At WWDC25 we launched a new type of Lab event for the developer community - Group Labs. A Group Lab is a panel Q&A designed for a large audience of developers. Group Labs are a unique opportunity for the community to submit questions directly to a panel of Apple engineers and designers. Here are the highlights from the WWDC25 Group Lab for Design. Can you expand on how Liquid Glass helps with navigation and focus in the UI? Liquid Glass clarifies the navigation layer by introducing a single, floating pane that acts as the primary navigation area. Buttons within this pane seamlessly morph as you move between sections, and controls can temporarily lift into the glass surface. While avoiding excessive use of glass (like layering glass on glass), this approach simplifies navigation and strengthens the connection between menus, alerts, and the elements that trigger them. What should I do with customized bars that I might have in my app? Reconsider the content and behavior of customized bars. Evaluate whether you need all the buttons and whether a menu might be a better solution. Instead of relying on background colors or styling, express hierarchy through layout and grouping. This is a good opportunity to adopt the new design language and simplify your interface. What are scroll edge effects, and what options do we have for them? Scroll edge effects enhance legibility in controls by lifting interactive elements and separating them from the background. There are two types: a soft edge effect (a subtle blur) and a hard edge effect (a more defined boundary for high-legibility areas like column sorting). Scroll edge effects are designed to work seamlessly with Liquid Glass, allowing content to feel expansive while ensuring controls and titles remain legible. How can we ensure or improve accessibility using Liquid Glass? Legibility is a priority, and refinements are ongoing throughout the betas. Liquid Glass adapts well to accessibility settings like Reduce Transparency, Increase Contrast, and Reduce Motion. There are two variants of glass: regular glass, designed to be legible by default, and clear glass, used in places like AVKit, which requires more care to ensure legibility. Use color contrast tools to ensure contrast ratios are met. The Human Interface Guidelines (HIG) are a living document offering best practices. The colors and materials pages are key resources. Do you have any recommendations for convincing designers concerned with consistency across Android and Web to use Liquid Glass? Start small and focus on high-utility controls that don't significantly impact brand experience. Native controls offer familiarity and predictability to users. Using the native controls makes sure your app feels at home on the device. Using native frameworks provides built-in accessibility support (dynamic type, reduce transparency, increase contrast). Native controls come with built-in behaviors and interactions. Can ScrollViews include Liquid Glass within them? You can technically put a glass layer inside a scroll view, but it can feel heavy and doesn't align with the system's intention for Liquid Glass to serve as a fixed layer. Think of the content layer as the scrolling layer, and the navigational layer as the one using Liquid Glass. If there is glass on the content layer it will collide into the navigational layer. What core design philosophy guided the direction of iOS 26, beyond the goal of unification? The core design philosophy involved blurring the line between hardware and software, separating UI and navigation elements from content, making apps adaptable across window sizes, and combining playfulness with sophistication. It was about making the UI feel at home on rounded screens. Can we layer Liquid Glass elements on top of each other? Avoid layering Liquid Glass elements directly on top of each other, as it creates unnecessary visual complexity. The system will automatically convert nested glass elements to a vibrant fill style. Use vibrant fills and labels to show control shapes and ensure legibility. Opaque grays should be avoided in favor of vibrant colors, which will multiply with the backgrounds correctly. What will happen to apps that use custom components? Should they be adapted to the new design within the next year? The more native components you use, the more things happen for free. Standard components will be upgraded automatically. Look out for any customizations that might clash. Think about what is the minimum viable change, where your app still feels and looks very similar to what it did. Prioritize changes in core workflows and navigational areas. There are a number of benefits to using native components including user familiarity, built-in accessibility support, and built-in behaviors and interactions. Will Apple be releasing Figma design templates? Sketch kits were published on Monday and can be referenced. The goal is to ensure the resources are well-organized, well-named, and easy to use. It's a high priority.

Video Playback on iOS 18 public release is asinine. I use video playback to show slow-motion video frame by frame to my students and the video can only be shown at like 3/5 of the screen size (just like Apple fouled up screenshot editing about a year ago) If you try to view video in the full screen you can’t scrub through and see time stamps or play frame by frame sliding left to right. It’s absolutely ridiculous. 2 out of 3x the video timeline finishes fully right and I haven’t watched the full clip. Here’s a video showing the issue how at the small default size I can see the entire timeline and play the full video from beginning to end, but when I go to full screen and/or zoom in or move the screen around the timeline doesn’t work and you can’t scroll through the full video! Need the video to not condense in size on the screen and play the full height / width of the screen. Also not have the text of the location showing above the screen. Way too much clutter. The reduced size of the video for editing issue started with photos several updates ago and now Apple idiotically brought a terrible flaw from photos to videos as well. Ugh.

