From the Apple IIe to today. Explore the history, then compare early 2025 with the HIG after Liquid Glass and iPhone Duo.
Latest comparison · Early 2025 → 19 September 2026
Liquid Glass changed the visual system and everyday controls. Duo later changed where those controls live and how layouts adapt. Ten detailed comparisons separate those changes from conventions that were already established in early 2025.
Evidence: 150 archived pages from before March 2025 · 173 pages as of 19 September 2026. The early archive is incomplete; gaps do not mean the guidance is new. Read the source limits ↗
Select a ribbon to see how that topic changed.
Width measures available text. Color describes the change in guidance.
The early-2025 archive is incomplete; the current HIG is represented in full. Their widths are not a measure of total HIG growth or design impact. Select a ribbon for the substantive comparison.
Select a ribbon between Early 2025 and Today, or choose a topic. Each comparison separates new guidance, established conventions, and practical design implications.
The early transition is not the invention of human-centered design. It is the move from a keyboard-and-text grammar into a graphical object world; later editions repeatedly reorganize and expand that foundation.
The 1982 Apple IIe guide devotes nine measured pages to audiences, user profiles, early tests, direct observation, and iteration. The 1987 desktop book preserves the method but compresses it to one page.
“Begin your human interface design by identifying your target audience.”
“The primary test of the user interface is its success with users.”
The 1987 book has three broad chapters. The 1992 edition has eleven: principles and process remain, while menus, windows, dialogs, controls, icons, color, behavior, and language become independently navigable bodies of guidance.
1987 already insists that users decide whether an interface succeeds. In 1992, that idea becomes a sixteen-page design-and-development chapter with audience definition, task analysis, prototypes, observation, and iteration.
“The primary test of the user interface is its success with users.”
“Involve users throughout the design process and observe them working in their environment.”
The 1987 edition makes the curb-cut argument years before the term became common in software. The 1992 book retains disability guidance, calls it universal access, and places it beside worldwide compatibility and networked collaboration as general design considerations.
“Computers hold tremendous promise for people with many kinds of disabilities.”
“Providing universal access means creating products that all people can use, including people who have a disability.”
1987 treats icons as part of graphic communication and the desktop metaphor. In 1992 they receive a thirty-four-page chapter covering recognition, cultural limits, metaphor choice, families, sizes, bit depth, and testing.
“Simple design is good design. Don't clutter the screen with too many windows, overload the user with complex icons, or put dozens of buttons in a dialog box.”
“People often recognize pictures of things and understand them more quickly than they do verbal representations of the same things.”
The 1987 instruction is concise: write directly, plainly, and with a skilled writer. The 1992 chapter expands this into terminology, tone, alert messages, documentation, interactive help, and Balloon Help.
“Communicate with the user in concise and simple terms.”
“A good alert box message says what went wrong, why it went wrong, and what the user can do about it.”
1982 → 1987 · Held
The Apple IIe guide already treats simplicity, consistency, efficiency, learnability, memory load, anticipation, and honest feedback as interface obligations. The 1987 desktop book retains them and adds the graphical principles of metaphor, direct manipulation, see-and-point, forgiveness, and visual stability.
Already human-centered. The Apple IIe guide sets goals of simplicity, consistency, efficiency, self-teaching, low memory strain, anticipation, and immediate feedback before Apple had a standard graphical desktop.
1982, p. 19 ↗ 1982, p. 22 ↗Added graphical principles. The 1987 book keeps familiar and predictable behavior but adds real-world metaphor, direct manipulation, see-and-point, forgiveness, perceived stability, and aesthetic integrity.
1982, p. 22 ↗ 1987, p. 3 ↗ 1987, p. 8 ↗This is not a jump from no design philosophy to one. The text-mode guide already argues that an interface should fit human memory, expectations, skill, and perception; the desktop edition adds principles made possible by a stable graphical object world.
In absolute terms the measured treatment grows 105%, while its corpus share falls from 19.5% to 11.8%. Held refers to continuity of intent, not a constant amount of text.
1982 → 1987 · Held
The earliest bank contains a surprisingly detailed method: define audiences, write user profiles, test early, watch people directly, and revise. The 1987 book keeps the method but compresses it into a single page while moving more attention to the new desktop grammar.
Survived. Both guides tell teams to identify the audience, test early with representative people, watch them directly, and revise the interface when they struggle.
1982, p. 11 ↗ 1982, p. 15 ↗ 1987, p. 15 ↗Compressed. Nine measured pages of user profiles, field observation, staged testing, and a detailed failure anecdote become a single compact testing section in 1987.
1982, p. 12 ↗ 1982, p. 18 ↗ 1987, p. 15 ↗The striking reversal is editorial. User research and testing occupy a large share of the smaller 1982 guide, then shrink in the 1987 book even though the substance survives. The new graphical components consume the space instead.
In absolute terms the measured treatment shrinks 87%, while its corpus share falls from 26.3% to 1.0%. Held refers to continuity of intent, not a constant amount of text.
The 1982 Apple IIe guide devotes nine measured pages to audiences, user profiles, early tests, direct observation, and iteration. The 1987 desktop book preserves the method but compresses it to one page.
“Begin your human interface design by identifying your target audience.”
“The primary test of the user interface is its success with users.”
1982 → 1987 · Arrived
The 1982 guide adapts to novice and expert knowledge and mentions localized keyboards, but it does not treat disability access as a design field. The 1987 book introduces explicit guidance for vision, hearing, motor, and other disabilities.
Arrived explicitly. The 1982 guide varies language and complexity for novice and expert audiences but contains no dedicated disability guidance; 1987 addresses vision, hearing, motor, and other disabilities directly.
1982, p. 11 ↗ 1982, p. 24 ↗ 1987, p. 16 ↗Added alternate routes. The desktop guide asks developers to preserve keyboard and other alternatives when a mouse-only action could exclude people with different physical abilities.
1982, p. 25 ↗ 1987, p. 18 ↗The earlier concern with different audiences is not the same as accessibility. In 1987, disability becomes an explicit product-design constraint and alternative access becomes something developers must plan rather than infer from general flexibility.
The quantitative view confirms the arrival: 1987 devotes 2,075 measured words, or 5.6% of its corpus, to a bank with no 1982 counterpart.
1982 → 1987 · Arrived
The Apple IIe guide assumes full-screen displays and sequential program states. The desktop book introduces overlapping, movable, resizable document windows as directly manipulated objects.
Arrived. The earlier guide structures interaction as successive full-screen displays. The 1987 desktop introduces movable, resizable windows that frame documents and can overlap in a visible workspace.
