After installing iOS 26 noticing glaring issue on iPhone Home Screen

Just installed ios 26 and noticed a glaring issue on the home screen..

I use dark mode for my home screen (press and hold home screen, "edit" in upper left, "customize", select "dark" and "always")

The home screen goes into dark mode, icons, etc.. The dock on the bottom goes into dark mode as well, background turns black.

Now open any app, shouldn't matter which one. The dock background now turns grey and sticks out like an ugly sore thumb. I go back through the settings, blah blah, it never stays black...

THIS IS ALSO an issue with all the folders, the background is the same grey color instead of remaining black.

Any ideas, or a bug?

[Re-Titled by Moderator]

Original Title: Dark mode- home screen dock and folders turning grey

iPhone 15 Pro

Posted on Sep 15, 2025 1:04 PM

Top-ranking reply

jericeric

Level 1

8 points

Posted on Sep 30, 2025 4:56 AM

Figured out (with the help of this post, thank you) that you must enable Dark Mode in BOTH Home Screen settings AND global settings: Settings > Display & Brightness > Appearance > Dark (I don’t have either set to automatic)

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20 replies

Sep 17, 2025 12:52 AM in response to robjw33

Another issue with dark mode is Safari’s keyboard.

it opens in light mode, but as soon as you type something, it changes to dark mode.

Quite an obvious bug

robjw33 Author

Level 1

10 points

Sep 17, 2025 12:28 PM in response to robjw33

I submitted this through Apple's Feedback Assistant; maybe it will get more attention there.

Oct 3, 2025 8:07 AM in response to robjw33

Followed all their recos and visibility is still reduced vs before the update! Why would you possibly make your screen more difficult to see?

Sep 15, 2025 1:42 PM in response to robjw33

Go to Settings>Accessibility>Display & Text Size and make sure Reduced Transparency is off. Mine had gotten turned on. Did Apple do it as part of the update? Had I turned it on and forgotten? We may never know.

Sep 21, 2025 12:27 PM in response to robjw33

I was expecting great things IOS26 after listening to several podcasts. However, the first thing I notice is that I have difficulty reading my home screen on my iPhone 16 ProMax. I went through the Accessibility settings as suggested, it is still difficult to see the aps in my folders while on the home screen. Can the folder background be set as it was before to a darker color without impacting everything else? If not, can I revert back to previous ios?

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After installing iOS 26 noticing glaring issue on iPhone Home Screen