iOS 17 AirPlay Features

by

With the iOS 17 update, Apple is updating and refining almost every iPhone app and feature, and that includes AirPlay. ‌AirPlay‌ is Apple's wireless communication protocol that allows music and video content from iPhones, iPads, and Macs to be beamed to devices like the Apple TV, HomePod, and third-party speakers, smart TVs, set-top boxes, and receivers.

iOS 17 AirPlay Feature
This guide highlights the changes that Apple is making to ‌AirPlay‌ in iOS 17, with these features also available in iPadOS 17 and macOS Sonoma.

AirPlay Preferences

iOS 17 improves on-device intelligence for ‌AirPlay‌, and it is able to better learn your preferences over time. If you typically ‌AirPlay‌ from your ‌iPhone‌ to the ‌Apple TV‌ in the living room, it will learn that behavior and show the ‌Apple TV‌ first in your ‌AirPlay‌ list over other ‌AirPlay‌ devices that may be in the home.

ios 17 airplay
Devices are shown in the ‌AirPlay‌ interface based on relevance, and you'll also now see suggested connections proactively based on your prior ‌AirPlay‌ usage.

The ‌AirPlay‌ interface is smarter from the outset, and it shows the devices that are located closest to you first rather than offering up a more arbitrary list. The ‌AirPlay‌ interface also makes it clearer which device content is AirPlaying to and whether ‌AirPlay‌ is active.

Automatic AirPlay

The Automatic ‌AirPlay‌ feature that was available for TVs in iOS 16 has expanded to include speakers as well in iOS 17. You can opt in to have the ‌iPhone‌ automatically connect to nearby speakers and TVs when playing content from apps that you regularly use with ‌AirPlay‌.

ios 17 airplay automatic
Previously, this setting was limited to ‌AirPlay‌ TVs.

AirPlay in Hotel Rooms

Apple is teaming up with hotel chains and TV manufacturers to introduce smart TV sets that will let hotel guests automatically ‌AirPlay‌ content from their Apple devices to the hotel TV.

airplay hotels
The option will let guests watch their own TV shows and movies without having to sign into streaming accounts on shared televisions, providing more security for viewing content when traveling.

IHG Hotels and Resorts will be the first hotel company to bring ‌AirPlay‌ to its hotels, and LG plans to introduce AirPlay-compatible smart TVs designed specifically for use in hotels.

Read More

You can get more information on the changes coming in iOS 17 in our comprehensive iOS 17 roundup.

Related Forums: iOS 17, iPadOS 17

Popular Stories

iOS 26

iOS 26.4 and iOS 27 Features Revealed in New Leak

Friday December 12, 2025 10:56 am PST by
Macworld's Filipe Espósito today revealed a handful of features that Apple is allegedly planning for iOS 26.4, iOS 27, and even iOS 28. The report said the features are referenced within the code for a leaked internal build of iOS 26 that is not meant to be seen by the public. However, it appears that Espósito and/or his sources managed to gain access to it, providing us with a sneak peek...
Read Full Article • 90 comments
Apple Logo Top Half

Early iOS 26 Software Leak Uncovers Dozens of Upcoming Apple Features

Monday December 15, 2025 3:05 pm PST by
Software from an iPhone prototype running an early build of iOS 26 leaked last week, giving us a glimpse at future Apple devices and iOS features. We recapped device codenames in our prior article, and now we have a list of some of the most notable feature flags that were found in the software code. In some cases, it's obvious what the feature flags are referring to, while some are more...
Read Full Article • 35 comments
apple beta 26 lineup

Apple Leak Confirms Work on Foldable iPhone, AirTag 2, and Dozens More Devices

Monday December 15, 2025 2:05 pm PST by
Last week, details about unreleased Apple devices and future iOS features were shared by Macworld. This week, we learned where the information came from, plus we have more findings from the leak. As it turns out, an Apple prototype device running an early build of iOS 26 was sold, and the person who bought it shared the software. The OS has a version number of 23A5234w, and the first...
Read Full Article • 79 comments
Apple Foldable Thumb