1982, p. 38 ↗ 1987, p. 39 ↗Added spatial persistence. Documents and tools can remain present in multiple windows, with activation and front-to-back ordering replacing the older sequence of screen changes.
1982, p. 43 ↗ 1987, p. 46 ↗Windows are a genuinely new organizing layer in this measured lineage. They let several documents and tools remain visible, reorderable, and spatially persistent instead of replacing one full-screen state with another.
The quantitative view confirms the arrival: 1987 devotes 5,112 measured words, or 13.7% of its corpus, to a bank with no 1982 counterpart.
1982 → 1987 · Reshaped
Prompts, sequential input fields, keyword matching, and inline error messages become graphical dialogs and alerts assembled from standard buttons, fields, and selection controls.
Recomposed. Sequential text prompts, typed responses, defaults, keyword completion, and inline validation become graphical dialog boxes made from visible fields, buttons, and choices.
1982, p. 31 ↗ 1982, p. 35 ↗ 1987, p. 55 ↗Preserved recovery. Both eras require errors to identify the problem and point toward a solution, but the desktop adds standardized alerts and explicit confirmation controls.
1982, p. 37 ↗ 1987, p. 59 ↗The older interaction is conversational and serial: prompt, type, validate, advance. The graphical dialog makes choices visible together and lets standard controls communicate both the available value and the method of changing it.
In absolute terms the measured treatment grows 34%, while its corpus share falls from 21.6% to 8.5%. Reshaped identifies the change in mechanisms and organization rather than volume alone.
1982 → 1987 · Arrived
The text interface communicates through words, numbers, cursor shapes, inverse video, and flashing. The 1987 desktop adds icons as persistent graphical objects and command targets.
Arrived. The text interface distinguishes states through cursor shapes, characters, inverse video, and flashing; it has no persistent graphical object vocabulary.
1982, p. 25 ↗ 1982, p. 38 ↗Made objects visible. The desktop represents disks, documents, folders, and tools as recognizable pictures that people can select and manipulate directly.
1987, p. 9 ↗ 1987, p. 20 ↗Cursor shape and text styling carry state in 1982, but they do not form an object vocabulary. Icons arrive with the desktop metaphor, giving files, folders, disks, and tools visible identities that can be selected and manipulated.
The quantitative view confirms the arrival: 1987 devotes 1,083 measured words, or 2.9% of its corpus, to a bank with no 1982 counterpart.
1982 → 1987 · Reshaped
Visual guidance moves from managing inverse video, flashing, focus, and television-display limits in 40- or 80-column text to composing a graphical screen with pictures, spatial hierarchy, and restrained color.
Escaped text mode. The Apple IIe guide concentrates on whether inverse video, flashing, focus, and column layouts remain legible across televisions and monitors.
1982, p. 38 ↗ 1987, p. 31 ↗Added graphical composition. The desktop guide can now discuss pictures, spatial grouping, screen balance, visual consistency, and restrained color as a coherent graphic system.
1982, p. 38 ↗ 1987, p. 33 ↗The constraint shifts from whether text effects survive heterogeneous televisions and monitors to how graphics establish hierarchy without clutter. The later visual bank is broader because the display can now represent objects, depth, and color rather than characters alone.
In absolute terms the measured treatment grows 660%, while its corpus share rises from 2.8% to 6.3%. Reshaped identifies the change in mechanisms and organization rather than volume alone.
1982 → 1987 · Reshaped
The 1982 interaction grammar is built from cursor shapes, arrow keys, Return, Escape, control characters, typed commands, and immediate keyboard feedback. By 1987, the one-button mouse and direct pointing share that role with the keyboard.
Preserved keyboard grammar. Arrow keys, Return, Escape, deletion, defaults, shortcuts, and visible input feedback remain useful conventions in the later system.
1982, p. 26 ↗ 1982, p. 28 ↗ 1987, p. 93 ↗Added pointing. The 1987 guide makes a one-button mouse the standard pointing device and adds click, drag, selection, and direct manipulation to the typed-command model.
1982, p. 30 ↗ 1987, p. 28 ↗ 1987, p. 94 ↗The keyboard does not disappear; many of its escape, confirmation, editing, and shortcut conventions survive. What changes is that pointing makes location and objects part of the command, reducing dependence on typed identifiers and sequential prompts.
In absolute terms the measured treatment grows 434%, while its corpus share rises from 17.2% to 27.1%. Reshaped identifies the change in mechanisms and organization rather than volume alone.
1982 → 1987 · Held
Both guides insist on familiar vocabulary, clear errors, consistent key names, discoverable help, and visible status. The later book generalizes those rules from text prompts into the graphical interface.
Survived. Both books require familiar words, consistent terminology, clear error messages, visible status during delays, and help that returns people safely to their work.
1982, p. 37 ↗ 1982, p. 40 ↗ 1982, p. 43 ↗ 1987, p. 14 ↗Changed surface. Language moves from prompts and dedicated help screens into menus, dialogs, alerts, icons, and other parts of the graphical interface.
1982, p. 40 ↗ 1987, p. 14 ↗The continuity is unusually direct: say what happened, show what can be done, use the names people see on the hardware, and keep help recoverable. Graphics expand the surfaces carrying those words but do not replace their communicative job.
In absolute terms the measured treatment shrinks 64%, while its corpus share falls from 7.1% to 0.7%. Held refers to continuity of intent, not a constant amount of text.
1987 → 1992 · Held
The core philosophy holds, but it becomes more concentrated. Consistency, user control, familiar metaphors, direct manipulation, and forgiveness remain the foundation while more applied guidance moves into dedicated chapters.
Survived. Real-world metaphors, direct manipulation, see-and-point, consistency, user control, feedback, and forgiveness remain the core grammar.
1987, p. 3 ↗ 1992, p. 4 ↗Added. The 1992 edition names perceived stability, modelessness, and aesthetic integrity as principles in their own right, making calmness and visual coherence explicit design obligations.
1987, p. 8 ↗ 1992, p. 12 ↗What changes is where the philosophy lives. In 1987, principles are interleaved with the explanation of the desktop model; by 1992 they work more like an opening constitution, while menus, windows, controls, icons, and language carry the operational detail in chapters of their own.
In absolute terms the measured treatment shrinks 15%, while its corpus share falls from 11.8% to 5.0%. Held refers to continuity of intent, not a constant amount of text.
1987 → 1992 · Held
The desktop window model remains recognizable: opening, closing, moving, resizing, scrolling, and managing multiple windows. The 1992 book elaborates the same model rather than replacing it.
Survived. The window remains a directly manipulated object with a title bar, close and zoom controls, resizing, scrolling, activation, and front-to-back ordering.
