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Opinion: Will limited device & app support lead 3D Touch to wither and die?

3dtouch

When Apple launched the iPhone 6s/Plus, 3D Touch was one of the headline features. Apple devoted a full four-minute video to showing what it does and how it works. Even today, visit the Apple website and click on the iPhone 6s, and it’s the first thing you see. Apple’s summary of the phone is ‘3D Touch, 12MP photos, 4K video.’

The first tab at the top of the screen is 3D Touch. The first video linked is the one for 3D Touch. Scroll down the page for the detail of the phone, and 3D Touch – ‘the next generation of multi-touch’ – is again the first feature to be shown. Clearly Apple thinks it’s a big deal.

And yet, the company just this week unveiled not just one but two new iOS devices, neither of which offers the feature. This is perhaps understandable in the case of the iPhone SE – Apple needed some tech distinctions between its flagship phone and its new budget model. But it’s an odd omission from a brand new iPad …

I’ve heard two theories about why Apple hasn’t rolled out 3D Touch more widely. The first is that yield rates have been poor. That would limit the volumes in which the system can be produced, and make it an expensive feature to add. If that is indeed the case, it adds a second reason for Apple to withhold it from its cheapest ever iPhone.

The second is that there are significant challenges involved in scaling-up 3D Touch to larger screens, and that this is the reason we haven’t yet seen it on an iPad.

While both suggestions are unconfirmed, I think they are likely true – because otherwise, Apple’s behavior doesn’t make sense. There’s no other reason I can see to hold back from the latest iPad a feature the company champions so strongly.

But even if it’s manufacturing challenges holding back the wider rollout, it still effectively places the feature on hold for a large chunk of iOS users.

apps

Nor is hardware support the only issue. While we have seen an increasing number of apps adding support for 3D Touch, it has still been adopted by only a minority of them. I haven’t seen any hard numbers, but if you follow the ‘View 3D Touch apps in the App Store‘ link on Apple’s website, it shows only 56.

Clearly there are many more than that, but a random sampling of the third-party apps on the first two screens on my iPhone shows that just 9 out of 37 of them support 3D Touch. Whatever the overall percentage, it’s low.

If adding 3D Touch support to an app was a complex task, you could understand developers deciding not to bother until Apple makes it available on more devices. But it’s not: adding Home screen actions is extremely easy. For whatever reason, developers don’t appear to share Apple’s view of the importance of the feature.

And it’s not just third-party developers who haven’t fully embraced the feature: there are still native Apple apps that don’t. The Activity app, for one. That’s a pretty crazy state of affairs.

finger

My sampling of my own apps brings up another big problem with 3D Touch. The only way I could tell which ones support it was to force-touch each one in turn. Trial-and-error. There’s no other way to tell.

As Forbes contributor Gordon Kelly put it in a Facebook discussion we were having yesterday: “For the record, I like 3D Touch, but it needs to be implemented in a way that removes the guesswork of what is and isn’t 3D Touch enabled.”

I’m going to be a little less polite than him. Just think about that from a UI perspective: an app may or may not support a headline feature of the phone, and the only way I can tell is by randomly stabbing at apps with my finger like a deranged monkey. That is utterly appalling UI design, and there’s no excuse for it from anyone – far less from Apple, which prides itself on usability above all else.

I would argue it’s also poor UI to have an operating system feature that may or may not be available depending on the device you’re using at the time. Sure, I understand that older devices may not be able to support all of the latest features, and that there are some features only practical on a larger screen. But someone switching between the flagship iPhone and the very latest iPad should not be seeing a feature on their phone that they can’t use on their iPad.

end

So 3D Touch seems to be trapped in a Catch-22 situation. App developers are seeing what looks like half-hearted support for it from Apple, and not even bothering to do the pretty trivial work involved in supporting Home screen actions, while Apple can’t really make too much fuss about a feature that some of its high-end iOS devices don’t have at all, and others have in only a relatively small percentage of apps.

This seems to me to call into question the future of the feature. Even if 3D Touch makes it into iPads in the next release, it will by then be such old news Apple can’t really hype it to any significant degree. And there will be a whole new generation of iPhone owners – those attracted by the ability to buy the very latest iPhone at a far more affordable level – who will never have experienced it.

One final personal point. When I first experienced 3D Touch, I was extremely impressed with it. I said at the time that I saw it as a good reason to upgrade from the iPhone 6 to the 6s. But I do have to say that the novelty has somewhat worn off – in part, because of ‘stabbing monkey’ syndrome: it gets annoying force-touching an app that does nothing, so I’ve largely stopped bothering. My use of 3D Touch is limited to those apps I use most frequently.

I do still think it’s a good feature. I like being able to upload a photo to Facebook right from the Home screen. I like the ease of being able to message a recent contact, resume a recent podcast, instantly recall the most recent photo I took, send a tweet or add a new note. But I’m not sure it’s the must-have feature I thought it might be, especially when I can’t use it on my iPad.

The real test for me will be when I try an experimental switch to the iPhone SE. I do think 3D Touch may be the thing I miss most. But I also suspect I’m going to be able to live without it – and I think the way things have gone so far, I may not be alone.

What’s your view of 3D Touch? Must-have feature, nice-to-have or meh? Does it annoy you to have it on your iPhone but not your iPad? Do you think it has a future? Please take our poll and share your thoughts in the comments.

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Comments

  1. applegetridofsimandjack - 8 years ago

    I really don’t see the advantage of 3D Touch. Peaking a link instead of opening it up completely, ok that is a small advantage.
    But peaking messages & photos? Why? It’s not like opening the photo completely takes hours to load…

    • thedingohasmybaby - 8 years ago

      Agreed. It’s an inconvenient user interaction that offers little benefit for those who persevere. Complete fluff.

