Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) 2025 arrived amid heightened scrutiny and anticipation. With the company facing regulatory challenges, competitive pressure in AI, and lingering doubts about its hardware ambitions, this year’s event was less about spectacle and more about substance.
Here’s a detailed, critical look at all the major announcements, the innovations on display, and the implications for Apple’s future.
What is “Liquid Glass”
Apple’s most visible change this year was the introduction of the “Liquid Glass” design language across all its operating systems — iOS, iPadOS, macOS, watchOS, and tvOS. This marks the most significant visual overhaul since the flat design shift in 2013. The new aesthetic features translucent surfaces, glass-like reflections, and layered interfaces that dynamically respond to user interaction. App icons, widgets, and even the lock screen now shimmer and cast subtle shadows, creating a sense of depth and motion.
While visually impressive, the Liquid Glass update is, at its core, a cosmetic change. It borrows heavily from visionOS, Apple’s mixed reality platform, and aims to unify the look and feel across devices. However, some critics argue that the focus on design may be compensating for a relative lack of groundbreaking new features, especially when compared to competitors’ recent AI and productivity innovations.
Apple intelligence: Expanding the AI ecosystem
Apple doubled down on its “Apple Intelligence” initiative, embedding generative AI and machine learning more deeply into the user experience. Key features include:
Writing Tools & Genmoji: AI-powered writing assistance for emails and messages, plus the ability to generate custom emojis (Genmoji) on the fly.
Image Playground & Visual Intelligence: The Photos app now supports natural language prompts for image creation and editing, and can organize or “clean up” photos using on-device AI.
Mail Summaries: Long email threads are condensed into concise highlights, saving users time.
Memory Movie Creation: Automatic curation of photo and video moments into shareable movies.
Privacy Focus: All AI processing is done on-device or via encrypted cloud servers, emphasizing Apple’s privacy-first approach.
Developer Tools
Apple introduced the Foundation Models Framework, enabling developers to integrate Apple Intelligence features directly into their apps, potentially unlocking a new wave of AI-powered experiences.
Apple’s AI push is notable for its privacy-centric approach, but the company remains behind rivals like Google and Microsoft in terms of the breadth and maturity of generative AI features. The delayed rollout of promised Siri upgrades and other AI capabilities has raised questions about whether Apple can catch up in this fast-moving space.
iOS 26: Features and innovations
Apple has shifted to a year-based naming convention, so this year’s release is iOS 26, bringing it in line with iPadOS 26, watchOS 26, and others. The Liquid Glass design is front and center, with the lock screen now wrapping time displays around wallpaper images and app icons featuring multi-layered glass effects.
Key Features
AI-Powered Call Screening: Your iPhone can now answer spam calls for you, a practical feature that leverages on-device intelligence to protect users from robocalls.
Messages Upgrades: Enhanced message drafting, live translation, and the ability to mix Genmojis3.
Maps and Wallet Improvements: More intuitive navigation and smarter payment options.
Visual Intelligence: Real-time image analysis and organization in Photos.
While these updates refine the user experience, many are incremental improvements rather than revolutionary changes. The call screening feature is a welcome addition, but similar capabilities have existed on Android for years. The design overhaul, while fresh, does little to address deeper platform limitations.
iPadOS 26: Bridging the gap with Mac
iPadOS 26 introduces advanced windowing features, making iPads behave more like Macs in terms of multitasking. Users can now resize, overlap, and manage app windows more freely, narrowing the gap between tablet and laptop productivity.
This is a long-overdue change for power users, but it also highlights Apple’s reluctance to fully merge the iPad and Mac ecosystems. Despite improved multitasking, iPadOS still lacks some of the flexibility and app support found on macOS.
macOS 26 “Tahoe”: Customization and continuity
The Mac interface adopts Liquid Glass, with fully transparent menu bars and customizable folder colors and wallpapers. Live Activities now appear on the Mac dashboard, and Spotlight search is smarter, thanks to deeper integration with Apple Intelligence.
Gaming and Graphics
Apple introduced Metal 4, its next-generation graphics rendering technology, promising better performance for gaming and creative applications.
The visual updates are appealing, but the lack of major new features for professional users is notable. Metal 4 could improve gaming on Mac, but Apple’s ecosystem still lags behind Windows in terms of game library and hardware flexibility.
watchOS 26: Smarter fitness and gestures
Key Features
Workout Buddy: AI-powered coaching and personalized workout suggestions.
Smart Stack: Improved glanceable widgets and information.
Flick Gesture: New gesture controls for hands-free operation.
These updates enhance the Apple Watch’s utility for fitness enthusiasts, but the platform remains constrained by hardware limitations and battery life concerns. The AI features are incremental rather than transformative.
tvOS 26 and Home: Incremental upgrades
tvOS 26 receives the Liquid Glass treatment, but otherwise, the updates are modest. There are minor improvements to navigation and content discovery, but no major new hardware or platform shifts were announced.
There were also persistent rumors of a HomePod smart display, but no such device materialized at this year’s event.
VisionOS 26: The mixed reality dilemma
Apple’s Vision Pro headset, launched with great fanfare last year, received a software update to VisionOS 26. The new version brings the Liquid Glass design and some usability tweaks, but there were no major new applications or hardware announcements.
The Vision Pro remains a niche product, hindered by high pricing and a lack of compelling use cases for mainstream consumers. The headset’s inability to anchor itself in the gaming or productivity markets has limited its adoption, and the software updates do little to change that dynamic.
Developer focus: Foundation models and app integration
Apple’s new Foundation Models Framework is a significant step for developers, allowing them to build AI-powered features directly into their apps using Apple’s on-device intelligence. This could lead to a new generation of smarter, more personalized apps across the ecosystem.
However, the framework’s capabilities are still being explored, and its real-world impact will depend on developer adoption and Apple’s willingness to open up its platforms further.
Pricing and availability
Apple’s software updates will roll out this fall as free upgrades for supported devices. However, hardware pricing remains a sticking point, especially for products like the Vision Pro, which continues to be priced far above what most consumers are willing to pay.
Our take: Are these innovations or iterations?
WWDC 2025 showcased Apple’s commitment to design consistency and privacy-focused AI, but the event was marked more by incremental improvements than by true leaps forward. The Liquid Glass design offers a unified, modern look, but is fundamentally a cosmetic update. Apple Intelligence brings useful AI features, yet the company is still playing catch-up with rivals in generative AI and productivity tools.
The most significant innovations — like advanced windowing on iPad and the Foundation Models Framework — are steps in the right direction, but they highlight Apple’s cautious, sometimes slow-moving approach to platform evolution. Meanwhile, high hardware prices, especially for mixed reality, continue to limit accessibility and mainstream adoption.
In summary, WWDC 2025 was a live concert of a sort to show Apple’s ability to polish and refine its ecosystem, but it also underscored the challenges the company faces in delivering truly groundbreaking innovation. As competitors push the boundaries of AI and hardware, Apple’s strategy of incrementalism may not be enough to maintain its leadership in the years ahead.
