The mud has settled, and one other WWDC keynote is over. And in some methods I’m relieved, as a result of the rumored cross-platform interface redesign turned out to not be fairly as radical as a few of us feared.
However my emotions about Liquid Glass are sophisticated. Sure, it appears good. No, most often (the Apple Watch’s Exercise app being the obvious exception), Apple doesn’t appear to have messed an excessive amount of with the navigational construction and placement of controls, so the up to date working programs shouldn’t be too complicated to make use of. However, on the danger of sounding opposite, I’m apprehensive that the aesthetics aren’t bizarre sufficient, and that the nice appears are an indication that Apple has regarded to the current somewhat than the long run for its visible inspiration.
Let me clarify.
The great type of unhealthy design
It might be an understatement to say that the brand for the 2012 London Olympics, that includes the 12 months in a stylized font, was controversial. At its 2007 unveiling, the design agency’s chairman overheard a journalist overtly describing it as “f–king terrible.” Newspapers ran competitions to provide you with one thing higher. Nearly 80 p.c of respondents to a BBC ballot gave it the bottom obtainable score: not gold, not silver, not even bronze, however “picket spoon.”
To anybody who checked out it, it was bizarre. Some folks stated the brand bore an unlucky resemblance to 2 cartoon characters doing one thing impolite. However the emblem’s trick was that its look–jagged, angular, garish–was merely forward of its time. The 2007 designers had consciously created one thing that will resonate in 5 years’ time. The London Olympics emblem match properly with the aesthetic tendencies of 2012, and by the point the Olympics rolled round, the brand was seen with fondness.
Evaluate that to iOS 7, which even after this week stays undefeated as Apple’s most controversial working system. Launched in 2013, it struck unsuspecting iPhone homeowners as brash, gaudy, weirdly flat, and completely unfamiliar. Which was precisely what was wanted with a purpose to start a brand new chapter within the iPhone’s story. iOS 7 regarded bizarre in 2013, regular in 2015, and was nonetheless holding up (with a couple of tweaks) in 2025. That’s forward-looking design, the kind of radical leap ahead that lets you be constant for lengthy durations the remainder of the time.
Now there’s iOS 26, which appears nice and inoffensive proper now. It’s good, but it surely’s a 2025 (or earlier) aesthetic: all transparency results and glossy specular highlights. You don’t have to undertaking your self into an imagined future for it to make sense. Certainly one of my colleagues stated it was harking back to the Sky Glass rebrand from 2021. One other argued that the mimicry of bodily supplies harks again to the skeuomorphic conventions that existed earlier than iOS 7 got here alongside.
The purpose is that by adopting a glasslike aesthetic, Apple isn’t main the design dialog, it’s merely giving customers what they’re already used to. Glassmorphism is a well-liked UI type in the intervening time, but it surely was recognized as a pattern as early as 2020. That is effective in the intervening time, however means that Liquid Glass may begin to seem dated far before iOS 7’s 12-year lifespan. And software program interfaces will not be like adverts and different advertising and marketing supplies. You need to change them as not often as potential.
The three measures of success
To my thoughts, there are three standards for achievement with regards to a software program interface: in descending order of significance, these are practicality, familiarity, and attractiveness. Liquid Glass does properly on the final depend, I’d say, even when the attraction is short-lived. However there are query marks over the opposite two.
As I stated at first of this text, iOS 26 and the opposite new working programs introduced at WWDC 2025 are so much much less unfamiliar than I feared they might be. They clearly look completely different from their predecessors, however the variations are principally beauty somewhat than basic. Take away the Liquid Glass impact, and the construction beneath is essentially the identical. You received’t should retrain your muscle reminiscence very a lot. You’ll simply should get used to some new results. iOS 26 might be unfamiliar to many iPhone customers who obtain it in September, however not in ways in which might be troublesome to cope with.
Practicality is a fair greater fear. The glassmorphic results that look so good in Apple’s advertising and marketing movies are proving distracting and faintly ridiculous in the actual world, with quite a few beta testers posting mocking screenshots and movies to social media. Notification Heart is impossibly busy with glass layers over glass layers, all competing on your consideration: it’s the other of focus. And all these animations and visible results are making calls for in your processor and battery that appear utterly pointless. Had Apple created one thing a bit weirder, possibly folks would have embraced it, however even in the most effective conditions, Liquid Glass doesn’t appear to be definitely worth the potential issues it brings.
It’s (extraordinarily) early days, in fact, and most of the much less user-friendly facets of iOS 26 and its siblings on the Mac, Apple Watch, and so forth might be ironed out earlier than public launch. By the point the 26.1 updates come out in late October or thereabouts, the interfaces ought to be buttery easy and largely free from flaws. We’ll even have had time to get used to them, and the reasonably unfamiliar ought to have turn into completely acquainted. Life might be simpler. However I think that, in time, Apple could remorse that its “broadest software program design replace ever” was not a little bit extra daring and, properly, weirder.
Foundry
Welcome to our weekly Apple Breakfast column, which incorporates all of the Apple information you missed final week in a helpful bite-sized roundup. We name it Apple Breakfast as a result of we predict it goes nice with a Monday morning cup of espresso or tea, but it surely’s cool if you wish to give it a learn throughout lunch or dinner hours too.
WWDC 2025 particular
10 WWDC options you might want to know (however most likely missed).
Apple wanted to repair one factor at WWDC25 and it didn’t.
iOS 26 makes huge modifications to your iPhone’s house display screen and main apps.
MacOS 26 Tahoe: The 5 greatest options coming to your Mac this fall.
Ipados 26 is severely making Roman Loyola take into consideration dumping his MacBook Air.
Your Apple Watch simply acquired so much smarter with watchOS 26.
Trending: Prime tales
Cease! Don’t purchase a brand new iPhone till you’ve learn this.
Alex Blake spent $35 to avoid wasting his iPhone from wilting in the summertime warmth.
You thought the Mac mini was small, wait until you see the Pico Mac Nano.
Evaluations nook
The rumor mill
iPhone 17 Professional Max video reveals off brand-new ‘lovely’ design.
The upcoming A20 chip’s killer function may very well be higher battery life.
iOS 26 code hints on the imminent launch of 2nd-gen AirTag.
Leaked Apple charger factors to extremely quick iPhone 17 MagSafe charging.
Software program updates, bugs, and issues
It’s not simply you: The iOS 18.5 Mail app is having an issue delivering mail.
And with that, we’re executed for this week’s Apple Breakfast. When you’d prefer to get common roundups, join our newsletters, together with our new e-mail from The Macalope–an irreverent, humorous tackle the most recent information and rumors from a half-man, half-mythical Mac beast. You can even observe us on Fb, Threads, Bluesky, or X for dialogue of breaking Apple information tales. See you subsequent Monday, and keep Appley.