    • Take switching between apps, quickly moving cursor and peak and pop in Instagram, these are SO useful.

      Especially in Instagram, instead of tapping on a photo in Explore tab and then tapping back button you just force touch and then let go…or swipe up and then tap Like, Show Profile or Send in a Message. With videos it plays with sound right away. :)

    • And peak and pop in Messages can be useful for someone who receives like really a lot of messages a day.

    • dcj001 - 8 years ago

      *peek, not peak – there is a difference.

  2. Abraham Song - 8 years ago

    They’ve added 2 new devices to the mix (smaller iPad Pro and the iPhone SE), neither have 3D Touch. It’s dead.

    • Rich Davis (@RichDavis9) - 8 years ago

      They can’t do 3D touch and have the screen work with the Pencil because the Pencil requires a different technology to work, and I don’t know if they are going to get both technologies down the road. So, for their IPads, they simply had to choose which technology was the more important, maybe down the road they can add it.

      They obviously didn’t use 3D touch on the SE’s for several obvious reasons.
      1. It would have added more cost due to a more expensive screen and the haptic technology.
      2. There isn’t much room for the haptic engine.
      3. The SE is Apple’s entry level product and removing certain costly technology allows them to lower the price and maintain decent profit margin.

      I wouldn’t say it’s dead until they remove it from their top end iPhones, which hasn’t happened yet.

      Do you own a 6S/6S+? Some people think that it’s a great feature and they’d miss it. I don’t know if they are going to remove it for their top end models and then integrating it in future iPads down the road, but they can’t have it in the iPads due to the Pencil screen technology.

      • taoprophet420 - 8 years ago

        False, a developer got 3D Touch gestures to work on the 12.9″ Pro at release. It is just Apple does not enable the gestures using the Pencil. 3D Touch gestures are able to be done on iPad Pro via the Pencil. The yield rate is to low using the sensors in a large screen now, to do it via just the screen.

    • rogifan - 8 years ago

      It hasn’t even been available for a year and you’re already calling it dead? What a joke. One, for all we know there could be engineering issues getting it to work properly on larger screen devices. Two, it requires the Taptic Engine. It’s probably likely space constraints kept Apple from adding it to the iPhone SE so as to not affect battery life (I believe the 6S has a slightly smaller battery than the 6).

    • 3D Touch on iPad is a BS and 6s needs to remain flagship and have some exclusive features over SE…besides better front facing camera :D

  3. chrisl84 - 8 years ago

    I dont have a 6S, but doesn’t it let you quickly shift the text cursor around when typing? I figure that would be a bigger missed feature than peak and pop.

    • Ben Lovejoy - 8 years ago

      Yeah, that’s quite a nice feature, though personally I find typing on a phone too fiddly so pretty much always either dictate or use my iPad.

      • PMZanetti - 8 years ago

        You’re basically denouncing typing on the iPhone software keyboard. That’s a different topic, and doesn’t diminish the value of 3D Touch on the iPhone Keyboard.

    • thedingohasmybaby - 8 years ago

      It does, but it’s not implemented very well. You press hard, which usually works but about 5% of the time it just treats it like a regular tap and types something else you didn’t want, then the cursor moves at exactly the same rate as you move your thumb. It’s remote direct manipulation.

      Compare and contrast with normal tracking surfaces like the Magic Trackpad — there’s a non-linear relationship between how quickly you move your finger and how quickly the cursor moves, to allow you to fling it from one side of the screen to the other in a single motion but still pick individual pixels if required.

      The cursor movement on iOS can’t do that because it always needs the whole width of the screen to be reachable in a single swipe because if you lift your finger then the interaction ends.

      So fine placement is unintuitive to people used to trackpads and unambiguously more difficult.

      • dcj001 - 8 years ago

        3D Touch works 100%, not 5%, for me.

        Apparently, you do not understand.

    • dcj001 - 8 years ago

      *peek, not peak – there is a difference.

  4. Jake Becker - 8 years ago

    It’s the next logical step in physical interaction with the UI of iOS. It works great, despite limited uses. It parallels Force Touch on the Mac, maintaining the relationship between the two OS. I hope it doesn’t die.

    • Scott (@ScooterComputer) - 8 years ago

      I agree. I think any extension of UI that incorporates how human beings NATURALLY act is an important paradigm. And humans ABSOLUTELY use force when touching things. 3D Touch is a natural extension. So I don’t think the tech is going away, it may require some iteration however. But I’m not pressed about it NOW. I chose “It’s a Must Have”, but not in the sense that since the iPhone SE it is a bad thing, but more in the sense that the tech itself is a no brainer, it WILL be a standard feature of future systems. It just makes sense. And I don’t think a year or so is going to “kill” an instinct that human beings have developed over several thousand. (The instinct is easy to see too…just watch any neophyte iOS user new to a touchscreen. They invariably PUSH on the screen expecting –something– to happen. “Touch”, “tap”, and “push” are all extensions of the same UX metaphor.)

  5. Tim Baker (@IAmTimBaker) - 8 years ago

    You need to give it time. Right now, there’s not a huge incentive for developers to force 3D Touch Support into apps because it’s only available on one device, which makes up only a fraction of the total iOS devices on the market. As the market becomes saturated with 3D touch-capable devices over the coming years, I think we’ll see this as something inherently native to the iPhone and widely used.

    I can say that there are some apps that support it where it’s a Godsend, but for the most part, developers seem to have just thrown it in without any real thought on UX. A few killer apps and deeper integration in iOS 10 and higher and we’ll see it become much more important.

    • o0smoothies0o - 8 years ago

      This is one of the reasons Apple should force developers to support the latest features within 6 months of release, or their apps are removed from the store (still available to be downloaded by previous purchasers).

