Five iOS 17 Features That Won’t Be Available on Launch Day

iOS 17 is shaping up to be a sizable update. The OS, which will likely launch alongside the iPhone 15 series, is chock-full of features Apple announced back in June. However, some of those announced features won’t be available upon iOS 17's launch. There are five features that will come to your iPhones a little later this year.

Collaborating on playlists in Apple Music

At the moment, Apple Music doesn’t allow you to team up with friends to create playlists. iOS 17 will eventually change that by introducing collaborative playlists for Apple Music, but this feature is scheduled to arrive a short while after launch day. Once it launches, you and your friends will be able to add, edit, and reorder playlists, and you’ll also be able to send emoji reactions on the Now Playing screen, according to Apple.

AirDrop transfers over the internet

With a later version of iOS 17, AirDrop transfers will be a lot more useful, as you can continue sending files even after your iPhone is out of range. Apple says once you initiate an AirDrop transfer with another device, if you step away, the file transfer will continue over the internet.

The new Journal app

For those of us who like to maintain a digital log of our lives, the Journal app seems quite promising. First of all, it’ll be free and built into iOS, so it’ll be quite accessible. In addition, Apple promises your journaling data will be private, uses end-to-end encryption on iCloud to protect your privacy while retaining the ability to sync your journal entries across devices.

NameDrop to an Apple Watch

NameDrop is a new iOS 17 feature that lets you share your contact information quickly with people who use Apple devices. While this feature will be available the day iOS 17 launches on your iPhone, you will not be able to NameDrop to an Apple Watch immediately, as it is scheduled to arrive later this year in a watchOS 10 update.

AirPlay in hotel rooms

Apple announced iOS 17 devices will be able to use AirPlay to stream content to TVs in hotel rooms. However, it will take some time for hotels to add support for this feature. When it’s available, you’ll be able to scan a QR code on the hotel TV and use the big screen to stream content from your iPhone to the TV.