Best of Apple — June 2025

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   Community Picks·47w

   Liquid Glass, but in CSS

   A detailed technical breakdown of recreating Apple's new Liquid Glass design language using CSS and SVG filters. The implementation involves multiple layers including specular highlights with box-shadow, backdrop blur and color filters, SVG displacement maps for refraction effects, and chromatic aberration simulation. The technique requires advanced CSS filter knowledge and has significant browser compatibility limitations, working primarily in Chrome with performance considerations for GPU usage.

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   Article

   Lobsters·51w

   Physicality: the new age of UI

   A comprehensive exploration of iOS design evolution from skeuomorphic to flat design, leading to a prediction of the next era focused on 'physicality' and dynamic glass-like interfaces. The author analyzes how VisionOS design principles might influence future iOS redesigns, proposing a 'Living Glass' concept where UI elements behave like real materials with dynamic lighting, reflections, and spatial depth. The piece examines the technical and design challenges of implementing such interfaces across Apple's ecosystem.

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   Article

   CodePen·49w

   Chris’ Corner: Liquid Ass – CodePen

   The liquid glass design trend is gaining popularity among developers, with CSS implementations using backdrop-filter blur effects to create frosted glass appearances. While visually appealing and demonstrated by Apple in their recent designs, this trend raises accessibility concerns due to poor text contrast ratios. The effect has been around for years but is experiencing renewed interest, with developers creating various implementations and tutorials.

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   Article

   80 LEVEL·49w

   Man Joked He Was Fired for Apple's New Liquid Glass Design

   Apple introduced Liquid Glass, a semi-transparent design at WWDC25 that drew comparisons to Windows Vista's Aero interface. A developer named Jon Yongfook successfully trolled the internet by falsely claiming Apple fired him for the design, leading some outlets to report it as real news. The design sparked various recreation attempts by artists using CSS, SVG, and Blender, with notable contributions from Blender creator Jesse Miettinen who created a glass-like interface parody.

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   Video

   Fireship·50w

   Apple redefines reality (again) at WWDC25…

   Apple announced native Linux containerization for macOS at WWDC 2025, allowing developers to run containers without Docker Desktop through optimized VMs on Apple Silicon. The company introduced 'liquid glass' as their new design language for iOS 26, emphasizing transparency effects. Swift received updates including Java interoperability and C/C++ mixing capabilities. Apple downplayed AI features this year after previous struggles, while simultaneously releasing research questioning the intelligence of large language models.

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   Video

   Awesome·48w

   Apple just exposed the lie of thinking AI

   Apple's recent research paper challenges the capabilities of AI reasoning models by testing them on logical puzzles like Tower of Hanoi and river-crossing problems. The study reveals that these models don't actually reason but instead use sophisticated pattern matching to simulate thoughtful responses. While reasoning models perform better on medium-difficulty tasks, they fail completely on complex real-world scenarios, even when given step-by-step algorithms. The research suggests that current AI systems are better at appearing intelligent than actually being intelligent, exposing the gap between marketing hype and technical reality.

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   Article

   Hacker News·50w

   My Mac Contacted 63 Different Apple Owned Domains in One Hour - While Not is Use

   A Mac user discovered their M2 MacBook Air contacted 63 different Apple domains in one hour while idle, representing 25% of all DNS queries despite using NextDNS to block telemetry. The domains included services for push notifications, CloudKit, iTunes/App Store, location services, crash reports, and various Apple infrastructure components. Notably, an older 2019 Intel MacBook Pro with identical DNS settings only had 3% of queries going to Apple domains, suggesting newer Macs may have increased background communication with Apple services.

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   Article

   WebKit·47w

   A step into the spatial web: The HTML model element in Apple Vision Pro

   visionOS 26 introduces the HTML model element as a default feature, enabling developers to embed 3D USDZ models directly in web pages for Apple Vision Pro. The element provides a simple API for displaying stereoscopic 3D content with features like orbit mode for user interaction, entity transforms for positioning, environment mapping for realistic lighting, and animation controls similar to video elements. The implementation supports the spatial web vision by making 3D content integration easier than traditional WebXR approaches.

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   Article

   LogRocket·49w

   Liquid Glass is here — how should designers respond?

   Apple introduced Liquid Glass, a new transparent UI design language for iOS 26 and other platforms, marking their first major mobile interface redesign since iOS 7. While visually impressive with realistic glass effects and fluid animations, the design faces significant criticism for readability issues and accessibility concerns. The approach resembles glassmorphism trends and Windows Aero from 2006, raising questions about innovation claims. Despite beautiful animations and cross-platform unification goals, users report cognitive load increases, contrast problems, and performance issues in the developer beta.

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