The 8 best features in iOS 8 - From Messages to Metal

How do you follow a truly enormous software overhaul like iOS 7? Well, if you're Apple... with another enormous software overhaul.

Some of the iOS 8 functionality Apple introduced at WWDC yesterday will fundamentally change the way you use your iPhone or iPad. You'll be faster, more productive, and be able to perform more powerful tasks than ever.

But let's cut the wheat from the chaff.

I don't care about selfies and sound bites in Messages. I'm not interested in enterprise. And, typically, being a gamer and being a fitness freak are mutually exclusive concepts.

But I do care about better games, smarter apps, and an improved app store.

Here, then, are the eight key things that make iOS 8 a big deal. Eight reasons to be unduly excited about a firmware upgrade for a rectangle of plastic and circuit boards.

Want to feel like Iron Man? You can now wake up Siri without touching a button (as long as your device is charging) simply by saying "Hey Siri".

Plus, Apple's digital assistant recognises words as you speak, so you can see if Siri's made a mistake before you finish your question.

And the best new Siri feature?

Ask something like "What song is playing" and Siri will listen and get back to you with an answer. It's also fun listening to it try to pronounce 'CHVRCHES'.

This is one of those features that should have been in iOS years ago. The sort of announcement where our reaction was less "wow, what a surprising new feature!" and more "oh, thank god, finally."

Now, when someone sends you an iMessage, you can simply tug on the notification and reply from the Home screen or a completely different app. Pull down an email banner and you can mark the message as read or chuck it in the bin.

"Extensibility" could very well prove to be the headline feature of iOS 8 - we just have to wait for app makers to start coding.

Essentially, extensions let apps break free from their sandbox silos (for the first time) and talk to one another.

The examples we got to see at WWDC include sharing to Pinterest, translating with Bing in Safari, and applying a custom watercolour filter in Photos. Once iOS devs get to grips with extensions, the possibilities are endless.

Third-party developers can also display widgets in the Notification Center. So, you can, for example, see your eBay auctions at a glance. Or you can dip into a universal documents folder so multiple apps can work on the same file without creating endless copies.

Apple is also giving developers access to Touch ID and manual camera controls.

And, yes, before you shout at us, we know that this is all stuff that Android has had for years. But, as always, Apple has focused on making this stuff more safe, secure, and accessible than it is in Google's OS. Hopefully, they were all worth the wait.

The new Family Sharing tool is a nice way for a family of up to six members to cut down on costs and share the same library of music, movies, and apps. But here comes the cool part...

Let's say little Billy wants to buy Minecraft - Pocket Edition with mummy's credit card. Before the sale goes through, mum gets a notification on her phone so she can approve the purchase, learn more about the game, or reject it.

At a time when parents are worried about what their kids are playing or how much their kids are spending, this added layer of parental supervision sounds like a much-needed feature.

"Hey, remember that iPhone we sold you?" Mr Apple asks. "Well, we figured out how to make it ten times faster. Enjoy!"

That was the basic gist of a rather mind-blowing segment of Apple's WWDC keynote, when the Cupertino tech giant introduced a new graphics software layer called Metal that can squeeze considerably more performance from the A7 chip than the previous graphics software layer.

At the show, we saw EA's Frostbite engine and Unreal Engine 4 running on an iPad Air without breaking a sweat. And a Zen Garden tech demo from Epic Games that wouldn't look out of place on a PS4.

For us gamers, Metal is going to change everything. Basically, The Room 3 is going to look incredible.

Though Apple introduced custom keyboards as part of its overall push for extensibility in iOS 8, we thought it deserved its own spot on this list.

Now, you can go tell your Android-owning friends to stop going on about Swype - a predictive keyboard that lets you type by smearing your thumb on the screen - because it's heading to iOS.

Best of all, these keyboards are forbidden from collecting any data unless you give them express permission, so you don't have to worry about typing in your credit card details with a third-party keyboard.

If you're really keyed in to the Apple ecosystem and you have an iOS device and a Mac and a pair of Apple-branded socks, this new feature is for you.

Let's say you're looking at a website in Safari on your Mac. There's now a button on your iPad's Lock screen that will let you load that very same site on your tablet. And it works in reverse, too.

Plus, you can pick up an email you're in the middle of writing from a different device. And Apple's giving this SDK to app makers, too, so third-party iOS and Mac apps can hand data off to one another.

Also, you no longer need to use your iPhone for calls and text messages. As long as your phone is within range, you can make calls or send and receive SMS messages from your Mac or iPad.

The App Store's getting a hefty update come autumn.

There's a new Explore tab to help you find apps in different categories, better search with suggested queries, trending searches for current events, and little Editor's Choice banners to highlight Apple's favoured software.

Plus, developers can show a video as part of their app listing, and put multiple games into a cheap bundle. I wonder if multiple developers can contribute to a bundle?