5 Best New iOS 26.1 Features You Need To Start Using, According To Users

With the launch of Apple's newest iPhone line in September came the release of arguably its biggest OS upgrade yet: iOS 26. Its features are both stunning and polarizing (check out our review of this new era), but roughly two months in, users are now finding a couple of faults and bugs with the software. The good news, though, is that the first major update to iOS 26, iOS 26.1, is now available for download. 

The update brings some security updates to the iPhone and fixes a few bugs. But more notably, iOS 26.1 includes several nifty features that are entirely new to the system. You'll get some user interface modifications, new features for some apps, and additional language support. Apple lists only 10 new features for iOS 26.1, but there's actually more. If you're wondering which of these additions are really worth trying out, here are five that stand out, according to users.

Apple has long been obsessed with giving the iPhone multiple ways to quickly open the camera — from hardware methods like using the iPhone's Action Button and Back Tap to software options like adding a Lock Screen and Control Center shortcuts. But the approach most people are probably familiar with is swiping left on the Lock Screen.

This has been a signature gesture for the iPhone for years now, but not everyone finds it useful. In fact, some people see it as annoying. When you're trying to clear a notification in the Lock Screen, you might accidentally open the camera instead. If you have the Lock Screen on while using the flashlight, one quick swipe to the left — even if it doesn't fully open the camera app — will turn off the flashlight.

Thankfully, Apple is now offering the option to disable this camera gesture in iOS 26.1, and users couldn't be happier. In a Reddit thread on the r/ios subreddit, one user said it was a UI improvement, and another said they've been needing the feature for so long. To turn off Lock Screen to Open Camera:

1. Go to your Settings.
2. Select Camera.
3. Scroll down to the very bottom of the page.
4. Toggle off Lock Screen Swipe to Open Camera.

Now, when you try swiping left on the Lock Screen, your iPhone won't do anything. As of this writing, though, there's no option to set the swipe left gesture to any other action as an alternative. 

iOS 26 gives iPhone alarms a neat new feature in the form of customized snooze times. Yes, if you don't already know, you can now set your iPhone alarm's snooze time to however long you like. Now in iOS 26.1, the Clock app has a slight UI design improvement. Instead of a button for both the Stop and Snooze for alarms or Repeat for timers, you get a new Slide to Stop option. This means you now need to slide the button to cancel your alarm or timer.

Some users on r/ios Reddit are liking this change, saying they no longer confuse the Stop and Snooze buttons on their alarms. It also helps with accidental presses when they're reaching for the Snooze button. If you have a habit of sleeping through your alarms, this change can come in handy, too. Since cancelling your alarm isn't as quick and easy anymore, you'll be forced to pay more attention and eventually get up.

Slide to Stop for alarms and timers is turned on by default after you update to iOS 26.1. But if you're not a fan, you can always go back to the button press. Here's how:

1. Launch the Settings app.
2. Navigate to Accessibility.
3. Under Physical and Motor, choose Touch.
4. Enable Prefer Single-Touch Actions at the very bottom.

This will get rid of the slider and bring back the Stop button for your alarms and timers.

If you're frequently watching videos in the Photos app, you've probably been mildly annoyed at the video scrubber. In iOS 26, it appears as a floating solid line that moves across the screen. The play, pause, and mute controls are also noticeably sitting isolated at the top. On the upside, this design puts a minimalist touch on the interface, and it works well with portrait videos. The same can't be said for landscape clips, though. When watching a landscape video in portrait mode, the scrubber essentially disappears as it blends into the background. This makes it hard to find and search through the video if needed.

Fortunately, iOS 26.1 changes how the video scrubber looks in the Photos app. It now comes in a visible background, with the playback controls integrated in the same background. Users on r/ios say it's significantly easier to see, both on portrait and landscape videos. The inclusion of controls also gives the scrubber a more cohesive feel. While this UI tweak might be a minor update, some are still plenty excited about it.

Some users have always compared Apple Music to Spotify, saying the latter is significantly the better choice. After all, there's a host of Spotify features that Apple Music is missing. But now, with iOS 26.1, Apple Music gains a new functionality that Spotify users might be pretty familiar with: The swipe gesture to change songs. This has been available on Spotify for at least a decade and makes navigating songs quicker and more convenient. That's why some users who switched from Spotify to Apple Music are stoked that it's now on their native iPhone music app too. 

To use this swipe gesture, all you have to do is go to the Apple Music app and play your song of choice. Then, on the MiniPlayer at the bottom, simply swipe left to go back to the previous song or right to skip to the next song. You can also do the swipe gesture on the Now Playing screen. 

One of the major iOS 26 features that got people excited was Live Translation for AirPods. What this does is instantly translate foreign speech into the language you choose, with the result played directly through your AirPods. It works on AirPods 4 with active noise cancellation, AirPods Pro 2, and AirPods Pro 3.

When AirPods Live Translation was first introduced in iOS 26, it featured just five languages: English, Spanish, French, Portuguese, and German. Now, in iOS 26.1, the language support is expanded to four more: Italian, Korean, Chinese (Traditional and Simplified), and Japanese. Users on r/apple are particularly thrilled about the addition of Japanese since there usually aren't English translations for spoken information like train announcements, at least outside major cities.

If you've yet to test out the AirPods Live Translation feature, here's a quick guide on how to get started:

1. Connect your AirPods to your iPhone 15 Pro or newer.
2. Install Translate if you haven't already. 
3. Open Settings.
4. Tap on Apple Intelligence & Siri.
5. Turn on Apple Intelligence.
6. Go back to the main Settings page.
7. Select your AirPods at the top.
8. Under Translation, tap on Languages.
9. Download the languages you want to use offline.
10. While wearing your AirPods, press and hold the stem of both earbuds to enable Live Translation.

From here, whenever you hear someone talk in the language you want to translate from, you should be able to see a transcript of the translation on your iPhone and hear it on your AirPods at the same time.