[Live Updates]: Apple WWDC 2025 For Marketers

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Apple didn’t just announce new OS updates at WWDC 25: it redefined what cross-device customer engagement looks like. From iOS to visionOS, Apple is embedding intelligence, personalization, and connectivity deep into every layer of the customer experience. And while the spotlight was on AI and the new Liquid Glass design, marketers should be paying even closer attention to the infrastructure changes that quietly unlock massive opportunities. In this article, we decode what each OS update means for marketers and how to turn these updates into meaningful, measurable customer experiences.

Day 1 Highlights: Apple WWDC 25 For Marketers

Here’s a quick look at the most important system-level updates announced on Day 1 of the conference:

iOS 26: On-Device Intelligence Meets Seamless Expression

Apple announced a sweeping overhaul of iOS with the new Liquid Glass UI, system-wide Apple Intelligence updates, Live Translation across core apps, a new Games app, Wallet order tracking, and CarPlay Live Activities and widgets.

Here’s what matters most for B2C marketers:

• Apple Intelligence brings on-device generative AI, powering smarter personalization, visual search, and content generation with privacy built in.
• Visual Intelligence “Tap to Search”: Customers can long-press images or screenshots across any app to trigger brand or product recognition, which is key for shoppable moments.
• Live Translation in Phone, FaceTime, and Messages enables real-time multilingual engagement for global campaigns.
• Games app & leaderboards: Leverage this for gamified promotions, leaderboards, and brand-sponsored events.
• CarPlay Live Activities & widgets: Create branded glanceable updates, such as order status updates, travel timelines, or loyalty points, right on the CarPlay dashboard.
• Wallet Order Tracking: Push rich post-purchase updates through Apple Wallet, improving the customer experience after checkout.

macOS 26 Tahoe: A Smarter Desktop for Cross-Device CX

macOS 26 Tahoe introduces Liquid Glass visuals, upgraded Spotlight search, menu bar Live Activities, Continuity with iPhone, enhanced Shortcuts, and the Phone app on Mac.

For marketers, this opens up new desktop engagement touchpoints:

• Spotlight Shortcuts: Enable native desktop search actions like “Track my order” or “Find my loyalty card” to create fast, intuitive conversions.
• Live Activities in the Menu Bar: Keep customers updated with real-time order status, events, or delivery ETAs, mirrored from your iOS app.
• Phone on Mac: Extend your CX workflows (support, campaigns, or concierge services) cross-device.

iPadOS 26: Desktop-level Engagement and Intelligent Multitasking

Apple’s iPadOS update from WWDC 25 brings desktop-like windowing, a new Preview app, expanded Shortcuts, Live Translation, and the full suite of Apple Intelligence features to the iPad. For marketers, the iPad just became a powerhouse customer engagement hub:

• Windowing and Preview: Launch side-by-side product pages, demo walkthroughs, or campaigns in real time.
• Live Translation: Create real-time multilingual engagement for global campaigns.
• Visual Intelligence: Leverage in-app content understanding to help customers engage with your app better.

watchOS 26: Glanceable Moments, Now Context-Aware

watchOS 26 comes with Liquid Glass aesthetics, an AI-powered Workout Buddy, Smart Stack widgets, and gesture-based controls for hands-free interactions. Here’s how your brand can stay on-wrist and in-context:

• Smart Stack Widgets let you surface timely, contextual brand content like offers, reminders, or loyalty nudges at just the right moment.
• Workout Buddy: Ideal for wellness and fitness brands, this update delivers contextual prompts and intelligent motivation tied to customer goals.
• Wrist Gestures: Customers can now act on your notifications with the flick of their wrist, perfect for time-sensitive nudges (e.g., flash sales, reminders).

visionOS 26: Spatial Interfaces Get Brand Real Estate

visionOS 26 enhances the Vision Pro experience with spatial widgets, Look-to-Scroll interactions, PlayStation controller support, and on-device Image Playground AI tools.
Marketers exploring AR or immersive retail should take note:

• Spatial Widgets: Anchor branded experiences like product launches, live counters, and shoppable showcases directly into the customer’s physical space.
• Controller Support: Leverage this for interactive VR campaigns, event gamification, or experiential demos.
• Genmoji/Image Playground: Encourage customers to remix brand visuals into personal, shareable formats, building affinity.

tvOS 26: Personalized Profiles Meet Living Room Discovery

tvOS 26 delivers a sleek Liquid Glass design, new multi-profile support, improved Continuity with other Apple devices, and upgraded Apple TV+ experiences. Here’s what makes tvOS matter for B2C marketers:

• Continuity Features: Run synchronized campaigns that bridge mobile, web, and living room touchpoints—great for co-viewing experiences or app-connected promotions.
• Visual Aesthetic: Present content that complements the fluid, immersive living room interface (better visual integration, better recall).

