“Welcome into a form-shifting multitasking and head-turning revolutionary iPhone user experience” reads in the Apple homepage’s description of Dynamic Island. Although it’s a shape-shifting experience, it’s not an experience that is game-changing or head-turning in any way. It isn’t in any way or way “multitasking.”
Dynamic Island is great to check out as it’s running but, after five months of its existence, it’s still not living its promise. Apple made at the time of its launch. There’s plenty of room for it, but we’re waiting for something tangible to be created from it.
Dynamic Island remains to be a disappointment. I was expecting it.
Apple states, “Dynamic Island blends fun and functionality as never before, integrating the notifications, alarms, and other information into one central space.” However, its advertising gimmicks and the hype on paper do not translate into real-world experiences.
In September of 2022, I had written I wrote in the month of September that Dynamic Island worked with only three of my apps three of them – Apple Music, Spotify, and WhatsApp. I figured things would improve as time went on and more developers incorporated functions within their apps. Fast forward to February 2023, then Dynamic Island is still a mess. Dynamic Island has mostly beautiful animations of things you already know about -but that’s all it is.
For example, Uber was supposed to utilize Live Activities and include the information about your ride on top of your iPhone 14 Pro’s screen. What I see right when I book a ride is the map icon within Dynamic Island that indicates an app is using location services running in the background. This is the same as seeing the location icon in my notification bar in the top left corner of any iPhone with no Dynamic Island. It’s not very dynamic on the Island, is it?
Uber has reportedly begun rollout Dynamic Island functionality in December, however in February 2023, it’s not observed for me on the iPhone 14 Pro. The feature is also not available in the Digital Trends editor Joe Maring’s iPhone 14 Pro Max, even when the Uber app is updated to the most current version.
The camera cutouts show beautiful voice animations that I can watch in the WhatsApp chat, and the colors change depending on the person speaking. These are pretty animations but aren’t functional.
The only time I’ve found myself using Dynamic Island occurs when I’m listening to music. When I press long, it displays the control for playback in a tiny area, while tapping it will take me to the application. This isn’t any faster than moving to the bottom to gain access to music controls from the notifications shade. If this is the way is required to allow Apple to classify the feature “multitasking,” it really must rethink the meaning of the word.
Multitasking on iPhones remains an impossible dream due to the fact that Apple thinks of offering music control over the application running “multitasking.” It’s not like Dynamic Island doesn’t do anything faster or more efficiently than was previously possible. It doesn’t give me the ability to swiftly open the Notes application in a separate window, and then jot notes while I’m searching for a story using Safari. It’s not allowing me access to the ETA in the Uber app. Uber.
In a sense, Samsung’s Galaxy S7 Edge’s waterfall-like display on the left edge seemed more useful as of 2016 than Dynamic Island will be in 2023. It was able to use one app over the other, something that is not yet available on iPhones.
An app issue that’s not improving
None of the apps I frequently use supports Dynamic Island Yes it’s zero. And I use quite a few apps daily. For a better idea of what I’m doing, I’m constantly switching from Twitter, Instagram, Asana, Zoom, Microsoft Teams, Gmail, and more all day long. One exception at this moment is Google Maps, which shows an ad for directions when you’re navigating. The Dynamic Island will show I’m in the Zoom call after I close the app however its utility is a bit shaky at best.
When it was first launched, Apple promised that Dynamic Island would become more effective “by the close of this year.” We’re two months behind on the date and it appears to be more an app-specific issue rather than an Apple problem in general. If there’s a single firm that can enlist developers to make a feature successful, it’s Apple. It’s not turned out as Apple wanted it to.
“The Dynamic Island is one of the main reasons to look at choosing the iPhone 14 Pro over the less expensive iPhone 14 and is also one of the few distinct features when you’re considering making the switch from an earlier iPhone. If it’s used only for system applications, its appeal diminishes along with the overall appeal of the most recent phone.” Digital Trends Andy Boxall wrote in a December article. 2022.
It’s still the case due to the slow and virtually non-existent rollout of the brand-new Live Activities support for existing applications. As of February 20, 2023, Dynamic Island is now running out of resources and isn’t the must-have feature that Apple would like you to believe it is.
