Use Apple's Liquid Glass design language natively in Play.
Apple’s introduction of Liquid Glass is about more than just blur and translucency. It’s a smarter, more expressive visual material that bends light, adapts dynamically, and gives UI a sense of depth. With iOS 26 and macOS Tahoe, you’ll see it used in toolbars, navigation bars, overlays, and more.
Play already supports key parts of this new design system, letting you build prototypes that look and feel like the real thing, because they’re using the real technology, directly from Apple.
What Apple Introduced
According to Apple’s documentation, here are the key characteristics of their Liquid Glass design system:
Refraction & depth: Surfaces bend light like physical glass, giving background content a subtle distortion.
Adaptive tinting: Materials automatically adjust contrast and color to stay legible over whatever’s behind them.
Interactive feel: Glass surfaces react to motion and gestures, making them feel alive.
System-wide use: You’ll see Liquid Glass across all OS 26 (iOS, iPadOS, macOS, etc.) in things like native controls, navigation bars, and tab bars that blend seamlessly into background content.
What We’ve Added in Play
Glass Effect on any object: Apply Apple’s glass material directly from the Appearance panel. It’s the actual material, not a fake blur.
Glass Containers: Group multiple glassy elements into one smooth, morphing shape. Perfect for cards or grouped UI.
Native UI updated: Navigation bars, tab bars, sliders, pickers, menus, alerts, sheets — all the usual suspects now have Liquid Glass baked in.
Scroll edge effects: Subtle gradients and blur at the edges of scroll views, creating more contrast between the background and foreground.
SF Symbols & sliders: Updated with Apple’s new ticks, snapping behavior, and animated icons.
iOS 26: Even if you’re working on an older macOS version, your prototypes will still render with full Liquid Glass styling when you preview them on iOS 26.
One thing you’ll notice from Apple’s announcement is the new Liquid Glass toolbar. Play doesn’t support that component just yet — but it’s on our roadmap. We know toolbars are central to many apps, and we’re working on bringing that same Liquid Glass treatment into Play soon.
How to Try It Out
Getting started is easy:
Update Play to the latest version (3.9.2 or later).
Open your project and try applying the Glass effect to an object.
Drop in a navigation bar or tab bar. You’ll see the new Liquid Glass style right away.
Preview on a device running iOS 26 to see the full effect!
Check out our iOS 26 demo project and tutorial playlist to learn more!
Liquid Glass represents an evolution in Apple’s visual language. With Play’s support for glass materials, glass containers, updated native controls, and scroll edge effects, you can start experimenting with this look in your prototypes today.
So go ahead and update Play to 3.9+!
Announcements
iOS
Apple
