All the Liquid Glass Changes in macOS Golden Gate

[Starfia]

Crossing my fingers (but not holding my breath) that they take all of the icons out of the menus!

This was, happily, addressed directly in the developer keynote. It sounds like icons in menus will be hidden by default, and developers can opt in system-provided icons for important actions.

 

[maruyama]

Aqua is BACK, baby!

 

[Starfia]

I hope they bring back the previous appearance, where a menu title and its drop-down items appear connected.

I've never heard anyone else mentioning that, but I've also always carried with me the impression that the subordinate menu was traditionally implied to be a contiguous part of the menu, like two differently-shaped regions of a single piece of paper. I'll admit that on reflection it's always been ambiguous.

 

[RedWeasel]

These changes look pretty good overall. Also that the toolbar is a toolbar again.

This is basically what Liquid Glass should have been on day one IMHO.

 

[diego]

Aqua is back!

 

[Starfia]

Unfortunately, there is no ultra-clear version of Liquid Glass available with the slider.

Thank you for the ultra-clarity on that point. Personally, I'll be fully tinting everything (and I'd be delighted to learn the processing power for the admittedly impressive distortion is being saved in lieu of that required for traditional blurring), but it's pretty silly that the (pretentiously unhyphenated) term "ultraclear" is now used to refer to something more opaque than what was previously called "clear."

 

[Spock]

I'm not a fan of the icons, but they don't bug me nearly as much as the rounded corners everywhere in menues. In Tahoe, the menu title (e.g., "File", "Edit"), the drop down menu, and the selected menu item all have four rounded corners, making them look like disconnected elements. I hope they bring back the previous appearance, where a menu title and its drop-down items appear connected.

View attachment 2636726View attachment 2636727

I'm with you, I hate the menu designs.

 

[Dust-by-Monday]

Looks like a few more tweaks and it will be Aqua

 

[Nush_F]

Bring back launchpad!!! Not updating from Sequoia until its back!

 

[HazeAndHahmahneez]

Not enough Liquid Glass! The slider is basically Frosted Glass high or mid. Terrible downgrade in UI, I want a more transparent Liquid Glass option like the initial beta last year.

I'm glad they made the icons more Liquid Glass at least.

We need Liquid Glass everything ya hear me!!!

Liquid Glass cords, phones, charge bricks, not enough GLASS! No such thing! 💪🏽

 

[Rygaard]

I REALLY don't care about 99% of the changes and I feel like they could have spend their money on fixing problems. getting a new design of colors every year / 2 years or what ever don't fix a problem for real people only for 0,001% design-elitists it DOES NOT MATTER.

focus on fixing all the stuff that is broken.
like:

1. Siri its a joke (even more so in the EU... and now incoming rant from the Americans... before you start, say thank you for USB-C, and the fact that its BlueTooth in your AirPods, and that you can soon change the battery, and you don't have to come here if you don't like it, but Samsung, Xiaomi and Google figured it out, im sure you can to Apple)
2. CarPlay that don't work 80% of the time
3. or the freaking "gamefuncktion " on Mac and iPhone that block the view of some of my game even when I turn it off it is there to say hey you can turn me on ...
4. or the fact that using maps for GPS counts towards your screen time
5. and hey what about adding a battery indicator on your AirPods 80% of the time it take so long to connect to the iPhone to show the status that I can navigate faster to settings, bluetooth, find the device click it and then have to check battery (iPhone 15 pro max. + 3. gen AirPods Pro )
6. or how about the ability to close ALL tabs in safari on my iPhone I have 500 open I think -(ohh you fixed that .. there is now a closed all others if you press and hold.. fantastic)

the list goes on...

 

[MonkeyT]

Golden Gate… it’s the first macOS name that sounds a bit weird to me, maybe because it is a bridge… but I guess Ill get used to it.

Golden Gate is also a park (which comes a lot closer to the established pattern), about 1,000 acres, with a commanding view of the bridge. My guess is that the locals are more likely to be referring to the park than the bridge when saying 'Golden Gate'

 

[Luftkopf]

I am super disappointed. I’m happy about the corner radius, but I’m mad about the sidebar design, and a lot of the rest of the changes. Apple has given up, they’ve caved in to the haters. Now macOS is design by whinge.

