‘99% of the work does not make it ‘ – Apple’s VP of human interface design about how liquid glass hits the high beam
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AppleThe last major redesign of a platform was iOS 7, A clear and lively view of the operating system, but one that was developed and eventually released in another apple. It was 2013 and Apple just didn’t have that much a coherent ecosystem or so many devices.
However, it is not 2013. It is 2025 and Apple has an extensive and extremely integrated ecosystem – you can copy and paste between an iPhone and a Mac, with an iPad in between, or vice versa. With Universal Control you can use the keyboard and trackpad of your Mac on an iPad, and AirPods quickly synchronizes between them all.
So with a function set and a mantra or ethos that aims to combine hardware and software, look Apple’s new liquid glass for all its platforms – iOS 26” iPados 26” MacOS 26” Watchos 26” TVOS 26And Visionos 26 – starts to make a lot of logical.
There is also the fact that Apple has always loved glass; A good example, I write this with Apple Park in sight – a gigantic ring that seems to have been made of glass.
Liquid glass is not a gigantic redesign in terms of moving buttons, as it was introduced by Apple during the keynote and later restored by Apple’s VP from Human Interface Design, Alan Dye; It is designed to be known immediately.
Shortly after the special event lasting about 90 minutes I was able to participate in a conversation with Alan Dye. It was short but extensive and focused primarily on the new material and the approach of Apple to design.
However, I don’t think we should look very far to find out where liquid glass came from. When Apple de Vision Pro and Visionos in 2023 to WWDCIt was announced as the future, and in my use it certainly feels that way. It overlaps apps, messages, facetimes, films and everything else that a Visionos app can be on the real world around you.
So if Visionos is the future, now it will come for everyone – well, now in one Developer Beta, With a public beta in July, and this fall as a full release, all in liquid glass. It is a translucent and slimmer operating system than before. While moving your finger around the screen on one Apple WatchiPhone or iPad, it all flows together.
I had to try to move along the new bottom bar in the music, because the marked part turns into a perfectly rounded oval that slides smoothly further. You can say the same for the cursor on the Mac.
Regarding the origin of liquid glass, Dye shared: “Much of the work you saw today was influenced by the many years that we have worked on Visionos.”
And that was all about taking glass, thanks to the translucent nature, and allowing it to put these different elements on the real world around you. That makes sense for a spatial computer that goes over your head and eyes.
That effort eventually led to Dye and his team thinking about how they could bring that language to the rest of our operating systems. “Of course, however, it is not a one-for-one recreation.” We had to treat glass very differently, “Dye explains.
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And after trying out liquid glass, it is clear that it is a screen with a good back and the interface now flows between applications, over and around overlapping windows and over a wallpaper. This digital material is much more malleable and transformable than real glass.
It is still the classic operating system, but Dye hopes that it feels a bit different after a while – “It feels much more expressive. It feels much more responsive. You can feel that you are pushing through the screen and comes into contact with the liquid glass itself.”
It is also clear that Apple has taken their time with this release, and that, comparable to any other position that the company rolls out, it must hit the goal. Dye shared that “99% of the work we make in the studio never comes into the world.” When asked why, he shared the idea that design is difficult, in particular design for simplicity.
That is a kind of Apple’s secret sauce, and although liquid glass screams, well, glass and transparent, I think we will find that it has layers, and that it will evolve just like any other OS release.
For now I am just excited to see that evolution iOS and macOS, iPados, Watchos, Visionos, TVos and what is yet to come.
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