Apple Looks to 2021 With Japanese New Year Ad Highlighting the App Store
Apple today shared a new App Store ad on its YouTube channel in Japan ahead of the New Year. The brief 15-second video highlights various apps available on the App Store for productivity, connecting with others, and gaming.
The ad emphasizes how the App Store can help people get off to a good start in 2021, complete with colorful animations. New Year or "Shōgatsu" is widely considered the most important holiday in Japan, observed on January 1-3.
Apple also typically holds a one-day New Year's shopping event in Japan in early January, offering Apple Store gift cards with the purchase of select Apple products, but it has yet to announce an event of this kind for 2021. This year, the event took place on January 2 at Apple Stores in Japan and through the Apple Store app.
Update: Apple has announced that the shopping event will be held January 2-3.
Popular Stories
Last year, Apple launched CarPlay Ultra, the long-awaited next-generation version of its CarPlay software system for vehicles. Nearly nine months later, CarPlay Ultra is still limited to Aston Martin's latest luxury vehicles, but that should change fairly soon.
In May 2025, Apple said many other vehicle brands planned to offer CarPlay Ultra, including Hyundai, Kia, and Genesis.
In his Powe...
Apple today confirmed to Reuters that it has acquired Q.ai, an Israeli startup that is working on artificial intelligence technology for audio.
Apple paid close to $2 billion for Q.ai, according to sources cited by the Financial Times. That would make this Apple's second-biggest acquisition ever, after it paid $3 billion for the popular headphone and audio brand Beats in 2014.
Q.ai has...
The calendar has turned to February, and a new report indicates that Apple's next product launch is "imminent," in the form of new MacBook Pro models.
"All signs point to an imminent launch of next-generation MacBook Pros that retain the current form factor but deliver faster chips," Bloomberg's Mark Gurman said on Sunday. "I'm told the new models — code-named J714 and J716 — are slated...
Apple recently updated its online store with a new ordering process for Macs, including the MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, iMac, Mac mini, Mac Studio, and Mac Pro.
There used to be a handful of standard configurations available for each Mac, but now you must configure a Mac entirely from scratch on a feature-by-feature basis. In other words, ordering a new Mac now works much like ordering an...
Apple is planning to launch new MacBook Pro models with M5 Pro and M5 Max chips alongside macOS 26.3, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman.
"Apple's faster MacBook Pros are planned for the macOS 26.3 release cycle," wrote Gurman, in his Power On newsletter today.
"I'm told the new models — code-named J714 and J716 — are slated for the macOS 26.3 software cycle, which runs from...