The Windows Phone 8 Features You Didn’t See Yesterday

I’ve been using Windows Phone 8 for a while now. Here are a few of my favorite features that didn’t get announced yesterday.

BING

By swiping left will cause Bing to show “Local Events”, “Local Deals”, “In Theaters”, “Top Videos” & “Top Headlines”.

AUTOMATIC BACKUP

Windows Phone 8 will automatically backup photos, text messages and settings to SkyDrive.

SEND VOICE AND CONTACTS VIA TEXT MESSAGE

Windows Phone can now send and receive voice and contact attachments via text message.

LOCK SCREEN NOTIFICATIONS AND WALLPAPER

Windows Phone 8 now allows app developers to access the lock screen (notifications and wallpaper). Here is an example of an email and text message shown on the lock screen with Bing set as the lock screen wallpaper. Bing will automatically refresh the wallpaper as Bing.com changes

WINDOWS PHONE STORE SUPPORTS CATEGORIES e.g. NEW AND RISING, NEW RELEASE, ETC.

Windows Phone Store now supports categories such as NEW + RISING, PICKS FOR YOU and more.

STORE SUPPORTS APP SUGGESTIONS/RECOMMENDATIONS VIA FACEBOOK

Windows Phone Store will recommend apps based upon your Facebook data.

TAP + SEND e.g. BUMPING PHONE TOGETHER TO TRANSFER PICTURES, CONTACTS, ETC.

Windows Phone 8 allows users to bump their phones together to transfer contacts, pictures, websites and more.

WINDOWS PHONE 8 WALLET

The Windows Phone 8 integrated Wallet app supports coupons, credit cards, memberships and more.

INTEGRATED SPEECH RECOGNITION NOW SUPPORTS ONENOTE

Windows Phone 8 not only allows users to send text messages via voice but now users can dictate to OneNote with a touch of a button.

COMPANY APP SUPPORT

Windows Phone 8 now supports Company Apps

AUTO UPLOAD APPS

Windows Phone 8 now has an auto upload feature. Users can approve apps to auto upload their data.

UPLOAD FULL RESOLUTION PHOTOS TO SKYDRIVE

Windows Phone 8 now provides an option to have full resolution photos automatically uploaded to SkyDrive

MICROSOFT ACCOUNTS NOT WINDOWS LIVE

Windows Phone 8 has a new start up process and now uses the term Microsoft Accounts instead of Windows Live

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  • Robert

    Completely gorgeous OS.

  • Greg

    Bland, and dull. Pity. Microsoft, if you’re listening, hire some damned designers. This effort isn’t going to win you back your users. You’ve got to do better. Yes, it is different to Apple’s design, and that’s good, great in fact, but it feels amateurish in comparison.

  • AndersOlesen

    Interesting post, I did not know of most of these improvements.

  • 161803

    One man’s bland is another man’s masterpiece. Given the current fashion for rubbishing skeuomorphism, maybe MS are ahead of the game… maybe!

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Matthew-Lyons/545588067 Matthew Lyons

    I thought this would be things that had not already been discussed…

    This is nothing new at all…

  • Dan Van Der Werken

    This post is very nice. Good job. The only thing I don’t like is when an app requires WiFi. I have Verizon LTE. As I understand it, Verizon won’t carry the really good WP8 phones (maybe they will, who knows), so maybe my point is moot, but requiring that I have a WiFi connection when my LTE gets me 20+megabits per second download and about 18+ upload, seems stupid. That’s my only gripe, and WP8 isn’t the only platform with applications that require this situation.

  • Awesomeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

    Looks worse than WP7. Kinda hurts my eyes. I’m not saying go full iPhone here with gratuitous gradients and skeumorphic icons — I hate that too. It’s just that it seems like the design-guidelines-formerly-known-as-Metro are being taken a bit to an extreme here. I think “Metro” is best in smaller doses. For example, would a black border around the white text on the lock screen really be so bad? It would improve readability 100x.

  • http://profiles.google.com/florin.jurcovici Florin Jurcovici

    I did. From both competing OSes :-)

    Aside from using Facebook recommendations, I don’t see any innovation.

  • Fabs

    Have you ever used a WP? It may not have serious innovation, but it surely bets the crap out of the others in usability. Simply awesome. I have a WP7 after going from iOS, then Android. I’m not looking back. Not to say that Lumia 920 hardware specs beats any other mobile phone, with great camera (important to me).

  • Doug

    As someone who has no axe to grind (I dont have an iPhone) I think the interface is great. What I want with a phone is more control and I dont get that with Android or Apple so heres hoping.