Apple Watch" feature is slightly changed.

Beta 2 added over 200 new emoji to iOS, in addition to Apple Music lyric sharing, new Apple Music swipe gestures, new shortcut options including a screenshot tool, among other changes. At this time, iOS 14.5 stands to introduce over 30 new features and changes for your iPhone.

iOS & iPadOS 14.5 Beta 3 Release Notes

Overview

• The iOS & iPadOS 14.5 SDK provides support to develop apps for iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch devices running iOS & iPadOS 14.5 beta 3. The SDK comes bundled with Xcode 12.5 beta 3, available from Beta Software Downloads. For information on the compatibility requirements for Xcode 12.5, see Xcode 12.5 Beta 2 Release Notes.

Display: Resolved

• iPad Pro 11-inch (1st generation and later) and iPad Pro 12.9-inch (3rd generation and later) are now able to connect to external displays using the USB-C Digital AV Multiport Adapter. (72618916)

Siri: New Features

• For Music, Podcasts, and Audiobooks requests, updated dialogs for app selection are now available. To ensure your app is set up to participate in Siri app selection, see Improving Siri Media Interactions and App Selection. (74555773)

SwiftUI: Resolved

• You can now apply multiple sheet(isPresented:onDismiss:content:) and fullScreenCover(item:onDismiss:content:) modifiers in the same view hierarchy. (74246633)
• Drop locations are now accurate when using onDrop(of:delegate:). (74030674)

The keyboardShortcut(_:) modifier now works in UIKit lifecycle apps. (73792634)

Changes to pages that you provide to a TabView with PageTabViewStyle are now correctly reflected in the view. (65701336)

Xcode: Resolved

• You can now collect GPU performance counters in Xcode and Metal System Trace. (74165162)

The View Debugger no longer quits unexpectedly when viewing an app that includes custom Shapes. (72300793)

How to Download & Install the Latest iOS 14.5 Beta

You'll need an Apple developer account to update your iPhone. You can get the restore image from your dev portal, then install it with iTunes or Finder. Otherwise, install the configuration profile, then update by going to Settings –> General –> Software Update. Finally, you can simply wait for it to auto-install if you have a dev profile and "Automatic Updates" is enabled.