iOS 8 Release Date: Top 15 Hidden Features You Should Know About

Apple has just released its new operating system for the iPhone and iPad, iOS 8. While there are many features such as group messaging settings and organization, smarter keyboards and more there is a handful of other features you may not know about. Check out these top 15 hidden features you should know about in Apple's iOS 8.

1. Send Last Location To Apple Before Battery Dies - There's a new feature that allows your iPhone (or iPad) to send its last known location to Apple when the battery drains to a critically low level. iCloud presently holds this information for 24 hours, but this new setting will allow Apple to access location information for a lost device for a longer period of time.
2. Identify Songs - Instead of opening the Shazam App it now appears Siri is integrated with the service. If you want to know what song is playing singly open Siri and ask "What song is playing?," the digital assistant will listen and pull up the song and album for you and also an option to buy from iTunes if it is available.
3. Credit Card Scanning - In Safari for iOS 8 you can now scan your credit card when making a purchase. This takes away the mundane work of typing the numbers.
4. Hide Photos/Videos - You are now able to hide videos or images in the camera app. By holding your finger on a picture and option menu will pop up asking if you wish to "Hide" the media. Hide will keep it from being visible in your Moments Collections and Years view but it will still be seen in albums.
5. View App Usage To Battery Life - With iOS 8 you can now view which of your apps is using what percentage of battery. You can find this in Settings.
6. Voice Activation - If your hands aren't free but you need Siri, simply saying "Hey Siri" while an iOS device is plugged in will activate her. This will allow users to give hands-free commands.
7. Download Via Siri - Users can ask Siri to download an app from Apple's App Store, which will initiate an App Store search.
8. Photo Recovery - Mentioned briefly at WWDC iOS 8 will now let users recover photos accidentally deleted. A pic can be retrieved by tapping on the trash can icon in the camera app. When you tap it a menu will pop up allowing you recover deleted photos or delete them all for good.
9. Desktop Sites for Safari - Instead of going to a webpages mobile site you can now request the desktop site to appear when you're going to any website.
10. Delete Albums - While in previous OS from Apple you could only delete songs one by one but if you don't want an entire album Apple has now added the swipe to delete feature to get rid of albums you no longer wish to have on your iOS device.
11. Quick Photo Access In Messages - When you wish to add a picture to your messages there is a new feature that allows you to display your most recent photos so you don't have to open your camera app.
12. Weather Updated - Apple has now chose to use weather data from The Weather Channel instead of Yahoo!. You also receive a longer and more detailed forecast of your day.
13. Photos To Notes - You can now add photos to your notes. Just hold down anywhere in the Notes app and the menu to select and paste will appear with a new option to "Insert Photo."
14. Notification of Background Location Usage - In iOS 8 users will now be notified when an app has been using your location in the background. It will also give you the option to allow or not allow this.
15. Gray Scale Mode - Shifts the entire OS into a gray version in the Accessibility menu.