Apple has announced the iOS 17 operating system for iPhone users at its annual developer conference, WWDC 2023. The operating system is currently in beta and will soon be available to the general public. iOS 17 will bring a range of new features and updates, including improvements to the Photos app.
According to a report by MacRumors, Apple will use machine learning to help the Photos app in iOS 17 identify various symbols, such as those found on clothing tags or a vehicle’s dashboard. When users take a photo of a laundry tag or a car’s dashboard, iOS 17’s Visual Lookup feature will highlight the symbols and enable users to tap on them for translation.
The report states that iOS 17’s Photos app will explain each symbol found on laundry tags or vehicle dashboards. For laundry symbols, Apple has partnered with the International Organization for Standardization to provide explanations from its online platform.
The report also mentions that iOS 17’s Visual Lookup tool successfully recognized all tested laundry symbols, including washing machine temperatures, bleaching recommendations, dryer restrictions, and ironing temperatures. However, users should note that the image must be sufficiently zoomed in for the iPhone to detect the symbols.
The ability of Visual Lookup to detect car symbols suggests that iPhones will support common symbols that users encounter in their daily lives.
In addition to the symbol recognition feature, iOS 17’s Photos app will also include other features such as pet recognition, one-tap crop, animated stickers from Live Photos, and recipe searches based on food pictures.