Apple released iOS 18.4 on March 31, with the update bringing bug fixes, new emojis and new recipe sections in Apple News. The update also brings some new controls to the iPhone Control Center, including one that brings visual intelligence to the iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max.
When Apple released iOS 18 in September, the update redesigned the Control Center, allowing you to have more control over the features of the feature. With iOS 18, you can resize the controls, assign some controls to your own dedicated pages, and place the controls in your preferences. Apple also introduced more controls into the feature, making it a central hub for all the most commonly used iPhone features.
Read more: Everything you need to know about iOS 18
With iOS 18.4, Apple continues to expand the number of controls that can be added to the Control Center. If you have updates on your iPhone, you can add ambient music controls, and iPhones with Apple Intelligence enabled can also get some AI controls in the menu. Here’s what you need to know about new controls and how to add them to Control Center.
Ambient music control
Apple provides four new controls for everyone in the Control Center library of the Ambient Music category. These controls are sleep, cold, productivity and well-being. Each of these controls can activate a playlist of music corresponding to a particular control. For example, sleep plays ambient music to help you go to bed.
Some studies have shown that white noise can help adults learn words and improve learning in distracted environments. Depending on the calmness of mental health companies, certain music can help you fall asleep faster and improve your sleep quality. Therefore, these new controls can help you learn, fall asleep and more.
Here is how to find these controls.
1. Swipe down from the upper right corner of the home screen to open the Control Center.
2. Click on the add sign (+) Sign in the upper left corner of the screen.
3. Tap Add controls.
You will see a part of the control called Ambient Music. You can also search for “Ambient Music” in the search bar at the top of the control library. Below Ambient Musicyou will see all four controls. Click one (or all) to add it to your Control Center. After adding one or all of the controls to the Control Center, go back to your Control Center and click one to start playing music.
When activated, the new Ambient Music Control Center plays the playlist in the playlist on the iPhone.
This is how to change the playlist for each control.
1. Swipe down from the upper right corner of the home screen to open the Control Center.
2. Click on the add sign (+) Sign in the upper left corner of the screen.
3. Click on the ambient music control you want to edit.
4. Click on the playlist on the right Playlist.
The drop-down menu will display additional playlists for each control. If you are in sleep control, you will see playlists like Restful Notes and Lo-Fi Snooze. If you have a playlist in your music app, you will also see the options in the library that draw music from it. Click on any playlist you want and assign it to the control.
Ambient music is similar to background sounds, but these are more static sounds, such as white noise.
Apple has already allowed you to convert your iPhone to white noise machines with background sounds like ocean and rain. But ambient music is the actual music, not the more static sound in the feature.
Both features feel like Apple’s way of being the first choice, i.e., as long as you want some background music to help you fall asleep or be productive. Other services like Spotify and YouTube already have similar ambient music playlists, so this may be how Apple attracts some of these service audiences.
Apple Intelligence Control
Only those with an iPhone 15 Pro, iPhone 15 Pro Max, or iPhone 16 lineup will have access to Apple Intelligence features, and those people have obtained three new dedicated Apple Intelligence Controls with iOS 18.4. These controls talk to Siri, typing and visual intelligence on Siri.
Here is how to find these controls.
1. Swipe down from the upper right corner of the home screen to open the Control Center.
2. Click on the plus sign (+) Sign in the upper left corner of the screen.
3. Click Add a control.
You can then search for “Apple Intelligence” using the search bar near the top of the screen, or scroll through the menu to find the Apple Intelligence & Siri section. Click any (or all) of these controls to add them to your Control Center. If you have trouble accessing a digital assistant, talking to Siri and typing in the Siri controls may help, but visual intelligence control is important because it brings Apple Intelligence capabilities to the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max.
That’s a kind of Monstera Laniata mint, visually intelligent. Put it together.
Visual Intelligence was initially only accessible on the iPhone 16 lineup, as these devices feature camera control buttons. With iOS 18.4, visual intelligence is now accessible on more devices and people thanks to the nominal control of the Control Center. But remember that visual intelligence is like any other AI tool, so it won’t always be accurate. You should double-check the results and the important information they display.
More on iOS 18, here are all the new emojis you can use now, and the recipe section you should know about in Apple News. You can also view all the features included in iOS 18.5 and our iOS 18 cheat sheet.
Watch the following: WWDC 25: Looking forward to major changes in iOS, but not much on smarter Siri
