Apple announced a new iPad mini on Tuesday, powered by the A17 Pro chip with support for Apple Intelligence features. The first new iPad mini orders are set to arrive to customers next week, but early benchmarks have now surfaced on Geekbench. These results confirm that the latest iPad mini features 8GB of RAM, and give us a glimpse at the performance of the binned A17 Pro chip inside.

At this point, you’ve probably read a lot about the iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Pro. You don’t need me to recap new features like the Camera Control, bigger screens, upgraded Ultra Wide camera, or better battery life. I’ll offer some of those thoughts, anyway, but I’ve been looking at the iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Pro mainly through the lens of their broader place in the smartphone ecosystem.

Hear me out: I think the combination of iOS 18 and the current iPhone lineup could be the most compelling package ever for those considering switching from Android.

Another shakeup is on its way to Apple’s executive team. Bloomberg reports today that Carol Surface, Apple’s Chief People Officer, is departing the company. Surface joined Apple less than two years ago in March 2023.

The struggles continue for Sonos. The company has confirmed that an ongoing “major outage” means that Apple Music is currently unavailable via the Sonos app.

The iconic Beats Pill made its triumphant return in June with a slew of modern and long-awaited upgrades. Now, Beats is back with two new Beats Pill variants – designed in collaboration with Kim Kardashian.

For months, Chick-fil-A has been testing and teasing its first-ever CarPlay app. Now, the day has finally come and you an officially place your favorite Chick-fil-A order using nothing but CarPlay.

Apple’s Car Key feature is expanding soon to three new brands, according to a new report. The feature will soon allegedly be supported on select cars from Polestar, Volvo, and Audi, based on recent code discoveries.

If you’re having issues accessing Meta services, you’re not alone. Both Instagram and Facebook appear to be experiencing widespread outages. Threads is also impacted by the outage.

Going to Instagram’s website currently shows an error message: Sorry, something went wrong. We’re working on getting this fixed as soon as we can.

Update: New public betas for iOS 18.1, tvOS 18.1, and iPadOS 18.1 are now available as well.

iOS 18.1 will be released to everyone in just two weeks. In the meantime, beta testing continues. iOS 18.1 beta 7 is now available to developer beta testers, coming just one week after the release of beta 5.

Foodnoms is a powerful nutrition tracking app we’ve covered multiple times over the years here at 9to5Mac, and it just got a big update. The update, available now on the App Store, adds smarter recipe import from websites, new Control Center widgets, Foodnoms AI enhancements, and more.

Apple Vision Pro has been available for just over seven months, and Apple is starting to ramp up its market research among customers. The company is sending surveys to early Vision Pro adopters inviting them to share their experiences with things like comfort, use cases, and much more.

Benjamin and Chance get excited for Apple’s upcoming product launches, which we are now expecting for the end of the month. The base model M4 MacBook Pro might even have fully leaked on the web. iOS 18.1 beta 6 brings some nice refinements, and more high-profile Apple execs are retiring from their posts.

And in Happy Hour Plus, the duo discuss Apple’s decision to put TV+ as a channel inside Amazon Prime Video. Subscribe at 9to5mac.com/join.

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Dan Riccio, Apple’s long-time hardware engineering executive, is retiring. According to a new report from Bloomberg, Riccio is leaving Apple this month after 26 years at the company. Most recently, Riccio led development of Apple Vision Pro.

Just a few hours ago, I wrote about H-E-B finally caving to the pressure and rolling out Apple Pay to all of its locations. As it turns out, H-E-B isn’t alone in this change. According to multiple 9to5Mac readers and reports across social media, Home Depot has also recently started rolling out Apple Pay support.

Update October 9, 2024: Home Depot spokesperson Beth Marlowe confirmed this news in a statement to 9to5Mac:

“We have begun rolling out contactless as a payment option in our U.S. stores. We anticipate the rollout will be completed to most of our stores and registers later this year.”

After kicking off a pilot program in July, H-E-B has announced that it will roll out support for tap-to-pay platforms like Apple Pay to all of its locations. H-E-B operates over 300 locations across Texas, making it one of the largest grocery store chains in the state.

With today’s release of macOS Sequoia 15.1 beta 6, Apple is making another change to screen recording permissions. The company says that this should mean users see fewer permission dialog popups on their Macs…

A long-time Apple veteran is retiring, according to a new report from Bloomberg. Dan Rosckes has informed his team that he is “leaving the company soon” after 24 years, most recently serving as vice president of global sourcing and supply management.

Apple is rolling out a design refresh to iCloud.com today. The update includes support for Dark Mode, more customization options, changes to iCloud Photos, and more. Head below for the full details.

iOS 18.1 is reportedly set for a release on October 28, which means we have several more weeks of beta testing to go. Today, Apple released iOS 18.1 beta 6 for developers, and it includes a few notable changes for iPhone users.

iOS 18.1 will be released to everyone in just a few weeks. In the meantime, beta testing continues. iOS 18.1 beta 6 is now available to developer beta testers, coming two weeks after the release of beta 5.