Somewhere, the one person that used this is weeping into their notepad
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Apple's Clips App Discontinued
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Maybe they can take the dev teams involved in Clips (and soon Invites) and have them work on Aperture for the Mac.
(Sorry, I'm just practising for my new job as a stand-up comedian.)
(Sorry, I'm just practising for my new job as a stand-up comedian.)
Never lock your data into proprietary apps or formats if you can avoid it.
Never used the Journal app, but it seems the data can be exported (in html format, but better than nothing).
Apple DID take it seriously when they launched it.
No one used it.
Apple tried to drum up interest with ads and how to’s etc.
No one cared.
It’s been dead for years, Apple just finally tossed the last shovelful of dirt over it.
I had to check the thread title to see which Apple flop you were referring to here.
Reads exactly how a post about AVP could be written. lol
Following up on my previous comment about being surprised that Apple didn't say anything about integrating Clip's functionality into iMovie...
I do miss the days when Apple had a clearer product and software strategy. Sure, things came and went. That’s inevitable. But back before “content creation” went mainstream, Apple’s lineup felt more intentional. You had distinct tools for different users: iMovie vs. Final Cut Pro (and remember Final Cut Express? That was a sorta weird anomaly to me), Photos vs. Aperture, GarageBand vs. Logic. We looked forward to those annual updates just as much as the latest operating system or the newest hardware. Even the iWork apps got regular love— new features, annual updates, the sense that Apple actually cared about the software side of the experience.
These days, that focus feels… diffused. Apple used to build out entire creative ecosystems. Now it feels like they occasionally dip a toe, like adding web-based iWork with light collaboration, but never really commit. Meanwhile, Google has steadily deepened its Workspace integration year after year, long before Gemini showed up to supercharge it. Apple’s equivalent momentum just isn’t there anymore. (And that's sad considering it seems like Google's productivity apps and Apple's iWork both started around the same time, more or less. Apple had the potential to turn iWork INTO that.)
People often say “the money’s not in it,” but Apple built its reputation on not chasing the easy money. They made thoughtful decisions because they could, not just because they should. I can’t help but wonder how much of today’s hesitation comes from playing it safe, maybe to avoid antitrust scrutiny, maybe just to avoid risk altogether.
That’s the sad part: Apple absolutely has the resources to build and sustain world-class creative tools and cohesive platforms. Their resources are effectively "unlimited" for a company their size. And these world-class creative tools and cohesive experiences? That's a HUGE part of why us diehard Apple fans love this ecosystem so much. But without a strong product vision, things get fragmented and eventually abandoned. And instead of doubling down on what makes the ecosystem powerful, we get things like “Liquid Glass” — pretty, sure, but it feels like a design solution in search of a problem. Cosmetic updates like that might grab attention for a cycle, but they don’t move the platform forward. Instead, they just add new layers of complexity while the truly valuable stuff quietly fades away.
Under Tim Cook, Apple has done phenomenal work on the hardware front, genuinely pushing the envelope of what’s possible. And while Apple is famously secretive, a lot of those breakthroughs only happened because the walls came down just enough for cross-team collaboration. You can see it in the way the hardware, chip, camera, and battery teams clearly work in sync. That level of coordination is what allows something like an iPhone Air or iPhone Pro Max to exist— a device that feels engineered as a single, coherent object, not a collection of parts.
The software side, though, hasn’t kept pace. It feels like that same spirit of collaboration, the “whole greater than the sum of its parts” mindset, never fully took root. I don’t know how Apple operates internally, but the difference shows. Hardware feels unified, almost poetic. Software feels siloed. Polished, but detached.
And that’s the irony: Apple’s greatest strength used to be the seamless blend of hardware and software— tools and experiences designed to amplify each other. Lately, it feels like the balance has tipped. The craftsmanship is still there, but the cohesion isn’t. Clips disappearing is just a small symptom of a larger story— a company that once obsessed over how everything worked together, now content to let some of those connections quietly fade away.
I do miss the days when Apple had a clearer product and software strategy. Sure, things came and went. That’s inevitable. But back before “content creation” went mainstream, Apple’s lineup felt more intentional. You had distinct tools for different users: iMovie vs. Final Cut Pro (and remember Final Cut Express? That was a sorta weird anomaly to me), Photos vs. Aperture, GarageBand vs. Logic. We looked forward to those annual updates just as much as the latest operating system or the newest hardware. Even the iWork apps got regular love— new features, annual updates, the sense that Apple actually cared about the software side of the experience.
These days, that focus feels… diffused. Apple used to build out entire creative ecosystems. Now it feels like they occasionally dip a toe, like adding web-based iWork with light collaboration, but never really commit. Meanwhile, Google has steadily deepened its Workspace integration year after year, long before Gemini showed up to supercharge it. Apple’s equivalent momentum just isn’t there anymore. (And that's sad considering it seems like Google's productivity apps and Apple's iWork both started around the same time, more or less. Apple had the potential to turn iWork INTO that.)