      Apple should be touting quality apps that are updated for the App Store now. Not the number of apps. They have well over 1 million apps. 99.9% of them are absolute garbage.

      • Yeah but then you fight the whole, “one man’s trash is another man’s treasure” argument. I totally agree that most of the apps are crap, for me. Some people play all those stupid little games non stop. They aren’t useless to them.

        Forcing them to update their apps to support the latest technology is certainly not the way to go either. Once again, it would be nice it all the apps I used were definitely going to be updated ASAP to support new stuff but sometimes that isn’t feasible.

        Don’t get me wrong, like I said.. I like both ideas but, as a software guy, I don’t know that they are realistic

      • ninjadude99 - 8 years ago

        Do that and the developer community will leave in droves. While yes, Apple does force developers into certain things, if the app has no use for something, then the developer won’t implement it. Furthermore, if the feature is somehow crashing the app, the developer will move it until they either found a fix for it or Apple fixes it themselves (an example being that Google removed the ability for users to use third-party keyboards because it was crashing Chrome for some reason).

        If this was the case, then Apple may as well force developers to use Swift instead of Objective-C, effectively making them all learn a completely new programming language. A language that’s not completely stable. That’s not right and it shouldn’t be done.

      • pdixon1986 - 8 years ago

        Why would apple do that… they should make it so developers will want to add it, not be forced to — and if apple were to say “you have 6 months or your off the App store”, then most of the apps would be taken down…
        Not everything needs force touch, and it is up to the developers of the apps to offer the best experience that they can offer (of course each app maker has a different level of experience…but even a skilled developer might feel that force touch adds little or nothing to the experience)

  6. Graham J - 8 years ago

    It will only die if Apple stops manufacturing devices that have it, and I don’t see them doing that. Over time more and more devices will have it and it will become ubiquitous. Apple plays a long game.

  7. brandonprice89 - 8 years ago

    While it makes sense to try and scale it up to larger screened devices, I don’t know how logical it would work on iPad because you have to hold it with two hands. 3D touch seems like a feature geared towards one handed devices. I can possibly see 3D touch like features on an iPad used in conjunction with the apple pencil

    • pdixon1986 - 8 years ago

      i have the iphone 6 plus… and i have small hands… i already have to hold it with two hands if i am to launch certain apps or type… so basically, by what youve just said, 3D touch should only be on the iphone 6s, 5SE and ipod touch because these are the only devices geared towards one handed use for the majority of people.

  8. smartysanky - 8 years ago

    At this point of time, 3D Touch is just an added feature with no exact necessity. But I guess, it is Apple’s first step towards eliminating the home button and reduce the Phone size.
    So I am quite hopefully about it.
    And even though iPad Pro doesnt support it, I guess that is to promote use of Apple Pencil.
    Considering the Force Touch on newer MacBooks and Magic Trackpad, it will become a ecosystem wide feature!!!

  9. Steve Grenier - 8 years ago

    Having an badge or symbol indicating an app supports 3D touch is an incredibly bad idea. You can complain all you want about Apple not showcasing which apps support it or not, but they want to live in a world where all apps support it, adding some kind of indicator just so you know which does and does not, is very very stupid. Tap the icons and find out for yourself.

    • rogifan - 8 years ago

      Yep that would add unnecessary clutter to app icons and home screen. There are plenty of long press features that don’t have visual clues. These are things you have to learn and once you do it becomes muscle memory and you don’t forget. At least with 3D Touch you get tactile feedback.

      • o0smoothies0o - 8 years ago

        Long press features are good, because they don’t allot many different functions. It is a simple feature that isn’t destroyed by complexity. 3D Touch is destroyed by complexity. You can’t have an invisible element of the UI have the allotted freedom Apple has given it. It is an order of magnitude more complex than any other feature. It is a failure so far due to lack of simplicity.

        I do want to point out that Apple was too lazy/stupid to even add useful quick actions to the Music app. No ‘Recently Played’ ‘Top Charts’ ‘Recently Added’ etc., I mean if you’re going to be stupid and have insane complexity, at least don’t be stupid enough to not add quick actions that even a 5 year old would come up with.

  10. mad1at35 - 8 years ago

    I use 3D Touch every day, but like Touch ID a lot of developers are slow to use it.

    There are some examples of early adoption of Touch ID (such as mSecure and Paypal) but some apps have only just got Touch ID support (I’m looking at you HSBC) even though they were crying out for it. And others haven’t even got it yet. IMHO anything needing a password should have Touch ID.

    It certainly seems that because only now that (virtually) every device Apple sells has TouchID there is more interest.

    I suspect when Apple rolls it out to other devices then this could be the critical mass. However, I suspect 3D Touch may be more useful on a smaller screen device and given the choice between Apple Pencil and 3D Touch on iPad I’d choose Apple Pencil every day.

    • iSRS - 8 years ago

      I’m with you. I use it constantly. The Facebook implementation has saved a few taps which doesn’t seem like a lot but before I used to have an article link tap open in Safari tab back to Facebook back to the feed. Now it is press hold swipe up open Safari back to Facebook enumerate back of the field so no it’s not a huge difference but it’s enough of a little time now it is press hold swipe up open Safari back to Facebook enumerate back of the feed so no it’s not a huge difference but it’s enough of a little timesaver. It enhances my experience

  11. Grayson Mixon - 8 years ago

    The apps that do support it, rarely do anything interesting with it. When they demoed it at the 6S event, a game developer showed how to zoom in with it, but of course, that can’t be required, because that game developer wants people with other devices to be able to play the game too. And I haven’t seen anyone use it for anything even remotely that original. Apple’s suggested 3D touch features of peak/pop and quick actions are about all that people use 3D touch for, and that’s boring, even if every app does that. I want to see something cool that 3D touch does. Of course, those features would only be available for new devices (even if it was on the latest iPad).

