Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Apple Encourages App Store Developers to Adopt 3D Touch

MacRumors

MacRumors

macrumors bot
Original poster
Apr 12, 2001
68,196
38,988



Apple has sent an email to its Developer Program members encouraging them to find out how their iOS apps can take advantage of 3D Touch on iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus, signaling that the company would like to increase App Store adoption of the all-new pressure-sensitive feature.

3D-Touch-Apple-email.jpg

3D Touch is a pressure-sensitive display technology that enables iPhone users to make "Peek" and "Pop" gestures to access Quick Action shortcut menus, preview content within apps or animate Live Photos. The feature is one of the biggest new additions to the iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus released in September.


Nevertheless, nearly three months later, a number of developers are only now beginning to update their apps with 3D Touch support. 3D Touch is also not as natural of an experience as multi-touch for some iPhone users, and it could take some time before the new feature becomes registered in muscle memory.

MacRumors shared a poll with our Twitter followers asking if they use 3D Touch, and the results are expectedly mixed. The poll, which has received nearly 4,000 votes and counting, will be live until December 17 at around 10:30 AM Pacific, so be sure to participate if you own an iPhone 6s or iPhone 6s Plus.
Do you use 3D Touch? - MacRumors.com (@MacRumors) December 16, 2015
Click to expand...
Recently, a number of popular iPhone apps were updated with 3D Touch support, including Adobe Photoshop Lightroom, Evernote, Facebook Messenger and Spotify. Other popular apps using 3D Touch are listed below, and more can be tracked on our sister website AppShopper by searching for "3D Touch."
Adobe Photoshop Lightroom
Amazon Video
Astropad Mini
Badland
BBM
Buffer
Byword
Camera+
Canary
Capital One Mobile
CARROT Weather
Citymapper
Coda
Day One
Deezer Music
Drafts
Dropbox
ESPN
Evernote
Facebook
Facebook Messenger
Fantastical
Flickr
GIF Keyboard
Google
Google Chrome
Google Drive
Hipstamatic
Instagram
Instapaper
iWork suite
KakaoTalk
Launch Center Pro
Lifesum
LinkedIn
Microsoft Outlook
News360
NFL
OneDrive
OpenTable
Overcast
PCalc
Pinterest
Pixelmator
Periscope
Reeder 3
Shazam
Skype
Spark
SPG
Spotify
Storehouse
Things
Todo
Touchnote
Tumblr
TuneIn Radio
Tweetbot
Twitter
VSCO
Waze
Weather Underground
WeChat
Weibo
WhatsApp
Workflow
Wunderlist
The list above will be periodically updated with other popular 3D Touch apps.

Article Link: Apple Encourages App Store Developers to Adopt 3D Touch
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2015/12/16/apple-email-3d-touch-developers/
I'd like to use 3D Touch to tweet and do other things with an app without actually having to open the app.
 
Maybe before Apple decides to make something, they should make sure that it's something that makes sense for the industry.

There's so many other things that developers were waiting to get there hands on, but Apple didn't answer to those. Now they've introduced some dumb and the developers are scratching their heads.

It's not exactly the most promising technology.
 
  • Like
Reactions: t76turbo and Col4bin
freepomme said:
Maybe before Apple decides to make something, they should make sure that it's something that makes sense for the industry.

There's so many other things that developers were waiting to get there hands on, but Apple didn't answer to those. Now they've introduced some dumb and the developers are scratching their heads.

It's not exactly the most promising technology.
Click to expand...
3D Touch is something dumb and developers are scratching their heads? I'd love to know what developers you're talking to. And if it's so dumb why is it coming to Android devices next year?

samcraig said:
Sorry - are you serious - you've deleted apps just because they don't use 3d touch?
Click to expand...

Well I can tell you I'm much more likely not to use an app that doesn't support split view and if there's a good alternative that does support 3D Touch I will use it instead.
 
  • Like
Reactions: xDKP and appledefenceforce
I don't mean to make anyone angry, but isn't 3D Touch just a pressure sensitive display? And isn't it true that pressure sensitive displays been around for a while? And isn't everyone thinking it's something new and different because it's Apple doing it and how they market it as being a brand new thing? 2 examples: FaceTime and Live Photos - (Not actually questions)
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: t76turbo and Col4bin
I can't share the sentiment that 3D Touch is a gimmick. It's quite useful and I've incorporated it into my usage patterns to the point where I'd have a hard time giving it up. I get a little disappointed when apps don't use it where they could.