We use SwiftUI's .tabViewBottomAccessory in our iOS apps for displaying an Audio MiniPlayer View (like in the Apple Music App). TabView(selection: $viewModel.selectedTab) { // Tabs here } .tabViewBottomAccessory { if viewModel.showAudioMiniPlayer { MiniPlayerView() } } The Problem This code works perfectly on iOS 26.0. When 'viewModel.showAudioMiniPlayer' is 'false', the accessory is completely hidden. However, on iOS 26.1 (23B5059e), when 'viewModel.showAudioMiniPlayer' is 'false', the MiniPlayerView disappears, but an empty container remains, leaving a blank space above the tab bar. Is this a known Bug in iOS 26.1 and are there any effective workarounds or should I just wait until Apple fixed it?

Hello everyone, I'm 14 and absolutely enthusiastic about Apple — not only the products themselves, but the design nuance, the sense that everything has been well thought-out, and even stuff like Fitness+ and the Tips app. I love how much attention Apple pays to making every aspect of the experience feel deliberate and cohesive. My dream is to eventually become an Apple employee, specifically in design (maybe even retail for the beginnin). I know that I am young right now, but I would like to start learning as soon as possible. To you all who have experience with design or anything else, what are a few things or habits one my age should focus on learning to strengthen in the right direction? to maybe reach this dream Any assistance or advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks! chase

I just recently upgraded to iPhone 16 pro max and I noticed you can no longer film in the 4:3 ratio in selfie mode or front camera, from photos like you could on the 13 and 15 (previous phones) I have 4:3 selected, I hold down shutter button and swipe as always, the photo readjusts to 16:9. Then when you hit the shutter button again to stop it resets back to 4:3. Did Apple change this? Is recording in that 4:3 ratio no longer an option?

In the video ”Create Icons with Icon Composer”, the presenter mentions that Apple has created a layer-to-SVG script for Illustrator that‘s available for download: Once the artwork is in a good place, next we want to export the layers as SVGs. For every tool, this can look a bit different. For those using Illustrator, we've created a layer to SVG script that will automate this for you, which you can download. Exporting out the canvas size ensures everything drops right into position in Icon Composer. Here‘s the link to the mention: https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/wwdc2025/361/?time=377 I can’t find any place to get this script, and my designer is very interested in using it to import our Illustrator icon into Icon Composer. Can someone point me to it?

I think in the next updates of IOS 26 that Apple should add a setting to enable/disable Liquid Glass because we all know that everybody doesnt like the new update.

Dear Apple Developer Relations Team, We are currently reviewing the documentation for the UIDesignRequiresCompatibility Info.plist key. In the documentation, there is a warning that states: "Temporarily use this key while reviewing and refining your app’s UI for the design in the latest SDKs." However, in the adoption guide for Liquid Glass: Adopting Liquid Glass, we did not see any explicit requirement to force adoption of the Liquid Glass design. We have the Gojek app, which currently uses the UIDesignRequiresCompatibility key. To ensure long-term stability, we would like clarification on the following points: Future Support of the Key: Is it safe to continue using the UIDesignRequiresCompatibility key? Can you confirm whether this key will remain supported or if there are plans for it to be deprecated/removed in future iOS versions? Liquid Glass Adoption: Our app’s design guidelines do not align with the Liquid Glass style. Can you confirm that adoption of Liquid Glass is not mandatory, and that apps can continue to use their existing custom design guidelines without any restrictions? Compatibility with iOS 26: Are there any required changes we need to make to our existing views to ensure that the UI will continue to render as it does today on iOS 26 and beyond? We want to make sure we provide the best user experience while remaining compliant with Apple’s guidelines. Your clarification would help us plan our design and development roadmap accordingly. Thank you for your support and guidance.

With the new ios 26 beta 3 helps some stabillty and performance issues but most of the liquid glass has been removed or made very frosty look; and it defeats the whole purpose of a big redesign, and even thought the changes are because of readability and contrast complaints it should not take away liquid glass design. I think apple should consider adding a toggle or choice to choose if they would want a more frosted look or a more liquid glass look the the original plan.

The newest iOS 26 CarPlay upgrade seems more like a downgrade with vehicles from Subaru with the 11.6 inch vertical infotainment display. Such a big screen, but only one widget shows at a time additionally, prior to this iOS update we had three lines of apps on the main page now only two. also to be noted album art size on all music streaming and podcast apps is extremely small about half the size of what it originally was prior to this update yes, I tried turning on and off the screen optimization setting and CarPlay. It did not do anything.

As someone who genuinely appreciated the Liquid Glass effect introduced in iOS 26 Beta 1–2, I am deeply disappointed by its reduction in Beta 3. Liquid Glass wasn’t just eye candy it gave iOS a unique identity, futuristic feel, and a visual soul. Now, the UI looks flat, generic, and indistinguishable from other platforms. I feel Apple is stepping back from a bold vision due to readability complaints that could’ve been solved with an option or toggle not by removing the whole design language. Please consider restoring the full Liquid Glass look, or at least offer a toggle so users who believe in Apple’s design language can choose it. Don’t let this innovation fade because of short-term complaints.

