When Apple presented iOS 26 at WWDC 2025, one of its most talked-about changes was a clearing visual update named Fluid Glass. This unused stylish brings glass-like translucency, liquid movement, profundity, and energetic lighting to the center of Apple’s interface over iOS, iPadOS, macOS, watches', and TVs.
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But as before long as Fluid Glass saw the light of day, the tech press started taking note echoes of that fashion showing up elsewhere—specifically, in an Android skin from Chinese smartphone company Vivo. Their up and coming OriginOS 6 shows up to borrow intensely from the Fluid Glass dictionary.
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Is this replicating, impersonation, or merging? And what does it cruel for plan inventiveness, client involvement, and competition? Let’s unpack.
What Is Fluid Glass?
To get it the circumstance, we to begin with require a clear picture of Apple’s Fluid Glass plan dialect: where it came from, what its objectives are, and how it works.
Origins & Philosophy
Liquid Glass was formally presented by Apple on June 9, 2025 at WWDC.
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The thought was to move past the moderately level, negligible tasteful that has ruled in later a long time and instep infuse a sense of profundity, translucency, and movement — reminiscent of how light interatomic with genuine glass. Apple depicts it as combining the “optical properties of glass” with a feeling of ease.
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One of Apple’s objectives is unification: making plan components feel reliable over stages, from versatile to desktop to wearable.
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Key Visual & Interaction Elements
Liquid Glass incorporates a few characterizing characteristics:
Translucent boards & obscured foundations: UI layers (e.g. Control Center, notices, boards) act like iced glass, unobtrusively obscuring substance behind them.
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Refraction & energetic lighting: The interface components can refract or move in reaction to gadget development or fundamental substance, creating a sense of layered profundity.
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Soft corners, adjusted symbols and buttons: Shapes are delicate, bended, and steady over framework UI parts.
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Depth layering & shadows: UI components are stacked with unpretentious shadows and 3D balanced to pass on pecking order and dimensionality.
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Motion & liquid movements: Moves, swipes, scrolls are implied to feel smooth, streaming, and outwardly associated.
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Adaptive to light/dark modes: The plan adjusts tints and differentiate to keep up clarity whereas keeping up straightforwardness.
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Beyond the visuals, Apple offers APIs and plan rules to third-party designers to embrace the Fluid Glass stylish (e.g. utilizing translucent materials, profundity prompts, obscure shades).
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In brief, Fluid Glass is implied to be more than enhancement — it is a all encompassing plan framework that touches each angle of the client interface.
The Affirmations: Vivo’s OriginOS 6 Imitating Fluid Glass
In the days and weeks taking after the iOS 26 declaration, eyewitnesses taken note that Vivo, by means of its custom Android overlay OriginOS 6, appears to be drawing intensely from Apple’s unused plan. Numerous tech outlets hailed this as a near-direct impersonation.
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Let’s look at the likenesses and differences.
What OriginOS 6 Appears to Copy
Translucent boards & iced overlays
OriginOS 6 special visuals appear iced, semi-transparent boards behind notices, organizers, Control Center formats, widgets, and menus.
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Rounded symbols, Squirtle style
The symbols in demo interfacing receive the same softly-rounded, “Squirtle” see that Fluid Glass employments.
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Hovering dock & profundity layers
The dock shows up coasting over the foundation, and UI components are layered with profundity signals and shadows, giving a glass-like stacking impact.
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Animated, moving wallpapers
Wallpapers in OriginOS 6 move from 2D to 3D points of view or have light refraction impacts, resounding Apple’s “spatial scenes” backdrops.
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Control Center & UI format mimicry
The format, dispersing, translucency, and visual cadence of speedy flips and sliders emphatically take after iOS 26’s Control Center.
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Lock screen clock & styling
The energized clock on Vivo’s bolt screen interfacing is so near to Apple’s default clock on iOS 26 that numerous spectators say it might be mixed up for Apple’s possess UI.
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The likeness is not coincidental: different outlets call it “uncanny,” “blatant,” or “copying with exceptionally small disguising.”
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Are There Contrasts or Adaptations?
While the likenesses are solid, we ought to moreover note that OriginOS 6 is not a pixel-for-pixel clone. There are regions where Vivo will require to adjust to Android’s design, equipment limitations, or plan legacy:
The fundamental framework rationale, settings, and engineering must stay established in Android (with its entomb, notices, authorizations, etc.).
Some UI components (particularly framework UI like route signals, app switcher, or multitasking) may go astray out of necessity.
They might change colors, tints, or accentuation to way better suit AMOLED shows or distinctive encompassing light conditions.
Vivo may optimize execution so that overwhelming obscure, profundity, and render shades do not harmed battery life or responsiveness.
Still, the visual “spirit” is clearly intensely educated by Fluid Glass.
Why Do Android Creators Duplicate Apple’s Design?
This isn’t the to begin with time Android producers have drawn inspiration—sometimes heavily—from Apple’s interface changes. Let’s investigate why this happens and what drives it.
1. Tasteful Administration & Advertise Appeal
Apple is frequently seen as a trendsetter in UI/UX, so unused Apple plan moves tend to get consideration. When Apple revives its plan dialect, it can reset client desires. Android merchants may need to capture a few of that tasteful request or visual freshness, particularly in markets where iPhones are aspirational.
By receiving comparative visual dialect, Android brands might pull in clients who appreciate Apple’s see but lean toward Android highlights or ecosystem.