Day 2 Highlights: Apple WWDC 25 For Marketers

Day 2 updates highlight how Apple continues to elevate the way brands engage with customers across apps. From Assistive Access to subscription merchandising, every update empowers marketers to create frictionless, deeply personalized experiences—be it with simplified interfaces, on‑the‑move widgets, or precision offer timing. Let’s dive into what truly matters.

Assistive Access: A Simpler Interface for Cognitive Accessibility

Apple’s iOS and iPadOS 26 updates expand Assistive Access, a mode that allows apps to run in a simplified, full-screen interface designed for customers with cognitive disabilities. Apps can now define a dedicated Assistive Access scene with simplified layouts, large controls, and minimal distractions, making core tasks easier to complete.

For marketers, this means rethinking how essential app actions like reordering, order status, or redeeming points can be presented with fewer options and clearer steps. To support this, brands must define which 1–2 core actions matter most to Assistive Access customers and expose only those in a simplified flow. Avoid hidden gestures, nested menus, or timed UI elements. Use large buttons, visual cues, and linear paths to completion.

Apple Pay and Wallet Just Became a Bigger Part of the Customer Journey

Apple is turning Wallet into more than a storage tool: it’s now a branded touchpoint across the post-purchase lifecycle. Updates this year let you customize how your brand shows up in recurring payment reminders, delivery updates, and event tickets, complete with logos, images, and rich descriptions. That means your brand lives not just at checkout but in every reminder, renewal, and delivery update.

Wallet also auto-detects order emails to provide a sleek interface now, so that customers can find the status of their orders right from the Wallet app. To enable this, make sure you parse the necessary information such as order tracking ID, the merchant name, an order number, and a tracking link to any carriers within the transactional email.

🚗 CarPlay: New Touchpoints for Driving Engagement

Apple is transforming CarPlay into an active brand channel with iOS 26 enhancements that bring your app into the driver’s line of sight. Marketers can now deliver compact Live Activities and system widgets on the car dashboard. Imagine a food delivery app showing arrival ETAs alongside maps, or a loyalty app delivering timely reward alerts mid-drive.

Beyond glanceable content, CarPlay also adapts your UI to various screen sizes with Smart Zoom and automatically applies Apple’s Liquid Glass design. For navigation, apps can show multiline rows, image-rich cards, and even display guidance in the heads-up instrument cluster. These updates let navigation and automobile brands deliver seamless, safety-first experiences behind the wheel without adding friction.

Smarter iOS Ad Attribution: Country-Level Insights and Better Re-Engagement Analysis

AdAttributionKit is Apple’s privacy-friendly way to measure ad performance on iOS, like installs and re-engagements, without analyzing individual customers. With iOS 26, it gets three major upgrades that matter to marketers:

1. Analyze multiple campaigns at once: Previously, if a customer engaged with more than one ad (say for two different offers), only one campaign could claim credit. Now, Apple lets you attribute actions across multiple re-engagement campaigns, so you don’t lose credit for mid-funnel conversions.
2. Country-level postback data: You can now see which country a conversion came from (if there’s enough volume). Use this to optimize segmentation, budget splits, or creative by region, even without third-party customer data.
3. Custom attribution windows: You can now tell Apple how long to “remember” a click or view—shorter windows for flash sales, longer ones for high-consideration purchases. No more one-size-fits-all attribution: your campaigns can reflect your actual funnel velocity.

AlarmKit: A Niche but Powerful Tool for Time-Critical App Use Cases

Apple’s new AlarmKit isn’t meant for every B2C app, but if your product has time-sensitive actions (think: flash sales, appointment check-ins, workout reminders, or medication timers), AlarmKit offers a more persistent, immersive way to nudge customers. These alarms cut through Silent Mode, stay live across device surfaces (Lock Screen, Dynamic Island, Watch), and can be customized with actions like “Open App” or “Repeat Timer.”

StoreKit Updates: Smarter Ways to Reconnect, Retain, and Monetize

This year’s StoreKit updates open up sharper levers for monetization, especially for apps with in-app purchases or subscriptions. You can now merchandise personalized offers, serve win-back discounts to lapsed customers, and handle crossgrades or downgrades with more logic, based on real-time subscription status. If you’ve ever struggled with the timing or relevance of upsells, this changes the game.

Even better, you can now redeem offer codes across all purchase types (including consumables and non-renewing subs) and securely set eligibility for intro offers or promotional plans using new signed purchase requests. That means better control over who sees what offer and when.

