Apple’s new Liquid Glass design that was announced at WWDC25 is more than just a fresh coat of paint—it’s a signal. One that points simultaneously to the future of digital interfaces and to the past. We’re calling it neo-retro.
Liquid Glass appears new and futuristic, yet somehow familiar—after all, the idea of translucent interface elements animating over glassy surfaces has been around since before Minority Report hit theaters in 2002. But Apple has brought the concept into the present day and made it their own. The layers, translucency, and animations feel like a natural evolution of VisionOS—clean, immersive, and spatially aware.
But just like the leap from Classic Mac OS 9 to Aqua over 25 years ago, the visual appeal doesn’t come without a cost. Liquid Glass introduces new challenges across accessibility, usability, and branding—and the design implications are real.
Accessibility
Layering text and translucent UI elements on vibrant backgrounds can wreak havoc with contrast and readability. We’ve already seen examples from Apple’s keynote where app icons or labels feel lost in the visual noise. No doubt Apple will adjust contrast and readability as iOS 26 moves through the beta process but it’s good to be conscious of the issues even now.
Designers will need to rely on their experience—layering, shadowing, and possibly adding custom modes—to ensure accessibility doesn’t take a back seat to aesthetics. Care will also need to be taken when features like transparency and contrast are changed at the system level: your design needs to hold up with a lot of different human capabilities.
Usability
Liquid Glass isn’t just a visual change—it’s a spatial one. Apple’s UI elements now float, breathe, and demand more space. The new Maps search bar is elegant, but it creates layout challenges, especially on smaller screens.
More padding around elements means less screen real estate which leads to more scrolling, rethinking hierarchy, and hiding content that used to fit just fine.
Branding
Here’s the existential one: In a system where everything looks cohesive and monochrome, how do you and your app stand out?
Apple’s design language is intentionally immersive and unified. That’s great for the user—but tough for brands that want to maintain a distinct identity. Your app might now live in an ecosystem that feels more like Apple and less like you.
This makes UX and feature decisions even more important. The challenge becomes: do you integrate your brand into Liquid Glass—or integrate Liquid Glass into your brand? How will you strike the right balance?
The Road Ahead: We’ve Been Here Before
This isn’t our first design rodeo. We’ve helped clients (and updated our own apps) through every major Apple design transition. From the skeuomorphism of the original macOS Aqua and iPhone iOS 1.0 to the familiar flat aesthetic of iOS 7 and Android Material Design. The challenge of designing for iOS 26’s Liquid Glass are many but we’re confident in our ability to not only navigate this new landscape but to excel and push boundaries like never before.
Each sea change comes with hype, uncertainty, and a learning curve. But we don’t just design delightful user experiences—we guide our clients through the strategic side of design transitions. Whether you’re refreshing an existing app or building something new, we have the experience and expertise to help you:
- Maintain usability while adopting a new visual language
- Ensure accessibility in complex UI environments
- Rethink branding within Apple’s unified system
- Navigate cross-platform realities without losing your mind (or your users)
Change is exciting. Change is hard. Let’s make it work.
Have an app that needs to evolve with Liquid Glass? We’d love to help.
Drop us a line and let’s talk.
