According to the majority of people here, everything Apple has ever released since the OG iPod has been the worst thing ever… until the next model, which is now the worst thing ever.
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Liquid Glass - A must read critique
- Thread starter turbineseaplane
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
I’m not surprised that Steve contradicted himself. He made snarky comments about small devices, then introduced the iPhone and iPad. He was a driven spark-plug, not divine--although Jony Ive brought him closer.
Speaking of inconsistency, the reader in Safari on my iPhone is on the opposite side of the reader on my MacBook. I wonder if 26 makes them consistent?
Attachments
I don’t really like finder if I’m honest. It feels clunky as hell. None of the views it uses feel quite right. All the keyboard shortcuts require radiation mutated hands on top of that. And it had to be frigged around with for ages to let you do power user things like see bits of your filesystem. Urgh.
I think they are about the same in usability. Well until this came about. The only thing I lose moving away is some mobile sync things between my iPhone and Mac but you know I did them on paper before and I’m doing them on paper now. Far more flexible and helps you retain info if you write it rather than sub context it out.
Ah it has been pretty good until they started adding AI to everything. Their products are done and finished. All they can do now is ruin them. They have to grow. They have to make changes. All corporations fall like this.
I get the joke. But I doubt that’s numerically true
I’d guess like 25% fanboy 25% hater and 50% judge things case by case
For example I think every iPhone since the 13 mini is the worst iPhone ever
But I also think the 16” m4 MacBook Pro is the best laptop anyone has ever made
Last edited:
Apple products—particularly the iPhone—have a sense of panache that is greater than the actual products. You see it when you travel. First Class is iPhonelandia as are the airline lounges. It’s like BMW, Mercedes, Range Rover, Porsche, Tesla …
The overlords are not like us. They don’t nitpick over the OS, they just buy. My buddy’s wife just got a new M-B. There was no shopping around, she just picked model and color.
They don’t watch the WWDC keynote and don’t know a thing about Liquid Glass. They just buy, and buy Apple.
but what does that mean? who cares what others buy, or for what reason? this is a forum of ppl who live & breathe tech, have lots of opinions, and choose to buy macbook pros, iphones etc because that's what they want to use.
i care most about my work, and mac OS and my macbook air are a near-perfect moment for me (i started on a powerbook).
the thing i find amusing is that ppl on forums like this think their opinion is the one that matters ("i've been using macs since snow leopard and this is what i think" etc); i'm certainly guilty of this too 🤣. truth is... we're all experts
Yup. Absolutely. To their credit, there are some moments where there are bits of improvement. But there’s a whole load of change for the sake of change.
Even in Apple’s most glassified experiences, there are still elements of flat design. Knowing that they will seemingly need to co-exist, I think that would prompt them to provide guidance around what should be glassified and what shouldn’t be, but it seems like every time there’s one or two elements by itself, like a button or two, their solution is to slap it on a little slab of glass. As a user, that effect attracts my attention in the UI, and that’s not always a good thing, especially when the UI actually should “recede” as is often quoted.
For example, in a Finder window or in Safari on the Mac, all of those buttons which previously could recede a bit into the toolbar until I intentionally focused on them and used them, are now front and center, competing for my attention. And if you have more than one window open, the effect and visual clutter begin quickly multiplying. (This was really bad in the first beta. The second beta has improved it.)
Apple has to know this is NOT a scalable solution. What about apps that are toolbar heavy, like Pages or Keynote?
Even worse, what about their pro apps? Does anybody really think Liquid Glass is going to translate well to something like Final Cut Pro?
I can appreciate what they’re trying to do in continuing to push styles and design, but I think they’re trying to take too big of a swing all at once. If this is a new direction, let’s focus on icons and prominent action buttons first (like the arrow button to send an email in Mail). But trying to rearchitect large swaths, like “sidebars are now these floating platters” and all this added excess of blurring and shadowing is just too much at once without much regard to the real impact of these changes at scale, let alone any real perceived improved value for making them in the first place.
And all the commentary about consistency between their platforms is marketing bull. From a UI perspective, they’ve been on a journey of consistency for many years now, and a lot of things are already similar (like toggle controls). Plus, having tested the betas on my Apple TVs and watch, the “Liquid Glass” is purely superficial surface-level skinning updates there.
