Apple is finding its voice for what more sophisticated multitouch user experiences can be

iPhone Duo software feels like a Mac OS X moment, making use of increased real estate with more sophisticated UIs. Mac OS 9 had to work on 640×480 displays with one-at-a-time cooperative multitasking which constrained how far apps could go.

The iPad to me felt like it stalled soon after 2011. GarageBand established new vocabulary for what a large screen multitouch app could be and it seemed possible that all desktop software would be rethought for our fingers. While the iPad hardware evolved at an impressive pace with the Pro, the app paradigm Steve Jobs introduced remained frozen like a fly captured in amber.

So I feel like we’ve never really seen what big-screen multi-touch multi-tasked apps done well from Apple could look like. iPadOS has been a mess, with a thousand maybes for every yes. Every handful of years it flip-flops between various multitasking and windowing systems which prevents any stable footing for app developers to hitch their designs to. Today iPadOS has a Windows-95-like uncanny valley adaptation of the macOS windowing system. It’s like a knock-off Rolex made by Rolex.

iPhone Duo feels like new territory, with an Apple that is ready to fully explore what this design space could be. I’m sure the hardware won’t be perfect, but I’d rather run OS X on a PowerBook G4 than OS 9 on a M5 MacBook Air.

Inspired by reading this https://www.macrumors.com/2026/10/20/apple-apps-iphone-duo/