UITabBar in iOS 26 is Too Big for Touch ID Devices

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Created 3w

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I do the majority of my test development on an iPhone 16 Pro in the iOS Simulator. As part of my UI rework to maintain compatibility with iOS 26 I decided to run on an older device with a small screen size for testing. The smallest device that supports iOS 26 is the iPhone SE 2nd Gen and 3rd Gen.

Take a look at the image below:

iPhone Screen Size Compare.jpg

On the left is the iPhone SE 2nd Gen. On the right iPhone 16 Pro.

It looks like the UITabBar which is from a UITabBarController is sized too tall. The actual Tab Bar itself is 62px while the container that houses it is 83px. Yes there should be some top/bottom space to allow for the Liquid Glass Effect to overlap as it often spills outside it's bounds but this feels like far too much.

Looking at them side by side, the iPhone SE Tab Bar actually takes up more space which is not ideal for users who are working on a smaller screen to begin with and have less real estate.

It looks like the bottom space is allowable room for the 'swipe to dismiss line' however these devices use Touch ID and that line is never present. Feels like the 83px for the Tab Bar should be reduced on these devices to allow for more useable screen real estate. Is this a design oversight as iOS 26 seems to be built predominantly for Face ID Devices? Just wondering if any Apple Design Engineers can chime in to see if this will be addressed in a future beta?

The only way to change it at this stage is with a CGAffineTransform however this does not impact the '_UITabBarContainerWrapperView' that sits behind it.

Also, on that note. The '_UITabBarContainerWrapperView' sometimes seems to be clear and other times displays a solid system background color. Is there anyway to control this? Many of my views both SwiftUI and UIKit have differing behaviour. My understanding is the idea of iOS 26 is for your app's content to be visible behind the Tab Bar, however the content is obscured by '_UITabBarContainerWrapperView' in many of my views and I can not figure out how to change that.

Thanks!

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Answer 1

DTS Engineer OP

Apple

3w

Looking at them side by side, the iPhone SE Tab Bar actually takes up more space which is not ideal for users who are working on a smaller screen to begin with and have less real estate.

Please file a feedback and please post the FB number here for my reference. If you have any questions about filing a Feedback report, take a look at Bug Reporting: How and Why?

Also, on that note. The '_UITabBarContainerWrapperView' sometimes seems to be clear and other times displays a solid system background color. Is there anyway to control this? Many of my views both SwiftUI and UIKit have differing behaviour. My understanding is the idea of iOS 26 is for your app's content to be visible behind the Tab Bar, however the content is obscured by '_UITabBarContainerWrapperView' in many of my views and I can not figure out how to change that.

Tab bar items rest on a Liquid Glass background that allows content beneath to peek through and It's not possible to change the Tab bar background color in iOS26. Keep in mind that iOS 26 is still in the beta and they've been some iteration on the look and feel of liquid glass. I'll suggest you keep testing the beta builds for the latest changes.

0

Answer 2

bradley_7 OP

3w

@DTS Engineer

I have filled feedback. FB19648533.

I am not explicitly trying to change the Tab Bar Color, the problem is that the system sometimes adds a '.systemBackground' color as the background instead of letting the content beneath 'peek through'.

Please refer to this image for reference:

Tab Bar Background Issue.jpg

The image on the left side allows for the content to 'peek through'. The image on the right does not when it should. The image on the right does have content underneath, it is just hidden by '_UITabBarContainerWrapperView'.

Within the black square in the image I have highlighted '_UITabBarContainerWrapperView' from View Hierarchy Debugging. On the left instance it shows the content below. On the right instance it assigns a system background which obscures the content below thus taking away the intended system 'peek through' effect.

I can not find why the system is putting a background color here. It. happens on many of my views and I can not find a way to change it.

1