iOS 18, iPadOS 18, and macOS Sequoia Add Support for Wired Xbox Controllers

Apple has quietly added support for wired Xbox controllers on iOS 18, iPadOS 18, and macOS Sequoia. Apple’s platform already supported wireless connections to Xbox and PlayStation controllers via Bluetooth, but when it comes to wired connections, only PlayStation controllers were supported until now.

As explained by Nat Brown, a former Engineering Manager at Apple who also worked on the original Xbox (via MacRumors), Microsoft uses a custom USB protocol called GIP on its Xbox controllers instead of the USB-HID standard. That’s why Apple devices couldn’t recognize wired Xbox controllers before.

Wired connections can reduce latency compared to Bluetooth connections, though the new Game Mode on iOS 18 and iPadOS 18 should help with that. The feature turns on automatically when users launch a game, and it minimizes background activity and improves the responsiveness of wireless game controllers and AirPods by reducing latency.

While there are millions of casual mobile games on iPhones and iPads, Apple is finally starting to take other games seriously. The company has some of the best ARM-based chips on the market, with the company’s latest M3 and M4 chips supporting advanced features such as hardware-accelerated ray-tracing and mesh shading.

With its Game Porting Toolkit, Apple is also making much easier for developers to port their Windows-based games on Apple devices. We’ve recently seen games like Resident Evil 4 Remake and Death Stranding launch on recent iPhones, iPads, and Macs, and Ubisoft’s upcoming Assassin’s Creed Shadows will also launch on day one on macOS and iPadOS. This would have been unbelievable just a couple of years ago.