I've been losing countless hours of work trying to create a variable-width SF Symbol that supports interpolation, no dice. Both Sketch and Figma output SVGs that are not interpolatable. After numerous hours of research, I believe it's due to the fact that when outlining strokes, these editing tools introduce artifacts into the shapes —​ sometimes I get very short line segments where there would not be needed, sometimes a 3-point curve gets expanded to a 4-point curve, but not in all weights. It's always inconsistent. So my only question is rather simple: what's the graphic editing tool Apple uses to create hundreds of symbols? Clearly you cannot edit the stroke of ALL curves by hand, it's inhumane. Sketch? Figma? Illustrator? Inkscape? Affinity? I'd like a definitive answer from someone internal so that I can at least try to use the same tool as you without wasting more hours.

Hi, Upon reviewing our app, we got feedback that our app icon within the Wallet app is not behaving as expected when the home screen is set to "light mode" only. In that case, on the home screen, the app icon remains its default color (e.g., red), regardless of the device's appearance settings (light or dark), which is expected. However, in the apple Wallet, e.g., under the From Apps from your device, app icons change their color (e.g., red in light mode, black in dark mode) when iOS appearance is changed - which is reported as an app issue. I've noticed that all apps in that section are changing the color, not just ours, so it seems to me like a bug in iOS or a behavior that was not clearly defined in the app store guidelines. If there is an API we must use to cover that case, which one would that be? Is this a bug that Apple should resolve, or is this the intended behaviour?

Hello, I am currently trying all of the new features in iOS 26, including some of the new API's. However, there's one question I am not sure of. In the Build a SwiftUI app with the new design video, there is one section where they show off the Apple Music TabView with one section containing the tabs on the left and the search tab on the right. The scroll down feature I was able to implement. The tabs being split, I have no idea how to do that. How can I do that in SwiftUI?

Can I use the “apple.intelligence” SF symbol to refer to the functionality of Foundation Models frameworks within my app, or does it specifically refer to Apple Intelligence and not a feature of my own creation that is built upon Apple Intelligence?

Ever since Xcode Version 26.0.1 I cannot for the life of me make my buttons rectangular. They are all capsule (or oval) shaped. My interface was designed for square buttons but no matter what I do the issue stays the same. This is what I have (it's fairly barebones but would have worked before I believe): @IBOutlet weak var PagesInterface: UIButton! override func viewDidLoad() { super.viewDidLoad() PagesInterface.layer.cornerRadius = 0 PagesInterface.layer.masksToBounds = true }

Hello So I have an application which is in the Apple store. I wanted to fixe some issue therefore i created update build with the following: • Reworked Character Physics: Improved responsiveness and movement for smoother, more controlled gameplay. • Bug Fixes & Performance Enhancements: Fixed critical issues affecting gameplay consistency and stability. Players will now experience better performance and more accurate controls. • Mac Catalyst Fixes: Improved support for macOS, fixing issues related to UI scaling and responsiveness. The changes above are basically all there is. Now it seems that i am not able to pass review as it constantly marks design spam and not give anything in particular. Whats up with that ?

I just played around on macOS with the new icons created by Icon Composer, and I noticed that the Dock displays programmatically set icons differently. Try this: Make sure you have the Mail app in your Dock. Set the icon appearance to "Tinted/Light" and set a dark (black) background for the Desktop. Run this code: let image = NSWorkspace.shared.icon(forFile: "/System/Applications/Mail.app") if image.isValid { NSApp.applicationIconImage = image } You'll get something like this: When the icon appearance is set to "Default" or "Dark," everything works as expected, and the "Clear/Dark" and "Tinted/Dark" modes seem to work as well. It seems like the Dock uses a special blend mode depending on the selected background, but this does not seem to be the case if the icon is set programmatically. I filed feedback FB20291186.

How can I achieve the result of buttons glass effect like sample videos that was show at de WWDC25? I tried a lot of approaches and I still far a way from the video. I would like something like the pictures attached. Could send a sample code the get the same result? Thanks

Hi Guys, I noticed that with Icon Composer when you export the icon it does not export a square image, is there any way of doing it or that's how it is now? Checking the icon on the iPhone something doesn't seem right...

Our application was first published on December 16, 2012, at 11:42 PM, and has been available on the market for 13 years. Over the years, we have implemented hundreds of updates to enhance and refine the app. Our recent updates are rejected for the reason "Guideline 4.3(a) - Design - Spam" warning. How can it be for a 13 years old app. Please advice me what to do. Thanks in advance