It does take some getting used to, but once you get the hang of it its great.
 
  • Like
Reactions: galrito, Oblivious.Robot, Jamalien and 4 others
I thought it would be amazing. But it turns out the great inconsistencies across apps, and across frequent updates of the same apps just make it too much of a pain to keep up with. I find it more consistent to just open the app and do what I want.

I think after a few years this will all settle down and when you 3D Touch an app, what you expect and want to be there will be there, but we're not even close to that yet. Most 3D Touch options presented to me today by the apps I use are rarely or never what I need to do.

Also, a 3D enabled app needs to have a little symbol or something to alert me to the fact that it is 3D enabled. I'm tired of poking around at unenabled apps and nothing happening. It is a frustrating exercise.
 
  • Like
Reactions: t76turbo and Avalontor
Aston441 said:
I thought it would be amazing. But it turns out the great inconsistencies across apps, and across frequent updates of the same apps just make it too much of a pain to keep up with. I find it more consistent to just open the app and do what I want.

I think after a few years this will all settle down and when you 3D Touch an app, what you expect and want to be there will be there, but we're not even close to that yet. Most 3D Touch options presented to me today by the apps I use are rarely or never what I need to do.

Also, a 3D enabled app needs to have a little symbol or something to alert me to the fact that it is 3D enabled. I'm tired of poking around at unenabled apps and nothing happening. It is a frustrating exercise.
Click to expand...

I Agree

I find that it usually takes a year to get full scale adoption on a new feature that is available in the iPhone. By then, the next iPhone is out with a new feature...
 
naeS1Sean said:
I don't mean to make anyone angry, but isn't 3D Touch just a pressure sensitive display? And isn't it true that pressure sensitive displays been around for a while? And isn't everyone thinking it's something new and different because it's Apple doing it and how they market it as being a brand new thing? 1 example: FaceTime - (Not actually questions)
Click to expand...
Who else has implemented anything like 3D Touch (outside of something that really is gimmicky just so they can claim they best Apple to the punch)?
 
  • Like
Reactions: appledefenceforce
Good news so far, Apple has an off setting for many of the new features. I use my phone as a phone with benefits, not a productivity tool. Thus, for me, many of the new features are set to off. Nice to have the choice is it not.
 
Rogifan said:
Translation: something I have no use for = 'gimmick'.

Apple needs to do the same for split view. What a joke that none of Google's apps support it, even apps that have had several updates since iOS 9 was introduced.
Click to expand...

I wouldn't hold your breath on Google. They'd prefer to charge people subscriptions for multitasking (see YouTube Red).
 
In some apps, there's no value to adding 3D Touch (dumbest Apple name imo - Thanks Huawei!) just for the sake of adding it. That's when it could be qualified as a gimmick. Other apps could actually benefit from it. The problem occurs when people get used to using it and expect it in every app. Should developers add gimmickry for the sake of uniformity? I personally don't think so. Someone upthread suggested apps have a visual cue denoting 3DT support. I think that's a pretty good idea.
 
  • Like
Reactions: t76turbo, tomi03, Oblivious.Robot and 2 others
ArtOfWarfare said:
From a developer's perspective, I think the reason you don't add 3D touch is because few of your users will have access to it. Why waste the effort?

I'll start thinking about using 3D touch when I expect a higher percentage of my users to have it.
Click to expand...
If you're going to use it eventually how is it wasted effort?

69Mustang said:
In some apps, there's no value to adding 3D Touch (dumbest Apple name imo - Thanks Huawei!) just for the sake of adding it. That's when it could be qualified as a gimmick. Other apps could actually benefit from it. The problem occurs when people get used to using it and expect it in every app. Should developers add gimmickry for the sake of uniformity? I personally don't think so. Someone upthread suggested apps have a visual cue denoting 3DT support. I think that's a pretty good idea.
Click to expand...

Can you provide an example of gimmickry? As far as a visual clue, should an app icon look different if it supports 3D Touch? Should it have a little dot next to it or something? I'm not sure what the best way of providing visual clues would be. For me, I just follow release notes too see when an app gets updated with it.
 
Last edited:
I would like for developers to make the 3D Touch menu customizable so that we can choose the features that are most important to us. Instapaper is the only one I've seen implement this so far.
 
  • Like
Reactions: _mdavenport
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back