    There are a few analogies here.

    The most similar case is with Touch ID. It came out on the iPhone 5S, and then Apple announced the iPad Air (AAAAAAiiiiirrrrrrr, oooooooh), but without Touch ID. So I had two brand new devices, and one of them didn’t have the new headline feature. And now that apps can access Touch ID, most of them don’t, even if they could. Most iOS devices out there probably still don’t support Touch ID. I mean, the iPhone 4S, 5, and 5C, and the iPad 2, 3, 4, and Air, and the iPad Mini 1 and 2 don’t have it. So, an app can’t make it a must have whiz bang feature, because most people don’t have it. So, it has to be optional (if it’s there at all) which limits how aggressively it can be used.

    The other analogy is with processor upgrades. When they release a new device with a new processor (and Phil doing his “4 times the graphics performance!” sales pitch), they demo a new game that takes full advantage (!!!) of the new power, but then, that game is available on older devices as well. In fact, if you are pushing the limits of the processor, you basically have to cater to the bottom of what is supported (I’m looking at you iPad 2) to have the largest audience you can, and app developers want a large audience because that’s money, dude. So, while apps can take advantage of more power, they have to wait until everyone has at least an A7 in order to really take advantage of the A7.

    I think 3D Touch will be similar. Most apps won’t take advantage of it at all (just like most apps don’t push the processor the limit, even on an iPad 2). I think we will see more and more apps using it for the boring features, and some apps will eventually (hopefully) use it for something interesting, but I think it won’t be until most or all of supported devices have it.

    Based on history, the iPhone was supported for 4 years (now 5 years since they didn’t drop the 4S), the iPad has been supported for 5 years (so far, they haven’t drop anything since the original iPad, which only had 2 years, so they may keep extending this), and Macs are supported about 7-8 years (although they haven’t dropped support for the MBA since the original, and they just keep extending support for the MBA2, so that may keep going for several more years).

    So, doing some rough math, if they don’t keep extending support for older devices, and actually drop support for an iPhone and iPad this year, and follow their regular pattern, all supported iPhones will have 3D touch in 2020, and if they release updates for all iPad lines at the end of this year and they all have 3D touch, then it will 2021 for the iPad.

    It’s sad, but we’ll probably have to wait until somewhere close to then. At least we only have to wait until 2017 for all iPhones to have Touch ID. Maybe then, people will start taking more advantage of that feature.

    Oh, and Apple Pay, same deal, with the added headache of brick and morter retailers being slow.

    • Grayson Mixon - 8 years ago

      I would be in favor having a tab in the App Store app that shows which apps you have on your device that support 3D touch, Touch ID, Apple Pay in-app, and Healthkit integration, and make it easier to find apps in the App Store that support these features.

    • Grayson Mixon - 8 years ago

      By the way, most apps haven’t found a use for multi-touch, even though the iPhone has always had it. Most of them use single-touch interfaces. Maybe it’s just because they haven’t found a creative way to integrate it.

  12. vonheim - 8 years ago

    I think 3D touch is not on the iPad Pros because it conflicts with the Pencil feature built into the screen. Secondly, it also has the vibration that is not on the iPad Pros, probably for similar reasons. This sounds as a reasonable choice by Apple, as I also see 3D touch to be most valuable for small screens.

    The fact that finding it is trial and error will be overcome by better app designs and visual improvements in iOS (10?).

    On the iPad (Pros at least) you can use two fingers to achieve the cursor movement you have with 3D Touch on the iPhone soft keyboards.

  13. iSRS - 8 years ago

    Just did the same test on my first two pages. Looks like 68% of the non stock apps I have on those pages have the equivalent of a “right click” menu option.

    7 of 9 non stock have 3D Touch (Audible and Apple Remote missing it)
    12 of 19 non stock have it (4 games, migraine buddy, airport utility, Plex missing it)

    If I count stock apps
    21 of 23 have 3D Touch (still Audible and Apple Remote missing it)
    14 of 21 have it (still 4 games, migraine buddy, airport utility, Plex missing it)

    Then my docked apps. Messages, Mail, Safari, Settings. All have it.

    So including the dock, 39 of 48 have this feature. Or over 80%

    It have become, like Touch ID, something I find myself silently cursing its absence when I go to my iPad 3. I think once they can get the outputs the way they want it, it will be a killer feature.

    • iSRS - 8 years ago

      Gasp! Ben – you might have just saved me some money with this article!

      I was preparing to get a 9.7″ iPad Pro to replace my “works better on 9.3 than 9.2” iPad 3, when my response above got me thinking… Hold off for iPad Pro 2. They may be able to, at that point, solve the finger/Apple Pencil dilemma on the Pros….

      So thanks!

      • dcj001 - 8 years ago

        Be careful. If you wait until the next model is released, you will miss out on one year or more of great experiences using the iPad Pro!

  14. Well, Apple also does not seem to care about updating all of their apps to the larger iPad Pro’s resolution. I don’t understand it, it wouldn’t be a big deal I’m sure. Especially if the Apps show a keyboard that’s double the size… It looks and feels just awful.
    Back to topic: I think 3D touch is here to stay. Just look at all the macs getting force touch. Since the iPad shows more information at once, peek and pop don’t make much sense here, so the importance is lower than on iPhones.

  15. David Fabian - 8 years ago

    3D Touch needs time to mature, there are lots of interesting things I could see Apple doing with it in the future. For example, imagine force touching the weather app and instead of a menu there could be a widget with current weather conditions. It may take more powerful devices, software revisions, and users becoming more familiar with it, but 3D Touch has the potential to become a (much more) useful enhancement.

  16. PMZanetti - 8 years ago

    Lack of App support? That is a whole topic unto itself. 3D Touch is not the only major iOS feature that has been ignored by lazy developers.

