Apple’s iOS and iPadOS 16.4 for their phones and tablets got a handy new feature on board: an ambient noise filter.
iOS and iPadOS 16.4 contain mostly bug fixes and security updates, plus a slew of new emoji. And some more hidden features. One handy one is a filter that allows you to have ambient noise filtered out for the receiving party while making a call. Even in a noisy environment, you are then still perfectly intelligible then. The trick works – so experience shows – excellently. If you want to do just the opposite, i.e. let the ambient noise come through, you can arrange that as well. To make use of the feature, call someone. This can be done via the standard phone app, but also something like Signal or Whatsapp. Then drag down from the top right corner of the screen, to slide down the Control Panel. In it, tap the new button at the top right titled Mode, set to Default by default. Tap Voice Isolation for ambient noise filtering or Wide Spectrum for pass-through. Sort of like configurable ANC, but then for the microphone.