Google Photos begins mixing Material 3 with Apple's Liquid Glass on iPhone

Google is beginning to combine its Material 3 Expressive design language with Apple's translucent Liquid Glass controls in some of its iPhone apps.

9to5Google reports that Google Photos version 7.94 replaces the solid floating bottom bar with a translucent one. Buttons in the top bar now use the same material.

The amount of background visible through those controls follows the iPhone's transparency setting. The default treatment is more frosted, while the clearer option exposes more of the photo behind it. Dark mode also lets Google's blue accent color tint the selected tab indicator.

Google Health has made a similar change to its traditional bottom navigation bar and the floating Ask Coach button.

The rollout is not yet consistent across Google's iOS software. Docs, Sheets, Slides and Keep still use the older Google Material Theme, while Tasks moved to Material 3 more recently. Google also has not brought Android's wallpaper-driven Dynamic Color system to iPhone, so the update is a visual blend rather than a wholesale adoption of Android's theming behavior.