Apple opens iPhone 18 Pro and Pro Max pre-orders Saturday at 8 a.m. ET, a day later than usual due to the date falling on 9/11. Customers can use Apple's 'Get Ready' feature in the Apple Store app or website to pre-select their model, accessories, financing and trade-in details ahead of time, speeding up checkout once orders go live. That setup window closes Friday night at 9 p.m. PT, despite a press release typo listing the cutoff as 9 a.m.
Apple quietly confirmed in a footnote to its iPhone 18 Pro announcement that existing iPhone 14, 15, and 16 users will keep free access to its satellite connectivity features for an extra year beyond the standard two-year trial. The extension applies automatically to anyone who activated their device before midnight PT on September 9 in a supported country, marking the third time Apple has prolonged this free trial.
Apple's newly reported Series 12 reportedly introduces two significant hardware changes compared to the Series 11, enabling a range of software features exclusive to the newer model. These upgrades reportedly touch on sensors and design elements that unlock new AI-driven capabilities not available on the previous generation.
A writer previewing Apple's overhauled Siri AI, arriving with iOS 27 next week, shared three real-world tests that impressed them. Siri successfully added an entire NFL team's schedule to a calendar with streaming details, located a license plate number buried in an old email, and helped with an Apple Watch band sizing question.
Apple's new AirPods 5 are now available for pre-order at $129 and $149, but Best Buy is offering trade-in credit that can bring the price down to as low as $64. Meanwhile, the flagship AirPods Pro 3 remain on sale for $199, and other discounts include $330 off a Studio Display XDR, a Ceramic Apple Watch Series 12 markdown, and AirTags returning to $20 each.
Following the debut of Apple's first foldable phone, the iPhone Duo, at $1,999, commentary suggests Apple should now build smaller flip-style and larger tablet-style foldables similar to Samsung's Z Flip and Lenovo's X1 Fold. The idea is that Apple has proven it can engineer a durable hinge and thin foldable body, making it easier to scale that design up or down for new devices.
Apple's new Ultra 4 keeps the same design as Ultra 3 but adds a new S11 chip, doubles RAM to 4GB, and introduces a redesigned Health Sensing System with upgraded heart rate and HRV tracking. New features include high-frequency background heart rate monitoring, a heart rate watch face complication, more frequent HRV readings, a new Recovery HRV metric, and more accurate real-time step tracking.
Microsoft has updated its Copilot iPhone app to support Apple CarPlay, requiring iOS 26.4 or later and a subscription to function. The voice-driven integration mirrors chat history from the phone app, including text-based conversations, and joins Siri AI, ChatGPT, Perplexity, Grok, Meta AI and Claude as chatbot options available in CarPlay.
Multiple restaurant chains are rolling out cheese-heavy items this fall, including Applebee's new O-M-Cheese-adilla Burger, Golden Chick's $1 queso, Freddy's Baconfest with cheese-topped tots, Denny's all-American-cheese burger lineup, Panera's Three-Cheese Lasagna Soup, and Qdoba's dip-focused 'Diptember' promotion featuring Queso Fundido.
9to5Mac's daily podcast episode for September 11, 2026 rounds up ongoing coverage of Apple Intelligence developments and speculation about a possible dual-device iPhone product referred to as iPhone Duo. The episode is a spoken recap of stories the site has already published, rather than new reporting.
Apple published a detailed study comparing the heart rate sensing of its new Health Sensing System in Apple Watch Series 12 and Ultra 4 against rivals like Garmin, Google Pixel Watch, Huawei, Samsung, WHOOP, and Oura Ring. The test involved over 1,400 participants across five sites in the US and Malaysia, using a Polar H10 chest strap as the accuracy benchmark during activities like running, cycling, HIIT, and daily tasks.
Apple is set to release iOS 27 next week, introducing a completely rebuilt Siri experience including a dedicated Siri app that syncs conversation history across Apple devices via iCloud. The update also adds one-tap contextual suggestions in Messages, letting users quickly create reminders, notes, or find relevant photos without typing out requests.
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