Apple released the public beta of iOS 27 on Monday, July 13, about a month after the company announced the upcoming iPhone software at its Worldwide Developers Conference in June. After living with the developer and public betas, I can confidently say the upcoming software is not astounding, but also not a huge disappointment.
The iOS 27 betas have a few useful new features that I enjoyed, like the big widgets. But there were an equal number of gimmicky features, like the new Reframe and Extend tools for photos. Despite the focus on AI and a revamped Siri, the software hasn’t convinced me that I need, or want, those AI features. If, like me, you don’t use generative AI regularly, a lot of this update might not feel all that useful. From my time with the developer and public betas, it feels like Apple did more fine-tuning under your iPhone’s hood than anything.
It’s important to remember the update is still in development, so if you want these features and can’t wait until the OS’s general release this fall, I recommend downloading iOS 27 on a phone other than your primary device. Features in the beta could be buggy and your battery life could be negatively affected.
Before the software’s release in the fall, here are some features in the beta I’ve used almost every day and other features I wasn’t impressed by.
My iPhone feels faster
I don’t think I would have noticed this if I weren’t interacting with multiple iPhones on different iOS versions, but the iOS 27 beta brings a lot of performance improvements to your device.
I initially downloaded the iOS 27 developer beta on my iPhone 14 Pro as soon as Apple released it. I didn’t feel a major difference between that and my iPhone 16 Pro running on iOS 26.5 at the time. But I could feel the difference after installing the iOS 27 public beta on my 16 Pro. Unlocking my iPhone feels snappier, opening apps feels faster and switching between screens feels more fluid.
This isn’t really a feature you can interact with and change, but it’s important to note because it’s central to how your iPhone behaves. It makes everything feel that much smoother on your device.
I like big widgets and I cannot lie
The iOS 27 beta also introduces another widget size option that takes up an entire screen on your iPhone. And honestly, I really like it.
My colleague Nelson Aguilar wasn’t sure he wanted a widget that big, and at first, I agreed. But then I transformed my Apple Music app into a big widget and everything changed. With Apple Music, I could see six playlists with this larger widget, which feels like the right number of music options for almost any situation. The widget one size down showed you four playlists, but that never felt like enough.
Quickly starting a playlist or seeing my emails is great.
Apple Music isn’t the only app that gets a big widget, either. The News, Reminders and Weather widgets can also be transformed into giants and show you more from each widget. You can also enlarge the Smart Stack widget so you can see additional emails, your schedule for more of the day and more without opening separate apps.
It’s true that big widgets just allow you to see more of a particular widget or app, but it feels like I’m interacting with the whole app rather than the tiny sliver you use with a smaller widget.
More detailed Weather app
The iOS 27 beta also updates your Weather app so that it can give you more details about your hourly and weekly weather. In your hourly weather forecast carousel, there are new buttons for Precipitation and Wind in the top right corner of the menu. Tap these and the views for your hourly and weekly forecast will change to give you visuals to better illustrate the chances of rain throughout the day and week at different intervals, as well as how calm or bad the wind will be.
I appreciate being able to see rain fall throughout the current day and across days in the future.
Apple didn’t even mention this change at WWDC or on the iOS 27 webpage, but I love it. When rain is in the forecast, I always check the hourly precipitation, and the new option helps me better understand the chances of rain throughout the day and week at a glance. This feature made me stop and go, “Huh, why wasn’t this here before?”
While I enjoyed those new features, a few didn’t impress me.
Still not convinced I want Siri AI
A major part of iOS 27 is the melding of Siri with Apple Intelligence. Apple wrote online that the new digital assistant is more capable and helpful, but I’m still not sold on the technology. And that’s because I don’t feel like it makes things easier; in some cases, it makes things more difficult.
I found this version of Siri AI to be inconsistent at best and that might be in part because it’s in Beta. I used voice commands and the new Siri app to ask Siri to perform simple tasks, like sending messages to folks or opening apps like Notes, and it would work sometimes.
But there were times when Siri wouldn’t register my voice and ignore me when I’d try to ask it to open an app like Bluesky. Sometimes I’d say “Thank you,” to Siri, and the digital assistant would respond, “No problem,” and that message would freeze on my screen. Other times, Siri would just do the first step in a multi-step request. For example, I asked Siri to send a message to someone at a later time, and Siri was prepared to send the message immediately.
