MacLifeの February 2026 の目次

ONE OF THE most welcome improvements in this year’s Mac operating system, macOS Tahoe, is how much personalization it offers. Where previous versions of macOS were pretty limited — you could adjust the size of your icons, change the wallpaper, hide the Dock, and not much more — Tahoe is packed full of features to transform how your Mac looks. You’ll recognize many of these features from iOS 26. There’s Liquid Glass, of course, which you can turn off if you don’t like it. You can apply transparency to your icons and your desktop widgets — or, if you prefer, make your icons the same color. You can change the way folders look and how Finder windows appear. You can even change the background of your chats in Messages. As…

SHORTCUTS HAS BEEN a feature on Macs since macOS Monterey in 2021. They enable you to automate tasks by combining actions to create custom workflows, and they’re run with a simple click or by asking Siri. You’ll find lots of them ready for use in the Shortcuts app, and their number has recently been bolstered by some new Apple Intelligence–powered options. Among them are Summarize PDF, which picks out key points from a PDF document, and Leftover Recipes, which enables you to list what’s in your fridge before coming up with a recipe you could use. You can also try a shortcut that extracts call–to–action items from meeting notes, one that gives you a morning report based on the weather, calendar events, and reminders, and one that takes a topic…

From the very first time we experienced the magic of Apple — in your writer’s case, discovering the Apple IIe at school — we were blown away not by what the hardware was, but what it could help us do. And that’s because every Apple device you buy includes something special: possibilities. The early Apple IIe helped us write words and explore imaginary worlds, and today’s Apple devices are infinitely more powerful, delivering almost infinite possibilities. Your iPhone, iPad, and Mac are Swiss Army knives for life, capable of transforming into almost anything: they can become classrooms and darkrooms; recording studios and podcast producers; movie cameras and connected cinemas; travel guides and celebrity kitchens. With your Mac, iPhone, and iPad, you can find fascinating places, create cartoons from faces, sharpen…

$579 From https://ruarkaudio.com Features 1x 20mm tweeter, 1x 85mm mid/bass driver, 2x 25W Class D amplifiers, Bluetooth 5.1 with aptX HD, 1x (RCA) phono input with MM preamp, 1x 3.5mm analog audio/digital optical input, 1x USB–C port, 1x subwoofer output CONNECT ANY USB–C DEVICE TO STREAM FULL–QUALITY DIGITAL SIGNAL RUARK’S MR1 DESKTOP speakers are very compact, but still feature the company’s trademark high–quality build and finish. The right speaker contains the bulk of the electronics, with the left unit connected via a woven cable. You also get a remote control, as well as the RotoDial on the top surface for controlling connections and volume. There are multiple input modes, the first of which is Bluetooth 5.1, with standard SBC and AAC codecs joined by the higher–quality aptX HD if your…

$29.99 From https://satechi.net Features Bluetooth 5.1, USB–C, rechargeable battery, 3–device memory, DPI control AN EXTERNAL MOUSE is a useful thing, even if you are using a laptop. It can give you more flexibility and, thanks to the excellent cursor support and the new windowing features in iPadOS 26, it’s also a great way to power up your iPad workflow. Satechi’s new Bluetooth mouse arrives together with its companion Bluetooth iPad keyboard (in the same black and white color options). It costs just $29.99; Apple’s Magic Mouse costs $79, and this mouse is slightly lighter to carry around. The mouse charges over USB–C and its internal rechargeable battery — so much more convenient than removable batteries — gives up to 80 hours use on a single charge. Pairing is straightforward, and…

GIVEN THE STATE of Apple Intelligence on iPhone compared with the artificial intelligence (AI) Google is offering on Android phones, it seemed almost inevitable that John Giannandrea, Apple’s senior vice president for Machine Learning and AI Strategy, would one day be persuaded by Tim Cook that he didn’t need to turn up to work again. In December, Giannandrea stepped down from his position and Amar Subramanya joined Apple as vice president of AI, reporting directly to Craig Federighi. Right now, Google has Gemini 3 Pro, an advanced AI chatbot that can answer pretty much any question you throw at it. It also has Nano Banana Pro, arguably the best mobile image generator out there. Apple, meanwhile, has Siri, which still struggles to tell the difference between “set a timer” and…

