You guys really should be consistent with the order of your before-after pictures. Sometimes it's older on left, sometimes not.
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Apple Improves Liquid Glass in iOS 26 Beta 4, Reversing Some Beta 3 Changes
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It's the one with the slightly frosted cartouche around it that you can see clearly if you press your nose against the screen
How do you add your home lights onto the control panel like that? I don't see that option at all.
Thanks for your perspective. I am concerned about legibility, I currently have both "Reduce transparency" and "increase contrast" turned on on both my iPhone and iPad. But I have only seen images and they do not reflect reality as they are highly compressed nd reduced in quality (I post in the Photos of the day and I know ...).
So I want to see for myself and will install the public beta on my iPad as there are some other features I'd like to use. I have no data on that iPad so if I need to wipe it out, fine.
Besides that, I am considering getting an iPhone 17PM so no way to avoid ios26, and if not this year, then next ...
But I understand that people have different needs/viewpoints.
Many people will update to iOS 26 to see what it's like, and not like it, so they'll want to downgrade back to iOS 18, but typically Apple stops signing the previous version of iOS within a week or two of the release of the new version, and after that, you can't downgrade. It's likely that Apple will continue to update iOS 18 after the fall release of iOS 26, but they typically do that for only a few months, though they usually provide security updates for the prior version of iOS for about a year after the new version is released.
In other words, Apple is polishing a turd.
Dear Apple,
There is a reason we use whiteboards and blackboards instead of writing on windows with white markers.
There's also a reason that televisions aren't see-through.
Sincerely,
Everyone that wants to see what they're doing.
There is a reason we use whiteboards and blackboards instead of writing on windows with white markers.
There's also a reason that televisions aren't see-through.
Sincerely,
Everyone that wants to see what they're doing.
Just put a slider for transparency setting. No need to release a whole new version to tweak it.
It's not that easy. Even with a slider you need to have different levels of transparency that actually work otherwise it's pointless. Sliding options are no good if things are broken at all points along the slider.
Apple being Apple, it never crossed their minds to just let users select their desired level of transparency.
... only young designers with perfect vision prefer the aesthetics of low contrast, tiny fonts with fine lines over higher contrast and readability. I liked beta 3 tiny bit better than beta 4. Why can't we just let the user make the choice?
Remember all those news stories about Apple designers leaving?
I think there’s hardly anybody still there from the Jobs & Ive days. They cashed out and are chilling on the beach, but the replacements are the same clueless designers you get at every company, making the same mistakes.
Apple is no longer a tier above the rest in design. This is a huge milestone in the company’s decline, which has been punctuated by the car project, Vision Pro, Siri and Apple Intelligence failings. The iPhone was the core product and the interface was the most important part, and now even that’s gone to pot.
They have enough cash to ride it out for a looong time, but I would definitely cash out any investments.
MUCH BETTER! But keep going. This should not be piecemeal based on hot takes. It's a design language. Follow the principles set out in the language for crying out loud!
Feels powerful when you say that huh? Now back to the forums.
"In response to criticism about too little Liquid Glass in beta 3, Apple has upped the translucency in several areas."
Nope. They started with one extreme, then b3 pulled it way back. Now they find a middle ground. That's what beta versions are for.
Nope. They started with one extreme, then b3 pulled it way back. Now they find a middle ground. That's what beta versions are for.
An example of the heavy lifting design work being done? Isn't it obvious? Apple already created the LG design. Now they're tweaking it.
If anyone cares about stuff other than Liquid Glass transparency - the CarPlay Smart display option still not reverted back to beta 2 state. Lots of space wasted on the display with only one widget stack and will never use widgets if it sticks until the release 🙄 Such a shame no one cares about this.
Open control panel and long press into edit mode, click Add Control and then pick the "Scene or Accessory" control from the Home section... click on the new control and you can pick the accessory and then resize the control if required.
Go on, make it more transparent and add little contrast and it should look nice!
What pisses me off are the time and icons in the top status area overlaying some of the app views with no background at all, making it look crappy and difficult to read. It all still just feels very unpolished at nearly the halfway point of the beta cycle. Which is probably an indicator that this wasn’t a good design to begin with. Sure it’s visually impressive at times, but at the expensive of being functionally good. That has me concerned that Apple is once again swinging away from practical design, except in this instance it’s somehow also worse looking as they are in pursuit of some seemingly unobtainable glass aesthetic. The thing about glass is that it’s clear and things that are clear are inherently difficult to sense for many people.
still amazes me
1. How many people access DEVELOPER betas just to get content out there... (its NOT meant for them yet!)
2. How much content there is covering every detail of what is an EARLY ... DEVELOPER ... BETA when again, its not meant for wide dissemination yet its just and early developer beta.
Would it really hurt these people to wait for the public beta at least? I guess the answer to that question is 'yes' where the desperation to be the first is so great that many missteps are made - just ask a certain Mr Prosser that one.
It’s interesting for a company that does a good job on accessibility to make some UI changes like this, the notifications are harder to read in both of those shots on the Home Screen, especially for those of us that use personal photos and not generic wallpapers….