Liquid Glass: Initial Thoughts
At WWDC 2025, Apple unveiled Liquid Glass, their latest design system set to transform all of their operating systems. The response has been predictably polarizing, those who love it are passionate advocates, while critics are equally vocal in their disapproval. After watching the announcement and following early developer feedback, here are my initial thoughts on what could be Apple's most controversial design decision in years.
Style Over Substance?
When I first saw Liquid Glass during the keynote, something immediately caught my attention. Even in Apple's own carefully crafted demo video, there were clear signs that legibility and usability would suffer. Text appeared to blend into backgrounds, interface elements seemed to float without clear boundaries, and the overall effect, while undeniably beautiful, raised serious questions about practical day-to-day use.
My initial reaction was that Apple would surely tone this down before release. The Verge's Nilay Patel shared this sentiment, and for good reason: it's hard to imagine Apple consciously shipping a design that makes their interfaces demonstrably harder to use. Users of the early developer betas are already reporting that UI elements like tab bars and notifications become nearly impossible to read against certain backgrounds and wallpapers.
This is particularly concerning when you consider that most users don't obsess over design changes the way tech enthusiasts do. Coupled with people's natural resistance to change, shipping Liquid Glass in its current form seems like a recipe for user frustration.
The Technical Trade-offs
In the introduction video, Alan Dye, Apple's VP of Human Interface, explains that advances in hardware and graphics technology have enabled this next chapter in software design. There's no doubt that Apple Silicon has the computational power to render these complex visual effects, the question is whether it should.
Early reports from developer beta users indicate battery drain issues. While not all of these can be directly attributed to Liquid Glass, they raise an important question: if rendering these glass effects requires significant processing power and impacts battery life, do the aesthetic benefits justify the trade-off? The most beautiful interface in the world becomes meaningless if it makes your device sluggish or drains your battery by lunch.
Frankly, even if the hardware can render these graphical effects with acceptable power consumption, I remain skeptical about whether the trade-off is worthwhile. Wouldn't it be better to forgo these effects in favor of improved performance and battery life?
The Next Design Trend?
Apple has historically been a trendsetter in design, with their design systems and guidelines becoming industry standards. But I’m not sure if Liquid Glass is going to achieve the same effect. When iOS 7 introduced flat design in 2013, it was riding an existing wave, designers and users were already moving away from skeuomorphism toward cleaner, flatter interfaces. The timing was right, and the industry followed suit.
Today's design landscape is more complex. While there's definitely fatigue with pure flat design, I'm not convinced there's a widespread appetite for interfaces that mimic physical materials like glass. Apple’s main competitor, Google, has seemingly gone in an opposite direction with Material 3 Expressive, betting on essentially an enhanced flat design, adding personality through colour, typography, and shapes rather than the “material” or texture of the UI elements (somewhat ironically).
This divergence could lead to an interesting fork in the road. Will Liquid Glass inspire widespread adoption, or will it become an Apple-only signature look? Could we see a hybrid approach emerge, or will the industry stick with evolved flat design?
What This Means Moving Forward
The success of Liquid Glass will ultimately depend on Apple's ability to resolve the fundamental tension between visual appeal and usability. If they can maintain the aesthetic impact while ensuring interfaces remain readable and accessible, they might have another design revolution on their hands.
The next few months will be telling. As Apple refines the design and moves toward public release, we'll see whether Liquid Glass represents the future of interface design or an ambitious experiment that needed more time in the lab.