5 iOS 18 Features Android Users Need to Know

We’re all about Android (it’s in the name!), but our mobile operating system of choice doesn’t exist in a vacuum. To understand broader trends in mobile technology and get a sense of where the industry is heading, it can be helpful to check the competition from time to time. Apple’s iOS 18 arrived this fall with many features that Android users will recognize, but also some brand new features that we’d love to see come to our side of the garden wall. These are the iOS 18 features that Android users should know about.

1 Apple is also AI

Apple Intelligence features are here

Google is well into what it’s described as its “Gemini era,” continually adding AI-based features to its apps and services and creating entirely new apps just to showcase AI features. The company has been serious about it since earlier this year, when it dropped its old Bard AI brand in favor of the current name.

Apple has been a little slower to jump on the AI ​​bandwagon, but since iOS 18.1, iPhones are just as packed with AI features as a Pixel or Galaxy phone. Apple Intelligence includes features like an AI image generator, AI-generated notification summaries, AI writing tools, and natural language search in Apple Photos, with more features – like connected Siri to ChatGPT – which should be deployed soon. If you’re disappointed by Google’s recent focus on all things AI, know that the grass isn’t much greener on iOS.

2 iOS now offers themed icons

A little better, mostly worse

With iOS 18, iPhones get new customization options that will be familiar to Android users. You can finally freely organize the icons on your home screens, positioning applications where you want and even leaving empty spaces. You can also choose to add a “tint” to your icons, creating a unified look with icons that all match.

While Android’s theme implementation goes further, changing UI elements in system settings and apps, iOS’s has a big advantage: it works with every app icon. Applying new colors to icons that weren’t designed for that purpose can lead to ugly results, but whether this is worse than incompatible icons for non-compliant Android apps is up for debate.

3 RCS is finally on iOS

Green bubbles have improved a lot this year

Google has been publicly pestering Apple to integrate RCS into iOS for years now, and in iOS 18, Apple finally agreed. The iPhone’s Messages app now supports RCS which works interoperably with Android, enabling features like high-resolution media sharing, typing indicators, and read receipts. Emoji reactions even work now.

RCS hasn’t replaced iMessage, and texts sent to iPhones from Android still appear in green bubbles. But with the addition of RCS, many of the features that previously made iMessage a better text messaging experience are no longer exclusive. You can finally send photos to your friends with an iPhone knowing that they won’t get a quality compressed version circa 2010.

4 iMessage lets you send wavy text

It is not compatible with Android

Of course, now that much of iMessage’s core functionality is no longer exclusive to iPhone-to-iPhone iMessage chats, Apple was forced to add new features to iMessage that don’t do it works when texting on Android phones. Starting with iOS 18, users can format text in iMessage. There are normal options like bold and italics, but also more pronounced effects with names like Ripple and Explode.

Google could add features like this to Android’s Messages app, and it’s possible that basic formatting will eventually work on Android and iOS. However, the flashier formatting options are likely intended to remain platform specific.

Google’s old Allo messaging app let you adjust the size of the text you sent by pressing and holding the send button and sliding your finger up or down. I always thought it was fun – maybe Messages could bring it back.

5 Apple now has an app dedicated to passwords

Where are you, Google?

Apple has been able to manage your passwords on iOS and macOS for a long time, but until recently, these passwords were only accessible in your device’s Settings or Safari. However, with its latest OS releases, Apple has rolled out a new Passwords app for mobile and desktop. Passwords allows you to access and manage your saved passwords, and can even handle 2FA functionality.

Google doesn’t offer a dedicated password manager app, so I hope it takes Apple’s lead on this. It’s fairly simple to access the login information stored in your Google account at passwords.google.com, but the current web interface is a bit cumbersome. A bespoke password manager app for Android and a corresponding web app for desktop could really improve the experience.

Android 16 will be here before you know it

The current Android 15 was light on new user-facing features, so we Android users are a little jealous of all the new features iPhone owners will get to experience this fall (although some between them debuted here on Android). But Android 16It’s closer than you think: Google has confirmed that it’s targeting the second quarter of 2025 for its next big software update. That’s still quite a long time to create a password manager app, right?