1987, p. 39 ↗ 1992, p. 133 ↗Clarified. The later book distinguishes document windows and utility windows and specifies how active, inactive, modal, and modeless windows relate, rather than leaving most of that behavior implicit.
1987, p. 55 ↗ 1992, p. 131 ↗This is continuity through elaboration. The object and its direct-manipulation behaviors remain stable, while the later edition makes edge cases and relationships—activation, ordering, zooming, scrolling, document windows, utility windows, and multiple-window behavior—more explicit.
In absolute terms the measured treatment grows 65%, while its corpus share falls from 13.7% to 11.4%. Held refers to continuity of intent, not a constant amount of text.
1987 → 1992 · Reshaped
The visual concern changes shape. The 1987 book combines screen design and graphic communication; 1992 moves icon design into its own large chapter and leaves a shorter, more specifically color-oriented visual treatment.
Survived. Both editions warn that color must not carry meaning by itself and that standard interface chrome should remain restrained so content, not decoration, attracts attention.
1987, p. 33 ↗ 1992, p. 257 ↗Narrowed. The 1992 visual chapter concentrates on color behavior—palettes, contrast, pointers, and display limits—because icon construction has moved into its own much larger chapter.
1987, p. 31 ↗ 1992, p. 260 ↗This bank becomes smaller partly because its former responsibilities split apart. Iconography graduates into a large independent discipline, while the remaining visual chapter concentrates more narrowly on color and display conditions. The concern persists, but its boundaries are redrawn.
In absolute terms the measured treatment shrinks 8%, while its corpus share falls from 6.3% to 2.9%. Reshaped identifies the change in mechanisms and organization rather than volume alone.
1987 → 1992 · Held
Keyboard and mouse behavior remain the interaction backbone. The later edition adds resolution and examples, but the underlying model of pointing, selecting, dragging, typing, and keyboard equivalents stays stable.
Survived. Both books make the one-button mouse the standard pointing device and say that merely moving it should move only the pointer; visible content changes begin with a button action.
1987, p. 28 ↗ 1992, p. 269 ↗Made inclusive. The 1992 edition states that double-clicking is only a shortcut and must never be the sole route to an action because some novices, children, and people with disabilities may not be able to perform it reliably.
1987, p. 93 ↗ 1992, p. 272 ↗Both books assume the same primary instruments and preserve the same interaction grammar: point, click, select, drag, type, and provide keyboard access to commands. The later book clarifies behaviors and conventions without introducing a new input paradigm.
In absolute terms the measured treatment stays nearly level, while its corpus share falls from 27.1% to 14.0%. Held refers to continuity of intent, not a constant amount of text.
1992 → 2008 · Held
The classic Macintosh principles remain almost intact in the 2008 Mac guide, while the first iPhone guide distills them to metaphor, direct manipulation, see-and-point, feedback, user control, and aesthetic integrity.
Survived on Mac. WYSIWYG, modelessness, direct manipulation, feedback, user control, forgiveness, and aesthetic integrity remain a named Mac design constitution.
1992, p. 9 ↗ Mac OS X, p. 39 ↗Distilled for iPhone. The first iPhone guide keeps metaphor, direct manipulation, see-and-point, feedback, user control, and aesthetic integrity, but drops principles tied to a persistent desktop.
1992, p. 4 ↗ iPhone OS, p. 31 ↗The apparent continuity hides an important split. Mac keeps nearly the full 1992 constitution; iPhone keeps only the principles that transfer cleanly to a small direct-touch device.
In absolute terms the measured treatment grows 265%, while its corpus share rises from 5.0% to 9.6%. Held refers to continuity of intent, not a constant amount of text.
1992 → 2008 · Held
The desktop guide preserves task analysis, prototyping, and user observation. The iPhone guide adds a product-definition statement and an explicit discipline of focusing the application on one primary task.
Survived. The Mac guide retains audience and task analysis, prototypes, observation, iteration, and the instruction to treat participant mistakes as evidence about the design.
1992, p. 41 ↗ Mac OS X, p. 25 ↗Added product definition. The iPhone guide asks teams to state the product's audience and purpose, then focus the application on a primary task instead of reproducing a desktop feature list.
iPhone OS, p. 35 ↗ iPhone OS, p. 39 ↗User observation remains an explicit development activity, but the iPhone branch adds product strategy: decide what the product is for, strip away secondary features, and build around the primary task.
In absolute terms the measured treatment stays nearly level, while its corpus share falls from 6.1% to 3.2%. Held refers to continuity of intent, not a constant amount of text.
1992 → 2008 · Held
Worldwide compatibility and universal access remain explicit in the Mac guide. The first iPhone HIG has no dedicated accessibility chapter, so the concern is carried by only one branch of the 2008 snapshot.
Survived on Mac. Universal access and worldwide compatibility remain explicit Mac design work, including assistive technologies, localization, scripts, and culturally portable imagery.
1992, p. 14 ↗ Mac OS X, p. 47 ↗Missing on iPhone. The first iPhone HIG has no dedicated accessibility bank; the 2008 snapshot carries the concern through the Mac branch alone.
Mac OS X, p. 47 ↗ iPhone OS, p. 31 ↗This is continuity with an uneven platform boundary. The Mac book carries accessibility forward; the first iPhone book concentrates on the new device model and leaves accessibility implicit.
In absolute terms the measured treatment shrinks 49%, while its corpus share falls from 5.8% to 1.6%. Held refers to continuity of intent, not a constant amount of text.
1992 → 2008 · Reshaped
Aqua elaborates desktop windows with toolbars, source lists, sheets, drawers, and inspectors. The iPhone guide makes the opposite constraint explicit: one screen and one application at a time.
Elaborated on Mac. Aqua adds toolbars, source lists, sheets, drawers, inspectors, and new window appearances to the inherited document-window model.
1992, p. 131 ↗ Mac OS X, p. 187 ↗ Mac OS X, p. 229 ↗Reversed on iPhone. The first iPhone model is deliberately single-tasking: one application at a time and one screen at a time replace the overlapping desktop workspace.
iPhone OS, p. 16 ↗ iPhone OS, p. 55 ↗The two books now disagree productively about the basic container. Mac adds richer window types; iPhone treats a full device screen and a navigation stack as the default unit of experience.
In absolute terms the measured treatment grows 94%, while its corpus share rises from 11.4% to 11.6%. Reshaped identifies the change in mechanisms and organization rather than volume alone.
1992 → 2008 · Reshaped
One bitmap icon family becomes two identity systems: high-resolution Aqua application and document icons on Mac, and separate app, Settings, toolbar, tab-bar, and launch imagery on iPhone.
