As in previous years, the company will focus on software updates and new technologies, including the next version of iOS, which is rumored to have the most significant design changes since the introduction of iOS 7. But iOS 19 (or 26, if the rumors about the new naming system are true), isn’t the only thing the company will announce at WWDC 2025.
iOS is getting the most dramatic design change in over a decade. When Apple introduced a major overhaul to iOS back in 2013 with the launch of iOS 7, it felt jarring for many users with the shift from the prior skeuomorphic design with gradients and real-world textures to the more colorful, but flat, design style that reflected Apple’s then chief design officer Jony Ive’s taste for minimalism.
Reports suggest the new design may have elements referencing visionOS, the software powering Apple’s spatial computing headset, the Apple Vision Pro. If true, that means the new OS could feature a transparent interface and more circular app icons that break away from the traditional square format today.
Gizmodo reported: Apple’s annual WWDC developer conference is almost here, and it’s shaping up to be an important one. Not just for iOS, which is taking another step forward into a rumored redesigned iOS 19 or iOS 26, or for iPadOS, which just got WhatsApp right on time, or even for visionOS, the operating system for Apple’s seemingly sidelined Vision Pro headset that is still awaiting a rumored cheaper version.
Put all of those expected updates aside for a moment, because Apple actually has bigger fish to fry this year, and no iOS redesign will be enough to distract from the big, pink, AI-shaped elephant in the room. It’s time to talk about AI Siri, or the lack thereof.
In case you haven’t been keeping track, Apple Intelligence has had some struggles since Apple’s launch in October 2024, and the most notable of those stumbles is arguably its LLM-powered Siri voice assistant, which, to date, still hasn’t made its debut.
CNBC reported: One year ago, Apple announced Apple Intelligence, its response to the wave of sophisticated chatbots and systems kicked off by the arrival of ChatGPT and the age of generative AI.
Analysts said Apple’s installed base of more than 1 billion iPhones, the stat on its device and its custom-designed silicon chips were advantages that would help the company become an AI leader.
Apple Intelligence stumbled out of the gate while rivals like OpenAI, Google and Meta have continued to make headway launching new generative-AI models.
Now, investors are calling for Apple to do something major to catch up in AI, which is rapidly transforming the tech industry.