WWDC: One of the main annual events for tech enthusiasts is the World Wide Developer Conference. Apple’s event dedicated to developers is always a harbinger of new software, and this time, the menu was rich as the Cupertino-based company unveiled its most significant design change. Just as iOS7, launched in 2013, broke with the past with flat icons and smooth animations, Liquid Glass is an aesthetic language for interfaces that surprises the eye and the touch, as well as reacting to movement, displaying a floating, translucent surface.
It is modelled on the Vision Pro headset system and will be the basis for the near future of Apple devices, whose operating systems no longer follow the company’s progressive numbering system but conform to the year of release. That’s why we’ll have iOS 26, iPadOS 26 and WatchOS 26.
What’s new on iPhone
The most eagerly awaited update is always the one for the iPhone, which will arrive in the autumn with some interesting new features. The most useful could be Call Screening, an anti-spam feature that uses voicemail to automatically answer calls from unknown numbers. It works as a filter against scams and telemarketing because when the system understands that there is a real person on the other end, the call will go through to the recipient.
In the Messages app, it will now be possible to filter messages received from contacts not in your address book, while in Maps, you will be able to trace the locations you have visited using the Places feature. It should be noted that iOS 25 is available for iPhone 11 and later, but AI features are only available on iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max and above.
Not much Apple Intelligence
Speaking of AI, WWDC did not feature Apple Intelligence, whose update is limited to the availability of simultaneous translations integrated into iMessage and other apps. It works quickly and intuitively: when you read a message in chat, you can click on the icon to translate the text, while on FaceTime, there will be subtitles to translate what the other person is saying. Finally, in calls, the translation will be heard immediately after the phrase is spoken in the unknown language by the person on the other end. It remains to be seen when these new features will arrive in European markets.
Updates on iPad and Apple Watch
As is tradition, the Mac system has a dedicated name, and this time, Apple has chosen Tahoe, the lake in the Sierra Nevada mountains on the border between California and Nevada. Among the many new features, one to highlight is the evolution of Spotlight, which, through Apple Intelligence, becomes an effective solution for quickly searching for content on your device.
WatchOS 26 brings a training instructor to the Apple Watch, which helps you improve by analysing the physical activity stored in the Fitness app and telling you how your progress is going over time. It is a sort of motivator trained by Apple to spread positivity for the present and the future.
Vision Pro and Games, but no Siri
Although it has not been a success in terms of sales and reception, Apple continues to focus on mixed-reality headsets. In addition to customisable widgets, the appearance of the avatars you interact with has now been improved, while the features are designed to make VisionPro a device for the enterprise world. It is impossible to say at this stage whether it will become a tool limited to certain fields of application, as was the case with Google Glass, but this could well be the trend.
Among the latest innovations worth mentioning is Games, a new app dedicated to Apple Arcade that will allow users to access their games from a single place and keep track of their results. The new AirPods were not presented, but they have been enhanced with some useful features, such as remote camera control by pressing and holding the stem. Given the limited space for Apple Intelligence, Siri fared even worse, being completely absent from WWDC 2025.