People often say “the money’s not in it,” but Apple built its reputation on not chasing the easy money. They made thoughtful decisions because they could, not just because they should. I can’t help but wonder how much of today’s hesitation comes from playing it safe, maybe to avoid antitrust scrutiny, maybe just to avoid risk altogether.
That’s the sad part: Apple absolutely has the resources to build and sustain world-class creative tools and cohesive platforms. Their resources are effectively "unlimited" for a company their size. And these world-class creative tools and cohesive experiences? That's a HUGE part of why us diehard Apple fans love this ecosystem so much. But without a strong product vision, things get fragmented and eventually abandoned. And instead of doubling down on what makes the ecosystem powerful, we get things like “Liquid Glass” — pretty, sure, but it feels like a design solution in search of a problem. Cosmetic updates like that might grab attention for a cycle, but they don’t move the platform forward. Instead, they just add new layers of complexity while the truly valuable stuff quietly fades away.
Under Tim Cook, Apple has done phenomenal work on the hardware front, genuinely pushing the envelope of what’s possible. And while Apple is famously secretive, a lot of those breakthroughs only happened because the walls came down just enough for cross-team collaboration. You can see it in the way the hardware, chip, camera, and battery teams clearly work in sync. That level of coordination is what allows something like an iPhone Air or iPhone Pro Max to exist— a device that feels engineered as a single, coherent object, not a collection of parts.
The software side, though, hasn’t kept pace. It feels like that same spirit of collaboration, the “whole greater than the sum of its parts” mindset, never fully took root. I don’t know how Apple operates internally, but the difference shows. Hardware feels unified, almost poetic. Software feels siloed. Polished, but detached.
And that’s the irony: Apple’s greatest strength used to be the seamless blend of hardware and software— tools and experiences designed to amplify each other. Lately, it feels like the balance has tipped. The craftsmanship is still there, but the cohesion isn’t. Clips disappearing is just a small symptom of a larger story— a company that once obsessed over how everything worked together, now content to let some of those connections quietly fade away.
We have reached the logical end game of this much time under "Ops Guy" Tim Cook.
The strategy that made sense, which you described, originated with Steve Jobs and was pivotal to the Apple comeback way back when.
Yes! 100% that! I mean, obviously we've grown beyond laptops and portables, but remember back then when you could literally sorta "hold" Apple's hardware lineup in your head? And more easily say, oh, you're this type of user, so the most bang for your buck is this product?
I do have a soft spot in my heart for Ops, and Tim Cook has done an amazing job at optimizing so many aspects of Apple (especially supply chains and a lot of other behind the scenes stuff), but there's only so far you can go with that without someone(s) also pushing with a strong strategy and vision.
I mean, unless there is a person/group/organization in the world that ONLY comes up with good ideas? It’s not a controversial statement, it’s reality.
Yup! I was thinking Invites app is next on the chopping board! If Clips app can’t survive, there’s no reason to think this one will. And I really like both of them.
There’sa lot of naysayers here.
I almost exclusively use Apple apps to run my life day to day. And I can’t see how it needs to be improved.
I have a choice few other apps for vector work and 3D work. Anything else I need I write in Xcode.
Today Ai read my email flight confirmation, autogenerated a calendar event which filled out about twelve different fields with all of the salient details, that still felt magical.
Clips was most likely unused, it was niche and did very little, you needed, that you couldn’t just do on a selfie camera.
I almost exclusively use Apple apps to run my life day to day. And I can’t see how it needs to be improved.
I have a choice few other apps for vector work and 3D work. Anything else I need I write in Xcode.
Today Ai read my email flight confirmation, autogenerated a calendar event which filled out about twelve different fields with all of the salient details, that still felt magical.
Clips was most likely unused, it was niche and did very little, you needed, that you couldn’t just do on a selfie camera.
I wish they’d just update iMovie so you could edit vertical clips like in every other app (edits, CapCut, VN, Premiere). Sad that it was disappeared without a usable replacement.
iTunes remote still works and I still use it quite frequently and it hasn’t been touched by Apple since 2019.
Just for reference, the latest version of iOS when that app was last updated was 13.1, and macOS Catalina 10.15.0.
And yet it still works perfectly fine under 26.
I'm lost here ... what does any of this have to do with the Clips app?
Yes. Unused, niche and cancelled.
I’d totally forgotten that it existed. I didn’t understand what it was for when it came out, so I never explored it. I probably never would have used it even if I did know what it was supposed to do, sooooooo yeah
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I forgot even had this app still on my phone.
Been defaulting to iMovie app to create my vids over the years
Been defaulting to iMovie app to create my vids over the years
What I missed so much about Clips is this version 2.0 - it had 2 Star Wars themes. Once updated to 3.0, this beloved theme DISAPPEARED.