    3D Touch has a short list of really killer uses across iOS…and a long list of really minor uses. That doesn’t mean the feature has no future. It just means it doesn’t have an infinite range of possibilities. Big deal. It is still great at few things. Why is that a problem?

  17. Paul Yoshihara - 8 years ago

    Nice article. The lack of support for 3D Touch on the latest iPad is clearly a loss for me. I’ll pass on it. For me 3D Touch is incredibly useful. Since I first owned my Watch, 3D touch has been an important component of “Do more with less” type of action. On my 6S, I gotta say I use it most when I’m typing: the ability to move the cursor at will is great; for the rest(Peek&Pop; Live photos) those are mostly gimmicks, in the sense that they help smooth the experience, but not as useful.
    My view is that Apple knows this will take time for users to internalize 3D Touch. I believe they will standardize this, incl the next i7 and after that, we’ll see depth of layers across the system (Imagine a 3D touch- enabled Control Centre) I think creativity’s the only limit to engage the user. Apps may be the key.

  18. Bryan Hoke - 8 years ago

    Well, based on Apple’s history of implementing new iPhone features (e.g., Retina Display, Touch ID) in iPad, I wouldn’t have expected any iPad to support 3D Touch by now; it generally takes a full product cycle before these features make their way to iPad, and the 9.7″ iPad Pro is part of the same product cycle as iPhone 6S.

    However, the bigger question for me is whether it makes sense to implement something like the Taptic Engine on iPad and whether Apple can achieve the desired 3D touch experience without it.

    • o0smoothies0o - 8 years ago

      The only way the Taptic Engine would work for an iPad is for multiple Taptic Engines to be inside it, and to preferentially fire dependent on what portion of the display the user is pressing.

  19. o0smoothies0o - 8 years ago

    There are so many problems with 3D Touch. First of all, as Ben mentions it is a lot of guesswork. The thing about a feature being guesswork is that it can’t catch on and be used widely. 3D Touch is a far too complicated feature. For example, Apple gave far too much freedom in what developers can choose to use it for, like quick actions can be almost anything they want, and in whatever order they want in the list. Users can’t be expected to memorize and remember every different apps’ particular quick actions list. The fact that they are all so different ensures that either the user will use 1-2 apps they use very frequently and remember the quick actions, or just reject using it altogether because of the vast complexity.

    Apple has been smart in the past to disallow massive UI differences between apps, but this is allowing it, and in the one feature you could never allow it for, because it is invisible unless purposefully acted on. The quick actions would have to be virtually identical across all apps.

    Peek and pop I don’t even want to go into because I think and thought when they were showing it at the keynote that it was virtually useless and the most gimmicky feature I’ve seen Apple ever greatly tout. First of all, it saves almost no time whatsoever, no matter what you’re using it for, I mean I’m not sure if people are aware of the critically amazing feature of swiping back from the left edge of the screen, but with that, it is actually slower than peeking at content.

    I have to point out one hilarious aspect of the disaster that is Peek/Pop and that is that they allow you to use it for Photos. The Apple Watch crown was said to be specifically designed so you don’t have to cover the content with your finger when trying to navigate the content on the screen, yet if you Peek at a photo, your finger covers the content almost 100% of the time. It’s embarrassing that what are expected to be intelligent people, elected to allow Peek and Pop be a feature, but most tragically, allowed it for Photos.

  20. rymc02 - 8 years ago

    3D Touch has to work inside spotlight otherwise it is limited to the icons not hidden in folders. This really hinders its functionality.

    Since spotlight, I rarely if ever go searching through folders to find apps, I just use spotlight, it’s great!

    But 3D Touch doesn’t work on app icons shown in spotlight, so even if the app has 3D Touch features I can never use it. It’s far quicker just to open the app in spotlight than to go into a folder for a quick action.

    Hopefully they make that change in iOS 10.

  21. tmaraccini - 8 years ago

    3d Touch suffers from many roadblocks. However, before you cry for universal adaptation, remember that not all apps would benefit from this api

    • o0smoothies0o - 8 years ago

      That’s why its implementation was the main mistake from the beginning of its conception. The fact is, peek and pop shouldn’t exist, as they’re a gimmicky useless function, and quick actions shouldn’t be actions, they should be quick info instead. Every app should give quick information when pressed, not a list of actions that aren’t even immediate actions, but rather locations it takes you in said app, where you can preform said action.

      It’s just a disaster on numerous fronts. The best thing so far is the ability to move the cursor, but that is the best thing only in its concept, because I’ve used it numerous times and I can say that it works and doesn’t work probably 50/50. There were times when I would press, bring up the cursor and then need to move it again shortly after, and pressing anywhere on the keyboard, no matter how hard, would not bring it back up.

      • thedingohasmybaby - 8 years ago

        I’m not sure it’s as bad as 50:50 for me but — to offer support in case this devolves into a typical Internet-style anecdote versus anecdote, blame the author — I also see quite variable recognition when trying to move the cursor, to the extent that I tend to avoid trying.

  22. scapegoat81 - 8 years ago

    I think there will be more features utilizing this tech implemented in the future. I for one enjoy 3D Touch. I get what this article is saying w/ how fragmented it can be but, I really think some of it is extremely useful. I use the swipe left to right to switch apps & the trackpad text selection daily. Great little features that make iOS much more efficient to use.

  23. twelve01 - 8 years ago

    I find the most use with launching specific app functions from the home screen. Peek and pop is also my default way for checking out a link now. None of this is essential, though I suspect Apple has greater plans for the tech in future iterations of the phone – specifically multi touch, 3D Touch home button, or removal of physical buttons altogether.

  24. Robert - 8 years ago

    It will live on iPhone since it makes efficient use of the small screen but it makes much less sense on iPad.

