• WWDC 2019 will be 3-7 June 2019 (almost certainly)
• In McEnery Convention Center in San Jose (almost certainly)
• iOS 13, macOS 10.15, watchOS 6 and tvOS 13 will be demonstrated and released in beta
• New Mac Pro is a possibility
• Tickets will cost $1,599 and the ticket lottery will open in mid March

WWDC is one of the biggest dates in Apple’s calendar, second only to the autumn iPhone launch in importance and hype. The Worldwide Developer Conference is Apple’s summer training and networking event for software developers, but it begins with a series of product announcements that will be watched around the world.

WWDC’s opening keynote speech will reveal major updates to the software running on the Mac, iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch and Apple TV, and see the release of those software updates in beta form. There may be hardware unveilings too: WWDC 2017 saw the launch of the HomePod and three iPhone models have made their debuts at WWDC events.

In this article we reveal everything that is currently known about WWDC 2019 and speculate about everything that isn’t. We’re talking dates, times, product announcements to expect, how to get tickets, how to watch the keynote speech online if you can’t make it to San Jose and more.

WWDC 2019 dates and times

Apple hasn’t yet announced dates for WWDC 2019, but smart detective work by MacRumors all but confirms that the event will run from 3-7 June, at the same venue as last year: the McEnery Convention Center in San Jose.

(In 2018, WWDC ran from 4-8 June.)

The event lasts a week and will be packed with useful workshops and networking events for developers, but the stuff of wider interest is front-loaded: all the big announcements will be made in a keynote speech, about two hours long, on the first day. Expect the speech to start at 10am Pacific Time on 3 June, or 6pm BST for those in the UK.

How to watch WWDC 2019

Apple livestreams WWDC’s keynote speech on its website – it will appear on the Special Events page – and then posts the entire video online for later viewing. (You can watch the WWDC 2018 video here.)

What will be announced at WWDC 2019?

Because it’s an event for developers, WWDC mainly focuses on software – more specifically, on the four Apple operating systems that devs will be building apps for. There will be other products to talk about, but the big four are nailed-on certainties that we’ll discuss first.

Note that these four OS updates will be demonstrated at WWDC and released as betas, but the official public launches won’t take place until the autumn.

iOS 13

The headline act. So many people have an iPhone, iPad or iPod touch that a chart-topping iOS app can potentially be downloaded hundreds of millions of times.

iOS has historically been a strictly controlled platform, so developers will be keenly watching the keynote to find out what new app features they will be permitted to offer customers. But this is a big deal for the customers themselves, whose entire experience with their iPhone or iPad could be changed by a drastic redesign (such as the one we saw with iOS 7 in 2013) or speed boost (as on iOS 12 last year).

In June we will get to see iOS 13 for the first time, and it should be a fun update; the unofficial narrative is that Apple pushed back a bunch of new features from iOS 12 so it could focus on stability and speed. Read more in our roundup of the latest iOS 13 rumours.

macOS 10.15

macOS runs on Macs and MacBooks, and (if you include Mac OS X, an older branding of the same line of software) is the oldest of Apple’s big four OS platforms.

In June 2019 we will find out more about macOS 10.15, the follow-up to macOS Mojave – not least its codename, which will be based on a location in California.

We think this update will see greater unification between iOS and macOS (Apple has already confirmed that it will be easier to port apps from one OS to the other) but don’t expect a full merger – not just yet, at any rate. We’ve got a separate article where you can read more about the new features and interface changes we expect in macOS 10.15.

watchOS 6

This writer’s favourite Apple OS, watchOS runs on the Apple Watch and has made some huge leaps forward in its first five major updates. This year we’re hopeful that sleep tracking will be dealt with properly, and expect 2018’s activity competitions to be extended to larger groups. Apple may even give in to popular demand and allow an always-on display, but don’t hold your breath.

You can get more clues about the new features coming soon to an Apple Watch near you in our watchOS 6 rumours article.

tvOS 13

tvOS is the operating system that runs on the fourth-gen and 4K versions of the Apple TV. The tvOS 13 update will be released at WWDC, but it may not get stage time, depending on whether it contains any glamorous updates and how much other stuff there is to talk about.