Rebuilt for Aqua. Mac icon families become high-resolution, perspective-rich application, document, toolbar, and preference imagery rather than small bitmap sets for display depths.
1992, p. 231 ↗ Mac OS X, p. 135 ↗Split on iPhone. The iPhone guide separates app and Settings icons from toolbar, tab-bar, navigation, and launch imagery, each with a different system role.
iPhone OS, p. 105 ↗ iPhone OS, p. 116 ↗Icon design stops being one technical family. The platform and placement now determine format, scale, silhouette, detail, and whether the image identifies an app or performs an action.
In absolute terms the measured treatment grows 42%, while its corpus share falls from 9.3% to 6.9%. Reshaped identifies the change in mechanisms and organization rather than volume alone.
1992 → 2008 · Reshaped
Mouse and keyboard behavior survives on Mac, but Multi-Touch creates a second interaction grammar built around tapping, flicking, pinching, rotation, and targets large enough for fingers.
Preserved on Mac. Mouse and keyboard remain the Mac interaction backbone, including pointing, selection, dragging, keyboard focus, and command equivalents.
1992, p. 268 ↗ Mac OS X, p. 95 ↗Added direct touch. Multi-Touch introduces tapping, flicking, pinching, and rotation, while finger-sized targets acknowledge that a finger is larger and less precise than a mouse pointer.
iPhone OS, p. 31 ↗ iPhone OS, p. 41 ↗For the first time the corpus has two primary physical grammars at once. The behavioral goals remain, but precision, target size, feedback, and discoverability must be reconsidered for fingers.
In absolute terms the measured treatment grows 49%, while its corpus share falls from 14.0% to 11.0%. Reshaped identifies the change in mechanisms and organization rather than volume alone.
1992 → 2008 · Reshaped
Balloon Help disappears. Mac uses Apple Help and hover help tags; iPhone argues for minimal help and makes concise communication part of keeping the product focused.
Replaced on Mac. Balloon Help gives way to Apple Help and short help tags attached to controls whose purpose is not immediately clear.
1992, p. 318 ↗ Mac OS X, p. 80 ↗ Mac OS X, p. 125 ↗Minimized on iPhone. The iPhone guide tells applications to communicate clearly and minimize the need for separate help by keeping the product focused and understandable.
iPhone OS, p. 17 ↗ iPhone OS, p. 40 ↗Help changes from a universal overlay into a platform choice: searchable documentation on Mac, and a deliberate attempt to make iPhone software need almost no help at all.
In absolute terms the measured treatment shrinks 27%, while its corpus share falls from 7.5% to 2.9%. Reshaped identifies the change in mechanisms and organization rather than volume alone.
1992 → 2008 · Arrived
Platform guidance arrives as a substantial body of its own: Mac OS X technologies, installation, security, and system services sit beside an entirely new iPhone OS product and application model.
Arrived on Mac. System technologies, security, installation, preferences, services, printing, and application packaging become a substantial design bank of their own.
1992, p. 3 ↗ Mac OS X, p. 59 ↗Forked into mobile. A second guide now defines an entire iPhone OS application model: touch, small screens, device capabilities, system integration, and common mobile tasks.
iPhone OS, p. 11 ↗ iPhone OS, p. 45 ↗This is the point where platform constraints become first-class editorial material. The guidelines explain not just interface elements but the environment, services, lifecycle, and product shape around them.
The quantitative view confirms the arrival: 2008 devotes 21,119 measured words, or 14.9% of its corpus, to a bank with no 1992 counterpart.
2008 → Early 2025 · Dissolved
The standalone principles bank dissolves into platform and component guidance in the early-2025 archive. Its concern for clear, familiar, useful interfaces persists; the missing dedicated bank describes editorial organization, not abandoned principles.
Survived. User control, feedback, familiarity, forgiveness, and aesthetic integrity remain visible even though the living HIG reorganizes and renames them.
Mac OS X, p. 39 ↗ iPhone OS, p. 31 ↗ HIG · Getting Started (2024-09-04 archive) ↗Added responsibility. Privacy and inclusion have dedicated guidance in the early-2025 archive; the getting-started material directs readers to platform-specific design considerations.
iPhone OS, p. 33 ↗ HIG · Getting Started (2024-09-04 archive) ↗The early-2025 archive is organized around platforms, foundations, patterns, and components. Its different editorial structure should not be confused with abandonment of the principles in the earlier books.
The early-2025 bank represents an incomplete archive of pages dated before March 2025. Gaps in the archive do not mean absent guidance. These counts describe the available evidence, not a full-corpus growth rate or the importance of the changes. The entire Duo page is counted once under Platforms & technologies.
2008 → Early 2025 · Dissolved
The 2008 Mac guide still teaches a complete user-centered design method, and the iPhone guide teaches product definition. Neither has a direct counterpart in the early-2025 outcome-oriented HIG.
Left out. The 2008 Mac guide still teaches task analysis, prototypes, observation, iteration, and testing; the early-2025 HIG has no comparable end-to-end method chapter.
Mac OS X, p. 25 ↗ HIG · Getting Started (2024-09-04 archive) ↗Left out too. The first iPhone guide's product-definition statement and primary-task exercise also disappear as formal steps, surviving only as scattered outcome-oriented advice.
iPhone OS, p. 35 ↗ HIG · Getting Started (2024-09-04 archive) ↗This remains a corpus-boundary change, now dated more precisely: Apple still published a full research and prototyping method in 2008, but the living HIG no longer acts as a development-process manual.
The early-2025 bank represents an incomplete archive of pages dated before March 2025. Gaps in the archive do not mean absent guidance. These counts describe the available evidence, not a full-corpus growth rate or the importance of the changes. The entire Duo page is counted once under Platforms & technologies.
2008 → Early 2025 · Reshaped
The iPhone rules that assumed one application and one screen at a time are reversed by multitasking, multiple scenes, iPad windows, tabs, and spatial windows, while the Aqua desktop lineage remains recognizable.
Reversed on mobile. The one-application, one-screen iPhone model gives way to multiple scenes, iPad multitasking, tabbed workspaces, and windowed mobile apps.
iPhone OS, p. 16 ↗ HIG · Windows (2024-05-03 archive) ↗Escaped the display. The Aqua window lineage persists, while visionOS turns a window into a plane placed in physical space and adds volumetric content.
Mac OS X, p. 187 ↗ HIG · Designing For Visionos (2024-02-02 archive) ↗The old fork begins to rejoin: desktop windows persist, while mobile gains scenes, multitasking, split views, and windows of its own; spatial computing then makes the window a plane in physical space.
