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Liquid Glass Is Cracked, and Usability Suffers in iOS 26

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Re: Liquid Glass Is Cracked, and Usability Suffers in iOS 26

#121

Post by jijijijij »

captn3m0 wrote: post #39
binarynate wrote: post #13

I haven't upgraded to iOS 26 because of Liquid Glass, mostly because I've read that it causes performance degradation on older devices (I use an iPhone 13 Mini because I have zero interest in using a larger phone). So, it looks like I'll be using iOS 18 for the foreseeable future.

I made the mistake of upgrading (13 Mini) and it is very clear that the new UI was not tested at all on smaller screens. The rounded buttons take up so much extra margin that actual usable space is greatly diminished.

On the mini, some UI elements got half pushed into Narnia. Apple, like, WTF?!

Re: Liquid Glass Is Cracked, and Usability Suffers in iOS 26

#122

Post by themadturk »

ForceBru wrote: post #71

Wow, I'm NOT upgrading to iOS 26, this looks terrible. Moreover, I see people complaining about poor performance and worsening battery life.

Certainly neither is true for everyone. I don't notice any difference in my iPhone's life or performance.

Re: Liquid Glass Is Cracked, and Usability Suffers in iOS 26

#124

Post by Animats »

Remember Aero, in Windows 7? Same translucency concept. Somewhat similar animation. But without the small-screen reuse of space, with text on top of buttons, buttons on top of text and text on top of text.

This seems to be a spinoff of the tendency to put controls on top of vertical video. Amusingly, just as design is focusing on vertical layout, folding phones are coming in.

Re: Liquid Glass Is Cracked, and Usability Suffers in iOS 26

#125

Post by shermantanktop »

porcoda wrote: post #31

This update is one of the rare cases where I really dislike the new version. I’m usually happy with Apple updates, even ones the commentators dislike. This time I’m sorta agreeing with them: I don’t like the new iOS. Same with the Mac and iPad: other than being glitchy, I just don’t like the changes. It feels like my screen real estate isn’t as efficiently used, UI elements feel jumbled and the transparency makes thi…

Same. I'm just not someone with strong feelings about UX consistency or appearance, and tend to focus on functionality.

But this...this feels like a symptom of something fundamental inside Apple going wrong.

Re: Liquid Glass Is Cracked, and Usability Suffers in iOS 26

#126

Post by Zaheer »

captn3m0 wrote: post #39
binarynate wrote: post #13

I haven't upgraded to iOS 26 because of Liquid Glass, mostly because I've read that it causes performance degradation on older devices (I use an iPhone 13 Mini because I have zero interest in using a larger phone). So, it looks like I'll be using iOS 18 for the foreseeable future.

I made the mistake of upgrading (13 Mini) and it is very clear that the new UI was not tested at all on smaller screens. The rounded buttons take up so much extra margin that actual usable space is greatly diminished.

Same. Terrible mistake. My mini overheats like crazy now.

Re: Liquid Glass Is Cracked, and Usability Suffers in iOS 26

#127

Post by Taek »

heywoods wrote: post #120
nomel wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can also swipe left and right to switch tabs, in any state. But, as you suggest, you have to tap the url to "bring it up" so it can be safely dragged upward, which is annoying. If they polish this a bit, I think it will be very nice.

So many changes over the years and some of them might actually be decent but I wouldn’t have known about this had I not read this comment or accidentally triggered it in the future. Has Apple experimented with “micro” tutorials that can pop up if they detect the user is performing an action in an inefficient/deprecated pattern? I.e. if in Safari I navigate to all tabs by tapping at the bottom —> hamburger icon —> all…

I hate micro tutorials so much, I really don't like when things have an invisible language that you have to just know to be able to use them.

If you have to have an invisible language, put it in a man page somewhere or something. I really don't like having my train of thought interrupted by "HEY, learn something new RIGHT NOW"

Re: Liquid Glass Is Cracked, and Usability Suffers in iOS 26

#128

Post by SomeHacker44 »

I have reduced transparency turned on in iPadOS accessibility forever. However there is so much gratuitous transparency now I can barely use half the features. Why do I need to see behind quick settings to adjust brightness? Or do anything? This new update has made me miserable. It never even asked me if I wanted to upgrade. Which I would never want anyway. I only use one, exactly one app... Foreflight.

Re: Liquid Glass Is Cracked, and Usability Suffers in iOS 26

#130

Post by jeroenhd »

evanjrowley wrote: post #11

If it makes Apple users feel better about Liquid Glass, the Material 3 Expressive in Android 16 is an overall worse experence than what came before. Yes it looks better, but apps are much laggier, at least on my Pixel 7 anyway. The venreble 120 Hz refresh rate on Android doesn't help when scrolling HN is enough for an FPS drop.

FWIW on my phone I don't have a problem with it at all, probably because it doesn't run into the same performance limitations.

I've always found Google's decision to include mid-tier SoCs into their flagship phones risky as it makes performance hitches for future updates much more obvious. If/when Google copies Liquid Glass into the next version of Material Design, I'm sure my phone will suffer from a performance hit too.

That said, scrolling HN still works fine on hardware from a decade ago, so there's got to be more to this. I've personally had custom ROMs experience random lags and slowdowns after major upgrades (which is probably why many ROMs claim it doesn't work and don't support it) and I wouldn't be surprised if the Android upgrade hit a similar issue on your phone. As a last resort before buying a new phone, doing a factory reset may make the new OS more usable on your device. Not the right solution (fixes from Google's side to prevent such issues would be right solution), but it might work and it's cheaper than a new phone.

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