The newest update for iPad, iPhone, and iPod touch is near, and I’ve got a firsthand look of what’s to come in the new iOS 7.1, the first major update since iOS 7 was released.

Update: iOS 7.1 Released to the Public (3/10/14)

The final version of iOS 7.1 was released to everyone. To see what’s new for all, check out our What You Need to Know About iOS 7.1 guide.

The Cool New Features in iOS 7.1 Beta 1

While the current build includes a multitude of fixes for big issues, it also features several superficial improvements that could make your Apple device more enjoyable overall.

Let’s take a deeper look at some of these features.

The New Dark Options in iOS 7.1

If reading your screen is difficult at all, or you just like a darker style on your device, you can now dig into the Settings on your device to darken the keyboard, dock, notification center, and folder backgrounds in order to make everything easier to see and read.

For more info on this, check out our detailed softModder guide on the new dark options in iOS 7.1.

You Can Now Bold Text Without Restarting

Previous versions of iOS have allowed you to bold your text for a better viewing experience, but it required you to restart your device before the setting would apply.

Now, in iOS 7.1, you can enable Bold Text without having to restart your device. All you have to do is switch it on and check out any application on your device—it’s pretty much instantaneous.

There’s an Automatic Flash/HDR Indicator

If you open the Camera, you’ll now get a small yellow indicator at the bottom of the device letting you know whether or not your automatic flash or automatic HDR is on or off before you take a shot.

While it may not seem too drastic of a change, it really helps me in knowing if the feature is being used, so as to not waste precious time taking two pictures. This way you know if your flash is going to be used for the picture you take.

Note: Automatic HDR only works on the iPhone 5S.

There is also a way you can auto-upload your Burst Mode photos to your Photo Stream, but like Automatic HDR, it’s only available for the iPhone 5S right now.

It Now Tells You That You Have No Notifications

If you drop down the Notification Center, you’ll now see an indicator that lets you know whether you have “No Missed Notifications” or “No Notifications.” Below, you can see the difference between iOS 7.1 (left) and iOS 7.04 (right), which has nothing but blankness.

The Future of iOS 7

Since this is the first step towards a more refined operating system, you can count on there being many more advancements and bug fixes in any future releases. Hopefully, they’ll finally get to fixing the wallpaper issues everyone’s been having.

What would you like to see on you Apple device that is currently lacking from this operating system? Let us know! And make sure to check out our other iOS 7 tips.