2. Joining of Visual Trends
It’s conceivable that different originators arrive at comparable arrangements freely. Translucency, profundity layering, movement impacts are as of now set up plan tropes (think Windows Aero, macOS translucency, Familiar Plan, etc.). So a few likeness may be common joining or maybe than copy.
However, the degree of similitude in Vivo’s demo proposes more than simple joining, given how numerous particular Fluid Glass characteristics are mirrored.
3. Competitive Signaling
If a producer can promote “We have what iOS clients cherish, but with Android’s flexibility,” that can be a showcasing point. Borrowing Apple’s “wow factor” can be a way to position a item as premium or cutting edge.
4. Client Brain research & Familiarity
Many clients are commonplace with iPhone aesthetics. A UI that “feels like iOS” might decrease contact for exchanging, or offer to clients who discover Apple’s UI more cleaned. A few Android plan choices endeavor to bridge that familiarity.
5. Brief Time to Market
Developing completely novel plan frameworks is costly and time-consuming. For a brand needing to revive its UI rapidly, adjusting an existing stylish as a beginning point is quicker. The center work at that point is customizing, refining, and optimizing for their possess equipment and interface patterns.
Implications & Dangers of Plan Copying
While replicating or near motivation is nothing unused in tech, a few dangers and suggestions emerge when an Android skin so closely mirrors Apple’s modern aesthetic.
1. Recognition of Unoriginality
If clients and faultfinders see a item as subordinate, it can harm brand distinction. Customers might say, “They fair cloned Apple, they need creativity.” Particularly for premium gadgets, separation in plan is a promoting asset.
2. Legal/Intellectual Property Concerns
Design licenses, interface exchange dress, or client interface copyrights can, in uncommon cases, be activated. Whereas UI plan is harder to secure all inclusive, greatly particular visual components can be challenged. The more one of a kind the plan dialect, the more hazard of lawful examination (in spite of the fact that we have no open prove of case emerging yet).
3. Ease of use & Clarity Tradeoffs
Liquid Glass has as of now drawn feedback for potential neatness issues: content differentiate over translucent surfaces, coherence beneath shinning surrounding light, or execution dragging due to overwhelming blur/shade impacts.
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If Vivo or others duplicate it without cautious alterations, those ease of use pitfalls might carry over or be exacerbated. A plan that looks lovely in demos might endure in real-world conditions.
4. Client Backfire & Brand Dependability Risk
Some clients are exceptionally delicate to “copying Apple.” They may see it as need of inventiveness or maybe than tribute. That can reverse discharge in tech-enthusiast communities or among brand loyalists.
5. Development Stagnation
If producers depend more on mirroring benchmark plan moves or maybe than pushing modern thoughts, the broader industry seem endure from less differences in aesthetics and slower evolution.
6. Specialized Execution & Battery Costs
Glassy UI, energetic lighting, profundity rendering, obscure, and movement impacts are computationally costly. Accomplishing smooth execution without serious battery deplete is nontrivial. A replicated tasteful with frail optimization would debase genuine usability.
What Does This Cruel for Apple, Android, and Users?
Looking ahead, what might the replicating of Fluid Glass flag for the industry?
For Apple
Validation of Plan Authority: Replicating is regularly a underhanded compliment. The reality that a major Android seller is so unmistakably embracing Fluid Glass affirms Apple’s impact in visual design.
Pressure to Advance, Not Fair Embellish: Apple will require to guarantee its plan developments are not fair tasteful — they must be seriously utilitarian and performant.
Ecosystem Use: The bound together plan dialect gives Apple more cohesion over stages; replicating by others may make Apple’s “authentic” execution more of a offering point.
For Android OEMs (Unique Gear Manufacturers)
Need for Separation: Whereas drawing motivation is characteristic, maintainable victory likely requires special adjustments or plan expansions or maybe than through and through mimicking.
Optimization Challenge: OEMs will have to contribute intensely to make such progressed visual impacts run easily over gadget variations, keeping up battery life and responsiveness.
User Desire Setting: If a UI looks like iOS, clients may anticipate iOS-esque behavior. Coming up short to adjust behavior may lead to disappointment.
For Users
Visual Taste Expansion: Clients may appreciate the opportunity to see Apple’s visual feel in Android environments.
Careful Examination of UX: A UI that looks smooth but hampers coherence or execution will isolate opinion.
More Theming Alternatives: Indeed if not built-in by OEMs, third-party launchers and topics will likely spring up, letting clients duplicate Fluid Glass over numerous devices.
Is This Truly “Copying,” or Fair Inspiration?
One dubious address is: at what point does motivation cross into replicating? The boundary is hazy, particularly in UI plan. A few considerations:
Overlap in numerous little points of interest (translucency, adjusted symbols, shadows, movement) recommends not fair coincidental convergence.
But these components are not totally unused — translucency, obscure, profundity layering have been utilized by numerous plan systems.
Adaptation vs. replication: If Vivo simply takes signals but reinterprets them in setting (e.g. for Android’s framework worldview), that contends more for inspiration.
User discernment things more than beginning: If the normal client feels that the UI is the same, brand separation suffers.
At show, numerous examiners incline toward calling it “blatant copying” or maybe than unimportant plan meeting — given how numerous unmistakable Fluid Glass characteristics are reflected in OriginOS 6.
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