Apple iOS 15 has some very cool features but they won’t work if don’t have an iPhone XS or newer

Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) 2021 saw the announcement of iOS 15 and the betas have been rolling out since. Now, over time people using the beta version of iOS 15 have been coming across new features and as 9to5Mac pointed out, some of them are exclusive to iPhone XS and newer devices. While Apple did say that the new iOS 15 update is going to roll out to iPhones as old as the iPhone 6s, not all features are going to work on those older devices, that’s not great news for those users. To best optimise what iOS 15 can do, you need an iPhone that has the A12 Bionic chip at least or newer, so that includes iPhone XR, iPhone XS, iPhone 11, iPhone 11 Pro, iPhone SE (2nd Gen), iPhone 12, and the iPhone 12 Pro.

Features like Spatial Audio on FaceTime, Portrait Mode on FaceTime, interactive globe on Apple Maps that show you 3D details, immersive walking directions on Apple Maps, etc will work only on iPhones that have the A12 Bionic or newer chips. The Live Text in photos is also another feature that will work only on newer iPhones. This is a win for Google since Google Lens works across a wider spectrum of devices, and Live Text was one of the cooler additions coming with iOS 15.

Also, visual look up (where you can swipe up or tap on the information button on any photo to highlight recognises objects and scenes, learn more about popular landmarks, breeds of pets, etc) will also work only on newer iPhones. Besides this, the new animated backgrounds on Weather, on-device speech processing, and Apple Keys in the Apple Wallet will work only with new iPhones.

And there are some other features in iOS 15 that will work only with the iPhone 12 series. Like panorama pictures, enhanced connectivity on 5G, and the device picking 5G over WiFi. The iPhone 12 and the iPhone 12 Pro series have improved geometric distortion and can capture moving subjects better while also reducing image noise and banding. This feature is not there on older iPhones.

But wait, it’s not all bad news. There are some iOS 15 features that will work with iPhone 7 and newer devices. So while iPhone 6 and iPhone SE (1st gen) owners can install iOS 15, there are some more features that will not work for them like Spatial Audio with dynamic head tracking and Walking Steadiness. Apple’s more immersive music experience with Dolby Atmos music and dynamic head tracking works on iPhone 7 and up, while the Walking Steadiness feature requires iPhone 8 and newer devices.