I'm developing an iPadOS 18+ application that uses a UITabBarController, styled as a sidebar, to serve as the primary navigation interface. This setup includes 20 different tabs, each representing a distinct section of the app. For the user experience, each tab needs to present a master-detail interface, implemented using a UISplitViewController. The goal is to allow users to navigate between tabs via the sidebar, and within each tab, access related content through the split view's list-detail pattern. The Problem: Currently, my implementation involves instantiating a separate UISplitViewController for each tab, resulting in 20 unique split view instances embedded inside the UITabBarController. While this works functionally, it leads to significant memory usage, especially after the user opens each tab at least once. The accumulation of all these instantiated view controllers in memory eventually causes performance degradation or even memory warnings/crashes on lower-end iPads. The Question: What is the best approach to implement this type of architecture without running into memory management issues? Specifically: Is there a way to reuse or lazily load the UISplitViewController instances only when needed? Can we unload or release split view controllers that haven't been used for a while to reduce memory pressure? Would a custom container controller be more appropriate than using UITabBarController in this case? Are there iPadOS 18+ best practices or newer APIs that support this kind of complex multi-tab, multi-split-view structure efficiently? Any advice on how to optimize memory usage while preserving the sidebar navigation and split view layout would be highly appreciated.

I am looking for guidance on how people have solved this problem/use case. What is the best way to structure a seat based subscription app that an organization can pay for seats for all their users, can be distributed via mdm or via app store and is easy (low friction) to get paid for and started for small companies? I market to a business to buy my app, they want it installed on all 25 devices they have. They use ABM to acquire 25 licenses with and MDM to distribute. The app is currently free to download so ABM charges $0 but has a paywall to use. The paywall is a RevenueCat one and no user account is needed. All entitlements and free trial work great. When it is deployed to the 25 devices, they can either sign up with their own AppleId and own/company credit card, or use a company appleid and company card for all 25 devices to solve the issue but neither are great. Doubtful they would want to pay their money for a company required app on a company phone (don’t blame them). If they share an appleid, my MRR drops to 1/25th since they will just share the purchase. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Hi everyone, I’m a mixed reality designer currently building visionOS experiences (RealityKit + SwiftUI), and I’m working on a course at Arizona State University where we develop a project in response to a real-world client. I’m looking to collaborate with someone in the visionOS ecosystem who would be open to sharing a simple prompt or brief (nothing confidential), which I can use to create a proposal response. The outcome would include: Spatial concept + storyboard Interaction design direction Rough scope, timeline, and team structure Optional small prototype in visionOS The goal on my side is to better understand how spatial work is framed and communicated in real-world scenarios, especially within Apple’s ecosystem. The ask is very lightweight: 1–2 short check-ins during April or async feedback via email A bit about my work: Built Spatial Synesthesia for Apple Vision Pro Eye tracking interaction that isolates instruments in a live orchestral mix based on color perception Working with computer vision and spatial anchoring in Unity and visionOS Focused on perception-driven interaction and minimal UI systems If you’re a developer, designer, or part of a small studio working in visionOS and this sounds interesting, I’d love to connect. Thanks in advance. Leo

Hi, in the Human Interface Guidelines, Apple writes: Avoid using a segmented control in a toolbar. Toolbar items act on the current screen — they don’t let people switch contexts like segmented controls do. Along with this image: Source I'm confused by this example. The screenshot seems to be showing a segmented control in a toolbar. Is this saying that the Phone app's All/Missed toggle is different from a segmented control? Under iOS 26 it seems to take a different style compared to a regular segmented control. If so, which component is used to create this filter? Could you please clarify the guidelines? Thank you.

The bane of my existence has been designing interfaces where the whole view needs to scroll, but a portion is a List and the other portion is static. I run into this problem time and again so I was hoping someone has a good solution because we all know that embedding a List view inside ScrollView is a no-go within SwiftUI. It simply doesn't work. So what is a best practice when you need the whole screen to scroll, but a portion is a List? Use a navigation stack instead of a ScrollView? What if it's a child view of a navigation stack already?

Hi there I have developed an offline algorithm for calculating tides, which works based on the built-in database of tidal stations in some regions. The algorithm works correctly and the results match the real data. I would like to receive and add moon data from Weather Kit to the algorithm for performance improvement experiments. What requirements do I need to apply to the application so that I can use data from Weather Kit in my algorithm ?

Looking at the UIDesignRequiresCompatibility documentation, watchOS is not listed among the supported platforms. When added to the project, it is also being ignored, resulting in Liquid Glass design. It is possible to opt-out from Liquid Glass design temporarily. Is that just an oversight for Apple Watch please?

I've seen a few older posts claiming the same behavior I'm seeing which is my cloudkit/core data app only syncs to iOS when the iOS app is reloaded. Can someone clarify if this is a bug, or the expected behavior. I have an iOS app which the entire purpose of it is to view synced data from MacOS, and I have a refresh button which does nothing because the data only syncs when the app is closed and reopened. Am I supposed to tell users to close and reopen the app to see fresh data? that seems like a terrible UI behavior, and I know apple does not accept this as all of their apps sync without needing to be reloaded. For example the notes app does not need to be reloaded for the MacOS -> iOS data to be synced.

