Apple has released a five-minute recap video summarizing key announcements from its WWDC26 Platform State of the Union, covering rebuilt intelligence frameworks, platform design changes, and major developer tooling updates.
Apple said its Foundation models were completely rebuilt in collaboration with Google, leveraging technology from the Gemini family of models. The Foundation Models framework now supports image capture and cloud model integration, allowing developers to connect to any cloud model provider for more complex tasks.
New dynamic profiles are also included to simplify the creation of AI agents and skills by swapping tools and updating instructions on the fly. Core AI, an entirely new framework for running on-device models, is integrated into the operating system and designed to take full advantage of Apple Silicon.
App Intents have been updated to connect apps to Apple Intelligence, making content discoverable and actions available through Siri through natural language, with a new View Annotations API allowing users to act on what’s on screen simply by asking.
The refined Liquid Glass design system features prominently in the rundown. Apple said the design is more consistent and customizable, with better readability. On macOS, each window now shares a narrower corner radius. App icons automatically receive a sharper rendering, with new refraction effects available via Icon Composer.
iOS apps are now resizable, allowing users to enjoy larger screens when running them on iPad or Mac via iPhone mirroring, with a new resizable iOS simulator for easier testing on all sizes.
SwiftUI received a series of updates, including drag-and-reorder and drag-and-drop actions into any container, nested layouts that resize up to two times faster, and automatic asynchronous image caching. Toolbars now provide finer control over visibility as space decreases, and a new spatial preview framework for Apple Vision Pro lets developers stream 3D models from a Mac to physical space.
In Xcode 27, projects load faster and the app is 30% smaller when switching to Apple Silicon only. Settings are now synced via iCloud, the toolbar is fully customizable, and themes like Emerald, Neon Noir, and Coral Reef bring color throughout the app.
Xcode Cloud is easier to configure with builds up to twice as fast. A new Device Hub replaces Simulator, bringing virtual and physical devices together in one place with live resizing and full hardware control from the Mac.
Apple said it was working with Anthropic, OpenAI and Google to integrate their agents into Xcode. Agent conversations now behave like files and can be opened, split, and stacked in the browser. Agents can run tests, use Playgrounds, customize previews in light and dark modes and other configurations, and drive a running application end-to-end. Developers can further extend Xcode with plugins that bring skills, MCP tools, and agents via the agent-client protocol, with Figma and GitHub shipping their own plugins at launch.
The full Platforms State of the Union video is available in the Apple Developer app, website, and YouTube.
