What is new in WidgetKit? I run a weather forecast with SwiftUI widgets, and I update the location and then forecast in the background.

What's New in WidgetKit?

Enhancements in WeatherKit

For your weather forecast app using SwiftUI widgets, there are several exciting updates in WeatherKit that you can leverage:

1. Richer Forecast Details:

   • Precipitation Amounts: You can now fetch hourly precipitation data, including the amount of precipitation.
   • Cloud Cover by Altitude: The API now provides details on cloud cover by altitude, which can be useful for more accurate weather predictions.
   • Humidity and Visibility: Additional data points like humidity and visibility are now available.

2. Contextual Weather Changes:

   • WeatherKit now supports highlighting upcoming weather changes contextually, which can help in providing timely updates to your users.

3. Binary Format for Faster Data Transfers:

   • Support for flat buffers has been introduced, which can reduce payload size by up to 25% and parsing time by up to 90% compared to JSON. This can make your background updates more efficient.

4. Historical Data:

   • A new statistics API allows you to fetch historical weather data, which can be used to provide users with a broader perspective on current weather conditions.

For more details on these enhancements, you can refer to the session Bring context to today’s weather.

WidgetKit Enhancements

In addition to WeatherKit, there are also updates to WidgetKit that can enhance your app's widgets:

1. Interactive Widgets:

   • Widgets can now have multiple interactive areas that perform actions and update state directly within the widget. This can be useful for providing more dynamic and engaging weather updates.

2. Accessory Widget Group Layout:

   • This new layout allows for more information and interactivity, accommodating three separate views and supporting deep linking to different parts of your app.

3. Relevant Contexts:

   • You can now specify relevant contexts such as time of day, location, and routine, so that your widgets appear when they are most useful to the user.

For more information on these updates, you can refer to the session Platforms State of the Union.

Relevant Sessions

1. Bring context to today’s weather
2. Platforms State of the Union
3. Bring your app’s core features to users with App Intents

These updates should help you enhance your weather forecast app with more detailed and timely weather information, as well as more interactive and contextually relevant widgets.