By now, everybody’s speaking about Liquid Glass, Apple’s new design language unveiled at WWDC 2025.

At first look, it seems like one other shiny facelift—translucent layers, glowing refractions, and all of the visible drama of a fragrance advert. However in the event you’ve been taking note of Apple’s lengthy love-hate relationship with skeuomorphism, you’ll know this isn’t simply an aesthetic refresh.

It’s a full-circle second—a surprisingly unashamed return to the tactile, material-rich UI Apple as soon as banished.

This time, although, they’ve traded stitched leather-based and felt for one thing that appears extra like molten acrylic. And whereas it’s being paraded as the way forward for interface design, Liquid Glass would possibly simply be Apple’s most controversial pivot for the reason that nice flattening of iOS 7.

From Flat to Fancy—Once more

When Apple ditched skeuomorphism over a decade in the past, it declared battle on ornamentation. Gone have been the textures, shadows, and fake 3D surfaces. In got here flatness, minimalism, and an entire technology of pastel-on-pastel apps. However now? Liquid Glass is again with depth, sheen, and reactive mild habits.

It’s as if the ghost of Aqua met the spirit of Imaginative and prescient Professional and determined to throw a celebration inside each display screen.

In line with Apple, these layers aren’t simply fairly—they’re purposeful. The refractive surfaces are alleged to create focus, information your consideration, and mirror environmental cues.

However make no mistake: that is skeuomorphism in disguise. The supplies could also be digital, however the philosophy is identical—simulate one thing tactile to make the interface really feel extra “actual.”

When Magnificence Undermines Usability

However not everybody’s swooning. Designers and accessibility advocates have been fast to level out the apparent: all that fairly glass can rapidly flip to mush when layered over complicated wallpapers or dynamic content material. 

Distinction suffers. Legibility collapses. Out of the blue, what was meant to really feel immersive finally ends up trying like a smudged touchscreen at a automobile dealership.

Already, early testers are complaining that buttons disappear, textual content turns into unreadable, and the UI can really feel extra ornamental than sensible.

Which begs the query—who is that this design actually for? Energy customers with excellent imaginative and prescient and OLED screens? As a result of for the remainder of us, it’s beginning to really feel like Apple has traded readability for dazzle.

Aesthetic Diversion Whereas AI Stumbles

And let’s not ignore the timing. Apple’s AI recreation is behind. Whereas Google, OpenAI, and Microsoft are racing forward with real-time brokers and generative assistants, Siri continues to be fumbling primary duties.

So what do you do when your AI isn’t prepared? You distract. You shine some Liquid Glass in folks’s faces and say, “Have a look at this! Isn’t it stunning?”

It’s a intelligent sleight of hand. Whereas the world waits for Apple’s large AI second, the corporate buys itself time by overhauling the interface and promoting it as innovation.

However ultimately, individuals are going to appreciate that layering translucency over Safari tabs isn’t the identical as fixing precise issues with intelligence. The longer Siri lags, the extra performative these redesigns begin to really feel.

Devs, Good Luck With That

And let’s not overlook the builders—these unsung heroes who now should reengineer their apps to keep away from turning into unreadable glass salads.

With Liquid Glass baked into each nook of the Apple ecosystem—from iPhones to CarPlay—devs are beneath strain to adapt quick. They’re being instructed to rethink layering, restructure content material, and guarantee each shimmering button nonetheless is smart in opposition to altering backgrounds.

This isn’t a toggle swap; it’s a deep architectural shift. Builders now have to contemplate how mild behaves, how transparency impacts readability, and whether or not distinction ratios will maintain up within the wild.

It’s a stage of design anxiousness not seen for the reason that iOS 7 overhaul—and it’s going to break a couple of issues earlier than it “simply works.”

Nostalgia or Cognitive Load?

Right here’s the bizarre twist: Liquid Glass isn’t even sincere about what it’s. It pretends to be minimalist, but it surely’s drenched in layers of affectation. That is the UI equal of whispering loudly. It desires to look delicate and chic whereas additionally dazzling you with physics-based depth and dynamic reflections.

Skeuomorphism was as soon as criticized for overwhelming customers with too many visible metaphors. It was gradual, heavy, and infrequently patronizing.

Now now we have its trendy cousin—Liquid Glass—which trades stitched leather-based for simulated plastic, however nonetheless carries the identical cognitive load. It could be prettier, but it surely nonetheless asks your mind to decode greater than vital.

So What’s the Verdict?

Let’s be sincere: Liquid Glass is beautiful. It provides Apple’s ecosystem a unified, trendy, nearly magical really feel. It’s wealthy, it’s spatial, and it presents a visible coherence that makes all the things really feel prefer it belongs to the identical world.

But it surely’s additionally aesthetic overcompensation. It’s designed to wow in keynotes, not essentially to serve customers in on a regular basis situations. And it dangers alienating customers who depend on Apple’s status for usability and readability.

The transfer is daring—perhaps even courageous—but it surely’s additionally regressive, placing type forward of operate, and asking customers to adapt to a new visible language with out giving them clear purposeful positive factors in return.

Closing Thought

Liquid Glass is likely to be essentially the most Apple factor Apple has accomplished in years—stunning, polarizing, and barely conceited. It’s a reminder that whilst we inch towards invisible interfaces and AI-driven design, Apple nonetheless believes within the energy of surfaces.

Whether or not that perception seems to be visionary or useless will depend upon how this new UI ages—and whether or not customers are keen to commerce readability for glow.

So right here we’re, as soon as once more, watching Apple flirt with the ghost of skeuomorphism. Solely this time, it’s much less stitched leather-based and extra sci-fi showroom. The query isn’t whether or not it seems good. It’s whether or not we wanted it in any respect.