Apple Releases iOS 13.3 and iPadOS 13.3 with Some Fixes for Blind and Low Vision Users, but also a Regression to Smart Invert

Seems to be gone. Thank goodness. Now when i set it to headings and load a new webpage, it stays on headings. Amazing!

Has Braille input using a Braille display been improved in IOS 13.3?

I’m a Low Vision user. I use Smart Invert + Dark Mode. I hate to say this but unless you are a user who is willing to immediately file feedback so Apple will be encouraged to correct the Smart Invert + Dark Mode problem, do not update! I have some work arounds if anyone is interested, but I don’t like them and they’re simply to get me by. Obviously, your feedback to Apple is strongly encouraged ASAP!!

I have a problem with banners all the time.

Well the issue with vo talking when using siri via power button still not fix. So much for fixing problem for the accessibility. Unlucky 13 saga continues. How can not they fix the siri and vo issue? No comands about waiting apple to fix it. This is not even acceptableanymore.

The bug where Voiceover speech continues while Siri has been initiated, is still there.

Before I update, can anyone confirm that siri and voice over no longer occasionally speak at the same time? Also, does voiceover pronounce things correctly now?

Regarding Siri and VO the answer is yes. Also but regarding notification repeating on messages. I check and do have to repeat 2 times but it does more than 2. Also the issue with getting any notification and hearing time at end continues. It is not good when you get 3 or more notification close and having to hear VO says the time. It is a major pain. Apple is no longer doing well in accessibility for me. No comands defending apple please.

I’m still having interference with VO and Siri. I’m also still experiencing the hanging notification banner. Incorrect pronunciations is still there as well.

I’ve been plagued by the inconsistent malfunctioning of Smart Invert Colours throughout the beta cycle of iOS 13. But it is inconsistent and often hard to reproduce. The keyboard so often is NOT white letters on dark background - and Safari web pages or documents in Pages just often require me to keep chopping and changing between Smart and Classic Invert. It is such a frustrating experience!, I have reported the issues, but no joy yet.
Fingers crossed!
Harry

Just noticed something. Ever since updating to iOS 13.3, in the status bar, right next to the name of the cellular carrier, Voiceover is now saying 4G. I have always had Voiceover say LTE for my cellular data, but now it says 4G. I have checked and my data speeds are still what they should be with LTE. So I am not sure why it no longer says LTE and says 4G instead. Wondering if this was a change made by apple?
Is this happening with anyone else too?

My cellular shows LTE on Verizon. Maybe your towers are down or overloaded at the moment. You could try to reboot phone, but sure it will resolve.

Hello,

A very stupid bug is is still in iOS:
When using earpods and the volume is higher than 60% the iPhone keep trying to unluck......

There does seem to be some improvements with notifications. All are set on same setting. Some now disappear, while others I still need to clear.

dear editors at applevis
thanks a lot for your amazing guides and reports.
I appreciate you all.

I don't know about anyone else, but the Face ID feedback bug is not fixed for me. I've gotten audio feedback maybe once out of at least 20 times unlocking my phone since updating to 13.3.

Same here, I too get that same bug. Before updating though, it seemed to be happening less, but since updating, it's more frequent again.

I've also noticed that, even though you turn wifi completely off from Settings and restart your phone, wifi turns itself back on.

And another bug, when getting emails or Facebook notifications, even though I've read and cleared them, when visiting the Notification Centre, the notifications are still there.

Not sure if anyone else is getting these.

I'm currently working with Apple Accessibility on these bugs too, so hopefully we'll be able to figure out what is going on and they'll be able to let the developers know so they can fix it.

I know, most are probably saying "Good luck" or have reported bugs to Apple with nothing coming out of it, but I'd rather do my due diligence and report them to Apple. I still try to keep hope and at least give them a chance, even though I know that it won't go anywhere.

I was hoping the update would fix the issue with the cursor constantly leaping to the top of pages and bouncing around apps like a grasshopper on speed but no luck. If you're trying to open links in the background be prepared to constantly lose your place and get very frustrated, especially if you're trying to read a long document with embeded links.

