Apple Announces New features in Keynote, Pages & Numbers

Apple has updated its iWork suite of productivity apps with new features.

Key Note

Apple says new tools in Keynote make presentations more engaging, with the ability to show a live camera view of the presenter directly in slides, and more collaborative with multi-presenter control.

“Powerful new tools make Keynote presentations more personal, engaging, and collaborative. With the option to use the front-facing camera on iPhone, iPad, and Mac, users can now add live video directly to their presentations.”

Pages

The tech giant says Pages makes it easier than ever to view and edit documents on the go by automatically displaying text and images in a single-column flow that is optimised for iPhone.

With the latest update, Screen View automatically displays text, images, and other elements in a single-column, continuous flow optimised for the iPhone screen. Text is enlarged to improve readability, photos and drawings are sized to fit the display, and tables can be scrolled horizontally.

Screen View is available for all word processing documents and doesn’t require any additional setup. When enabled, users still have access to the complete set of editing tools in Pages. And Screen View can be switched off at any time so users can see the page layout for their document before printing or publishing.

Numbers

Numbers has also got an upgrade with the introduction of pivot tables that bring powerful data analytics capabilities to iPhone, iPad, and Mac.

“Creating a pivot table in Numbers is quick and intuitive: Users can easily select the data to include, choose how to group and summarise it, and access other display options from the sidebar. The resulting pivot table appears in a clear layout that makes it easy for the user to read and gain insights.

Apple says users can visualise their pivot tables with insightful charts, share pivot data with others while keeping the source data private, and even import or export pivot tables to and from Microsoft Excel.

Bob Borchers, Apple’s vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing says they are adding even more power and capability to these apps.

“Whether they are in the office, at school, or working remotely, users around the world love Keynote, Pages, and Numbers for their powerful features, ease of use, and seamless experience across iPhone, iPad, and Mac.”

Keynote, Pages, and Numbers also support the new translation features introduced in iOS 15, iPadOS 15, and macOS Monterey. Users can select text and quickly see a translation, hear it read aloud, and instantly replace the selection with the translated text.