The early-2025 bank represents an incomplete archive of pages dated before March 2025. Gaps in the archive do not mean absent guidance. These counts describe the available evidence, not a full-corpus growth rate or the importance of the changes. The entire Duo page is counted once under Platforms & technologies.
2008 → Early 2025 · Held
Alerts, action sheets, modality, buttons, pickers, and fields remain, but the system now selects among platform-specific presentations and strongly favors undo or inline feedback over interruption.
Survived. Alerts, action sheets, modality, buttons, fields, pickers, and selection controls remain recognizable components across the ecosystem.
iPhone OS, p. 69 ↗ HIG · Modality (2024-03-25 archive) ↗ HIG · Modality (2024-03-25 archive) ↗Interrupted less. Modern alerts are reserved for essential actionable information, and routine destructive actions should often be recoverable with undo instead of a warning.
Mac OS X, p. 230 ↗ HIG · Alerts (2024-03-25 archive) ↗The vocabulary is recognizable, but interruption is treated more cautiously and each platform can choose a different component for the same decision or short task.
The early-2025 bank represents an incomplete archive of pages dated before March 2025. Gaps in the archive do not mean absent guidance. These counts describe the available evidence, not a full-corpus growth rate or the importance of the changes. The entire Duo page is counted once under Platforms & technologies.
2008 → Early 2025 · Reshaped
Hand-built Aqua and iPhone image families give way to scalable SF Symbols, system masking and effects, appearance variants, and a clearer separation between interface symbols and app identity.
Systematized. Hand-built interface icon families give way to SF Symbols that scale across weights, sizes, rendering modes, and platform contexts.
Mac OS X, p. 135 ↗ iPhone OS, p. 105 ↗ HIG · Sf Symbols (2025-01-03 archive) ↗Separated from identity. App icons remain bespoke identity artwork, but the early-2025 guidance already covers system masking, appearance variants, and platform-specific layer requirements.
iPhone OS, p. 105 ↗ HIG · App Icons (2025-02-25 archive) ↗The production burden moves from drawing every rendition to choosing semantic symbols and supplying identity artwork that the system can adapt across contexts.
The early-2025 bank represents an incomplete archive of pages dated before March 2025. Gaps in the archive do not mean absent guidance. These counts describe the available evidence, not a full-corpus growth rate or the importance of the changes. The entire Duo page is counted once under Platforms & technologies.
2008 → Early 2025 · Reshaped
The 2008 split between mouse-and-keyboard and Multi-Touch expands into one multimodal system spanning touch, pointer, keys, remote, game controller, Pencil, voice, gaze, and Digital Crown.
Unified modalities. Separate Mac mouse-and-keyboard and iPhone touch grammars become shared concepts expressed through touch, pointer, keys, remote, controller, Pencil, voice, gaze, and Digital Crown.
Mac OS X, p. 95 ↗ iPhone OS, p. 41 ↗ HIG · Focus And Selection (2023-11-02 archive) ↗Made pre-activation useful. Hover, focus, and gaze can now preview or highlight before activation, reversing the older assumption that pointer movement alone should change only the pointer.
Mac OS X, p. 95 ↗ HIG · Focus And Selection (2023-11-02 archive) ↗ HIG · Apple Pencil And Scribble (2023-11-02 archive) ↗Mouse and touch are no longer separate editorial worlds. Modern guidance defines shared concepts such as focus, selection, activation, and feedback, then explains how each modality expresses them.
The early-2025 bank represents an incomplete archive of pages dated before March 2025. Gaps in the archive do not mean absent guidance. These counts describe the available evidence, not a full-corpus growth rate or the importance of the changes. The entire Duo page is counted once under Platforms & technologies.
2008 → Early 2025 · Reshaped
Apple Help, help tags, and the iPhone principle of minimal help are redistributed across onboarding, writing, launching, loading, feedback, recovery, and contextual assistance.
Redistributed. Apple Help, help tags, and the iPhone principle of minimal help are now spread across onboarding, inline guidance, feedback, recovery, and task-specific assistance.
Mac OS X, p. 80 ↗ iPhone OS, p. 17 ↗ HIG · Offering Help (2023-11-02 archive) ↗Moved into the journey. Modern guidance organizes explanation around first run, waiting, errors, and contextual moments rather than around one documentation technology.
iPhone OS, p. 40 ↗ HIG · Onboarding (2023-10-07 archive) ↗ HIG · Alerts (2024-03-25 archive) ↗The modern organization follows moments in the product journey instead of a documentation technology: first run, waiting, feedback, failure, recovery, and contextual help.
The early-2025 bank represents an incomplete archive of pages dated before March 2025. Gaps in the archive do not mean absent guidance. These counts describe the available evidence, not a full-corpus growth rate or the importance of the changes. The entire Duo page is counted once under Platforms & technologies.
Early 2025 → Today · Arrived
The interval brings back an explicit Design principles page, introduces Liquid Glass, and adds Duo. The philosophical through-line is stronger than a simple old-versus-new visual comparison suggests.
Early 2025 guidance is organized around foundations, patterns, components, inputs, technologies, and individual platforms. Familiarity, accessibility, feedback, and adaptation already shape the recommendations, even without today's standalone principles page.
Apple reintroduced Design principles in June 2026, with eight themes: purpose, agency, responsibility, familiarity, flexibility, simplicity, craft, and delight. Liquid Glass and Duo provide new circumstances in which to apply those longstanding concerns.
2026 · a principle page returns. Treat the new page as an editorial consolidation. Its appearance does not mean that user agency or familiar controls were absent before 2026. The archived getting-started and iOS guidance already situate design within platform conventions. This matters when interpreting a river: more words under a heading can reflect a reorganization as well as a new obligation.
HIG · Getting Started (2024-09-04 archive) ↗ HIG · Designing For Ios (2025-02-24 archive) ↗ HIG · Design Principles (as of 2026-09-19) ↗Continuity · familiarity has a practical cost. Established navigation gives people knowledge they can transfer between apps. A distinctive appearance is compatible with this goal when destinations, hierarchy, control roles, and expected feedback remain legible. Familiarity is a reason to examine a custom tab bar's behavior, rather than a rule that every app must look identical.
HIG · Tab Bars (2024-09-14 archive) ↗ HIG · Design Principles · Familiarity (as of 2026-09-19) ↗ HIG · Branding (as of 2026-09-19) ↗2025 · content and controls become distinct layers. Liquid Glass gives navigation and controls a shared visual language above the content. The principle is still to make the task clear and keep the interface out of the way; the mechanism now includes adaptive materials, grouped controls, and views that reveal more content while scrolling. A material choice is therefore also a hierarchy decision.
