Usually, when we think of Apple and “invitations,” it means that the company is going to demonstrate some new product at a high-profile product presentation. But this time, we’re talking about a new invitation app.
The idea behind Apple Invites is that you can create and share custom invitations for any event or occasion. You can use your own photos or backgrounds in the app as the image for the invitation. Image Playground is built into Invites, and you can use it to create images for your invitations. Other Apple Intelligence features, such as Writing Tools, are also built in, in case you need help crafting the right message for your invitation.
It’s worth noting that only users with a paid iCloud plan (also known as iCloud+) can create invitations in the app. There’s no limit to the number of events you can host, but each one is limited to 100 participants. As you might expect, events will appear in the Calendar app (which Apple has made some changes to in recent months, including the integration of reminders, as it rolls out iOS 18).
Anyone can respond to an invitation in the app or online. You don’t need an Apple account or device to do this. You can also add photos and videos from the event to a Shared Album (in case you want to feel like it’s 2008 and we’re all back on Facebook). You can also help decide what to listen to during the party by creating joint Apple Music playlists. There is integration with weather and maps to provide guests with directions and weather forecasts on the day of the event.
Privacy is an important factor. Hosts can choose whether to include their home address in the invitation, and guests can control how their information appears to other people.
The app seems useful and quite interesting. The shared albums and Apple Music collaboration features make it more interesting than a boring Outlook invite.
Update, February 4, 13:18 EST: An earlier version of this article stated that you need an iPhone and an Apple invite to add photos and videos to the Event Shared Album. This is not the case, as you can do it online from any device.
