When iOS 16.3 arrives last week, it will deliver some exciting new features, including support for 2nd-gen HomePod and physical security keys. It will also contain two big fixes that iPhone users have been waiting for.
According to Apple’s release notes and the release candidate, which hit beta devices on Wednesday, iOS 16.3 “fixes an issue where horizontal lines may appear temporarily when waking up the iPhone 14 Pro Max.” Over the past few weeks, some iPhone 14 users have been complaining about horizontal lines flashing across their screens. According to reports on social media and chat rooms, the lines appear when the iPhone wakes up or restarts. Additionally, the release fixes a few lingering bugs with the lock screen, Siri, and CarPlay:
- Fixes an issue where the wallpaper may appear black on the lock screen
- Fixes an issue where the Home Lock Screen widget does not accurately display the status of the Home app
- Fixes an issue where Siri may not respond correctly to music requests
- Fixes issues where Siri requests in CarPlay may not be understood correctly
The other issue is related to the new Home architecture that previously arrived in iOS 16.2. Just before the holidays, Apple pulled the feature, which improves reliability and efficiency, due to a sharing issue, but didn’t provide an update on when it would be restored. The Home architecture upgrade reappeared in the second iOS 16.3 beta, suggesting that Apple has fixed the problem. However, there’s no mention of it in the release notes, so it’s unclear if it will be part of iOS 16.3 or if it will arrive as a separate update.
iOS 16.3 is expected to arrive Tuesday or Wednesday alongside macOS Ventura 13.2.