Apple WWDC25: Solid rather than spectacular

After overpromising and spectacularly underdelivering last year, Apple played it safe at WWDC25. The Liquid Glass redesign is lovely and there are plenty of decent software tweaks, but it all felt a little flat.

To be frank, it's been a bit of an annus horribilis for Apple. It's under pressure from legislators around the world, it finds itself too often for comfort in Donald Trump's tariff crosshairs, and the Apple Intelligence features it unveiled with such fanfare only a year ago have turned out to be largely vapourware. 

As a result, the new design update across its platforms that it unveiled yesterday felt a bit like Tim Cook pointing at the horizon and shouting 'Look over there'. Apple's stock was marginally down after the event, and if it was looking to rev up the designer community (which is, after all, the main thing that WWDC is about) alongside the wider public, it's largely failed.

Here are the main announcements. As the headline says, there's some solid stuff in there. But anyone looking for spectacle is going to have to go elsewhere.

Liquid Glass redesign

“Delightful and elegant,” says Apple of its new software design which, for the first time, is an update that is rolling out to all its platforms simultaneously. Basically, it adds translucent, glass-like elements to everything, making all the objects on the screen semi-transparent. It uses realtime rendering and can dynamically react to movement with specular highlights.

Apple’s core apps have already been updated to the new aesthetic and its publishing an updated set of APIs so that developers can in turn update their own apps. And they will probably need to as well: the look is so overarching that anything that doesn’t match it is going to feel rapidly out of place.

New OS naming

As widely leaked, Apple’s various OSes are going to pivot to being named for the year after their release rather than simply by their version number. So, rather than the hodge podge of iOS19, watchOS 12 and the like we have now, from the fall onwards we will have  iOS 26, iPadOS 26, macOS 26, watchOS 26, tvOS 26, and visionOS 26. 

New software

Exhaustive features about what’s coming in the new versions of iOS 26, iPadOS 26, macOS 26 are available elsewhere, not least in the previews on www.apple.com. A few things are worth mentioning though.

First, this year’s major Apple Intelligence reveal regarded visual intelligence features that extend to a user’s iPhone screen so they can search and take action on anything they’re viewing across apps. As Apple explains, “Users can ask ChatGPT questions about what they’re looking at onscreen to learn more, as well as search Google, Etsy, or other supported apps to find similar images and products. Visual intelligence also recognizes when a user is looking at an event and suggests adding it to their calendar, repopulating key details like date, time, and location.”

Of course, everybody’s been slightly burned when it comes to Apple Intelligence since last year. We’ll see what this and more is like when, hopefully not if, it arrives.

Coming this year, macOS Tahoe 26 marks the end of upgrades for most Intel Macs, only those with a T2 security chip making the cut (list of models here; it's a short one). The addition of Live Activities from your phone is a neat touch, letting you track things such as an upcoming Uber ride, flight, or live sports score from the macOS menu bar. 

But the Mac’s main update is a huge upgrade to Spotlight. During a search, all results (files, folders, events, apps, messages, and more) are now listed together and ranked intelligently based on relevance to the user. There are also new browse views to make it easy to scan through apps, files, clipboard history etc.

Then there is the Alfred-like ability to take actions from Spotlight itself, using it like a mini-launcher to send an email or create a Note without jumping between apps, including third parties. Users can also run shortcuts and perform actions from the menu bar in the app they’re currently working in, all without lifting their hands off the keyboard using new quick keys.

It’s good, but it's with iPad OS that the great leap forward comes this year, with Apple making it more Mac-like now than ever. Key to that is a new windowing system that lets users fluidly resize app windows, place them exactly where they want, and open even more windows at once. Exposé works like Mission Control on the Mac, allowing users to quickly see all their open windows spread out, helping them easily switch to the one they need.

An enhanced Files app with an updated List view allows users to see more of their document details in resizable columns and collapsible folders, while also offering folder customization options that include custom colors, icons, and emoji that sync across devices. 

The iPad has always bridged the gap between the Mac and the iPhone, but with this release it feels like its edging closer to the desktop. Certainly productivity is going to become massively easier.

New looks for Camera and more

Related to the redesign work, some of the main iOS apps have had a further makeover too. Camera, Safari, and Phone have all been updated. The Camera app now has a simplified layout that shows you just the two main options, photo and video. You then have to swipe the toolbar to reveal other modes.

And while we’re talking about the camera, you will soon be able to use your AirPods 4 or AirPods Pro 2 to take a photo or a video just by pressing and holding the stem.  The Photos app has also been updated to feature separate tabs for Library and Collections views.

Siri updates

Just kidding. There weren't any.  "As we've shared, we're continuing our work to deliver the features that make Siri even more personal," said Apple's software engineering chief Craig Federighi. "This work needed more time to reach our high quality bar, and we look forward to sharing more about it in the coming year."

So, where does all that leave Apple?

Compared to last year’s spectacular overreach, it’s trying to go back to its basics while reasoning that it is better to slightly underwhelm rather than spectacularly overpromise. That said, everything is going to look very pretty and the AI features that the big tech companies are touting (and that Wall St loves to see) are hardly setting the market on fire at the moment for the competition. If the company spends a bit more time working them out, you get the sense that most Apple users aren’t going to be too bothered.

More pressing as far as the company is concerned are the legal challenges and the impact that the ongoing tariff situation will have on hardware sales. WWDC is normally one of the highpoints of Apple's year. But for all the razzmatazz, and for all of Tim Cook's misdirection, you can't help feeling that the meat of Apple's story for 2025 lies not in Cupertino and Rainbow Park but elsewhere.