Your old iPhone (as long as it’s not too old) is your new iPhone this morning thanks to the iOS 7 operating system that Apple released yesterday. The update is the most significant to the iPhone since it’s launch and gives the phone a much more fluid and streamlined look. If you don’t know what you’re looking for though, it can be hard to find your way around the new system, so here’s what’s new and a few things you need to know:

First and foremost, there’s the new user interface. It’s sleek and new but it’s also familiar enough that you won’t have to spend hours looking through your phone trying to relearn it. The whole thing is brighter and it seems a lot more fluid and user friendly. Icons and pictures are much more defined and more clearer. The key here is that you’re going to spend a lot less time navigating menus and backing out of applications. More is done with swiping motions than clicking and you’re going to be able to do a lot more multitasking.

Quick and easy file sharing finally comes to Apple’s mobile operating system as Airdrop has been added to all iPhone 5 models as well as the newest iPads and iPod touch systems. Airdrop, which was added to mac systems last year allows you to quickly and safely share photos and other documents with other modern iPhone users. You’ll need an iCloud account though.

There’s now a simple and easy to use control panel that you can pull up by simply pulling up at the bottom of the screen. The control center gives you access to most of the functions that you’d have to manually go into settings to change. Your wifi, blu-tooth and airplane mode controls are here as well as some of your utility functions like camera, calculator and a dedicated flashlight app. It may be nerdy, but I’m most excited about the fact that I can now look at my alarms by just opening this menu, since I set about ten of them and then proceed to check them a million times during the night.

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One of the biggest changes in iOS 7 is the revamped photo app. Photos can now be grouped by collection, year and moment, allowing you to find what you’re looking for easier. iCloud is now used to be able to share your shots with others much easier. The camera has also been given a bunch of new features including a burst mode (if you’ve got an iPhone 5), more controls and instagram like filters, so you can make your lunch look even more artsy.

Safari has been given a minor upgrade as well, allowing for better searching and tabbing, along with allowing more room on the screen to look at webpages, but let’s be honest — you’ve been using Chrome anyways. Siri has been tweaked and can now check sources like Twitter and Wikipedia, and you now have the option to make Siri a guy, s there’s that.

Keep in mind that you don’t have to  download iOS 7 right now and in fact, you may not want to. There’s bound to be some kinks and glitches that the next update will fix. Have you downloaded it? What do you think of the new operating system? Let us know in the comments!

About The Author

Joe Sinicki is Blast's Executive Editor. He has an unhealthy obsession with Back to the Future and wears cheese on his head. Follow him on Twitter @BrewCityJoe

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