    The larger display should generally reduce the value of the 3D Touch shortcuts, since the larger display should offer a more fully featured UI. At this point iPad needs to go in it’s own direction since the extra screen real estate opens up possibilities beyond what are possible on iPhone.

    Also the Pencil technology clearly trumps 3D Touch on iPad.

    I’m very glad the SE does not have it. It’s the right thing to compromise in a less expensive device, as is the front facing camera. Those compromises mean we get an A9 and excellent rear camera! Certainly the right decision!

  25. Kai Rode - 8 years ago

    It’s a feature that is not really needed on large screen devices. What is 3D touch for? Basically it gives you two more kinds of “clicks” in addition to single clicks, double clicks and long touches with the bonus of one kind of click – the hard one – logically following the other kind. Additionally it can be used as an analog control. Bonus: tactile feedback. Well, an iPad does not need twenty kinds of clicks; the screen is large enough to have separate buttons for more actions without the UI feeling cramped. It would be nice to have analog control on an iPad without having to swipe or slide, but the “Oh, neat!” effect is certainly bigger on an iPhone.

  26. Vann (@VannSmall) - 8 years ago

    Could be the apps you use aren’t interested in trying out 3D Touch. My 3rd party apps (over 40 excluding games) are above 50% usage of 3D Touch. Also usually when an app updates it notes that 3D Touch is now available and is usually in the release notes for a new app or in the first time use splash screens. So I don’t think it’s hard to find or requires testing out each app. Though I do agree it would be nice on an iPad. Can’t count how many times I’ve tried using it after switching over from my 6s.

  27. Brett Halladay - 8 years ago

    I think that apple has created 3d touch with the idea in mind that it is the right click option for your finger as a mouse. I wouldnt be surprised to see it come to the ipad, but I don’t expect it to be built into the screen. Apple has created the apple pencil designed to be ‘the new mouse’ for the touch screen era. I am expecting apple to save the significant hardware costs of implementing 3d touch into the ipad pro’s screen and instead build an apple pencil 2 that has a button that activates 3d touch when hovering over or near a compatible menu/icon/app. The implementation of 3d touch this way will not only be cheaper, it will further enhance the idea that the ipad pro is the new generation’s laptop with the pencil being the mouse. A new pencil with 3d touch built into it as opposed to the screen makes too much sense.

    • Brett Halladay - 8 years ago

      Lower hardware costs, maintaining or increasing margins, and higher sales of a new apple pencil with this feature are the big reasons this would work.

    • Grayson Mixon - 8 years ago

      The Apple Pencil already has pressure sensitivity built into it. iOS on the iPad Pro just doesn’t translate the pressure data into 3D touch events.

      However, 3D touch on the iPhone is used in the Notes app to vary the darkness and thickness when drawing, and on the iPad Pro, the pressure data from the Apple Pencil does the same thing.

      So, they could implement 3D touch with the Apple Pencil on the iPad Pro with a software update to iOS.

      • taoprophet420 - 8 years ago

        A developer did just this right after the 12.9″ Pro was released.

        To me the gestures of 3D Touch makes much more sense on iPads then iPhones.With the $599 entry price for the 9.7″ model i think Apple should included the pencil and enabled #D touch via the Pencil.

  28. 3D Touch has, so far, just been a “hey look it does this” and then forget it feature. Tons of apps have added the 3D Touch menus to the homescreen icon but.. they are for items that you can get to just as easily by opening the app. It’s only SLIGHTLY more convenient because I’m touching twice in roughly the same area. An example of this could be Tweetbot. I could 3D Touch the icon and touch “New Tweet” or I could have just touched the icon and touched the “New Tweet” icon in the corner. 9/10 the 3D Touch shortcuts and such don’t offer any real benefit.

    IF Apple could make it so that apps could provide custom UI as an overlay without having to open the app, that would be nice. Or, trigger that custom UI without a second menu. So like, if I could 3D Touch the Messages icon and that action something like the Quick Compose functionality that BiteSMS and others used to provide. That, I would like.

  29. Ian Band - 8 years ago

    They left if off the 5SE because it’s a “cheaper” alternative, so it will have less features. They left if off the new iPad Pro because of the backlash they would get from those of us who purchased the larger iPad Pro. The next versions of both iPad Pro devices will have it….well, at least that’s my opinion.

  30. Frank Bicking - 8 years ago

    The problem with 3D Touch is Apple. The one thing I want the most is to press to play a playlist from the home screen. Why Apple can I not add a a few of my favorite playlist to the music icon? Even as a huge Apple fan and a person that owns almost all Apple products I am tiring of Tim and the Apple control. Also another area it has huge potential is collapsed tools in drawing apps. From what I have read the iPad Pro 12.9 could support it but Apple will not let it. It’s this type of control crap that is going to hurt Apple and 3D touch in the long run.

  31. I can’t imagine holding iPad in a hand and using a 3D Touch, it seems purposed for iPhones IMO. Just as is Pencil made only for iPads.

    • taoprophet420 - 8 years ago

      3D Touch to e is better suited for iPad. It has more potential for productivity and easier navigation on an iPad

    • Jake Becker - 8 years ago

      Though I’ve seen some valid criticism in here, I agree with this statement most. There’s nothing user friendly or intuitive about 3D Touch on iPad or Apple Pencil on iPhone.

  32. Morac - 8 years ago

    I have a 6s Plus and I frequently forget I even have 3D Touch, even though I’d estimate that 40% of the apps I use support it. Sometimes I accidentally press and trigger it and I think “oh yeah I have 3D Touch”. I think the only app I use it on consistently are Google Maps (from home screen). I find myself accidentally force pressing on the Google Maps app icon on my iPad because of that.

    The only 3D Touch feature I use consistently is app switching and the trackpad feature, both of which can already be done on the iPad using multiple finger touch.

