Apple unveiled a list of new things during its WWDC keynote, but most of them were old news to Android fans.
Apple’s WWDC keynote was jam-packed with an array of new features, apps, and tweaks designed to make our Apple device prettier and more powerful than ever before. Come September, Apple devices new and old will have an assortment of new tricks to try in iOS 13, iPadOS, and watchOS 6, and to hear Craig Federighi and company deliver the news, they’ll be nothing less than ground-breaking, earth-shattering, and straight-up revolutionary.
But while the new updates may indeed be as dramatic and delightful for iPhones, iPads, and Apple Watches as Apple says they are, they’re not exactly new. At least not for anyone other than Apple users anyway. Most of the marquee features Apple announced yesterday have already been done before, and as the crowd whooped and hollered at every obvious applause break, Android and Fitbit fans were likely smirking rather than clapping.
Yes, Apple delivered dark mode for the menu bar and Dock with Yosemite and expanded it to apps with macOS Mojave last year, but Dark Mode on smartphones is old hat. Google’s has had a dark theme on its phones for years, and Samsung introduced a system-wide dark mode with its One UI redesign earlier this year. When Apple says Dark Mode is «thoughtfully designed to make every element on the screen easier on your eyes and is seamlessly integrated throughout the system» just remember that Galaxy and Pixel users had it first.
Dark Mode may be pretty but it’s not new.
This feature is so overdue Apple doesn’t even have a fancy name for it. In iPadOS, you’ll be able to «see your active and recent downloads in Safari and access them easily from the new Downloads folder in Files,» thanks to the existence of a bonafide downloads manager. Talk to any Android user and they won’t be able to remember a time when they couldn’t do that.
The ability to search, download, and install apps on your wrist is a huge step for the Apple Watch, but it was a bigger deal when Google launched the Play Store for Android Wear watches back in 2017.