AT THE END of 2025, Apple announced its annual App Store Awards — the best apps and games as decided by App Store editors. Now, it’s time for the people’s choice: Apple has revealed 2025’s most downloaded apps and games on iPhone and iPad in the US. There are some caveats. Apple did not disclose any download numbers, so we don’t know how close the second-placed app came to the winner in each category, and so on down the line. More importantly, we can’t know which apps people loved and kept using, and whether any were downloaded simply because of the hype surrounding them, opened only once, and then discarded. With that proviso, the lists are fascinating. Unsurprisingly, ChatGPT was the most downloaded free iPhone app in the US over…

SANTA MAY HAVE been and gone, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t still great gifts to be had — so if you got a new Mac, iPhone, or iPad for Christmas, picked up an Apple bargain on Black Friday, or just feel like treating yourself, there are many great free apps available to give you a very happy new year. In this guide, we’re going to highlight some of the very best free apps for Mac, iPhone, iPad, and Apple Watch — and by free, we mean free; not demos, time–limited trials, or apps that are unusable without buying in–app purchases. While some of the apps here do have paid versions that unlock additional features or just banish adverts, the ones we’ve selected deliver the goods without requiring payment. Over…

PART 2 of 3 IN PART ONE of our macOS iMovie series (#ML240), we demonstrated how to import long, rambling clips, trim their duration to only show the good bits, and rearrange them in iMovie’s non–linear timeline. This enabled us to tell a more succinct story before sharing the edited footage to social media. In part two, we’re showing you how to harness iMovie’s slick suite of post–production tools to make your edited footage even more entertaining and professional. By adding titles or captions, you can include extra information in your footage to keep your audience in the picture, so to speak. Transitions such as dissolves and wipes help blend a series of cut–together clips into a more smoothly flowing narrative, plus they help add an extra level of visual…

VISUAL INTELLIGENCE IN iOS 26 is now more powerful than ever, not only identifying real–world images and text, but working with on–screen content, too. You can now take a screenshot of a recipe and ask to change the portions, get a bio of someone mentioned in an article, look for more information about a product, or shop around. The more you use Visual Intelligence, the more uses you’ll find. Accessing it is easy, but the method depends on your device and task. To use it via the camera on an iPhone 15 Pro/Pro Max or iPhone 16e, you can customize the Action button, add a Visual Intelligence control to the Lock Screen, or launch it via Control Center. With other iPhone 16 models and the iPhone 17 range, you press…

WHEN APPLE UNVEILED the iPhone Air, it proudly declared it the thinnest handset the company had ever built. Measuring just 0.22 inches, it shaved 0.05 inches off the iPhone 6’s slim 0.27 inch profile, yet look at it from the side, and you’ll spot an anomaly. At the top of the iPhone Air is a so–called “plateau” — a fancy–sounding name for what is essentially a bump. It’s the thickest point of the device, boosting its thickness to 0.45 inches; or double that of the rest of the phone. Although its presence means some may argue Apple hasn’t quite achieved the thinnest iPhone, the plateau could actually point to the future of smartphone design. A plateau is also included on the back of the iPhone 17 Pro and the iPhone…

$99.99 From www.logitech.com Features Logi LightCharge tech, full–size layout with number pad, connects up to three multi–OS devices, customizable Action key, 10m range; 5.63x16.96x.08 inches, 24.69 ounces WHILE BATTERY LIFE for wireless keyboards is improving, it’s always annoying when you run out of power. Imagine a keyboard that never runs out, and is always ready to go; no plugging into a USB port for recharging, and no disposable batteries to replace. Well, imagine no longer — behold the Signature Slim Solar+ wireless keyboard K980. As you’ve probably guessed, the keyboard is charged by solar energy; specifically, the pill–shaped indentation above the keys with “logi” on it absorbs energy from both the sun and artificial light. Just make sure you don’t use the indentation as a tray for pens, USB flash…