To get an idea of the sort of updates Apple makes to tvOS, read our roundup of tvOS 12’s new features from last year.

Macs

WWDC isn’t just about operating systems. We’ve seen some major hardware launches at WWDC events in the past (although none at all in 2018, which might be a bad omen), and are hopeful that Apple will take this opportunity to refresh its Mac lineup.

We are hoping, for instance, that Apple will reveal some more details about the new Mac Pro, which was announced back in April 2017 and should be a game-changer for creative professionals. We’re also expecting a next generation iMac Pro, and WWDC would be a great place for Apple to unleash it.

We may also see a 16in MacBook Pro with a 4K display, read more about the rumours about the 2019 MacBook Pro here.

Finally, it’s believed that Apple is working on a new display, potentially offering up to 8K. If Apple does show off the new Mac Pro then this display would be likely to appear alongside it.

What has Apple announced at WWDC in the past?

We can learn a lot from history. Here are the highlights of the past 13 WWDC events:

• WWDC 2018 (4-8 June, McEnery Convention Center, San Jose): macOS Mojave, iOS 12, watchOS 5, tvOS 12
• WWDC 2017 (5-9 June, McEnery Convention Center, San Jose): macOS High Sierra, iOS 11, watchOS 4, tvOS 11, new iPad Pro models, iMac Pro, MacBook upgrades; HomePod
• WWDC 2016 (13-17 June, Bill Graham Civic Auditorium & Moscone Center West, San Francisco): macOS Sierra, iOS 10, watchOS 3, tvOS 10
• WWDC 2015 (8-12 June, Moscone Center, San Francisco): Mac OS X ‘El Capitan’; iOS 9; watchOS 2; Apple Music
• WWDC 2014 (2-6 June, Moscone Center, San Francisco): Mac OS X 10.10 ‘Yosemite’; iOS 8; Swift programming language
• WWDC 2013 (10-14 June, Moscone Center, San Francisco): New Mac Pro; new MacBook Air models; Mac OS X 10.9 ‘Mavericks’; iOS 7; iWork for iCloud; iTunes Radio
• WWDC 2012 (11-15 June, Moscone Center, San Francisco): New MacBooks: updated MacBook Airs and MacBook Pro with Retina Display; Mac OS X 10.8 ‘Mountain Lion’ (sort of – it had previously been announced on Apple’s website, but this was its showcase demonstration); iOS 6
• WWDC 2011 (6-10 June, Moscone Center, San Francisco): Mac OS X 10.7 ‘Lion’; iOS 5; iCloud
• WWDC 2010 (7-11 June, Moscone Center, San Francisco): iPhone 4; FaceTime and iMovie for iPhone
• WWDC 2009 (8-12 June, Moscone Center, San Francisco): New MacBook Pro models: a new 13in MacBook Pro and updates to the 15in and 17in MacBook Pros; iPhone 3GS; release of iPhone OS 3.0 (which had already been announced)
• WWDC 2008 (9-13 June, Moscone Center, San Francisco): iPhone 3G; iOS App Store; iPhone OS version 2.0; Mac OS X 10.6 ‘Snow Leopard’; MobileMe
• WWDC 2007 (11-15 June, Moscone Center, San Francisco): Feature-complete beta of Mac OS X 10.5 ‘Leopard’; Safari for Windows
• WWDC 2006 (7-11 August, Moscone Center, San Francisco): Mac Pro; revisions to Mac OS X 10.5 ‘Leopard’ (which had already been announced) and Mac OS X Server

For a closer look at previous WWDCs, visit our History of WWDC article.

How to get tickets to WWDC 2019

Because there’s so much demand, WWDC tickets are allocated by lottery – and even if you win the lottery, you still have to pay the entrance fee, which has been $1,599 for the past three years. That’s about £1,240 at current exchange rates, although by the time WWDC rolls around things may have changed somewhat.

The lottery will open in March and run for a week and a half: in 2018 it ran from 13-22 March. If you miss out there will be opportunities to buy unclaimed tickets at a later date, and Apple also gives WWDC tickets to scholarship winners.

Read more in our How to get WWDC tickets article.