iOS 14 has just been made available to the public, but Apple has just given developers access to a beta of the next version, and all the features that come with it.
Keep in mind that this is a beta, so these features may disappear or be significantly different when they go live. Also remember that this is 14.2, which means there will be a full-release 14.1 update coming before this with other upgrades. Screenshots of the new features below were taken by 9to5Mac and MacRumors.
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The most obvious change will be the appearance of a new Shazam button in the Control Center menu, even if users don't have the Shazam app downloaded. As you might expect, tapping this button will let you identify music that's playing on the iPhone or externally.
Also in Control Center, you'll see that the media controls pop-out will now suggest content to you if you aren't currently playing anything. It also shows you all the available speakers and TVs for you to stream your content via AirPlay by default, rather than hiding it behind another button press.
Using AirPlay via an app now shows the play/pause controls as a pop-up instead of switching the apps. This is similar to how incoming phone calls no longer take up the whole screen, but instead appear as a small window that's far less disruptive to whatever you were doing before.
For users with poor eyesight or blindness, the beta has introduced a 'People Detection' option within the Magnifier apps, under the Accessibility settings. This will show you, via an AR display, how much distance there is between you and others around you, which should prove very useful for social distancing when in public.
Users with iOS 13-compatible phones can upgrade to the current version of iOS 14 now, although it's not necessarily a good idea given how little notice Apple gave to developers to update their apps. iOS 14 will also be the standard operating system that comes with the iPhone 12 series once it launches, which will likely happen in November after being revealed in October.