Since it's a beta I'd wait and see. Since Liquid Glass creates problems with contrast for some people it should eventually be tunable in the Accessibility menu. If not there then Tinkertool will likely have some adjustments available. If that fails some person aggrieved by excessive eyestrain will release a Death To Transparency mod to fix it.
logic pro and final cut pro work and look fine on tahoe
As a fellow iphone 13 mini user, I've already decided to skip out on iOS 26. I've been around Apple long enough to see that this is a cash grab; by massively increasing gpu usage to render the glass effect, many many older devices are going to start feeling their age.
Without a proper iPhone mini 17 announcement, I'll have no choice but to keep using my 13 as it gets slower and slower and no way to go back...
I find it interesting too when it’s not a step back in function/intuitiveness.
Read carefully, please.
This is that to which I was responding:
Ah it has been pretty good until they started adding AI to everything. Their products are done and finished. All they can do now is ruin them. They have to grow. They have to make changes. All corporations fall like this.
Look at my signature line. Even if I don’t like something AAPL does, as long as others do, I’m good.
got it 🙏Read carefully, please.
This is that to which I was responding:
Ah it has been pretty good until they started adding AI to everything. Their products are done and finished. All they can do now is ruin them. They have to grow. They have to make changes. All corporations fall like this.
Look at my signature line. Even if I don’t like something AAPL does, as long as others do, I’m good.
then we're in agreement, that tahoe is in fact a step forward. nice!
I think you are absolutely correct.
This is a nice subtle way to make several generations of phones suddenly sorta start to feel a little sluggish ...
hey maybe I need to buy a new iPhone!?
Apple boosters keep saying "You'll get used to it", "You are complaining about everything".
Nah, I don't think so.
I'm still not used to the Big Sur~Sequoia design, every time I use macOS I'm shocked by how ugly it is.
The only reason I'm still using a Mac is the Continuity for my iPhone and iPad, nothing more.
About Liquid Glass and Tahoe, I liked the concept but after testing the Developer Beta on my Mac, it was way worse than Sequoia.
"It's only a beta."
Yeah sure, they'll fix bugs, glitches and few minor design flaws, but I don't expect they'd change the overall design of Tahoe.
For me, macOS Tahoe is the ugliest macOS I've ever seen.
Alan Dye and his design team needs to rethink what makes macOS, macOS.
Nah, I don't think so.
I'm still not used to the Big Sur~Sequoia design, every time I use macOS I'm shocked by how ugly it is.
The only reason I'm still using a Mac is the Continuity for my iPhone and iPad, nothing more.
About Liquid Glass and Tahoe, I liked the concept but after testing the Developer Beta on my Mac, it was way worse than Sequoia.
"It's only a beta."
Yeah sure, they'll fix bugs, glitches and few minor design flaws, but I don't expect they'd change the overall design of Tahoe.
For me, macOS Tahoe is the ugliest macOS I've ever seen.
Alan Dye and his design team needs to rethink what makes macOS, macOS.
Last edited by a moderator:
Of course they will still defend it because that’s what they’ve been doing during Tim Cook’s entire time as CEO. To them, as long as Apple is making astronomical amounts of money, then whatever Cook is doing is the right thing, even if it means he is removing user-friendliness.
Dye should be fired quite frankly.
They won't.
The infantalization will continue as corners get even more rounded and icons are reduced to rudimentary glyphs.
I think it's all due to a much deeper cultural shift at Apple and Louie Mantia highlights it a bit in another piece about Liquid Glass here.
They’re doing a terrible job of that, installing iOS 26 dev beta on my iPhone 14 confirmed my decision to keep this phone for 5 years. iOS 26 is running well (rare dev beta glitches notwithstanding) for me. I particularly love the new Safari.
He’s the new Jony Ive.
We get our ports back and the products start working again.
Then they hire another moron.
Great post, and this is a good point that I hadn’t considered.
I use Logic Pro frequently - if Apple Liquid Glassifys apps like this then I’ll be seriously worried. They’re perfect as they are and don’t need change for the sake of change.
Apple's best Sellers are the iPhone, so they are going to concentrate on that. Mac users are second class.