I was initially keen to update, but after sleeping on it I’m considering holding off updating for a while. It looks pretty boring and dead now.

 

[MacBH928]

the exaggerated rounded corners make it look like a toy

 

[skiguy45]

Better? Yes
Great? Not sure ... I'll reserve judgement but it's certainly a step in the right direction.

iOS has always been more of an issue for me than MacOS, though places where MacOS failed, it failed very very badly.

 

[klasma]

It’s good to see that at least some sanity is returning to UI design.

 

[blaichch]

I wish they would have actually refined Liquid Glass instead of going back to the old sidebar and corner radius. The new (old) sidebar feels completely out of place with the rest of Liquid Glass. I also liked how the content next to the sidebar changed its colors.

The different window corner radius was there for a reason and I think Tahoe looked more consistent. The old corner radius feels out of place with the buttons of the toolbar.

Also I feels sorry for the developers who put in so much work in order to make Liquid Glass work for their application.

 

[Populus]

The name "Golden Gate" for the entrance to San Francisco Bay predates the bridge by many decades. The entrance to San Diego Bay is the "Silver Gate".

I think I will bypass Tahoe for my three Mac's in use (two MBP's have been retired) and try out "Golden Gate" after it has been released and complaints die down.

I didn’t know that fact!

Also, I don’t feel like GG will receive many complaints, all the contrary, seems like a solid compromise in terms of UI, and a step ahead in other areas.

 

[NewOldStock]

I wonder how much RAM/memory this glass tech is using up.
In the days of Ram expense shut it down please APPLE!. 🙂
Never found the glass a thing for me. Does not twiddle my twirler 1-BIT!

 

[groove-agent]

Golden Gate… it’s the first macOS name that sounds a bit weird to me, maybe because it is a bridge… but I guess Ill get used to

C’mon Apple, now bring us launchpad

Golden Gate is bad because it plays into the “Watergate” meme. They should have thought about that more.

Speaking of bringing back UI features, I actually miss Dashboard - particularly putting it in dev mode and moving certain widgets onto the desktop of you needed to use them routinely. It was over because it didn’t clutter your desktop. The notepad widget was my fave.

 

[Populus]

I wish they would have actually refined Liquid Glass instead of going back to the old sidebar and corner radius. The new (old) sidebar feels completely out of place with the rest of Liquid Glass. I also liked how the content next to the sidebar changed its colors.

The different window corner radius was there for a reason and I think Tahoe looked more consistent. The old corner radius feels out of place with the buttons of the toolbar.

Also I feels sorry for the developers who put in so much work in order to make Liquid Glass work for their application.

You know what? I agree. I like the macOS 26 curvier, wider radius. The only problem is consistency. If they make those corners, I’m fine, as long as ALL the corners are that way.

 

[klasma]

The different window corner radius was there for a reason and I think Tahoe looked more consistent. The old corner radius feels out of place with the buttons of the toolbar.

The true solution is to not have rounded corners at all. That would solve the problems you describe as well as what users complained about in Tahoe. Really, rounded corners just cause trouble either way.

 

[Luftkopf]

Golden Gate is bad because it plays into the “Watergate” meme. They should have thought about that more.

Speaking of bringing back UI features, I actually miss Dashboard - particularly putting it in dev mode and moving certain widgets onto the desktop of you needed to use them routinely. It was over because it didn’t clutter your desktop. The notepad widget was my fave.

Then it is appropriately named for the version where Apple caved in to the haters.

 

[RedWeasel]

I also liked how the content next to the sidebar changed its colors.

Up to this day I don't understand what physical reality should get simulated by this. Is the sidebar supposed to be some "slab" of glass? Then why is it taking a color from stuff around it?

 

[groove-agent]

I wonder how much RAM/memory this glass tech is using up.
In the days of Ram expense shut it down please APPLE!. 🙂
Never found the glass a thing for me. Does not twiddle my twirler 1-BIT!

I’m hoping the Liquid Ass UI plays a bigger part when AR comes out. Otherwise it’s a horrible design from a UI/UX perspective.