Apple today announced a free software update for the iPhone, allowing users to find their location using the Maps application; text message multiple people in one message; create Web Clips for websites; customize their home screen; and watch movies rented from the iTunes Movie Rentals.

Apple iPhone More Photos View Specs

With its multi-touch user interface and software, users can add new features to their iPhone through software updates. Existing iPhone customers will automatically get the update for free when they sync their iPhone with iTunes.

Maps, one of the most popular applications on the iPhone, has a new interface and adds features such as the ability to find a user's location automatically. With just the tap of a button, the iPhone can triangulate the position using nearby Wi-Fi base stations or cellular towers. Customers can use this as a starting or ending point for directions or to find local points of interest. The new hybrid map view combines map view and satellite view so they can see major street names overlaid on satellite imagery.

Users can also create Web Clips - icons on the home screen that take them directly to their favorite websites. Web Clips can easily track websites that are frequently checked such as news, blogs, sports sites and movie listings. In addition, users can customize their home screen by repositioning any of the icons, and even create up to nine different home screens that they can easily flick between.

The iPhone's new software update also adds the ability to send the same SMS text message to multiple people, and it saves a history of the text messages, so with one tap users can send a new message to the same group.

With Apple's new iTunes Movie Rentals, movie fans can rent movies on their computer, transfer them to their iPhone, and watch them anywhere. Users can also navigate forward or backward through their movies by chapters, select alternate language tracks and view subtitles.

The iPhone software update 1.1.3 is available immediately for free via iTunes 7.5 or later for all existing iPhone customers in the US, UK, Germany and France. New iPhone products shipping from the factory will include the software update and existing iPhone customers will automatically get the update for free when they sync their iPhone with iTunes at http://www.itunes.com .

- Apple iPhone Specs