Leak Reveals Foldable iPhone Details

Monday December 15, 2025 9:09 am PST by
The first foldable iPhone will feature a series of design and hardware firsts for Apple, according to details shared by the Weibo leaker known as Digital Chat Station. According to a new post, via machine translation, Apple is developing what the leaker describes as a "wide foldable" device, a term used to refer to a horizontally oriented, book-style foldable with a large internal display....
Read Full Article • 157 comments
iOS 26

iOS 26.3 Beta 1 Features: What's New So Far

Monday December 15, 2025 4:23 pm PST by
Apple is testing iOS 26.3, the next version of iOS 26 that will launch around January. Since iOS 26.3's testing is happening over the holidays, it is a smaller update with fewer features than we've seen in prior betas. We've rounded up what's new so far, and we'll add to our list with subsequent betas if we come across any other features. Transfer to Android Apple is making it simpler...
Read Full Article • 42 comments
iOS 26

Apple Releases iOS 26.2 With Alarms for Reminders, Lock Screen Changes, Enhanced Safety Alerts and More

Friday December 12, 2025 10:10 am PST by
Apple today released iOS 26.2, the second major update to the iOS 26 operating system that came out in September, iOS 26.2 comes a little over a month after iOS 26.1 launched. ‌iOS 26‌.2 is compatible with the ‌iPhone‌ 11 series and later, as well as the second-generation ‌iPhone‌ SE. The new software can be downloaded on eligible iPhones over-the-air by going to Settings >...
Read Full Article • 111 comments
airpods max 2024 colors

AirPods Max 2 Likely to Offer These 10 New Features

Monday December 15, 2025 7:41 am PST by
Apple released the AirPods Max on December 15, 2020, meaning the over-ear headphones launched five years ago today. While the AirPods Max were updated with a USB-C port and new color options last year, followed by support for lossless audio and ultra-low latency audio this year, the headphones lack some of the features that have been introduced for newer generations of the regular AirPods and the ...
Read Full Article • 36 comments
iOS 26

iOS 26.2 Coming Soon With These 8 New Features on Your iPhone

Thursday December 11, 2025 8:49 am PST by
Apple seeded the second iOS 26.2 Release Candidate to developers earlier this week, meaning the update will be released to the general public very soon. Apple confirmed iOS 26.2 would be released in December, but it did not provide a specific date. We expect the update to be released by early next week. iOS 26.2 includes a handful of new features and changes on the iPhone, such as a new...
Read Full Article • 82 comments

Top Rated Comments

Apple Fan 2008 Avatar
Apple Fan 2008
31 months ago
Can't wait for AirPlay in hotels!
Score: 11 Votes (Like | Disagree)
ShivneelSingh Avatar
ShivneelSingh
31 months ago
Just allow me to not include my HomePods as my speakerphone options on my iPhone.
Score: 11 Votes (Like | Disagree)
krell100 Avatar
krell100
31 months ago
Is Airplay still limited to 24/48? I'd like to see an updated Airplay that allows streaming the full bandwidth of high resolution files in Apple Music (24/192). Also, Apple, please fix the auto sample/bit rate changing in macOS, why does it work in iOS but not macOS??!!
Score: 11 Votes (Like | Disagree)
PsykX Avatar
PsykX
31 months ago
I hope it's more reliable, because I've been having a lot of screen flickers and then AirPlay quits right after... on multiple Apple TVs and iPhones in the last 5-6 years.
Score: 11 Votes (Like | Disagree)
arobert3434 Avatar
arobert3434
31 months ago
How about instead of all this fancy-schmancy guessing simply preserving your last airplay choice for more than 30 seconds or so if you pause the music? This has driven me crazy for years. A Mac will remember your selection until you change it, why can't iDevices do this?

Also in the missing-basics department, Music won't remember your play history across devices. Why do they make this fancy iCloud thing just to let each device be its own silo? It reminds me of the sad state of Books. Remembering the page across devices seems like the simplest possible cloud application. The Kindle app does it flawlessly. But it was always unreliable in Books, and then in iOS 16 rather than spending software development hours on stabilizing that, they invest in a hack-job UI rewrite AND apparently introduce a hard barrier so Books 16 devices and Books <=15 devices cannot sync the page together at all!

The emphasis on simple basic usability seems to have completely left Apple. If it weren't for so much legacy and existing convention in the software at this point they'd be worse than Windows.
Score: 9 Votes (Like | Disagree)
HVDynamo Avatar
HVDynamo
31 months ago

Is Airplay still limited to 24/48? I'd like to see an updated Airplay that allows streaming the full bandwidth of high resolution files in Apple Music (24/192). Also, Apple, please fix the auto sample/bit rate changing in macOS, why does it work in iOS but not macOS??!!
There is literally no benefit to 24/192 outside of the mixing environment. 16/44.1 is enough to flawlessly reproduce any frequency in our hearing range.
Score: 9 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Read All Comments