So what went wrong with that Dynamic Island? Discuss.

Apple’s WWDC 2023 event is less than three weeks away and, as is usually the case, there are more rumors than ever making the rounds on the Web about what the new versions of iOS, iPad OS, macOS, watchOS and TVOS have in store for billions of consumers across the globe. There’s one iOS feature in particular, though, that some of us are quite curious to see how it will be handled by Apple, maybe even more so than any new ones: the Dynamic Island. That’s mainly because it’s hard to shake the feeling that, well, we’ve been here before – twice, in fact – and that how Apple handles this might prove to be rather important in the future.

For anyone in need of a reminder, the Dynamic Island is Apple’s version of the pill-shaped cutout that many Android smartphones had adopted over the years for the selfie camera – only, in the case of the iPhone 14 Pro and 14 Pro Max, that camera cutout was actually disguised as an interactive part of the screen that morphed into different shapes depending on different functions of iOS 16. It was the kind of original, delightful feature – “so very Apple” in nature and execution – that impressed a lot of people and piqued the interest of many more in terms of possible future functionality. Could this be a true step forward in UI control, an ingenious way to increase smartphone screen usability after so many years of minimal to no progress at all in that area?

Yours truly was impressed enough by it to leave his trusty iPhone 12 Pro Max behind for an iPhone 14 Pro Max partially because of the Dynamic Island’s potential, as – at the time – it seemed that “the basic concept is sound, it’s smart, it’s different and it’s certainly more than what any other manufacturer ever did with the “pill” or “pill and hole” thing on any Android device”, even concluding that “it’s not a gimmick” after 2 weeks of use.

Fast forward to May 2023, though, and hardly anyone’s talking about Dynamic Island. It’s almost as if Apple’s unveiling of it never happened, as if millions of iPhone 14 Pro/Pro Max users don’t even notice it on their devices’ screens anymore, let alone comment on its use or value. So… what happened, Apple?

It’s not that simple and, at the same time, it kind of is. It is for anyone able to recall a couple of similar failures.

Out of (3D) Touch, not raising the (Touch) Bar

This is not the first time Apple implemented a new user interface feature in iOS that seemed promising at first but turned out to be far less important in practice. Loyal fans of the company’s products surely remember 3D Touch, an iOS 9 feature made available back in 2015 alongside the iPhone 6S. It relied on a modified version of Apple’s Force Touch tech (originally developed for the touchpad of MacBook laptops) in order to add the option of “long-pressing” the icons of apps, adding extra functionality to them in a similar way that “right-clicking” an icon with a computer mouse on a desktop OS offers relevant options to consumers.

The original implementation of 3D Touch went through a few changes and was somewhat improved upon over the years that followed, but it eventually became clear that app developers had no intention of doing anything of note with it because consumers were not all that interested in using it. Or was it the other way around? Sometimes it’s hard to tell with these things! In any case, Apple did not see the point in trying to save 3D Touch all by itself by modifying its own apps to really take advantage of it in 2017 or 2018, so the company removed the feature altogether from iOS in 2019 (the iPhone XS/XS Max was the last model offering it).

The other feature that was supposed to bring a new level of interaction to an Apple system, but proved to be a failure to the point of attracting mockery instead, is the infamous Touch Bar the company added to a number of MacBook models between 2016 and 2021. That strip of touch-sensitive surface that so boldly replaced the row of physical function keys almost all laptops – or almost all keyboards for that matter – have offered since, well, forever, was never going to get much love from people who work with shortcuts in applications every day. If you know, you know.

But even MacBook owners not using their machines for professional work on a daily basis always seemed to either not really know what to do with the Touch Bar or be constantly frustrated by it. Apple itself struggled to demonstrate how modern software could leverage the Touch Bar’s versatile display in meaningful ways, let alone inspire developers to implement imaginative, genuinely helpful extra functionality for it. The fact that so few people even cared that Apple removed the Touch Bar from almost every MacBook in existence two years ago – there’s just one model still sporting it right now – is telling. Going back to physical function keys was widely celebrated by many Macbook users instead.

Those two features failed for three different reasons and all three apply to each feature in a different way. One, they looked promising on paper but seemingly no one made sure beforehand that, in the context of everyday use, those features actually delivered in terms of increased usability. The Touch Bar is guilty of this in a more obvious way, but 3D Touch did not manage to become part of the way consumers use their iPhones for 4 years either. Two, neither Apple nor developers managed to utilize them in a way that really added something of actual value in terms of how most or even many iPhone or MacBook owners used their devices. Software features that are just “nice to have” rarely ever prove to be successful. Three, neither feature was ever elevated to exclusivity status in terms of functionality: whatever Touch 3D or the TouchBar could do, Apple’s operating systems could do in other ways already.

At the end of the day, both features worked as fancy but unimaginative, just alternative ways of doing certain things. As a result, neither proved to be popular with developers or consumers, so… yeah. Apple ditched both and moved on.

A second chance that might well be the last

The reason why it’s worth keeping an eye on what Apple intends to do with the Dynamic Island is simple: this feature will also be offered by the iPhone 15 and the iPhone 15 Plus this year, not just the iPhone 15 Pro and the iPhone 15 Pro Max, so the number of people having it at their disposal will grow significantly in 2023 and 2024. It’s already expected by industry insiders to be included in the new 2024 iPhone lineup too, so it’s not going away anytime soon. Since it’s going to be right there in the middle of the screen of so many iPhones, Apple can’t just forget about it and move on (like it did with Touch 3D). Plus, since Dynamic Island is intrinsically connected to the front-facing camera, only iPhones sporting an invisible, under-display selfie camera can do away with it completely (and those iPhones are a long way off).

No. Apple really must do more with it, over the next few years at the very least. But what?

That is anyone’s guess right now. Several people on Twitter who have routinely leaked information about Apple products in a somewhat accurate manner, though, agree that “new Dynamic Island features are coming in iOS 17”, “after insistence from the company’s marketing people” no less (so you just know there will be at least one flashy but pointless thing the new Dynamic Island will be able to do). There will probably be more types of notifications supported this time around, some actually useful Live Activities information displayed, maybe more default iOS apps will use it in more imaginative ways and there’s even talk about Siri’s fancy orb moving up from the bottom of the screen – where it has always resided – into the Dynamic Island itself.

The most important thing, though, that Apple must do for the Dynamic Island is, quite frankly, obvious: give app developers all the tools and system permissions they’d ever need in order to have this feature either (a) do stuff that saves consumers a lot of time and effort compared to how they are currently doing something or (b) do stuff that just can’t be done in any other way but by using the Dynamic Island.

That is exactly how this feature will catch on and that is how it can become a competitive advantage of the iPhone 14 Pro/15 lineups over older iPhones or Android flagship smartphones. If Apple does not announce changes of that kind for iOS 17 in June, the Dynamic Island could end up being the company’s most notable UI failure ever. It’s not that hard of a choice, then, is it Tim?