Updated June 3 with further analysis of exactly what will be revealed on Monday, June 9.
When Tim Cook introduces Apple’s World Wide Developer Conference on Monday, June 9, at 10 a.m. Pacific in the grounds of Apple Park, it looks like the company will reveal its biggest software overhaul in years — Bloomberg refers to part of it as the company’s “biggest-ever software rebranding” and says it promises many changes for this and the operating systems for other Apple devices, too. Now, a new page in the Apple developer website gives a clue as to what the new software might look like. Read about that in the section below on design.
For many iPhone users, the software, thought to be called iOS 26, will make them feel like their existing handset is suddenly a whole new iPhone. Here are the latest details.
iOS 26: The New Name
If you’ve missed the recent news on the renumbering about to take place, reports say that every new OS announced at WWDC will have the same number, referring to the year in which it will mostly be updated: 2026. So, instead of iOS 19, we’ll see iOS 26, alongside watchOS 26, macOS 26, iPadOS 26 and tvOS26. The biggest number leap will come with the Vision Pro, which will jump from visionOS 2 right to visionOS 26. More details of this here.
Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman refers to it this way: “This reinforces the unification theme and helps make the naming less confusing for developers and consumers,” and speculates that the 26 is partly because Apple is planning to move to more frequent software updates rather than a big rollout in the fall and that using the number of the upcoming year is “obviously much more forward looking” than 25.
iOS 26: The New Design
It’s just a week until the conference starts, and it seems the software will be designed alongside new versions of iPad, Mac, Apple Watch, Vision Pro and Apple TV operating systems, all designed to be much more similar to each other and provide a more cohesive feel between devices.
The internal codename for the software is Solarium, which conjures images of brightness and sunlight — though many codenames are selected at random. Still, if it takes its design cues from the Vision Pro, as has been reported, then there will be a light, translucent look to things.
Now, Apple has shared a new teaser at developer.apple.com, which, as you’d expect, is aimed primarily at developers. The first thing to notice is that the words “On the Horizon,” which decorated the page until now have been replaced with a new legend: “Sleek peek,” which is right in line with Apple’s love for taking a familiar phrase and turning it in a different direction.
So, the sneak in sneak peek is replaced by sleek. Clearly, that means that what we’re going to see unveiled is something sleek. And as if to prove it, the rainbow image previously found on the page has been replaced with something different.
Now, it’s the Apple logo, in three dimensions as though it’s been die-cut out of glass, or Perspex or something else translucent. The colors from the WWDC25 letting underneath are gently reflected up into the base of the Apple logo, again suggesting translucence. In short, it’s exactly the sort of thing you’d expect to see somewhere in the Vision Pro’s design.
Meanwhile, Greg Joswiak, Apple’s smoothly accomplished Senior Vice President Worldwide Marketing, posted on X. The words were straightforward enough: “WWDC25 is next week! Can’t wait to show you what we’ve been working on. See you June 9 at 10am PT,” he said. He also put the new WWDC25 hashmoji into the text, but you’ll have to click on the link to see it. That also applies for the animation in the post, which shows the Apple logo morphing first into the Swift logo — that’s Swift, Apple’s coding language — and then into a rainbow.
All three have the same translucent glow that looks gorgeous and bodes well.
iOS 26: The Key Upgrades
According to Gurman in his latest Power On newsletter, there will be plenty of changes beyond the design update. Expect to see new iPad features to build on its productivity capabilities, making it more like the Mac. Apple is thought to be opening up its Apple Intelligence models to developers, “which will let them integrate the technology into their own apps,” Gurman says.
Gurman also says that Apple Intelligence won’t be the center of this year’s WWDC: “The conference may be a letdown from an AI standpoint,” he says, with the focus being on the design and “the basics,” such as making it easy to share Wi-Fi sign-in details across all your devices, “a handy improvement for logging in at gyms and hotels,” he claims. Though — and I don’t mean to be controversial here — shouldn’t you be doing other things at the gym rather than signing into multiple gadgets?
It’s also reported that there will be an eye-scrolling option for the Vision Pro and a revamped Health app.
iOS 26: Battery Life
There’s a lot more to come, including a calligraphy pen for Apple Pencil and live translation for AirPods, but one really stands out for me: an AI-powered battery management set-up, which will make devices last longer between charges.
That alone means I can’t wait for the new OS to land. The announcement is just days away, then the developer betas of the software will arrive, with the first public beta expected in July, and general release in September.
