5 ms·

I don't see it said enough, but liquid glass slowed my M3 noticably. Odd I got the update 2 weeks before M5 launch. Software as a means to obsolete hardware.

I don't see it said enough, but liquid glass slowed my M3 noticably. Odd I got the update 2 weeks before M5 launch. Software as a means to obsolete hardware. Trillion dollar company

frizlab 1y ago
I have an M3 max and see literally no difference in performance. YMMV I guess! I do have performance issues on my iPhone 13 mini, but I expected it.
- jsheard 1y ago
  I mean your M3 Max has a 3-5x bigger GPU than OPs base M3, you'd certainly hope it could rip through those new shaders.
  - jamesthurley 1y ago
    I haven’t noticed any performance issues on my M3 Air, other than the Ghostty / Zed scrolling lag issues that were fixed in a software update.
  - frizlab 1y ago
    The shaders are nothing. I’m kind of appalled by everybody telling “oh shaders, it’s expensive!” OP probably has been hit by the electron bug, which does indeed kill the performance of the whole OS…
- mroche 1y ago
  I migrated from a 13 Mini to a 17 Pro last week. Updated the Mini to 26 beforehand to mitigate any potential 18->26 issues with data transfers/backups. I'm still getting accustomed to the device size, the Mini was such a perfect device. If only app and web developers would actually preview their work on its dimensions, I probably would have just replaced the battery (76%). Reduced Transparency is a hard requirement for iOS 26.
  - debian3 1y ago
    I just replaced the battery on my 13 mini (actually I got a brand new one since I still have Apple Care+ on mine and I did an express replacement). I’m good for an other 2 years.
    - mroche 1y ago
      Yeah, I'm keeping mine around and not trading it in. I might get the battery replaced at some point anyways and continue using it as a secondary device for some workloads.
  - discordance 1y ago
    Missing my Mini too
zamadatix 1y ago
The M3 can run modern 3D games at high frame rates, surely it was something else about the update than the glass effect in the UI causing slowness?? It's a more appreciable burden on older iPhones though.
- throwaway48476 1y ago
  The glass transparency effect is just very computationally expensive.
  - gambiting 1y ago
    I just don't understand how if Visa could render its transparency efects smoothly on Intel 920 grade GPUs with 128mb of ram.
    - hombre_fatal 1y ago
      That's not how I remember it. Back in the day the first thing you did was disable the Aero stuff to claw back some performance on Vista. That said, who knows how efficient the implementation is compared to other changes in iOS 26. I turned liquid glass off with "reduced transparency" because even 1% extra battery usage for it would be too much even though I kinda appreciated the new look.
      - gambiting 1y ago
        >>That's not how I remember it. Back in the day the first thing you did was disable the Aero stuff to claw back some performance on Vista. I remember it being kinda like placebo - you did, you marvelled at how much faster it's working, but in reality nothing changed. I really liked the look, and it did run smooth unless you had something below the minimum spec(which a lot of people did at the time).
        throwaway48476 1y ago
        Vista problems were largely nvidia driver crashes and low spec machines. Otherwise vista was fine.
t1234s 1y ago
I think LG made the finder windows buggy as they have issues focusing when I click on them. Didn't have this issue before Tahoe
mikepurvis 1y ago
Wasn't Windows 7 doing this same stuff back in like 2009?
- AlexandrB 1y ago
  I think the liquid glass transparency is more complex than Aero - with curved glass objects distorting what's behind them significantly in some cases. Don't know how much more computationally intensive that is.
- Gigachad 1y ago
  Nah liquid glass isn't just transparency and gaussion blur, it refracts/bends light around the rims as well as a kind of sub pixel colour splitting on some elements like when you have a water droplet magnifying your screen.
  - bathtub365 1y ago
    That sounds like maybe a few more multiplies and applying slightly different constants to different colour channels. There is no complex simulation happening.
  - mikepurvis 1y ago
    Sounds like some computationally expensive, unnecessary bullshit.
  - dontlaugh 1y ago
    Even an iGPU from a decade ago could handle that easily. There is some other problem with the new UI’s performance.
- fujigawa 1y ago
  If we follow the same pattern, iOS 27 and corresponding releases will be completely flat and look like Mac OS System 7. Chicago font wants to live another day. Windows 8 got some serious hate back in the day, it had some sound ideas that were implemented poorly, but no one could deny it was lightweight. It had the smallest memory footprint of all the modern Windowses IIRC.
tiahura 1y ago
Four trillion
Gigachad 1y ago
I don't think that's the UI, it's some other bug. My M1 is still running at full speed after Tahoe. Some people have said there is a broken version of Electron which causes slowdowns on Tahoe currently, most but not all apps have updated to a newer fixed version of Electron.
Aaargh20318 1y ago
You may want to check if you have one of the app listed here[1] on your system. Electron based apps cause a huge system wide lag on macOS 26 due to the use of a private macOS API[2]. This bug has been fixed in Electron but not all Electron-based apps have been updated yet. [1] - https://avarayr.github.io/shamelectron/ https://avarayr.github.io/shamelectron/ [2] - https://github.com/electron/electron/issues/48311 https://github.com/electron/electron/issues/48311

