Apple WWDC 2025: Key Takeaways and Reactions
Let's break down the new designs, features and developments announced at this year's event, what intrigued us most, what underwhelmed, and what Wall Street thinks.
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Monday afternoon, as part of its WWDC 2025 event, Apple AAPL showcased its upcoming operating system (OS) releases for its hardware products, including iPhone, Mac, and iPad.
As suspected, Apple has changed its naming convention, unifying it across all its platforms. Public betas for iOS 26, iPadOS 26, macOS Tahoe, watchOS 26, and tvOS 26 will be coming in July, and the company will release beta updates until the final software is released sometime this fall.
Given the leadup to the event, there were few surprises, but ones we did see included live translation for messages, FaceTime and iPhone apps; improved Apple Wallet and CarPlay features; and an AI-powered “workout buddy” for Apple Watch. Arguably the biggest changes were with iPadOS, which should bring the iPad that much closer in functionality to a Mac. As a longtime user of both, we look forward to the addition of Preview, drop-down menus, and other aspects of iPadOS 26. We’ve downloaded the iPad 26OS Developer Beta and so far, we like what we see.
On the AI front, there were modest under-the-hood developments, but here, too, as was largely expected, Apple announced its Foundation Models Framework. This is a new API allowing third-party developers to leverage the large language models at the heart of Apple Intelligence and build it into their apps.
Digesting the event, we are intrigued by the design overhaul and new features coming to its OS platforms later this year. This could help those with older, not supported device models upgrade to newer ones.
It is hard to disagree, at least for now, that Apple is taking, as some have called it, a “gap year” on Apple Intelligence, but one of the great advantages the company has is its developer community and that’s the core audience for WWDC. At last count, Apple had 34 million developers across 227 regions and the apps they developed are what powers the App Store and the $1.3 trillion in developer billings and sales it delivered last year.
With that in mind, over the coming weeks and months, we’ll be paying close attention to developer comments about Apple’s Foundation Models Framework as well as the company’s progress on Apple Intelligence. We’ll also be interested in any AI partnering announcements, including for Apple’s AI on-device efforts in China.
Our thinking is that as the company continues to enhance Apple Intelligence and other AI efforts, it will foster an extended upgrade cycle across its massive install base. That should trigger accelerated EPS growth, especially as Apple Silicon and the higher-margin Services business account for a larger portion of its revenue mix. The catalyst for that will be what we describe as Apple’s next “ah-ha” moment, one that shows investors and consumers it is not to be counted out. Until then, AAPL shares are likely to be rangebound, which means we'll be carefully picking our spots to round out the Pro Portfolio’s position size.
Wall Street Reaction
Wall Street’s reaction to WWDC wasn’t too dissimilar to ours. Morgan Stanley said it sees sentiment unlikely to shift until more tangible AI progress is evident, contending that Apple "clearly still has the ingredients to make it an AI winner." The firm keeps an Overweight rating and a $235 price target on Apple shares.
UBS called Apple’s announcements “evolutionary not revolutionary,” which is an accurate summation, in our view. Citi, like us, will focus on upcoming AI developments at Apple, including the company’s personalized Siri powered by Apple Intelligence, which has been pushed to 2026.
At the time of publication, TheStreet Pro Portfolio was long AAPL.
