As part of Apple’s new iOS 10 operating system, the firm has introduced the biggest changes to its Messages app in the history of the iPhone.
With iOS 10, as well as letting you delete standard Apple apps and building in a lot more artificial intelligence, Apple has made the Messages app more interactive and added features that pit it directly against the likes of WhatsApp.
Here’s how to use iOS 10’s Messages app.
Learn more about the other new features in iOS 10 here.
Full screen animations and bubble styles
Messages now come with the ability to send animations that change the default iOS white background. At present, the animations come from lightning strikes and lasers to balloons and confetti.
Read more: How to use iOS 10’s new emoji features
To get the full-screen animations when you write a message, press and hold the send button. The menu then allows an effect to be sent across the phone screen or on an individual bubble.
Bubble effects manipulate how iMessages are displayed on another iPhone.
The bubble animations let you send a variety of message and font styles, such as ‘loud’ or ‘gentle’. Like full-screen effects, these bubble manipulations are accessed by writing a message then pressing and holding send.
Invisible ink
Another text effect lets users make a message invisible before sending it in iMessage. Hold the blue up arrow after typing a message and the effect menu will appear – tap ‘invisible ink’ and your message will be obscured until your contact swipes their finger over the message to view it.
Website previews
Now when you copy and paste a URL into iMessage, it’ll create a small website preview showing the recipient what the page they’re being directed to looks like. The latest version of iMessage pulls in the website’s main image to create a small clickable preview.
YouTube videos are also now playable from within the app – simply paste a video URL to create a preview card with the video automatically embedded.
Reactions
In a feature similar to Facebook’s expanded Like buttons, Apple is also letting users react to messages.
By pressing and holding a received message, it’s now possible to offer a quick response to the sender. You can send a heart, thumbs up, thumbs down, ‘ha ha’, a double exclamation mark, or a question mark, as a reaction to a message.
Stickers, apps, and GIFs
Stickers are all the rage with social media companies at the moment: Twitter, Snapchat and Instagram allow you to add stickers to pictures posted onto social networks. Apple’s Messages app is following suit.
These can be used and installed through the new App store for Messages. Three icons appear next to the message writing area: camera, touch, and applications. It’s possible to install stickers that can be dragged and dropped onto any part of the chat. At the time of writing it’s only possible to install a Classic Mac, Hearts, Hands, and Smileys set of stickers.
However, as iOS 10 rolls out and developers update their own apps, it will be possible to install more Messages apps, which won’t just be limited to stickers.
The Messages app store went live on September 13 and features the likes of Citymapper, Evernote, Words with Friends, JibJab, The Weather Channel and more.
“An iMessage extension can include the same features as a standalone iMessage app, and allow users to access features of your iOS app without leaving Messages,” Apple said. This means you’ll be able to use current apps and access data from them without leaving Messages.
Apple has also finally added dynamic content to the messaging area for the first time. This means sending a link to a GIF is no more. It’s now possible to search, through the applications pane in Messages, for GIFS, images, and videos. The search is powered by Bing.
Drawings
With iOS 10, Apple has also gone big on drawing and handwriting. Through ‘Digital Touch’, the icon represented by two fingers on a heart, users can send writing and animations through movements created with their fingers.
With Digital Touch, it’s possible to draw with one finger, create an animated ‘Tap’ on the screen by tapping the screen once, send a fireball by pressing with one finger, send a kiss by tapping with two fingers, share a heartbeat by tapping and holding with two fingers, and show heartbreak by tapping and holding with two fingers and dragging down.
With this feature, you’re able to draw onto images and also videos as they are taken.
Handwriting has also been added. To write on the screen with your fingers the iPhone should be unlocked and then rotated to a landscape position – the device will then automatically enter writing mode.
