Apple today released iOS 26.4 Beta 1 for developers alongside similar betas for the iPad, Mac, and other products. This comes just five days after the company issued iOS 26.3 and the other ‘26.3 releases publicly.
There are no release notes per se, but according to Macworld, 9to5Mac, and some other third party reports, this first developer beta includes:
Apple Podcasts improvements. Per the news earlier today, Apple Podcasts now includes support for advanced video podcast capabilities in the form of HLS technology.
Apple Music improvements. Apple Music provides a new full-screen artwork experience for select albums and playlists that “brings your music to life,” nearby concert information, a Playlist Playground that lets you create playlists based on text descriptions or preselected prompts, and a redesigned Profile screen (which also appears in the App Store, Apple Podcasts, and Apple TV).
Messages improvements. The Messages app now supports encrypted RCS messaging, though only between iPhones in this initial release.
Wallpaper Gallery improvements. The Wallpaper Gallery is redesigned with a cleaner, more organized user interface.
Reminders improvements. Reminders gets a new Smart List and automatic alarms for urgent tasks.
Ambient Music widget for the Home screen. This new widget lets you quickly access the odd ambient music feature Apple added to Control Center (which requires an Apple Music subscription).
Stolen Device Protection improvements. This feature is now enabled by default.
App Store improvements. The search bar has been moved back to the top of the Search view.
Safari improvements. On the iPad, the compact tab bar is back.
There’s more, obviously. But just as obviously, this release doesn’t have any hint of the conversational Siri feature that was supposed to debut in this release after Apple revealed that it was partnering with Google to use Gemini. A more recent report suggests that’s been delayed yet again.