Only when I broke up the steps did it seem to understand what to do in most cases — allowing Siri to perform one task before asking a follow-up. But there were a few times when I would break up steps and Siri still wouldn’t perform a follow-up task, like opening Mail and starting a message to someone.
The Siri AI app also falls victim to issues other chatbots run into, in that information may be incorrect or outdated. I asked the app about what’s in the news, and it gave me information from about a month prior. There’s a disclaimer near the bottom of the responses to verify the information, which is a good callout, but it makes me wonder why I’d use this if I have to do my own research anyway.
There is no data at this time on how often Siri AI gets current events right, but a BBC study from last October found that other AI models misrepresented news content about 45% of the time. Using a digital assistant, like Siri AI, could be more time-consuming for me because I have to turn to search engines anyway just to verify the information.
That B-52 crash happened about a month prior to me asking Siri AI about the news.
The one Siri AI feature I did find helpful is the way the assistant can take more actions across apps, like creating a reminder or note straight from Messages. When someone triggers the feature with a phrase like, “Don’t forget to pick up bread at the store,” or “Take the picture frames the next time you’re here,” the options to Add to Reminders and Add to Notes appear beneath the message. These options are helpful for me because I can be either very forgetful, very distracted or both — that’s not a great combination!
These single-tap prompts also let you add photos to your Library, create an event in your Calendar and more.
Accessing your Notifications Center can be a hassle
As part of iOS 27’s Siri AI revamp, you can access Siri Search or Ask by swiping down from the top-middle of your home screen. Which would be fine if I hadn’t spent years learning to swipe down from that exact spot to access my Notification Center.
If you have Siri AI enabled and want to access your Notification Center, you have to swipe down from the top-left side of your home screen. But I usually hold my iPhone in my right hand, so this change effectively means I can’t access my Notification Center from my home screen unless I use both hands.
The good news is that if you don’t enable Siri AI, you can swipe down from the top-middle of your home screen to open your Notification Center. Apple also gives you the option to enable the old Siri without AI, and if you do this, you can also access your Notification Center by swiping down from the top-middle of your screen.
New photo editing tools have mixed results
The two new AI photo editing tools in the iOS 27 beta, Extend and Reframe, are both OK but weird. Extend lets you take your picture and extend the border around it using AI. Reframe lets you take a photo and shift the perspective using the same technology. You could probably get away with using these tools for light touchups, but my experience with them produced some strange results.
My wife said Reframe (right photo) made me look significantly less attractive thanks to my flattened head.
When I used these tools, the proportions of the resulting photos were off, or there were some weird, uncanny valley vibes. That is likely in part because the reframe tool is trying to mimic what it’d be like if you moved the camera to take the photo, which can lead to the lens distorting the image. When I used the tools on a few pictures, it altered my tattoos and shaved off part of my head. You probably won’t notice when photos are extended on blank backgrounds, but otherwise, these tools might make your photos look a little off.
Extend (right photo) made the tattoo of my dog on my forearm look nightmarish.
I can’t help but think: Why wouldn’t someone just take another picture instead? Taking more photos with different angles seems like a simpler and better solution to me.
Final thoughts
When Apple announced iOS 27 at WWDC in June, I wasn’t convinced the update was a big deal, but after testing, my thoughts have changed. The iOS 27 betas succeed in fine-tuning the iPhone experience, and there are smaller features and improvements throughout that can make the overall experience feel smoother.
Apple likely views Siri AI as its big, tentpole feature for iOS 27, like what Liquid Glass was for iOS 26, but based on the betas, I still don’t think it lives up to the promise that AI makes things easier. Granted, I don’t use generative AI or AI agents, so I can’t say if Siri AI is better or worse than other models, like Google Gemini or OpenAI’s ChatGPT, but the iOS 27 beta hasn’t made me any more eager to spend more time with it. The technology feels limited, results can be wonky, and I have to double-check chatbot results. I don’t feel like it makes anything easier.
The overall result is an operating system update that feels like a mixed bag.
It’s important to note iOS 27 is still in beta, so many of the issues and bugs in the software could be resolved when Apple releases it in the fall. Based on past releases, I’d expect the company to release the software around mid-September.
For more iOS news, here’s what you should know about iOS 27 and everything to know about iOS 26.
Watch this: The Truth About iOS 27 Beta: Don’t Make This Mistake!
Stephan is the sports journalist for the Maple Grove Report.
