Learn how to minimize the new Liquid Glass transparency effects across your iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch, and Apple TV user interfaces.
Apple’s new Liquid Glass design language simulates a translucent glass-like material that “reflects and refracts what’s beneath in real-time.” It’s applied pretty much everywhere, from Control Center to the Lock Screen notifications to your Home Screen, apps, and beyond. Liquid Glass is available across iOS 26, iPadOS 26, macOS Tahoe 26, watchOS 26, and tvOS 26.
Liquid Glass design is the visual foundation of Apple’s new operating systems, and thus, there isn’t a switch in the settings that you can flip to turn off this effect entirely. However, if Liquid Glass gets in the way of visibility and accessibility for you, you can mitigate this see-through effect to a great extent with the familiar Reduce Transparency accessibility feature. Doing so will replace the hazy transparency effect with a solid background.
Some Control Center toggles will still reflect light around borders, but that’s not a biggie; at the very least, a non-glassy user interface will make on-screen items more visible, while also improving readability and accessibility.
iPhone or iPad
Go to iOS 26 Settings > Accessibility > Display & Text Size and turn on the Reduce Transparency option to minimize the Liquid Glass effects. Alternatively, you can enable the Increase Contrast option and see how this sits with you.
To quickly toggle Reduce Transparency, add it to Control Center or assign it to your Accessibility Shortcut, which can be invoked by triple-pressing the power button.
Apple Watch
Open the companion Watch app on your paired iPhone, choose Accessibility from the My Watch tab, and turn on Reduce Transparency.
Or, go to Settings > Accessibility on the watch itself and turn Reduce Transparency on.
If you’d like to toggle the Reduce Transparency feature from Control Center on your Apple Watch, just add its button to your Accessibility Shortcut.
Control Center and other user interface elements on your Apple Watch will have a solid background and reduced transparency. Don’t expect miracles; as evidenced by the screenshots below, the difference doesn’t seem that noticeable.
Mac
Open System Settings, then select Accessibility in the sidebar and click Display on the right. Here, turn on the Reduce Transparency switch to minimize the Liquid Glass effect throughout the Mac’s user interface.
macOS 26 brings Control Center customization by letting you add new controls and adjust their layout. Feel free to add a Reduce Transparency button to Control Center so you can quickly toggle the feature.
This is how the Mac’s Control Center and the menu bar look without and with Reduce Transparency.
Apple TV
Open the Settings app and navigate to Accessibility > Display, then turn on Reduce Transparency.
You’ll no longer see the Liquid Glass effects in Control Center and other places.
How has your experience been so far with these new operating systems?