Apple’s best and worst designs throughout the years
Apple’s Chief Design Officer, Jonathan Ive, has resigned from the company after working there for almost 30 years. He was responsible for designing popular Apple products such as the iPhone, iPad, Macbook, Mac and iMac series and his oeuvre has allowed him to succeed James Dyson as Chancellor of the Royal College of Art in London. Sir Jony Ive is also famous for his dramatic voice-over breakdowns of Apple products in their release videos. Jony Ive, in many ways, has influenced the entire consumer technology industry to not just make products that work great but that look great too. With his work, he emphasised the role of a designer in a product not just the engineer. His products were designed before they could even work and we can see the result of this today.
However, in recent years at Apple, designing new products with innovative features rather than aesthetic features hasn’t been their most successful endeavor. Apple has become even more focused on how they and their products are marketed rather than the essence of the product itself. This is inevitable in any company where innovation is slow or non-existent. For example, a company like Coca-Cola can’t innovate their product, it will always have the same taste. So, instead they must market their product to always seem new and current. Even Steve Jobs was aware of this:
Year after year, the difference between each new iPhone and other Apple products is becoming minuscule and Apple has suffered from this both financially and in terms of producing groundbreaking designs like they used to. However, Jony Ive’s design prowess can still be found in some of their products today but not so much in others. Let’s have a look at Apple’s best and worst designs in the past decade or so.
The Best
The iPhone 5
The iPhone 5 was revolutionary in design and made a permanent impact on the smartphone industry. It’s all metal case and glass front were to remain the standard flagship design for many other companies for years to come.
The Macbook Air 2012
For the longest time, you couldn’t use any other laptop at a café other than a Macbook. The signature light-up Apple logo was the Macbook Air’s pièce de résistance. Not only was it the world’s slimmest laptop for a very long time, but it was also the most beautifully designed leaving Windows laptops playing catch-up for years. The Macbook Air perfectly embodied the potential of a laptop.
The iPad Pro 2018
The new iPad Pro is by far Apple’s best designed product in recent years. It’s thin bezels and rounded display create an immersive experience for any artist or prosumer. The original iPad Pro had some issues, which I’ll discuss later in this article, but the latest generation has pinnacled in both design and engineering. It’s only significant problem now is software as Apple continues to market it as a computer replacement. For many, the iPad Pro could replace your laptop but for professionals and creatives, it’s replaceability is debatable.
The Apple Watch
The Apple Watch series continues to dominate the smart watch sector with ease. Its simple, compact design encompassing innovational engineering is yet to meet its match. The Apple Watch is arguably one of Apple’s most successful products.
The Worst
The First Apple Pencil
I can’t comprehend how Apple decided to release the first Apple pencil with its charging mess. The pencil itself was fine, nothing special, but how it charged was baffling. As seen above, to charge the pencil, you had to plug it into the original iPad Pro. Imagine trying to put a charging Apple Pencil in a bag! This isn’t the first time Apple has incorporated an interesting charging design to its products. However, Apple has thankfully since fixed the pencil’s charging mechanism taking inspiration from Microsoft’s Surface line. It now magnetically charges from the sides of the new iPad Pro.
The Magic Mouse
Apple’s Magic Mouse 2 is already a poor performing mouse but what makes it even worse, is how it’s charged. To charge it you must turn it upside down and plug in the cable as shown above, meaning it cannot be used while it’s being topped up. Apple is yet to fix its so-called Magic Mouse.
The New Mac Pro a.k.a The Cheese Grater
This year, Apple released the much-anticipated successor to the 2013 Mac Pro. It’s an incredibly powerful computer but it could also be an expensive cheese grater. Apple says the cheese-grater-esque grill on the side will greatly improve air flow and cooling, however, I can already see colonies of dust spreading over it. The design is a surprising step-back from 2013’s “trash-can” Mac Pro.
The HomePod a.k.a The Toilet Roll
Apple’s attempt of a virtual home assistant was quickly met with criticism over its design amongst other things (Siri isn’t a very good voice assistant). Twitter immediately started comparing the HomePod to a toilet roll with users posting pictures of toilet roll with a caption like, “I have the HomePod already”.
Apple has had its fair share of good, bad and ugly products. Some honourable mentions for good products include the iPhone 6, the iPod series and the iMac G3. Some other questionable designs include the AirPods, Butterfly Keyboard and their leaked iPhone 11:
Will Apple’s design philosophy change much with the departure of their lead designer? Probably not. Sir Jony Ive will be starting his own design company and Apple have confirmed that they will be a major customer for him.
