Kerry Wan/ZDNET
Apple’s WWDC annual developer conference in June signaled the first major redesign of iOS since 2013, with flashy demos of iOS 26’s Liquid Glass design and AI-driven features. Apple sometimes takes its time bringing features to its many surfaces, but when it does, it’s often a highly polished and well-considered take on a familiar theme.
With the public beta release of iOS 26 this week, let’s unpack a few ways where Apple’s software is catching up, and how it stacks up against its Android counterpart.
1. Call Screening and Hold Assist
Kerry Wan/ZDNET
Apple’s new Call Screening automatically answers unknown numbers in the background, transcribing caller responses in real time. Hold Assist detects hold music, mutes the call, and alerts you when a live agent returns.
Also: How to download the iOS 26 beta on your iPhone right now (and which models support it)
It’s slick, but Android has had this nailed since 2018. Google’s Call Assist suite features Call Screen, which debuted on the Pixel 3. It filters spam calls before they ring and provides real-time transcripts. Hold for Me arrived in 2020, using Duplex AI to wait silently on hold. Apple’s version adds nuanced voice detection, but the core idea of reclaiming time from telemarketers is a well-known Pixel staple.
2. Spam Detection
iOS 26 routes suspected Spam messages to a dedicated Unknown Senders folder so they stay out of the main feed. Those messages remain silenced and will not appear as notifications unless they’ve been explicitly given the green light.
Also: Apple finally added my most-requested iPhone feature with iOS 26 (and you’ll love it, too)
Google’s Messages app introduced on-device spam filtering by 2018. Google goes one step further by also automatically warning and filtering spam calls inside the Phone app. We haven’t even touched on Google’s most recent inclusion of real-time scam detection during phone calls using on-device AI, which feels like pure magic. Apple’s implementation is a great start, but it’s not quite as sharp as the tool Android has honed for nearly a decade.
3. Live Translation
Jason Howell/ZDNET
Live Translation in iOS 26 converts speech and text in real time across Messages, FaceTime, and calls. AirPods even speak translations aloud mid-conversation. It’s seamless and incredibly useful in the right situations.
Also: Google Translate gets 110 new languages with AI’s help, bringing the total to 243
Android has offered this since 2021 when Google’s Live Translate debuted on the Pixel 6, with offline translations in 20+ languages. Pixel Buds integration followed, letting users hear translations directly through their earbuds. Go back even further to 2017, and Google offered this capability with its first-generation Pixel Buds, tapping into Google Assistant for real-time translations.
Apple’s Live Translation feature is elegant and important, but the underlying tech mirrors what Android has been excelling at for years.
4. Visual Intelligence
Kerry Wan/ZDNET
Apple’s Visual Intelligence now extends to screen contents, enabling users to circle or scribble objects in screenshots to search across apps. With it, users can identify a jacket in a social post or a unique vase in a photo.
Also: How to clear your Android phone cache (and why you should do it before installing Android 16)
If this feels familiar, you’ve probably heard of Android’s impressive Circle to Search, one of my favorite new Android features in years. It first launched in January 2024, allowing users to circle, highlight, or simply tap an object on the screen to fire off a visual search. It works across all apps, and contrary to Apple’s implementation, it doesn’t litter your photo roll with screenshots to work.
5. Genmoji & Image Playground
Genmoji lets users combine two emojis together into a dynamically generated image, along with text prompts, to create custom stickers.
Android’s had emoji mashups since 2020 with Gboard’s Emoji Kitchen offering pre-designed combinations across messaging apps. Android’s version lacks real-time generation but still boasts over 100,000 combinations. Gboard has also offered Pixel Studio sticker generation driven by AI since 2024. While Apple’s AI-driven customization is more flexible, the core idea of remixing emoji for messaging is nothing new.
One more thing: Liquid Glass
Perhaps Apple’s biggest story with iOS 26 is Liquid Glass, a design language that feels equal parts futuristic and familiar. While iOS 26’s translucent icons and glass-like layers are impressively polished, that didn’t stop Android enthusiasts from drawing correlations to icon packs from Android’s early 2010s era. Third-party launchers like GO Launcher and ADW offered icon packs and themes that heavily resemble the aesthetic Apple is going for this time around, even if Apple’s attempt is miles ahead in execution and polish.
In all seriousness, Liquid Glass’s philosophy shares a lot with Google’s Material Design, which has a similar goal of unifying its digital interfaces by emulating real-world elements. Apple strives to make something “purely digital feel natural and alive” by drawing from VisionOS’s physicality, with icons that morph contextually across all surfaces.
Also: Your iPhone is getting these useful features with iOS 26 – including a big AI one
Google has focused on tactile surfaces and adaptive layouts since Material Design was first launched in 2014. A major update called Material 3 Expressive, launching with Android 16 later this year, doubles down on this ethos by blending bold, personalized interfaces with motion informed by real-world physics and materials. Both aim to humanize interfaces while taking a different pathway to get there.
Many of Apple’s WWDC innovations this year are Android staples rebranded with Apple’s artful polish, but the competition is heating up. With iOS 26’s Liquid Glass and Android 16’s Material 3 Expressive launching months apart, both platforms are chasing similar goals: interfaces that feel alive.