I was checking news in the apple news and it refresh and lost focus. Where are the people that defended apple on accessibility? Fix bugs for accessibility? It looks like there are more bugs and only fix some.

The number of unread messages used to be announced by VoiceOver on the home screen. Since IOS 13, this very handy piece of information is no longer available.

Ever since updating to iOS 13.3, my battery drains like hot cakes. It usually lasts for at least 24 hours but I took it off the charger around 4 PM yesterday afternoon and by 5 this morning, it needed to be put back on the charger and was at 10%. What gives?

In response to Marcia: Found that if I read a notification text, then unlock my phone, the Messages App will say X number of messages unread when in fact I have already read them. My work around is when I ask Siri to read messages, the App won't say there are unread messages.

Apple has had a bug in iOS 13 with the Shortcuts app and accessibility(voiceover) That I have been noticing for a very long time now. It seems like no one has reported it here, so that I will report it here now, LOL. It is unfortunate that you cannot edit certain actions like you used to be able to do. For example, in iOS 12, I could add a random number action, and then add a repeat action. Set the repetition times two the random number action that you just added, and boom, you can make your device repeat something a random number of times between a start and end number. Same is true for the weight action, you can have it wait for a random number of seconds. Iused to love making my shortcuts app act like a robot, with random input frases and other things, if you would like to see one of my experiments with that please let me know. Unfortunately, going into edit the repetitions now only gives you the options to decrement and increment. It doesn't even tell you, unless you dismiss the popover, how many times you've set your device to repeat. Secondly, add a new shortcut, and add the send message action. Usually, in iOS 13, you can use the rotor to edit the different parts of a shortcut, for example, editing the two field and the recipient field in messages, Or editing the repetitions as described earlier. Anyway, you add the message, and I tap on where it says to, message, recipient, or something similar. Swipe up or down, and it uses the rotor actions that you had it previously set to. If I look for actions in the rotor, it's not there. So I can't edit the send message option anymore in shortcuts. Anyone have any idea on how I can work around these bugs for now? Thanks.

I am curious if anyone has found a way to delete old message threads considered recents? Basically, the message thread is not in my list of messages when I open the app but when I am composing a new text and type in someone's name, all of the old threads pop up with various people in groups. In older versions, I could hit the plus button on the far right of the thread and delete from recents but now, I am not sure how to go about this.

So, I was really hoping this would have been fixed by now, but it seems that despite all the resources that Apple has at it's disposal, it is still unable to invest in proper testing for accessibility before releasing an update.

What are the issues:

Currently, it seems random as to whether or not an app will open with smart invert or not. A good example is the web browser, where pages will not come up black with white font, however when you tap in a edit box you get a black keyboard (note, the font on the keys is not very well defined)

When you start the phone up the keyboard is almost impossible when smart invert is on.

Disappointing...… overall

I experienced this before, but has become more frequent.
VO seems to freeze more often. A VO toggle off/on used to correct. I now have to lock/unlock the phone.
I’ve lost count on how many times I’ve reported this. I’m really getting over Apple at this point. Bugs persist constantly.

Hi all, I just got the pro max and restored my backup today. Now I have no options to download alex, or daniel enhanced, and in fact other voices don't seem to work with VoiceOver like siri etc. only US voices I seem to have showing as available are fred, Samantha, siri female and male voices. that doesn't sound right to me, didn't they also have voices such as thom? not sure if this is corruptions on my end or apple have taken out lots of voices.

thanks, looks like I will have to try restoring my iPhone, this is why I don't like iCloud backups. it was also an unwelcome surprise when I found they don't give lightning cables with 11 phones anymore.

The lightning cables that Apple provides are junk anyway. That's why I use my 10 ft cable I got from Walmart and it's very sturty so it will last a long time.

Apple always wants to get money from us. Got a pack of cables that last a long time. about 10 feet long.

Hi Alex,
Your backup could be corrupt. However; plugging in phone and leaving it alone will often resolve that issue. All will show as they should.

Hey Alex, you didn't get any cables with your 11 Pro Max? I was under the impression that all of the Pro models came with a USB-C to USB cable. I know that when I got my iPhone 11, it came with a Lightning to USB cable, with a pair of their Lightning EarPods.

