Originally published at: OS 26.1 Updates Bring Small Improvements - TidBITS
A week later than past release patterns suggested, Apple has pushed out the 26.1 versions of all its operating systems. iOS and iPadOS receive the most changes, while macOS gets a subset, visionOS adds just a couple, and watchOS, tvOS, and HomePod Software see only bug fixes.
Shared iOS 26.1, iPadOS 26.1, and macOS 26.1 Improvements
For many things, Apple tries to keep its operating systems in feature parity, so changes appear in multiple operating systems at once.
As I wrote in “iOS 26.1 to Add Optional Opacity to Liquid Glass” (21 October 2025), Apple has added a Tinted option to Liquid Glass, which increases the opacity of some Liquid Glass interface elements. It’s quite different from using Reduce Transparency on the iPhone and iPad, so if you’ve been using that, experiment to see which you prefer. In the screenshot below, the leftmost iPhone is using Liquid Glass’s default Clear view, the center iPhone is using Tinted, and the rightmost iPhone has Reduce Transparency turned on instead. (You can’t combine Tinted with Reduce Transparency or Increase Contrast.) Switch to the Tinted view in Settings > Display & Brightness > Liquid Glass.
macOS 26.1 Tahoe also adds the Tinted view, accessible in System Settings > Appearance, but in my example screenshot from “How to Turn Liquid Glass into a Solid Interface” (9 October 2025), I cannot discern any changes at all after selecting it. Maybe the changes are visible in apps other than the Finder?
Another shared improvement is support for the new Apple Music AutoMix over AirPlay. Previously, AutoMix transitions didn’t play over AirPlay; they now do. If you prefer the old Crossfade option or dislike the transitions entirely, you can control them in Settings > Apps > Music > Song Transitions on the iPhone and iPad, and in Music > Settings > Playback on the Mac.
Other shared changes include:
- Improved FaceTime audio: Apple says that FaceTime audio quality has been improved in low-bandwidth conditions.
- Child account content filters: Communication Safety and Web content filters that limit access to adult websites are now enabled by default for existing child accounts for ages 13–17 (the age varies by country or region).
iOS 26.1 and iPadOS 26.1 Improvements
A handful of additional changes affect only iOS 26.1 and iPadOS 26.1. They are:
- Apple Music MiniPlayer swipe: When music is playing in the Music app, you can now navigate to the next and previous songs by swiping left (next) and right (previous) on the MiniPlayer.
- Lock Screen Camera swipe setting: If you are annoyed by accidentally opening the Camera app by swiping left on the Lock Screen, you can now turn it off in Settings > Camera > Lock Screen Swipe to Open Camera.
- Slide to stop: With alarms and timers, the Stop button, which was too easy to hit accidentally instead of Snooze or Repeat, has been replaced by a slide-to-stop control.
- Gain control: When using external USB microphones to record local capture (on-device recording), gain control is now available.
- Local capture locations: When recording audio for local capture, you can now specify where local capture files will be saved.
- More Live Translation languages (iPhone): For the Live Translation feature that works with the AirPods 4 with Active Noise Cancellation, AirPods Pro 2, and AirPods Pro 3, Apple added support for Chinese (Simplified and Traditional), Japanese, Korean, and Italian. Those join the existing languages of English (US and UK), French, German, Portuguese (Brazil), and Spanish (Spain).
- Manual workout logging (iPhone): If you need to log a workout manually in the Fitness app, that’s now possible.
- Slide Over returns (iPad): After initially removing Slide Over in the major multitasking revamp in iPadOS 26, Apple has now brought it back. Although the new multitasking approach has been generally popular, people have missed Slide Over, which lets you quickly access a floating window over other windows. You can choose your preferred size and aspect ratio.
visionOS 26.1 Improvements
The visionOS 26.1 update seems like a small one, but since I don’t have a Vision Pro, I can’t comment on how welcome the changes might be to existing users—they seem unlikely to affect buying decisions. They are:
- New iPad app: “Discover new content, spatial experiences, and quickly access information about your device using Apple Vision Pro app for iPad when you upgrade to iPadOS 26.1.”
- AirPlay sharing: “Apple Vision Pro app on iPhone and iPad now allows you to turn on AirPlay to view experiences from Apple Vision Pro.”
- Spatial Gallery controls: “Videos in Spatial Gallery will show playback controls and video length while in immersive view.”
watchOS 26.1, tvOS 26.1, and HomePod Software 26.1 Bug Fixes
Apple’s smallest devices received the least attention, with watchOS 26.1, tvOS 26.1, and HomePod Software 26.1 each receiving nothing more than “improvements and bug fixes” or “performance and stability improvements.”
Security Updates
As always, these updates—and updates for the last two versions of macOS—address numerous security vulnerabilities. None of those that Apple lists have been reported as being exploited in the wild.
- iOS 26.1 and iPadOS 26.1: 45 vulnerabilities
- macOS 26.1 Tahoe: 90 vulnerabilities
- macOS 15.7.2 Sequoia: 54 vulnerabilities
- macOS 14.8.2 Sonoma: 46 vulnerabilities
- Safari 26.1: 14 vulnerabilities
- visionOS 26.1: 32 vulnerabilities
- watchOS 26.1: 26 vulnerabilities
- tvOS 26.1: 21 vulnerabilities
Update Advice
If you’re already running version 26 of any of these operating systems, you should update soon. The new features, security improvements, and unspecified bug fixes feel worthwhile given that we’re coming from an initial release with just a handful of high-profile bug fixes in 26.0.1.
However, if you haven’t yet upgraded, I recommend holding off until version 26.2, due out in mid-December. It’s not that upgraders are experiencing significant problems; there’s simply no harm in putting upgrades off for another month or so.