Apple Rolls Out Second Betas of iOS 14.4 and watchOS 7.3 (Here’s What’s New)

HomePod Handoff Changes

Although the HomePod has already supported Handoff since last year, the existing feature relied exclusively on Bluetooth proximity detection, and was therefore limited to simply transferring whatever music was currently playing between your iPhone and your smart speaker.

By contrast, the U1-powered Handoff that's been implemented in the HomePod mini and iOS 14.4 will offer visual, audible, and haptic effects that adjust as you position your iPhone closer to the speaker. Plus, it won't simply transfer the music outright, but will present you with the option to do so, along with a variety of other controls.

The feature naturally requires the corresponding HomePod Software 14.4 to operate, and while that's available to a much more limited group of people right now compared to the iOS 14.4 betas, those who were able to test the feature offered some insight into how it worked, but also noted that it was fairly buggy.

According to AppleInsider, however, which also has access to the HomePod Software beta, Apple has significantly polished the experience over the past few weeks. It's now said to be "much smoother" as opposed to the initial implementation which was quite buggy and unreliable, and buttons that were previously just placeholders now appear to be working properly.

Find My Updates

Apple has been quietly updating the Find My app over the past couple of point releases to add support for its upcoming AirTags and other third-party item tracking tags — we stumbled across the new set up screens in the first iOS 14.4 beta late last month, and others have found even more direct ways to trigger them since then.

While there's still no mention of AirTags within these screens, it's become clear that Apple intends to launch the third-party Find My experience first, and new products have already been unveiled at CES 2021 that will take advantage fo the Find My App, most notably Belkin's SoundForm Freedom true wireless earbuds.

With the second beta of iOS 14.4, Apple is officially letting the cat out of the bag with a new splash screen that appears when first opening the Find My app, which mentions support outright for adding "non-Apple products" to Find My as well as the "Find My network."

Additional Changes

As MacRumors notes, the second beta of iOS 14.4 also introduces a new setting to let you specify a device type for third-party Bluetooth audio devices for more accurate Headphone Audio Level measurements in the Health app. For example, this would allow you to designate whether you're using in-ear or over-ear headphones, or even a speaker or a car stereo system so that your iPhone can make a better determination whether you're listening to potentially dangerous audio levels.

The latest betas of iOS 14.4 and watchOS 7.3 also continue to include the "Time to Walk" setting for workouts that was discovered earlier this month, although so far, it doesn't look like that's changed in any way in the second beta.

Apple is also continuing its battle against unauthorized repairs; new code found in the latest beta shows that Apple will now be flagging camera replacements that use "non-genuine" parts, in much the same way that it began doing for display replacements back in 2019, and battery replacements before that.

Since the display warning was purely informational and didn't impact the usability of your iPhone in any way, it's a safe assumption that this will also be the case with the camera warning, which will likely appear on your lock screen and within your Settings app for a short time just to make you're aware of that fact. It's also likely that Apple will eventually publish a support document reminding users of the importance of using authorized Apple service and repair providers.