Prior to iOS 26, this successfully gave me a modal view with a transparent background: let settingsVC = MySettingsViewController() settingsVC.modalPresentationStyle = .automatic //settingsVC.modalPresentationStyle = .overCurrentContext self.present(settingsVC, animated: true, completion: { } MySettingsViewController: self.view.backgroundColor = UIColor(white: 0, alpha: 0.5) Now in iOS 26, modal view is presented in a opaque grey background.

I downloaded iOS 26 beta 3. I was very happy with how it turned out, but when I activated Siri, I noticed the rainbow pulsing glow that bordered the phone was missing, and all that was left was the original Siri bubble. I was very disappointed, does anyone know how to get this back? I loved that design feature.

Hello Apple Engineering Team and Fellow Developers, I’ve been using iOS 26 beta from day one and closely following all its improvements. One feature that significantly enhances the user experience is the automatic hiding of the Home Bar (the bottom navigation indicator) after a few seconds of inactivity in menus and apps. This subtle but powerful UI behavior not only increases immersion but also reduces distractions, making navigation smoother and visually cleaner. I strongly urge the Apple team to integrate this feature into the upcoming iOS 18.6 update. Bringing this polished interaction to iOS 18 users would greatly improve usability and keep the interface modern and elegant. Thank you for your continuous efforts in refining iOS. Looking forward to seeing this improvement officially adopted soon! Best regards, [ERFANEX]

Hi community my name is Adam Robles. I have a question. I recently downloaded the beta on my iPad Pro 13 inch and I noticed where are the iPad wallpapers I only get one wallpaper, but where what happened to the wallpaper that was released with iPad last year

In the past, we had a red badge without a number on the app icon. We want to bring it back. Please provide instructions.

Hi everyone, I’m testing our SwiftUI app on both Xcode simulator and a real iPhone. On the simulator, everything looks clean and aligned. But when I run it on an actual iPhone (same build, iOS 18), the layout looks broken—fonts overlap, spacing is off, and elements are misaligned. Both screenshots are from the exact same screen and time. First is simulator, second is iPhone. Any idea why this difference happens? Is there something I should check in terms of rendering or layout settings? Thanks in advance!

I placed apple.logo symbol image on the top of a view. This view is used to link or unlink Apple ID for user. In the middle is the apple sign in button. I want to use something to describe or represent what the view is, instead of using text description. so I think sign in's company logo is a good choice. Is it allowed by apple official?

Hi, I am trying to create a custom SF Symbol from an SVG file created with Affinity Designer but, even though my SVG file look perfect in Firefox for example compared to the exported custom.circle.svg file (as recommended in Apple's documentation), I fail to get rid of this error: "The provided variants are not interpolatable" My creation process using Affinity Designer is: Export as SVG file Duplicate the custom.circle.svg file exported from the SF Symbols app In the new file, replace the 3 "path" tags in the "g" sections "id="Black-S", "Regular-S", "Ultralight-S" with the paths from the SVG file exported from Affinity designer Set the 3 transform matrices to "matrix(1 0 0 1 0 0)" for the 3 variants to be generated at the correct location. Verify in an SVG viewer that the file looks correct. Import the file via Drag&Drop into the SF Symbols app. What is wrong with my file? Thank you in advance for any help, Marc mySymbol.svg.txt

Hi everyone 👋 I’ve been using the Apple Pencil Pro with my iPad Pro M4 and absolutely love it — the squeeze gesture, rotation, and haptics are amazing for creative work. But I’ve run into a little roadblock… Right now, only one Pencil Pro can be paired at a time. So while one is charging, you can’t use another as a backup without unpairing and re-pairing, which interrupts the workflow. I’d really love to see one of two things: The ability to use one Pencil while another charges or An official external charger (or support for third-party ones) Personally, I’d happily buy both a second Pencil and a charger if this became possible. I’ve even chatted with other creatives who feel the same — it would make a huge difference for long projects or working on the go. Just wanted to share this idea and see if anyone else here would like this too. Thanks for reading!

Not sure if anyone else has this issue, however with the new appearances when i use the dark appearance and then open the app "TickTick", the icon goes to its original colour until the app is closed.

Hi all — I wanted to share an idea I recently submitted through Feedback Assistant that I think could improve safety and usability for drivers using CarPlay: Add an option to overlay live weather radar (rain, snow, storms, etc.) directly onto CarPlay Maps while navigating. Similar to how traffic conditions are shown now, this would allow drivers to visually track incoming weather in real time without switching apps or relying on separate devices. Why this matters: • Enhances driver safety by increasing situational awareness • Helps with trip planning and route adjustments around severe weather • Reduces distractions by integrating everything into one screen • Useful for everyday drivers, long-haul travelers, and first responders I submitted this via Feedback Assistant, but I’d love to know what others think. If you also see value in this feature, consider submitting your own version via Feedback Assistant so Apple sees there’s interest. Let’s push for smarter, safer navigation — thanks for reading!

hi, i have an objc ipad application that use xib with zooming for adapt to the screen (until ios18) but with ipad os 26 will be displayed wrong