Apple’s new feature lets brands put their stamp on emails and calls to your iPhone

Soon, Apple will let businesses customize how they appear in emails and phone calls on the iPhone. Apple announced on Wednesday how companies using its Business Connect tool can add their brand name and logo in ways that will pop up in iPhone apps used for email, phone calls, and payments.

Each registered business can confirm its info is accurate and add additional details like photos or special offers. Collecting verified, up-to-date business information could be useful for Apple if it ever launches its own search engine or inside features for Apple Intelligence instead of sending users to outside sources like Google, Yelp, or Meta.

Branded Mail is a feature businesses can sign up for today before it starts rolling out to users later this year, potentially making emails easier to identify in a sea of unread messages. In recent years, Gmail has also added authenticated brand logos and checkmarks to show if an email is coming from a verified source.

Additionally, if companies opt into Business Caller ID, Apple will display their name, logo, and department on an iPhone’s inbound call screen. This feature should come in handy when you’re trying to figure out whether the random number that’s calling you is spam, or if it’s a legitimate business. It will start rolling out next year.

A smaller update coming to Apple’s Tap to Pay service will let companies show their logo when accepting payments instead of just displaying a category icon.