Home for the Holidays? Use This iOS 26 Feature to Make Dinner Plans With Friends

Home for the Holidays? Use This iOS 26 Feature to Make Dinner Plans With Friends Can't decide where to meetup with your friends? A poll could help. Zachary McAuliffeStaff writer Zach began writing for CNET in November, 2021 after writing for a broadcast news station in his hometown, Cincinnati, for five years. You can usually find him reading and drinking coffee or watching a TV series with his wife and their dog. ExpertiseWeb hosting | Operating systems | Applications | SoftwareCredentials Apple software beta tester, "Helps make our computers and phones work!" - Zach's grandparents The holidays can be a good time to catch up with friends and family, and you might do so over dinner. However, it might be hard to figure out what to eat or where to go. Fortunately, the Polls feature in Messages on your iPhone can help your crew vote on where to go. Apple introduced Polls alongside iOS 26 in September. With Polls, you can create a poll in a group chat where everyone can vote on a given action or decision, like where to go for dinner. That way, all the members of the chat can have a say, rather than just the loudest voices. Here's how to create a poll in Messages and what you should know about the feature. Don't miss any of our unbiased tech content and lab-based reviews. Add CNET as a preferred Google source. How to create a poll in Messages 1. Open Messages and tap into a chat. 2. Tap the plus (+) button to the left of the text box. 3. Tap Polls. Apple/Screenshot by CNET A box with Choice 1, Choice 2 and Choice 3 will appear over your text box. Tap into Choice 1, and you can enter what that option is for your poll. Once you have that filled out, hit the return button on your keyboard, and you will automatically be taken to the line for Choice 2. You can have between two and 12 choices per poll. Once you've filled out your choices, you can type a message to send with your poll to provide additional information about sending the poll to the group, and people will be able to vote on their choice. Apple/Screenshot by CNET What else you should know about polls in Messages If someone creates a poll in Messages and you don't see an option you want considered, you can add it to the poll. Tap Add Choice beneath the poll, and you can add another option or two, as long as there is space for them. Remember, you can only have 12 options in a poll. Voting in a poll is easy. Just tap your choice, and that option will be illuminated. However, you can vote for as many choices as you want, but you can only cast one vote per option. So it's kind of like a survey that says, "Check all that apply." That means it's possible that a poll can have more votes...

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