Apple today shared a new television ad on its YouTube channel, designed to introduce people to the new Screen Effects feature in iOS 10. In the minute-long spot, a sole red balloon drifts through mountains, over the sea, and through hilly terrain to reach the city, where it's joined by hundreds of additional balloons floating through the streets.
The shot pans to an iPhone user who receives a "Happy Birthday" message, where balloons fill up the screen to accompany the text. It ends with the tagline "Expressive messages on iPhone 7. Practically magic."
Introduced in iOS 10, Screen Effects are designed to make the messages experience more emotive, personal, and fun. Screen Effects temporarily alter the look of the Messages display with full screen animations that play alongside text messages. There are several animations, ranging from balloons and confetti to lasers and fireworks.
With certain keywords like "Congratulations!" or "Happy Birthday!" Screen Effects play automatically whenever the relevant text phrase is sent to an iPhone user who has iOS 10 installed.
Apple has unveiled a whopping nine new products so far this March, including an iPhone 17e, iPad Air models with the M4 chip, MacBook Air models with the M5 chip, MacBook Pro models with M5 Pro and M5 Max chips, the all-new MacBook Neo, an updated Studio Display, a higher-end Studio Display XDR, AirPods Max 2, and now the Nike Powerbeats Pro 2.
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Wednesday March 18, 2026 7:39 am PDT by Joe Rossignol
While the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max are not expected to launch for another six months or so, there are already plenty of rumors about the devices.
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I find apples new ads to be stupid. Honestly, my favorite was the retina macbook pro ad they ran years ago for the 15 inch. short sweet and to the point.
