WWDC 2025: System-Wide Cohesion and iOS 26’s Design Milestone

Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference 2025, scheduled for June 9, is set to mark a major inflection point for the company’s software ecosystem. According to MacRumors and multiple corroborating sources, Apple will debut a new naming strategy across its platforms—standardizing all operating system versions to a single number, “26,” reflecting the 2025–2026 launch cycle. For dedicated Apple followers, this update signals both consistency and transparency in tracking system releases as the company expands its cross-platform ambitions.

A Unified Versioning Scheme: Ending Number Fragmentation

Apple is appending “26” to iOS, macOS, iPadOS, tvOS, watchOS, and visionOS this fall, streamlining version identification. This new approach replaces the staggered numbering scheme and aligns updates by the time they will be in active use. For example, what would have been iOS 19, watchOS 12, or macOS 16 under previous conventions will