When Apple stopped thinking different

A long reflection on the decay of design, innovation, and honesty in Cupertino.

There was a time when Apple didn’t follow trends, it created them. From the first Macintosh to the iPhone revolution, Apple defined itself by one core principle: thinking different. It wasn’t about specs or price wars, it was about bold ideas, beautifully executed, with obsessive attention to detail. You didn’t just buy a product; you bought into a philosophy.

But somewhere along the way, something changed. Innovation slowed, priorities shifted, and the polish that once dazzled began to wear thin. Apple hasn’t fallen, not in sales, not in profits. But if you look closer, beyond the marketing, the keynote performances, and the loyal fanbase, it becomes clear: Apple has stopped thinking different. And it shows, in the details they ignore, the choices they make, and the illusions they sell.

A legacy of simplicity, now complicated

Remember the Magic Mouse? Sleek, elegant, and minimal, until you needed to charge it. Then came the awkward reality: to recharge, you had to flip it upside down and plug a cable into the bottom. An ergonomic nightmare that turns a $100 accessory into a paperweight.

Or take the MacBook’s older generation, once equipped with subtle, user-centric features like battery indicator lights and power cable LEDs. With a simple glance or button press, you knew your charge status. Now? Unless your screen is open and booted, you're in the dark. These weren’t just aesthetic flourishes, they were functional details that made Apple products feel alive and considerate. Their absence today is deafening.

All of this would be easier to accept if Apple weren’t also marketing itself as an environmental champion. They tout recycled aluminum, low-carbon logistics, and even smaller packaging as signs of sustainability. But that green halo starts to fade when you look at how they actually build their machines. Apple’s obsession with minimalism has become an enemy of usability. In the name of clean lines, we’ve lost ports, tactile feedback, and even the right to upgrade our own machines. RAM and SSDs are now soldered to the motherboard, making repairs expensive or impossible, and upgrades a thing of the past. The company claims it’s for performance and eco-efficiency, yet what’s more wasteful than discarding a perfectly working computer because a single component is outdated? It’s not environmentalism. It’s engineered obsolescence hidden under a recycled aluminum shell.

And speaking of eco-efficiency: Apple’s “green” narrative crumbles under scrutiny. The same company that touts carbon neutrality refuses to increase the iCloud storage tier from its ancient 5 GB, unchanged since 2008. In 2025, after nearly two decades, multiple devices, and the rise of 4K video and massive app libraries… Apple still offers 5 GB. Per account, not per device. You could own a €1,200 iPhone, a €2,000 MacBook, and an Apple Watch, and still get just 5 GB unless you pay more. It’s not a technical limitation. It’s a business decision. One that treats loyal users like wallets on autopay. 

Innovation as performance, not progress

Once, Apple innovated by solving real problems. Now, they innovate by branding limitations as features. Nowhere is this clearer than with the iPhone’s notch, a design compromise introduced in 2017 that still hasn't disappeared. While other manufacturers have implemented full-screen displays with under-display fingerprint sensors or punch-hole cameras, Apple clings to Face ID, and the giant black void that comes with it.

Their refusal to implement under-display Touch ID isn’t about security or elegance, it’s about control. Fingerprint sensors are fast, reliable, and discreet. But acknowledging their usefulness would mean admitting other companies have outpaced Apple. That’s a narrative Cupertino cannot allow.

Take the Apple Watch, sleek, popular, aspirational. But it’s also a battery guzzler. Where competitors like Huawei and Garmin boast two-week lifespans, the Apple Watch taps out after barely two days. Even after a decade of iterations, the compromise remains unchanged.

And then came the Vision Pro. Marketed as a revolutionary leap into spatial computing, the $3,500 headset is a technical marvel, and a conceptual misfire. Released into a world where no one asked for it, the Vision Pro serves as a monument to Apple’s growing disconnect from its users. Critics noted its heavy weight, limited real-world application, and claustrophobic interface. It’s not a product of vision, but of isolation. A headset made in a vacuum, both literally and metaphorically.

Developers weren’t enthusiastic. Adoption was lukewarm. And outside of niche use cases, even loyal Apple fans struggled to justify its price or purpose. For a company that once waited until a product was perfect before unveiling it, Vision Pro seemed rushed, a sign of pressure to keep the “next big thing” narrative alive, even when the reality wasn’t ready.

A new coat of paint on a shrinking canvas

With iOS 26 and macOS Tahoe, Apple has unveiled a “Liquid Glass” UI, a visual redesign meant to modernize and soften the interface. Translucent layers, subtle gradients, floating cards. It looks clean, but it feels...hollow. Functionality is obscured by shimmer. Accessibility suffers in favor of aesthetic.

It’s the kind of design that pleases a demo reel, not a real user. Once again, Apple has prioritized beauty over clarity, confusing animation with usability. Buttons float, windows blur, contrast fades. It’s an OS that wants to be admired, not used. And that’s the problem.

Even Siri, once hailed as a glimpse of the AI future, now lags embarrassingly behind. While Gemini, Grok and even ChatGPT-powered tools offer real, contextual conversation and automation, Siri remains brittle, slow, and frequently unhelpful. Today, Siri struggles to understand context, can't hold a conversation, and lacks the open integration that makes its competitors useful. Meanwhile, companies like OpenAI are building assistants that can summarize documents, handle memory, and reason through complex instructions, in real time. Apple, despite its resources, has fallen behind. And for users who bought into the ecosystem early, that feels like betrayal. Years of development and Apple’s AI still can’t set two timers at once without confusion. In 2025.

So now Apple’s answer? A marketing campaign called Apple Intelligence, a clever rebranding of AI that adds no real innovation, but plenty of keywords. Promised features are limited to the latest hardware, despite no substantial hardware changes, suggesting a manufactured exclusivity to boost sales. Meanwhile, genuinely smart assistants exist, just not in the Apple ecosystem.

It’s not artificial intelligence. It’s artificial progress.

Still premium, but no longer leading

Apple still builds excellent hardware. The industrial design is still world-class. The integration between devices remains best-in-class. But the spark is dimming. They are not leading, they’re reacting, retouching, rebranding. You pay more, and get less freedom. You buy in, and are locked down. You expect vision, and get maintenance.

This isn’t just about ports or lights or notch sizes. It’s about a company that once changed the world forgetting why it did. Apple used to be for the rebels, the creatives, the builders. Now it’s for the loyal, the locked-in, the resigned. There was a time when buying Apple meant buying into the future. Today, it feels more like buying time, until the next inevitable compromise.

In a world moving fast, Apple is coasting. And many of its fans haven’t noticed, or don’t care, because everything still looks so beautifully polished.

But polish without purpose is just a mirror. And in that mirror, Apple might one day realize it’s admiring a reflection of the past, not building the future.