WWDC25 · Get to know the new design system · 0:00 ↗ HIG · Materials (as of 2026-09-19) ↗2026 · flexibility becomes physical continuity. Duo adds transitions between displays and poses. The editorial consequence is concrete: a successful adaptation preserves the selected destination, unfinished task, and information hierarchy while changing layout. Recreating the same coordinates on every display can undermine the continuity the principle is meant to protect.
HIG · Designing For Iphone Duo · Best practices (as of 2026-09-19) ↗ HIG · Design Principles · Flexibility (as of 2026-09-19) ↗Responsibility · wider than appearance. The current principles put privacy and transparency alongside visual craft. A design review that approves attractive screens but ignores data use, recovery, or unexpected AI behavior misses part of the stated design standard. These are cross-cutting responsibilities, not decorative details to add at the end.
HIG · Privacy (2024-12-30 archive) ↗ HIG · Design Principles · Responsibility (as of 2026-09-19) ↗ HIG · Generative Ai (as of 2026-09-19) ↗Delight · justify the intervention. The new principles distinguish meaningful delight from decoration. For a bespoke navigation treatment, the useful question is which recurring user task it improves. A branded shape by itself does not establish that improvement; an interaction that makes a difficult workflow clearer can. That is an assessment criterion, not Apple's approval or rejection of a particular design.
HIG · Design Principles · Delight (as of 2026-09-19) ↗ HIG · Branding (as of 2026-09-19) ↗The strongest argument for standard components is not that Apple forbids alternatives. It is that those components carry a tested interpretation of several principles at once, and that interpretation evolves. A replacement should be reviewed against the same outcomes, with explicit evidence for the benefit that justifies owning the replacement.
The early-2025 bank represents an incomplete archive of pages dated before March 2025. Gaps in the archive do not mean absent guidance. These counts describe the available evidence, not a full-corpus growth rate or the importance of the changes. The entire Duo page is counted once under Platforms & technologies.
Early 2025 → Today · Reshaped
The baseline already supports multitasking and adaptive layouts. The interval adds a more flexible iPad windowing environment, evolving scroll edges, and Duo's dual displays, reserved regions, and pose-dependent arrangements.
Early 2025 is already beyond the one-screen, fixed-layout iPhone era. The HIG covers size classes, iPad multitasking, split views, sidebars, and spatial windows. It does not yet describe Liquid Glass or Duo's physical constraints.
Today's layouts must accommodate changing window geometry and control regions while preserving the task. On Duo, a fold can change the usable interaction area without requiring the app to create a new information architecture.
Existing foundation · adapt to available space. The archived Layout and Multitasking pages already require adaptation. Duo is not the invention of responsive design. The change is the range and meaning of the conditions: a layout can move between displays, share an inner display with another app, or avoid an awkward region around a fold. Width alone is no longer a sufficient description of those conditions.
HIG · Layout (2024-09-10 archive) ↗ HIG · Multitasking (2024-02-25 archive) ↗ HIG · Designing For Iphone Duo · Dynamic layouts (as of 2026-09-19) ↗2025 · iPad windows demand continuous adaptation. Current iPad guidance emphasizes fluidly resizing windows and keeping window controls clear of toolbar content. Compare the archived multitasking guidance with today's Windows page: the implementation needs to work across intermediate sizes, not just a few artboards. Fixed breakpoints may still be useful, but the content must remain coherent between them.
HIG · Windows (2024-05-03 archive) ↗ HIG · Multitasking (2024-02-25 archive) ↗ HIG · Windows · iPadOS (as of 2026-09-19) ↗2025–26 · scroll edges are part of the composition. The newer scroll-view guidance describes system effects that separate scrolling content from overlaid controls. A custom pinned header or navigation capsule needs to coordinate with this behavior. Testing a static top-of-list state misses what happens as content moves behind the controls, reaches an edge, or changes the legibility of a title.
HIG · Scroll Views (2024-09-18 archive) ↗ HIG · Scroll Views (as of 2026-09-19) ↗2026 · preserve state between displays. Moving from one Duo display to the other should keep the task recognizable. The HIG calls for consistency of experience and functionality. In a review, this translates into checking the selected item, navigation depth, edited text, scroll position where meaningful, and access to actions. That checklist is an implementation implication of continuity, not a claim that every state variable is prescribed by Apple.
HIG · Designing For Iphone Duo · Best practices (as of 2026-09-19) ↗2026 · reserved regions are conditional. The fold does not create a permanently forbidden stripe in every presentation. Duo identifies reserved regions when the physical pose makes interaction near the center unsuitable. System layouts account for those regions; custom layouts need to respond to the same conditions. Avoid baking a fixed hinge gap into every screen or moving content abruptly at every small pose change.
HIG · Designing For Iphone Duo · Reserved regions (as of 2026-09-19) ↗ Apple Tech Talk · Design for iPhone Duo · 0:00 ↗2026 · split views preserve hierarchy. A split view can expose a list and its detail together where space permits, then reduce the presentation while keeping the same hierarchy. This is a stronger model than treating the two displays as two unrelated screen designs. Define which column owns navigation and selection before deciding how many columns fit in a particular pose.
HIG · Split Views (2023-11-24 archive) ↗ HIG · Designing For Iphone Duo · Split views (as of 2026-09-19) ↗2026 · arrangement views serve related content. Duo introduces arrangement views for content that already benefits from a related multi-part layout. The HIG cautions against putting navigation inside them. A dashboard, preview-and-controls arrangement, or paired content view needs to be evaluated for whether this relationship remains useful as the device moves; the available API is not itself a reason to force every screen into two panes.
HIG · Designing For Iphone Duo · Arrangement views (as of 2026-09-19) ↗Asymmetry · usable content is not the screen rectangle. A side bar, window controls, safe area, and reserved region can make the actual usable content area asymmetric. Centering a key object against the physical display can make it look off-center within the interface. Review alignment relative to the relevant content region, and ensure local controls stay near the content they affect.
HIG · Designing For Iphone Duo · Vertical controls (as of 2026-09-19) ↗ HIG · Layout (as of 2026-09-19) ↗The new design burden is maintaining a coherent activity while geometry changes. System containers help encode that activity in terms of navigation, columns, and content regions. A custom layout can succeed, but it needs equivalent decisions about what stays stable and what reflows; a collection of device-sized screenshots does not specify the transition between them.
The early-2025 bank represents an incomplete archive of pages dated before March 2025. Gaps in the archive do not mean absent guidance. These counts describe the available evidence, not a full-corpus growth rate or the importance of the changes. The entire Duo page is counted once under Platforms & technologies.
Early 2025 → Today · Reshaped
Familiar controls remain, but Liquid Glass changes their visual hierarchy and grouping, while revised sheet and Duo guidance makes completion, dismissal, and constrained placement more explicit.