    I don’t think it’s dead though. Especially since the current iPhone Apple is running focuses on 3D Touch.

  33. taoprophet420 - 8 years ago

    Ben I think you ignored a bigger issue here.Users are going to be very confused on what gestures there device is capable of. If Apple releases an iPhone without a home button this year or next, there will be 3-4 current iPhones that have a different set of gestures and interactions.

    Thinking $399 budget iPhone should have 3D Touch is kinda insane. The 6S got .2mm thicker from the 3D TouchPanel, the iPhone 7 is rumored to be 1 mm thinner from a new display array and most likely its 2nd gen take at 3D Touch. This next model will probably have a higher yield rate. I see plenty of rumors the initial yield rate was 30-40% on iPhone 6s and is 30% or below on screens big enough for iPads.

    I think right now the issue is production capability. However on iPad Pro Apple is able to do 3D Touch gestures via the Pencil. Maybe it will activate it in iOS 10, but i think they should already enabled.

    To me 3D is better suited for iPads then iPhones.

    • Ben Lovejoy - 8 years ago

      “I would argue it’s also poor UI to have an operating system feature that may or may not be available depending on the device you’re using at the time.”

  34. carmenia83 - 8 years ago

    3D Touch is cool tech, but I feel like it is much better implemented on Apple Watch where you HAVE to use it to perform certain functions, than it is on the iPhone. I’m hoping that this is the beta test for ditching the physical home button and replacing it with a 3D Touch gesture, coupled with a Touch ID sensor embedded behind a sapphire display.

  35. Whoda (@Whodakat) - 8 years ago

    Developers are still updating their apps for a 5.5″ screen! That’s been since 2014 and I think it’s safe to say the larger screen was kind of a big deal that developers might want to adjust their apps for. Clearly some developers are busy/lazy whatever. Use it, don’t use it. It’s just going to get better and since it’s not in the way, why would it go away? I personally think it gives the function of widgets without the mess.

    ‘…the only way I can tell is by randomly stabbing at apps with my finger like a deranged monkey.”

    That might be a bit of an overstatement. As long as your not a moron and you don’t download hundreds of new apps a day, you’ll have no problem remembering which apps it works with.

  36. Smigit - 8 years ago

    It’ll get there one day, but it’ll take a while and the 5se not supporting it will likely slow the adoption rate down. The problem is while there is tens of million if devices with current OS but without 3D Touch support, developers are forced to implement another UI method to cater to these customers. If they need to cater to devices without 3D Touch, is it then still worth their effort to cater to those with the feature? Probably not…better to keep the experience consistent and make that universal workflow as great as it can be.

    3D Touch will be more useful when it isn’t just being used for shortcuts I imagine. Right now half those shortcuts aren’t even particularly more efficient…it’s not like it takes long to pop in and out of an email for example so I haven’t found the preview features in Mail and the like to be of any use. And that’s the issue…it’s a shortcut for the most common functions that needs to be quick for those without the proper hardware. Right now I see the shortcuts more as alternatives than quicker ways to do anything.

    I’d have liked the 5se to have implemented if only to streamline the hardware and hopefully make developers lives easier when they make a decision on this feature.

    • Smigit - 8 years ago

      On the point of previews…in theory in Safari it sounded cool but in practice every time I got previewed a link I was getting a website header and not a lot else. They probably need to work it around some of the formatting happening with Apple News or something so we get content not site headings and banner ads.

  37. ankushnarula - 8 years ago

    Features such as Multitouch, Retina Display, Taptic Engine, 3D Touch and TruTone build on top of Steve Jobs’s original skeumorphic vision for the iPad of being able to “type on a multitouch glass display” [1]. We should also expect Apple to tap Senseg for their tactile touchscreen feedback technology to round out the skeumorphic vision. [2]

    Personally, I look at 3D Touch the way I looked at Siri in the first year. Neat – but not particularly useful. But now I use Siri all throughout the day for reminders, notes, iMessaging, navigation, etc. I expect that over the next two product generations 3D Touch mechanisms will become more refined and valuable to developers and users alike.

    [1] http://allthingsd.com/20100601/d8-video-steve-jobs-on-the-origins-of-the-ipad/

    [2] http://www.theverge.com/2011/12/2/2605173/senseg-tactile-display-technology-tablet-demo-video

  38. Vamsi Deepak Gadey - 8 years ago

    I think the biggest problems are discoverability, inconsistency and even confusing (long tap vs hard tap) – but I think there is lot of unrealized potential.

    Not all 3D Touch quick actions are equal. There are some really stupid ones (like View Medical ID) on Health app and some really nice ones (like Start Beats1, resume reading a book on iBooks or watching a movie on Videos app). These actions really reduce cognitive overload, and reduce the time to get to something. The problem is there are only few really good quick actions, and you have to make it a habit to use them regularly.

    Even Apple is not fully utilizing them. Why doesn’t Remote app have quick actions for directly launching an app, or even a tv program?

    Another problem with Quick Actions is – it has to launch the corresponding app. For ex: the Weather app can just show the weather of a few cities without having to launch the app, turn on alarm without launching Clock app, mute notifications on Messenger without launching etc. I wish in iOS 10 – they allow Quick Actions to do something without necessarily launching the app.

  39. DanG (@Ingila_Bear) - 8 years ago

    Unless Apple opens up the API give developers more freedom to take advantage of it, it will just stay what it is now, which means it’s nothing special.

  40. Jeremy Shepherd - 8 years ago

    It’s a tough one with new features being implemented into iOS apps. As many people have already pointed out that it isn’t just 3D Touch that hasn’t been added by developers, it’s other things like TouchID & even some apps not having updated textures/graphics for the not-so-new iPhone screen sizes (I’m talking from even back in the 4s/5 jump, not just 6/6+ jump). There are so many apps out there now that there simply is no longer blanket support from developers to update their apps, there will never be a mass update of apps for new features.