Well, it’s fair to say that Apple didn’t quite set the tech industry alight in 2025. Sure, it wasn’t a damp squib by any means, given we saw the introduction of the M5 chip, the high–performing iPhone 17 Pro, and the feature–laden AirPods Pro 3, to name but three. Yet, sales of iPhone Air fell flat, the much–awaited Siri improvements were delayed, and the jury remains out on Liquid Glass. The good news is that 2026 will be better. Much better. In fact, the more rumors you hear about the products heading our way, the more excited you’re sure to become. “I think Apple has a major 2026 in store,” Bloomberg tech journalist Mark Gurman told Mac|Life. “The beginning of the year will be packed but incremental.” So what can…

ASSUMING YOU’RE NOW running macOS Tahoe, you’ll find that Launchpad — the app that once enabled you to open programs on your Mac — has been replaced in the Dock by a new offering called Apps. Delve deeper, and you’ll find that Spotlight also incorporates Apps, while doing a whole lot more. In fact, you could go as far as to say that Apple has supercharged Spotlight and made it more integral to the macOS experience than ever before, which means real ease of use. The more you explore, the more you realize just how useful Spotlight can be in enabling you to find what you need and power through tasks in double–quick time. It lets you dive deep into apps, folders, and the operating system, while enabling you to…

STAYING ON TOP of your daily tasks can be a struggle, even with Apple’s much–improved Reminders app on your side. If you’ve been looking for an alternative, try FirstSeed Tasks (https://firstseed.io) — not only does it help you stay organized in a fast and intuitive way, it looks gorgeous, too. The app can display your task in two ways: a Kanban board, where you drag and drop your tasks from one section to another; or a Timeline mode, where your tasks are laid out chronologically, so you can see what should be top of your agenda. FirstSeed Tasks works on Mac, iPhone, iPad, and Apple Watch. It’s free to use, but offers a subscription that starts at $2.99 a month. This adds calendar integration and an AI assistant, backs up…

IT’S NOT ALWAYS easy to keep track of your books and television shows. Sure, you could use a spreadsheet, or even a pen and paper, but those aren’t exactly streamlined solutions — or the best ways to discover new favorites. Enter Fable. This app is a one–stop place for you to log all your literature and TV consumption, from the books on your wishlist, to the television seasons that totally changed your world. It enables you to log how much you read in each session, view your progress over time, and find community in one of its many clubs. It’s also a great way to find new titles that will quickly become firm favorites. There’s a vast library of books and shows with tags and genres to make discovery easy,…

Free From www.affinity.studio Needs Needs macOS 10.15 or later, 8GB RAM FIRST THINGS FIRST: yes, it’s free. You’ll need a premium Canva subscription if you want to use its artificial intelligence (AI) features, but then those have never been what Affinity is all about. The purchase of Britain’s Serif by Australia’s Canva has led to this, the three pro–grade Affinity creativity apps — a vector illustration program, a photo editor, and a desktop publishing package originally designed for Mac (an iPad version is “coming soon”) brought together as one app. You’ll be looking for the catch, but as far as we can see, there isn’t one. The new Affinity takes Affinity Designer, Photo, and Publisher, ups their version number to 3, and gives them away for nothing! It’s not the…

$49.99 From www.twelvesouth.com Features 35W of fast charge, charge two devices at once, 20W via USB–C and 15W wireless, supports StandBy mode; 60mmx60mm deep (including prongs) THERE’S NOTHING COMPLICATED or esoteric about this plug. Twelve South’s PowerBug is a two–in–one charger that plugs directly into wall power. Your wireless–charging iPhone snaps onto it magnetically, and if it’s MagSafe or Qi2 compatible, it charges at a nifty 15W. Underneath the PowerBug is a USB–C port (cables not supplied), which can charge a second device. When charging two things at once, the USB port charges at 20W and the wireless charger at 15W, or if you’re using the USB–C port on its own, it can charge at 35W. PowerBug is solidly built, pleasingly small, and available in black or white. The US…