The archive already distinguishes alerts, temporary sheets, popovers, and controls. It asks for clear action labels, feedback, and restrained interruption. Medium-height sheets and interactive dismissal are established patterns.
Current guidance preserves the existing style and role distinctions, revises prominent styling, and coordinates controls with glass toolbars and adaptive presentations. Existing modal semantics still determine when these components are appropriate.
Continuity · style and role already existed. Both versions distinguish visual style from role and recommend using style rather than size to identify the preferred choice. The current wording shifts from a visible background to a prominent visual style as the treatments evolve. When migrating a screen, retain the existing action hierarchy while updating its expression; do not describe button roles as a new Liquid Glass concept.
HIG · Buttons (2025-02-24 archive) ↗ HIG · Buttons · Style (as of 2026-09-19) ↗ HIG · Buttons · Role (as of 2026-09-19) ↗Destructive actions remain a separate decision. A destructive action should not inherit the primary role merely because it is the most likely selection. The visual system needs to communicate both importance and consequence. This is especially relevant when replacing bespoke button colors with system styles: the intended role must survive the appearance migration.
HIG · Buttons · Role (as of 2026-09-19) ↗ HIG · Alerts (2024-03-25 archive) ↗ HIG · Alerts (as of 2026-09-19) ↗2025–26 · completion belongs in recognizable groups. Today's toolbar guidance separates critical actions such as Done, Close, or Save into familiar, distinct sections and recommends one prominent primary action. A custom header that distributes all actions evenly can erase that hierarchy. Check whether people can identify how to finish, cancel, and navigate back without reading every control.
HIG · Toolbars · Actions (as of 2026-09-19) ↗ HIG · Toolbars · Item groupings (as of 2026-09-19) ↗2026 · sheet anatomy becomes more explicit. The early source already specifies expected Done and Cancel placement. The current Sheets anatomy further explains dismissal, completion, and Back navigation, alongside revised platform placement guidance. Those controls have different meanings even when both leave the sheet. A custom presentation needs to distinguish discarding work, accepting work, and simply returning to the parent context; an unlabeled cross cannot express every one of those intentions.
HIG · Sheets (2024-09-06 archive) ↗ HIG · Sheets · Anatomy (as of 2026-09-19) ↗ HIG · Toolbars · Navigation (as of 2026-09-19) ↗Continuity · choose modality by task. A visual refresh is not a reason to move a prolonged workflow into a sheet. Today's guidance still recommends alternatives for complex or lengthy flows and nonmodal views for supplementary controls that affect the main task. Retain a coherent interaction model while updating the surface treatment.
HIG · Sheets (2024-09-06 archive) ↗ HIG · Sheets · Best practices (as of 2026-09-19) ↗ HIG · Modality (as of 2026-09-19) ↗2026 · a control's representation can change. Duo can move and compress bar items. Supplying appropriate labels and symbols lets the same action remain meaningful in another representation. A custom control embedded as an arbitrary view may need explicit adaptation. Review the action's behavior and semantics through compression, rather than testing only whether its original view still fits.
HIG · Designing For Iphone Duo · Vertical controls (as of 2026-09-19) ↗ Apple Tech Talk · Raise the bar with iPhone Duo · 0:00 ↗Custom controls still need complete states. The current button guidance explicitly requires a press state for custom buttons. This is a useful minimum reminder: an attractive default appearance does not define disabled, pressed, focused, busy, or selected behavior. Specify only the states relevant to the control, then test them with the material and background on which they actually appear.
HIG · Buttons (2025-02-24 archive) ↗ HIG · Buttons · Best practices (as of 2026-09-19) ↗ HIG · Buttons (as of 2026-09-19) ↗A control migration should preserve the meaning of the task while adopting the system's current way of making that meaning visible. First decide what completes, what dismisses, and what changes data; then choose the supported role, style, and placement. Copying a glass appearance onto an ambiguous action model preserves the ambiguity.
The early-2025 bank represents an incomplete archive of pages dated before March 2025. Gaps in the archive do not mean absent guidance. These counts describe the available evidence, not a full-corpus growth rate or the importance of the changes. The entire Duo page is counted once under Platforms & technologies.
Early 2025 → Today · Reshaped
The interval changes both icon production and where brand expression belongs. Layered app icons participate in the new material system, while interface symbols and familiar component behavior remain distinct from app identity.
SF Symbols, platform masking, and appearance adaptation already exist. Early 2025 app-icon guidance also covers dark and tinted appearances, and layered icons on some platforms. Neither adaptive icons nor layered artwork begins from zero in 2025.
The current app-icon workflow emphasizes unmasked layers, system-rendered effects, and Icon Composer. Updated branding guidance is more explicit about preserving familiar component sizing, placement, and behavior while expressing identity.
“Express your brand with familiar components.”
2025 · layered composition becomes central. The current App icons page is organized around layer design, shape, visual effects, and appearances. Designers supply source layers that the system can render, rather than baking every highlight and blur into a flattened asset. This changes the production brief: foreground separation and the relationship to the background matter alongside the final silhouette.
HIG · App Icons (2025-02-25 archive) ↗ HIG · App Icons · Layer design (as of 2026-09-19) ↗ HIG · App Icons · Visual effects (as of 2026-09-19) ↗System effects need room to work. The current guidance favors unmasked layers and leaves effects such as blurring to the system. Artwork with a pre-drawn mask or simulated glass effect can interfere with that rendering. Review the deliverable in the actual icon workflow, including masking and appearances, rather than treating an exported square preview as the complete result.
HIG · App Icons · Icon shape (as of 2026-09-19) ↗ HIG · App Icons · Visual effects (as of 2026-09-19) ↗Continuity · dark and tinted are not new concepts. The early app-icon source already discusses appearance variants. The current refinement is how a consistent identity survives the newer rendering system. Preserve recognizable features across appearances and check legibility at small sizes; a technically generated variant that changes the identity too far is still a design problem.
HIG · App Icons (2025-02-25 archive) ↗ HIG · App Icons · Appearances (as of 2026-09-19) ↗2025 · symbols gain expressive options. The current SF Symbols guidance includes newer animation and rendering capabilities. These broaden the tools for feedback and hierarchy, but do not make motion or gradients appropriate everywhere. Choose a familiar symbol first, then use animation only where it communicates a state change or meaningful response.
HIG · Sf Symbols (2025-01-03 archive) ↗ HIG · Sf Symbols (as of 2026-09-19) ↗ HIG · Motion (as of 2026-09-19) ↗2025–26 · color is contextual. A brand accent that works on a flat surface can lose clarity when paired with vivid content behind a glass control. Current color and branding guidance asks designers to consider those interactions. Establish a hierarchy of brand use instead of applying the same saturated accent to every label, symbol, background, and navigation surface.