Day 3 Highlights: Apple WWDC 25 For Marketers

Day 3 of Apple WWDC 25 brought updates to the App Store, App Analytics, visionOS, and the Map capabilities. Let’s dive in:

Deploy Smarter Subscription Analytics For App Store Apps

Apple is making it easier to recognize and reconnect with paying customers, no matter how or where they subscribed. With recent App Store updates, your app can now tell when a customer has redeemed a promo code, made a purchase on a different device, or restarted a subscription, even if the action happened outside your app. This means fewer dead ends. You can now:

• Welcome customers back seamlessly if they reinstall your app or switch devices
• Tailor your messaging based on their exact subscription history
• Avoid sending irrelevant prompts to consumers who’ve already converted

For example, if someone claims a special offer through the App Store, you can now greet them with personalized content the moment they open your app instead of treating them like new customers.

Boost Discovery and Conversions with New App Store Connect Features

Apple is making it easier than ever for marketers to drive discovery and relevance on the App Store. With updates to tags, search keywords, offer codes, and custom product pages, you now have more control over how your app is found—and who finds it.

First, App Store Tags are a powerful new way to surface your app for feature-specific searches. These tags are generated using Apple’s AI but are fully human-reviewed, ensuring quality and consistency. You can view and edit these tags in App Store Connect, so only the most relevant ones are associated with your app. Tap into tags like “guided meditation” or “offline workouts” to appear in themed carousels, search filters, and curated lists, even outside your default category.

Second, Apple now allows you to assign keywords to Custom Product Pages, so they appear directly in search results based on query intent. Want your “Work From Home Fitness” page to rank for “desk workouts”? Just assign the keyword, no resubmission required.

Finally, Offer Codes have expanded beyond subscriptions to include consumables and non-renewing purchases. You can now run more nuanced promotions: for instance, reaching customers who’ve never purchased, or those who dropped off in the last 30 days. Set up campaigns in App Store Connect, distribute via QR or deep links, and identify redemptions directly.

Pinpoint What’s Working (and What’s Not) with the New App Analytics

With the latest App Analytics revamp, you can now filter, segment, and benchmark app data with more depth than ever. This helps you spot what drives revenue and where drop-offs happen in your funnel.

A key highlight is the Download-to-Paid Conversion and Average Proceeds per Download. These new metrics let you identify how quickly customers convert after install and how much they spend over time. You can also compare your performance to peer benchmarks to see if you’re ahead or falling behind. For example, if your “running” campaign sees poor conversion but strong long-term retention, you’ll know it’s not your product: it’s the messaging or offer.

Plus, cohort analysis tools now let you drill down by custom product pages, territories, device types, and more. You can compare how different audiences convert, subscribe, or churn, all in one place. And if you’re testing trial offers, Apple now shows you exactly how many customers convert from trial to paid, and how long they stay subscribed after.

Reimagine Brand Storytelling with visionOS

Apple’s visionOS isn’t just for developers: it’s a creative playground for B2C marketers ready to craft immersive, premium experiences. With support for branded spatial content, real-time product demos, and location-aware interfaces, visionOS gives marketers new ways to build presence and trust in a crowded digital landscape.

Imagine a travel brand letting customers explore a destination in 3D before booking. Or a fashion retailer offering a virtual try-before-you-buy moment in augmented reality. With Apple’s new APIs like Window Follow Mode and Camera Region Views, these aren’t futuristic fantasies; they’re real possibilities on Apple Vision Pro.

And because visionOS now supports richer, more secure enterprise-grade UI controls, your team can experiment with VIP-only experiences, secure onboarding flows, or exclusive previews, all in a hands-free, heads-up environment.

Personalize Local Discovery with Apple’s Upgraded Maps APIs

Apple’s latest Map updates give marketers new ways to deliver richer, more contextual local experiences on apps and the web. A key feature is PlaceDescriptor, a new way to reference real-world locations even when you don’t have a specific identifier. Whether you’re pulling place data from a CRM, a photo’s GPS tag, or a customer’s typed-in address, you can now surface accurate, live information from Apple Maps, like business hours, descriptions, or reviews, without duplicate data entry.

For marketers, this means:

• Hyperlocal personalization in travel, events, or retail apps.
• Smarter place-based segmentation (e.g., customers who visited a concert venue or store).
• Up-to-date, auto-refreshed listings without manually maintaining location databases.

Stay Tuned For More Updates From Apple WWDC 25

The takeaways from Days 1, 2, and 3 of Apple WWDC 2025 are clear: Apple is building an ecosystem where brand experiences aren’t just mobile-first: they’re context-first, intelligent, and seamlessly omnichannel. Whether it’s real-time translation, spatial widgets, or Live Activities on CarPlay and the Mac menu bar, the opportunities to show up in your customer’s journey, proactively and helpfully, have never been greater.

As marketers, it’s our job to translate these product upgrades into emotional, relevant moments that convert. And with Apple doing the heavy lifting on intelligence, interactivity, and infrastructure, the brands that adapt fastest will be the ones consumers remember most.

Note: Stay tuned this week as we cover the 5-day event through this live blog. Remember to bookmark this tab so you don’t miss anything!