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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

#351

Post by jonhohle »

ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #311
bavent wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m referring entirely to built-in Apple apps - Mail, Messages, etc. The in-house apps can’t even get it right, which to me means: - devs are so siloed, nobody knows what’s going on - product is not communicating anything outside of individual fiefdoms - there is zero QA testing - no designers are actually signing off on the final results …which all seem pretty typical for a large bureaucracy, I guess I just had high…

A lot of them are SwiftUI apps. I feel that SwiftUI is not ripe. I use it for one of my apps (I have to, in order to use the charts), but it’s too limited to use for anything else.

It’s so bizarre. I wanted to use it for a menu extra and something as simple as animating the icon couldn’t be done. There are several of Apple’s own apps that use animated Menu extra icons and they’re probably doing the same hybrid AppKit/SwiftUI workarounds.

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

#353

Post by dpark »

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…

It’s flashy for the sake of flashy and poorly done. It’s tacky.

I can’t believe Apple shipped this.

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

#355

Post by DrammBA »

lynndotpy wrote: post #342
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…

If it were implemented as intended, it would just be very ugly, slower, and a waste of battery life. But a lot of it is really just broken. In the past hour, I saw a number of funny glitches. The funny glitches are better than the glitches where things crash or hang. On MacOS, it even requires running terminal commands at startup to fix performance regressions. This is hitting people who aren't tech-savvy particularl…

> On MacOS, it even requires running terminal commands at startup to fix performance regressions.

You can't just say that and not share the goods

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

#356

Post by pkulak »

Gigachad wrote: post #283
bicx wrote: post #79

2025 feels like a cardinal year for top-down decisions we all just have to endure for the present. The best we can do is bitch loudly and often, and hope the people at the top still feel threatened by consumers/constituents. This Liquid Glass decision is particularly challenging for my tiny startup. We have multiple platforms including iOS and Android. I was hoping to share much of our design language across iOS and…

I’d rather an app look consistent with iOS than look consistent with an android version I don’t use.

And devs would rather the opposite.

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

#357

Post by dreamcompiler »

Several years ago Apple had become manic about products that looked impressive in the store but were unusable in the real world. Ultra-thin laptops with minutes-long battery life, butterfly keyboards, touch bar, etc.

Then Jony Ive left and it seemed like sanity was on its way back. But here we are again.

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

#358

Post by amluto »

bavent wrote: post #296
ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #294

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of the issues is almost certainly that the app developers didn't add the UIDesignRequiresCompatibility = YES [0] item to the Info.plist. Set that, and it doesn't use Liquid Glass in your app. I set it for all my apps. One was designed by a professional designer, who absolutely defecated masonry, when I showed him what it did to our app. I'm worried that Apple may end up ignoring that flag, and will force us to us…

I’m referring entirely to built-in Apple apps - Mail, Messages, etc. The in-house apps can’t even get it right, which to me means: - devs are so siloed, nobody knows what’s going on - product is not communicating anything outside of individual fiefdoms - there is zero QA testing - no designers are actually signing off on the final results …which all seem pretty typical for a large bureaucracy, I guess I just had high…

Apple’s Mail app has been intensely buggy for years, and the bugs rarely get fixed.

(Search is comically bad.)

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

#359

Post by celsoazevedo »

anshumankmr wrote: post #328
game_the0ry wrote: post #112

I am so glad I am not the only one. I see like 3-5 UI bugs a day in iOS 26. Liquid ass, indeed. Some apple product VP really wanted to be the next Steve Jobs, took 4 steps backwards instead. I'll probably end up switching to android eventually, and I am bummed about it bc I am an apple fan boy and I like the ecosystem.

I have an Android phone from samsung.. they send ads on the default Google Messages app, and due to some rich text formatting unlike a regular SMS it takes space in my notifications menu.

Who is "they"?

It sounds that companies are sending you spam via RCS, something that seems to be a problem in countries like India. But that's not exactly a Samsung or Android problem and you can always disable RCS.

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

#360

Post by ebbi »

rTX5CMRXIfFG wrote: post #316
ebbi wrote: post #274

I like Liquid Glass on the whole (I will state upfront I have no accessibility issues so I know I'm speaking from my little corner). Putting aside the fact that, yes, there are a few issues with the way Liquid Glass is implemented currently (nothing that can't be iterated on over the next few releases), I will say that some of the critics use really silly examples to prove their point. The messages screenshot would h…

I agree. I think that the criticisms on legibility are extremely biased. In my experience, the real issues with Liquid Glass are in terms of decreased usable space, less discoverability of actions that were previously top-level, and most importantly (and rather objectively), battery life. I started off thinking that the design was ugly (the reflections made it look kinda plastic) but came to like the fluidity after a…

decreased usable space is definitely my biggest gripe, especially on Tahoe.

I converted a 2019 5k iMac to work as an external display a few years ago, and the extra screen real estate was a massive QoL improvement. But with Tahoe, it feels like I'm back on a smaller res monitor with the window chrome taking up a lot more space (I live in Safari and it feels massively different on here, especially with the larger tab bar).

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