SharePlay, an iOS 15 feature that allows users to stream and FaceTime with friends simultaneously, will not be included in the fall release of iOS 15 (or any other major Apple software release). Instead, it will be the latest iOS feature to miss its public release date. Apple plans to include SharePlay in a future software update.

Apple announced the news to developers on its site today (August 17), posting that the feature is "not available in the developer beta 6 versions of iOS 15, iPadOS 15, and tvOS 15" and will not be available in Monterey's beta 6 release The company offered no explanation for this. The company offered no explanation as to why this was the case.

As for when SharePlay will be restored, Apple notes that it "will be available again in a future developer beta release and will be available to the public in a software update later this fall."

Over the past year and a half, many people (myself included) have needed something like SharePlay. Watching shows and movies remotely with friends and family is so clumsy that it requires a device to stream the programs and a device to make calls on services like FaceTime, Google Meet, Houseparty, and Discord. Balancing these two activities is too complicated.

When SharePlay comes along, it will allow Apple users to share streams while on a FaceTime call. This is, as the old saying goes, a kind of Apple feature.

I tested this feature using the Apple TV app and it worked quite well, even with Spatial Audio (Apple's trick of making the audio come from a position on the screen). tested on iPadOS 15, "Ted Russo's" episode sounded like my colleagues, whose faces were positioned to my left and right, respectively.

My only complaint was that on macOS 12, the FaceTime call video and SharePlay stream were not layered well; on the iPad, the stream and call boxes were more aware of each other, but on the Mac, they did not share enough screen They were just windows.

SharePlay is not such a great feature for people whose friends use Android or want to watch something on Netflix (Apple has yet to announce a partnership). Also, if Apple releases a camera for Apple TV, we will be able to do FaceTime from Apple TV, eliminating the need to use a cell phone or iPad as a camera.

Apple likes to announce big features when it releases OS updates at WWDC. in the case of iOS 12, it was group FaceTime chats, which appeared on October 30, a month and a half after iOS 12's September 17, 2018 release.

Application Tracking Transparency, which improves privacy and allows third-party developers to limit their ability to track your activity, came on April 26, 2021, a few months after the September 16, 2020 release of iOS 14 It was introduced in iOS 14.5.

Relatedly, Apple's controversial technology for scanning and detecting child sexual abuse material (CSAM) has also been delayed. It will not be in the first public release of iOS 15, but will be in iOS 15/iPadOS 15 by the end of 2021.