Apple’s Pursuit of ‘Joy and Delight’ with Liquid Glass May Be Backfiring
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A new aesthetic rollout across Apple products, dubbed “Liquid Glass,” is facing criticism for prioritizing form over function, raising questions about whether the company is losing the design ethos championed by Steve Jobs.
Apple introduced Liquid Glass in June 2025, declaring an ambition to bring “joy and delight to every user experience.” The visual design style—applied to everything from iPhones to Apple Watches and TVs—is defined by a new screen type intended to resemble translucent liquid. However, the initial reception suggests the pursuit of this aesthetic may be undermining Apple’s long-held reputation for seamless usability.
Standing out through design has been a core tenet of Apple’s identity since its founding by Steve Jobs half a century ago. Jobs famously eliminated uninspired ideas, asserting that “deciding what not to do is as important as deciding what to do.” While his leadership style could be demanding, it proved essential to Apple’s enduring success, which remains the world’s most valuable brand more than 14 years after his death.
To Jobs, both design aesthetics and user experience (UX) were paramount—both had to be flawless for public consumption. Yet, the recent trajectory of Liquid Glass—launched under CEO Tim Cook—suggests Apple may be deviating from this principle.
The official release of Liquid Glass last September triggered a wave of customer complaints regarding the design of Apple’s new operating system, OS 26. Social media platforms were flooded with criticism concerning slow or illogical animations, disruptive color shifts, excessive interactions, cartoonish or blurry icons, poor contrast, inconsistent highlighting, and battery-draining effects that offered minimal benefit.
A review by the UX consultancy NN/g offered a lukewarm assessment: “At first glance, the system looks fluid and modern. But try to use it, and soon those shimmering surfaces and animated controls start to get in the way.” Wired magazine went further, labeling the new system “awful,” and concluding that “people don’t enjoy forking over data and dollars in exchange for annoyance.”
With OS 26 and Liquid Glass, Apple seemingly abandoned interactions users had ingrained into their muscle memory over years. This poor usability is particularly jarring for a company built on Jobs’ mantra: “It works like magic.” Evidently, it did not. The difficulties culminated in the December departure of Alan Dye, Apple’s vice-president of human interface design, to competitor Meta. While viewed as a win for Meta, speculation arose that Dye’s exit was linked to the underwhelming reception of Liquid Glass. Cook, upon the announcement, emphasized that Apple “prioritizes design and has a strong team.”
Where Did Apple Go Wrong?
As a senior lecturer in UX design, understanding how digital interactions shape our lives and consumer behavior has been a central focus of my professional career. Small interactions matter. A key criticism of Liquid Glass centers on the poor usability of OS 26, specifically how the “transparency” of the design hindered readability for many users.
Even during pre-launch beta testing, Apple acknowledged issues with the new design, implementing changes to reduce transparency effects on notification backgrounds. While the transparent elements appeared aesthetically pleasing on certain default wallpapers on the iPhone, they were widely deemed unusable on others. The first update, released two months after the September 2025 launch, allowed users to disable Liquid Glass’s transparency to improve legibility. However, reducing transparency and blurs on some backgrounds resulted in a more sterile user experience.
Despite the criticisms, there are elements of Liquid Glass to admire. The “glass bubble” magnifying glass effect during text selection on the iPhone, for example, is a particularly decadent touch. Yet, the tenth principle of the great German designer Dieter Rams constantly resonates: “Good design is as little design as possible.” Jony Ive, Apple’s design guru for over two decades, based the original iPhone aesthetic almost entirely on Rams’ designs.
The usability issues with Liquid Glass become most apparent when selecting the “clear” homescreen setting—a prominent visual in Apple’s marketing materials. Not only is text difficult to read, but app icons become nearly indistinguishable. Each time I view my screen in this mode, I experience discomfort from the lack of color and the muddiness of icons blending into the background (locating the WhatsApp icon, for instance, proves challenging). Choosing an unsuitable wallpaper, such as a photo of a child, exacerbates the problem.
It’s a questionable decision to remove the core color signals that have long underpinned Apple’s exceptional usability. After just one day, the discomfort became unbearable, prompting a return to the default color setting.
What’s Next for Liquid Glass?
The design and UX issues with Liquid Glass are symptomatic of broader cultural shifts within Apple. Dye’s departure followed the announcement of John Giannandrea’s retirement—the British software engineer who oversaw the company’s AI chatbot system, Apple Intelligence. Like Liquid Glass, Apple Intelligence has failed to impress, receiving unfavorable comparisons to competitors like Google Gemini and ChatGPT since its delayed 2024 introduction.
These leadership changes coincide with a trend highlighted by a UK survey indicating that 69% of consumers desire more affordable smart products—a market increasingly dominated by Chinese brands. Where companies like Oppo once directly copied Apple, they are now producing highly distinctive handsets.
Fixing Liquid Glass’s flaws is inevitable—I anticipate the March 2027 release of OS 27 will address the necessary adjustments. However, the need for these fixes reveals an underlying problem: Apple is fallible. While individual design flaws can be corrected, a pattern of underwhelming UX is eroding Apple’s luxury status.
Apple’s core philosophy of perfectionism must remain non-negotiable. The company needs a bolder vision for future product interaction, not simply another new aesthetic. To quote Wayne Gretzky, a figure Jobs often referenced: “I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been.”
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Citation: Apple’s unrivaled commitment to excellence is fading. A designer explains why (2026, January 28) retrieved 28 January 2026 from https://techxplore.com/news/2026-01-apple-unrivaled-commitment-excellence.html.
