With the release of iOS 18 and macOS Sequoia this fall, Apple will make a small semantic change. We will no longer use an “Apple ID” (“Apple ID” in English) to connect to Cupertino services, but an “Apple account” (“Apple Account”). Mark Gurman had, once again, predicted this development.
Apple justifies this change by the desire to make “the consistent sign-in experience across Apple services and devices”. The term “account” is perhaps better understood by the majority of users than “login”.
The Apple account/ID allows you to connect to the App Store, iCloud, iMessage or even Apple Music. To manage the personal information attached to it (email, password, payment methods, etc.), you must connect to the appleid.apple.com website (the address may change with the change of name) or Go to the dedicated settings section of iOS or macOS.
Apple has not announced any other changes, for the moment, regarding its user accounts. Some would like to be able to merge two existing accounts (for example to repatriate all the purchases of the other to one), but after a distant sign of interest from Tim Cook, this possibility still does not seem to be on the agenda.