I do agree that their cables and wired headphones aren't the greatest, but in a pinch, they work fine.

I much more prefer using Anker cables myself as I find them more solidly built then Apple's own cables, and the price tag that Apple charges for them, I find is a little too much for a simple cable.

I just heard the beta for iOS unlucky 13.3.1 is out. Anyone wants to take a vote that bugs will be fix? No.

I can confirm that the first fix listed in the list, "VoiceOver focus no longer jumps to an unexpected location in the list of emails in the Mail app after taking an action such as delete, mark as unread" is actually not reliable at all. Meaning, that this bug very much still exists and has not gone away entirely. Sure, there has definitely been some improvement, but it is still very much there. I for one, have encountered it multiple times ever since updating to iOS 13.3 earlier this week. There is no consistent way to reproduce the bug, apart from simply going through the process of deleting an email or performing another action on it via the roter, multiple times. But every once in a while, the bug reappears and continues to happen for a few times that you keep deleting your emails and then randomly disappears.
This bug has become so hard to reproduce that I don't even know how to report it to Apple. You know they're gonna ask you to give them a method to reproduce it consistently, which, there's none. And then it'll just fall by the wayside, something else for us to just get used to. It'll just be another one added to the list of bugs that have been reported and reported in the past, but have never been fixed.

Wow, Apple...I'm sorry, but some of these fixes are seriously a half-ass attempt. I was expecting a much better effort in at least resolving the bugs that they did attempt to resolve. This was a 13.X release, so one can and should expect proper fixes. But no, they simply made "improvements" to various reported bugs, rather than release proper fixes.

Another mail bug seems to have possibly been fixed. I can delete trash in bulk. Reliably and with select all and delete consistently showing.
This is nice, I had another app installed. Just for bulk delete.

Firstly, I use voice control more than I do dictation. I am using voice control right now to write this. Yes, there are some negative things to it. For example, voice control listens to everything that VoiceOver speaks as you're dictating. There are a few ways around that, using bluetooth headphones, or turning your speech off as you're dictating, or even going into the typing feedback voiceOver settings and setting the key echo under software keyboards to none. But I like it because it works without Internet access. I could be typing a note without Internet on my phone. I also like it because unlike dictation, you can keep talking and talking without getting interrupted and have to activate dictation again. In fact, there's no need to activate dictation because it's already running. You can stop the dictation by saying go to sleep, and resume by saying wake up, and you'll hear a sound to confirm. Although I think voice control is good for non-interrupted dictation, it seems to slow down voiceover. Have any of you notice this?

I use the smart invert and the problems from ios13 are not all fixed. Pages im the safari browser are still not loading with the smart invert, so for that I have to use the old classic invert. Also some emails aren’t loading correctly and the background stays white. I strongly hope apple will fix this problem.

Hi,

I just got used to using the Show Context Menu option in my voiceover rotor. It's gone after updating to 13.3. Did they remove the option? Now when I flick up and down on the home screens, all I get are Activate and Edit Mode.

Hi, it'sn't gone, they remove from the rottor but if you press dabble tapp and hold it will be there.

Now when I put the phone on mute, it affected my ringtone, it stop VO from working when getting a call. When moving phone to my ear to talking, does not go from speeker to phone. Waiting for iOS 14, it can not be worse than this unlucky 13.

Hello.
Has anyone noticed a Bug whereby voiceover sounds are extremely loud, regardless of voiceover's actual volume?
I have volume set to 5% so that it's not blasting in my ear, but the sounds blow my head off, it's annoying.
I can turn off the sound, but I'd rather not.
Anyone noticed this?
I tried restarting voiceover, and tried restartin the phone.
I only just updated to iOS 13 because of the multitude of bugs present.
Regards.
Melissa
PS:
Not a major issue in the grand skeme of things, but thought I'd let people know anyway.

Hello, When using a bluetooth device all music goes through the device as it should, but voiceover comes through the iPhone speaker. Anyone have an idea why this might be? Just upgraded to iOS 13.3 from iOS 12.