Trusted Reviews is supported by its audience. If you purchase through links on our site, we may earn a commission. Learn more.

iOS 9 release date and how to update

You’ll soon be able to get iOS 9 on your iPhone and iPad as Apple has confirmed you can download it from September 16.

Ahead of the launch of the iPhone 6S and iPhone 6S Plus, you can download Apple’s latest operating system and experience all its new features and improvements.

The iOS 9 update introduces a host of new features, mostly focused on improving multitasking capabilities and making Siri more useful.

If you want to experience iOS 9, you’ll need to have to pack an iPhone 5C, iPhone 5, iPhone 5S, iPhone 6, iPhone 6S Plus on the smartphone side, or an iPad Air, iPad Air 2 or iPad mini 2.

The 4th generation iPod Touch is also making the cut.

If you own any of these devices, you’ll soon get a prompt telling you that you can download and install iOS 9.

But, if you can’t wait, you can always check as soon as you wake up on September 16 by going to Setting > General > Software Update repeatedly.

Related: iOS 9 Features — What’s new?
iOS 9

iOS 9 Features

Pulling its voice assistant into line with rival services like Google Now or Cortana, Siri is getting a lot more helpful with iOS 9. She’s powering a more advanced search on your iPhone and iPad, providing you with a lot more information in a single search. That includes sports scores and fixtures, weather forecasts, stock information, calculations and conversions, in-app searches and quick connections.

She’ll also start to offer up better suggestions as to what to do next, based on your most used apps

iOS 9 also adds new home-grown apps and updates the existing ones. That includes the new Apple News app, which collates all the stories from top news sources based on topics you’ve said you’re interested in.

The more you read, the more personalised your Apple News app is supposed to become too.

Apple Maps is getting a major update as well, with you finally able to find public transport route options via the new Transit view. Better late than never, eh Apple?

For iPads there some specific new multitasking features, such as the ability to have two apps running side-by-side in SplitView. There’s also Slide Over for quickly accessing an app to send a text or tweet the latest news, while you’re busy doing something else.

Another great iPad feature with iOS 9 is Picture in Picture. While using FaceTime or watching a movie for example, you can press the Home button and scale your video screen to the corner of your display. You can keep watching or chatting, but perform other tasks at the same time.

Why trust our journalism?

Founded in 2003, Trusted Reviews exists to give our readers thorough, unbiased and independent advice on what to buy.

Today, we have millions of users a month from around the world, and assess more than 1,000 products a year.

author icon

Editorial independence

Editorial independence means being able to give an unbiased verdict about a product or company, with the avoidance of conflicts of interest. To ensure this is possible, every member of the editorial staff follows a clear code of conduct.

author icon

Professional conduct

We also expect our journalists to follow clear ethical standards in their work. Our staff members must strive for honesty and accuracy in everything they do. We follow the IPSO Editors’ code of practice to underpin these standards.

Trusted Reviews Logo

Sign up to our newsletter

Get the best of Trusted Reviews delivered right to your inbox.

This is a test error message with some extra words