HIG · Branding (2024-01-24 archive) ↗ HIG · Branding (as of 2026-09-19) ↗ HIG · Color · Liquid Glass color (as of 2026-09-19) ↗2026 · component familiarity becomes more explicit. The revised Branding page specifically addresses identity through familiar components and preservation of expected sizing, placement, and behavior. This is directly relevant to a custom tab bar: the critique should identify which expectation changes and why that serves the user, rather than assume distinctive branding requires replacing the component.
HIG · Branding (2024-01-24 archive) ↗ HIG · Branding · Best practices (as of 2026-09-19) ↗App identity and action semantics are different. An app icon identifies the product; an interface icon identifies an action, object, or destination. A distinctive brand mark can be appropriate for the first while an unfamiliar metaphor harms the second. Duo's re-presentation of actions makes that separation more consequential: recognizable symbols and meaningful titles must remain usable outside their original layout.
HIG · Icons (2024-08-13 archive) ↗ HIG · Icons (as of 2026-09-19) ↗ HIG · Designing For Iphone Duo · Vertical controls (as of 2026-09-19) ↗A coherent identity can be expressed through content, illustration, writing, and considered use of color while preserving system navigation. That is not a prescription for blandness. It is a way to spend design effort where distinctiveness helps recognition without asking people to relearn routine controls.
The early-2025 bank represents an incomplete archive of pages dated before March 2025. Gaps in the archive do not mean absent guidance. These counts describe the available evidence, not a full-corpus growth rate or the importance of the changes. The entire Duo page is counted once under Platforms & technologies.
Early 2025 → Today · Reshaped
The largest visual change is a new material system for the control layer. It is substantially more than blur, and it does not replace every existing material or turn app content into glass.
The early materials page describes semantic thickness, blur, vibrancy, and adaptable appearance. Dark Mode, dynamic colors, accessibility settings, and visionOS glass already exist. Translucency itself is not new in 2025.
Liquid Glass adds a coordinated, dynamic treatment for navigation and controls on supported platforms, with specific rules for layering, tint, contrast, and motion. Standard materials remain available for content and other contexts.
“Don’t use Liquid Glass in the content layer.”
2025 · a distinct layer for controls. The current Materials page separates Liquid Glass from standard materials. Navigation and controls sit above the app's content; the content itself should not receive Liquid Glass. This is the starting point for assessing a glass treatment: first identify which layer the element belongs to, then select the material. A list row or content card does not qualify merely because transparency looks attractive.
HIG · Materials (2025-02-07 archive) ↗ HIG · Materials · Liquid Glass (as of 2026-09-19) ↗Beyond blur · the material responds. Liquid Glass includes optical and motion behavior that responds to the surrounding interface. A fixed translucent rectangle is therefore an incomplete specification. For an actual product, evaluate changing backgrounds, interactions, and transitions. The design consequence is that component anatomy and state behavior matter alongside the resting appearance.
WWDC25 · Meet Liquid Glass · 0:00 ↗ HIG · Motion (as of 2026-09-19) ↗Regular and clear serve different contexts. The current guidance distinguishes the regular treatment from clear Liquid Glass over visually rich backgrounds. Clear is a contextual choice, not a universally preferable version with more transparency. The review should begin with foreground legibility and what lies behind the control; switching materials to match a mockup without that context can make the same component fail elsewhere.
HIG · Materials · Liquid Glass (as of 2026-09-19) ↗Existing materials still have a role. The earlier guidance to choose materials by semantic purpose survives in today's Standard materials section. Adopting Liquid Glass does not mean removing every blur, fill, or material from the content layer. A migration should classify the existing uses and update the appropriate controls, rather than replace materials indiscriminately across the app.
HIG · Materials · Best practices (2025-02-07 archive) ↗ HIG · Materials · Standard materials (as of 2026-09-19) ↗Color now interacts across layers. Content can influence the appearance of the controls above it. Today's color guidance therefore asks for restraint in tinting glass and the labels or symbols on it. A saturated brand color applied to every control can compete with colorful content underneath. Test the combination, including representative photographs and illustrations, instead of approving each layer in isolation.
HIG · Color (2025-01-28 archive) ↗ HIG · Color · Liquid Glass color (as of 2026-09-19) ↗Avoid compensating with extra chrome. Toolbar guidance warns that custom backgrounds can interfere with system background effects. Adding an opaque slab behind a floating bar may solve one contrast screenshot while suppressing the system's intended relationship to content. Prefer the supported treatments and scroll edge effects, then test whether the real content requires additional intervention.
HIG · Toolbars · Best practices (as of 2026-09-19) ↗ HIG · Scroll Views (as of 2026-09-19) ↗Shape becomes a relationship. The toolbar guidance favors standard components whose corner radii are concentric with their enclosing bar. This is a relationship among nested shapes, not a mandate to apply one radius token everywhere. A custom inner button needs to fit its container through different sizes and groupings; repeating the same numeric radius can produce visibly inconsistent spacing.
HIG · Toolbars · Best practices (as of 2026-09-19) ↗ HIG · Buttons (as of 2026-09-19) ↗Motion carries state and continuity. Liquid Glass adds new expressive transitions, while the existing motion guidance still favors purpose, brevity, optional motion, and responsive feedback. The relevant change is the system's movement vocabulary, not permission to animate every interaction. Frequent navigation should remain efficient, and reduced-motion preferences still need a coherent presentation.
HIG · Motion (2023-11-02 archive) ↗ HIG · Motion (as of 2026-09-19) ↗ HIG · Accessibility (as of 2026-09-19) ↗Platform distinction · visionOS glass predates this. The early archive already describes visionOS glass and environmental adaptation. It would be historically wrong to call all glass interfaces a 2025 invention or assume the same material rules apply identically to every platform. Consult the platform-specific guidance, especially for spatial comfort and preserving visibility into the surrounding environment.
HIG · Materials · visionOS (2025-02-07 archive) ↗ HIG · Materials · visionOS (as of 2026-09-19) ↗A useful migration review asks three questions of every conspicuous material: what layer is this, what role does it communicate, and what happens as its context changes? This produces more reliable decisions than matching a single reference image. The strongest brand expression may come from the content behind the control rather than a custom coating applied to the control itself.
The early-2025 bank represents an incomplete archive of pages dated before March 2025. Gaps in the archive do not mean absent guidance. These counts describe the available evidence, not a full-corpus growth rate or the importance of the changes. The entire Duo page is counted once under Platforms & technologies.