I don't see it said enough, but liquid glass slowed my M3 noticably. Odd I got the update 2 weeks before M5 launch. Software as a means to obsolete hardware. Trillion dollar company

frizlab 1y ago

I have an M3 max and see literally no difference in performance. YMMV I guess! I do have performance issues on my iPhone 13 mini, but I expected it.

jsheard 1y ago
I mean your M3 Max has a 3-5x bigger GPU than OPs base M3, you'd certainly hope it could rip through those new shaders.
- jamesthurley 1y ago
  I haven’t noticed any performance issues on my M3 Air, other than the Ghostty / Zed scrolling lag issues that were fixed in a software update.
- frizlab 1y ago
  The shaders are nothing. I’m kind of appalled by everybody telling “oh shaders, it’s expensive!” OP probably has been hit by the electron bug, which does indeed kill the performance of the whole OS…
mroche 1y ago
I migrated from a 13 Mini to a 17 Pro last week. Updated the Mini to 26 beforehand to mitigate any potential 18->26 issues with data transfers/backups. I'm still getting accustomed to the device size, the Mini was such a perfect device. If only app and web developers would actually preview their work on its dimensions, I probably would have just replaced the battery (76%). Reduced Transparency is a hard requirement for iOS 26.
- debian3 1y ago
  I just replaced the battery on my 13 mini (actually I got a brand new one since I still have Apple Care+ on mine and I did an express replacement). I’m good for an other 2 years.
  - mroche 1y ago
    Yeah, I'm keeping mine around and not trading it in. I might get the battery replaced at some point anyways and continue using it as a secondary device for some workloads.
- discordance 1y ago
  Missing my Mini too

zamadatix 1y ago

The M3 can run modern 3D games at high frame rates, surely it was something else about the update than the glass effect in the UI causing slowness?? It's a more appreciable burden on older iPhones though.

throwaway48476 1y ago
The glass transparency effect is just very computationally expensive.
- gambiting 1y ago
  I just don't understand how if Visa could render its transparency efects smoothly on Intel 920 grade GPUs with 128mb of ram.
  - hombre_fatal 1y ago
    That's not how I remember it. Back in the day the first thing you did was disable the Aero stuff to claw back some performance on Vista. That said, who knows how efficient the implementation is compared to other changes in iOS 26. I turned liquid glass off with "reduced transparency" because even 1% extra battery usage for it would be too much even though I kinda appreciated the new look.
    - gambiting 1y ago
      >>That's not how I remember it. Back in the day the first thing you did was disable the Aero stuff to claw back some performance on Vista. I remember it being kinda like placebo - you did, you marvelled at how much faster it's working, but in reality nothing changed. I really liked the look, and it did run smooth unless you had something below the minimum spec(which a lot of people did at the time).
      - throwaway48476 1y ago
        Vista problems were largely nvidia driver crashes and low spec machines. Otherwise vista was fine.

t1234s 1y ago

I think LG made the finder windows buggy as they have issues focusing when I click on them. Didn't have this issue before Tahoe

mikepurvis 1y ago

Wasn't Windows 7 doing this same stuff back in like 2009?

AlexandrB 1y ago
I think the liquid glass transparency is more complex than Aero - with curved glass objects distorting what's behind them significantly in some cases. Don't know how much more computationally intensive that is.
Gigachad 1y ago
Nah liquid glass isn't just transparency and gaussion blur, it refracts/bends light around the rims as well as a kind of sub pixel colour splitting on some elements like when you have a water droplet magnifying your screen.
- bathtub365 1y ago
  That sounds like maybe a few more multiplies and applying slightly different constants to different colour channels. There is no complex simulation happening.
- mikepurvis 1y ago
  Sounds like some computationally expensive, unnecessary bullshit.
- dontlaugh 1y ago
  Even an iGPU from a decade ago could handle that easily. There is some other problem with the new UI’s performance.
fujigawa 1y ago
If we follow the same pattern, iOS 27 and corresponding releases will be completely flat and look like Mac OS System 7. Chicago font wants to live another day. Windows 8 got some serious hate back in the day, it had some sound ideas that were implemented poorly, but no one could deny it was lightweight. It had the smallest memory footprint of all the modern Windowses IIRC.

tiahura 1y ago

Four trillion

Gigachad 1y ago

I don't think that's the UI, it's some other bug. My M1 is still running at full speed after Tahoe. Some people have said there is a broken version of Electron which causes slowdowns on Tahoe currently, most but not all apps have updated to a newer fixed version of Electron.

Aaargh20318 1y ago

You may want to check if you have one of the app listed here[1] on your system. Electron based apps cause a huge system wide lag on macOS 26 due to the use of a private macOS API[2]. This bug has been fixed in Electron but not all Electron-based apps have been updated yet. [1] - https://avarayr.github.io/shamelectron/ https://avarayr.github.io/shamelectron/ [2] - https://github.com/electron/electron/issues/48311 https://github.com/electron/electron/issues/48311