"iMessage on Android would simply serve to remove [an] obstacle to iPhone families giving their kids Android phones" -- an actual quote from the SVP of Software Engineering in charge of iOS, revealed in Epic Games v Apple court discovery
https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.36...
Of course, if you really cared about green bubbles, you'd switch to Android because there you can adjust outgoing message color to your heart's liking :-)
In general, Apple has lowered contrast throughout the UI over the years. There's an accessibility setting for high contrast if you need it.
Yes, one could argue that the default should provide high contrast for everyone, but once this setting is enabled, it effectively becomes just that going forward for those that need it.
With white foreground text, this gives a contrast ratio of 2.15:1 for SMS and 3.79:1 for iMessage. WCAG 2.x AA level compliances requires a contrast ratio of at least 4.5:1 for normal text and at least 3:1 for large text.
https://www.w3.org/WAI/WCAG21/Understanding/contrast-minimum...
Whereas for black on green it's 9.72:1 : https://webaim.org/resources/contrastchecker/?fcolor=000000&...
| iOS 5-6 | iOS 7+ |
---------+-------------+--------+
SMS | 11.3 - 13.4 | 2.2 |
iMessage | 11.8 - 14.1 | 3.8 |Also worth noting is that the color only applies to sent messages. When you receive a message, it's just gray in either case. It makes a certain amount of sense to let the user know which transport their outbound message went on since it will affect your expectations.
To my eyes, the green/blue doesn't make much difference in terms of legibility. I obviously find the reduced contrast throughout iOS annoying and keep increase contrast turned on.
Original: https://ronstauffer.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/taking-a-pic...
Current: https://support.apple.com/library/content/dam/edam/applecare...
generally I try to avoid SMS since the photo quality is bad, there’s no delivery guarantee, and it doesn’t work over wifi.
But let's run with that for a moment, and assume many people do in fact find that more difficult to read. I still have trouble calling that particularly hostile given that it's sent messages, received ones are the same color no matter what.
I'm more open to the green vs blue argument than the old-green vs new-green one. Apple definitely wants you to know you're using iMessage. It just happens to be useful for me as a customer, too -- I'm glad it's prominent when I send a text message instead of an iMessage. It aligns my expectations for what features will work in the conversation.
For small developers there's checker tools and simulators, but Apple is huge and has a responsibility to get this right.
Most accessibility problems aren't things that those without some sort of sensory disability (beyond mild long-sightedness) can detect easily - at least, without using tools to do so.
Surely though there is some sort of "accessible" mode you can put it into that does improve the contrast?
I worry this a subjective matter, i.e. if the colours were reversed some people would make exactly the same complaint.
The actual argument really should focus on whether phone providers should use some interoperable standard more capable than SMS. If they can't come to consensus then the telecommunications regulators should involve themselves and force one.
In fact, it is much better than what iOS6 had.
iMessage is apparently a differentiator for them.
