Apple WWDC 2025: iOS 26 Announced With Liquid Glass Design, New Apple Intelligence Features And More

Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) is back with its annual developer conference, where the company announced a major design overhaul and new Apple Intelligence features with iOS 26.

What Happened: At the ongoing Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC), Apple announced Liquid Glass, its new material design. The Cupertino giant also revealed a major overhaul to its applications, CarPlay and more.

Liquid Glass

Liquid Glass is the Cupertino Giant's new design language, which dynamically reacts to movement and offers a translucent material effect. It refracts to its surroundings, aimed at offering better focus on content.

It combines the optical qualities of glass with a fluidity only Apple can achieve, as it transforms depending on your content or context. It lays the foundation for new experiences in the future and, ultimately, it makes even the simplest of interactions more fun and magical," said Alan Dye, Apple's vice president of Human Interface Design.

The Liquid Glass design extends from elements like the buttons, media controls, and sliders to larger functions such as the lock screen, home screen and the control centre.

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App Design

Apple has also overhauled the app design, redesigning controls, toolbars and even navigation within the apps.

The new phone app offers a combined layout for recent and voicemails.

Apple also announced call screening, a much-awaited feature for iOS. Automated Screening will automatically answer calls from unknown numbers and ask for their name and the reason for calling, before passing the call to the user.

Messages has also received its share of updates, allowing you to add custom backgrounds to convos. Group Chats have received the ability to hold polls, with AI also stepping in and suggesting polls when needed.

Group Chats have also received features such as typing indicators and the ability to send and request Apple Cash.

You will be able to create new emojis by merging two emojis with Genmoji and Image Playground will let you make images with OpenAI's ChatGPT.

Live Translation

Apple is also adding live translation powered by Apple Intelligence with iOS 26. This can translate conversations on the go, using on-device models. It can translate conversations in FaceTime Calls, phone or messages.

Developers will be able to add Live Translation to their apps using an API.

CarPlay

iOS 26 brings widgets with Apple CarPlay. The widgets developed for the iPhone now also work with CarPlay and CarPlay Ultra. CarPlay Ultra, which is currently limited to select Aston Martin cars, brings car controls to the CarPlay experience.

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