    As to the usefulness I’ve found with 3D Touch on my 6s+ that it is quite hit & miss for me. I LOVE the rolling press in on the left edge of the display to access multi-tasking (one handed use is easy being left handed with this too) and I’d never go back to any iPhone without because it is literally something I use *that* much. Everything else like quick actions and peek & pop, I kind of use but not really, I wouldn’t miss being without those features if it came down to it.

  41. Chase Angelo Giles - 8 years ago

    Apps like Postr have taken great advantage of the home screen shortcuts, but in-app 3D Touch may be falling short.

  42. 2is1toomany - 8 years ago

    No, the same thing happened with Touch ID. It’ll catch on as time goes and new iPhones include 3D Touch Supporr.

  43. 2is1toomany - 8 years ago

    No, the same thing happened with Touch ID. It’ll catch on as time goes and new iPhones include 3D Touch support

  44. David Kaplan - 8 years ago

    It’s a small advantage in some situations but it’s a great advantage in others. Peeking an email isn’t that big a deal but 3D Touch on a link to see what the page is.. that’s a great feature. I can’t tell you how many times I do that to make sure I’m not following a dead link. It’s not going to wither away, I would think the next iPads that ship will have the feature. What’s kind of pointless is some shortcuts from the home screen. For instance, News has a shortcut for the ‘For You’ page. It opens to that automatically anyway… Basically it’s a feature that will continue to come to more and more devices and people will start to use it more. I use it multiple times a day. Then again… this is an Apple fanboy site and I use every feature of OS X that nobody else does so…. the jury’s out.

  45. Note that Apple did not make this feature available in Xcode’s simulator until recently, so developers would have to buy or somehow acquire a 6S to develop and test 3D Touch.

  46. confluxnz - 8 years ago

    Apple have never really implemented a new technology / new flagship feature on the iPhone without some sort of roadmap to develop and integrate said feature deeply in to the user experience. Take Siri and Touch ID as examples. Both started out as locked down one dimensional features and offered only a few real world practical benefits; fast forward a couple of years and Siri is deeply integrated in to both iOS and tvOS while Touch ID is the cornerstone of Apple Pay, in-app authentication and iCloud Keychain… It follows then that we have yet to see the best of 3D Touch, irrespective of whether developers or Apple itself is taking full advantage of the technology at this point in time.

    Live Photos and the quick actions menu from the home screen etc. are largely pointless and, dare I say it, gimmicky features. Peeking links, photos and emails certainly comes in handy from time to time, but it’s a nice-to-have function at most. If I had to stake my money on the silver bullet feature of 3D Touch, it’s the ability to bring up the Multitasking interface by pressing the left hand side of the screen.

    This is such a simple feature but in the long-term opens up the real possibility of Apple removing the home button. Of course this is contingent on Touch ID being integrated into the display, but the fact you can now perform such a hallmark function via another medium has me really excited to see if Apple do in fact replace the home button with 3D Touch in the next few years.

    Great though-provoking piece and enjoyable reading as always Ben. Cheers.

    • Ben Lovejoy - 8 years ago

      I definitely think the underlying tech has a future, for the eventual point at which we lose the physical Home button.

  47. It’s odd: I thought Live Photos was a gimmick and couldn’t wait to get my hands on 3D touch. Since using the iPhone 6S Plus, it’s almost the opposite. It shines for me when turning the keyboard into a way to move the cursor around (though this needs some tweaking), other than that, I barely use it.

  48. jmiko2015 - 8 years ago

    Since Samsung didn’t copy 3D Touch for Galaxy S7, we can assume it’s dead.

  49. pdixon1986 - 8 years ago

    force touch is a huge gimmick and for a lot of apps you just dont need it — for example… the camera app — essentially you are one click and slide away from video…now you are a force push, slide, push more…

    In fact for certain apps it actually takes you longer to do what you want it to do.

    It has very little real use.

  50. It’s the only thing holding me from buying the smaller iPad pro, I’d be very pissed off if next years model comes equipped with it

  51. Nigel Burrell - 8 years ago

    Actually 3D Touch and a larger screen are the two main reasons I’ve been considering taking the plunge and upgrading to iPhone 6s from my 5s. However, after reading Ben’s opinion that the 3D Touch “…novelty has somewhat worn off – in part” and has limited app and hardware support, and the fact that 35% of iPhone users still prefer keeping their 4″ models (including the number of users commenting about ditching their 6s for the 4″ SE model), I’m now starting to have doubts about whether the upgrade is a good idea.

    Does anyone find the 3D Touch (and larger screen size) a “must have” and worthy of upgrading from an iPhone 5s?

  52. Danny Munger - 8 years ago

    I think 3D Touch is a very useful feature and allows for an ability to do more with less alll by keeping the simplicity we all love about iPhone. Whether it’s a functional memo that is helpful with productivity or accessibility. Or something fun that would be left out because of its unimportance to a lot of iPhone users. The problem I have now, is going from an iPhone 6 to now a 7 and recently spending over $1100 on an iPad Pro and accessories a short time before, now that I’m using 3D Touch on my iPhone I’m getting confused when using my iPad and clicking things or sending things I wasn’t ready to do because the 3D Touch isn’t there. It also makes me feel like my brand new $1100 iPad Pro is outdated and obsolete at only one month old. It’s actually a big disappointment.

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Avatar for Ben Lovejoy Ben Lovejoy

Ben Lovejoy is a British technology writer and EU Editor for 9to5Mac. He’s known for his op-eds and diary pieces, exploring his experience of Apple products over time, for a more rounded review. He also writes fiction, with two technothriller novels, a couple of SF shorts and a rom-com!


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