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Zac Kew-Denniss / Android Authority
TL;DR
- iOS 27 introduces massive 4×6 widgets that can occupy an entire home screen pane, a concept Android pioneered in 2009 and expanded with resizable layouts in 2012.
- Currently in developer preview, the update will allow users to drop extra-large widgets directly or long-press and stretch existing smaller widgets to expand them.
- While designed for standard iPhones to boost data visibility for apps like calendars and stock trackers, these giant widgets would be perfect for the rumored “iPhone Ultra” foldable display.
Android users have taken widgets for granted for years, and rightfully so. Google introduced the foundation of its widget framework all the way back in 2009 with Android 1.5 Cupcake (!). iPhone users, on the other hand, only jumped on the bandwagon relatively recently. Now, with the new iOS 27 update announced at WWDC 2026, Apple is finally introducing massive, extra-large widgets that can occupy an entire home screen pane.
To put this timeline in perspective, Apple introduced its rigid widget system in 2020 with iOS 14, more than a decade after Android pioneered the concept. Apple’s initial approach revolved around strictly enforced, predictable aspect ratios like 2×2, 2×4, and 4×4. Ironically, this mirrored the blocky, hardcoded sizes Android developers were forced to use during the Android Cupcake era.
On the other side of the fence, Android evolved past that constraint a generation ago: Android 4.1 Jelly Bean introduced real-time, user-resizable widgets in 2012, and Android 12 introduced truly responsive layout buckets via Material You in 2021. You could simply take a widget and stretch it across the entire home screen, leaving the app and the Android system to handle the rest.
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Even in 2026, Apple is still playing catch-up on fundamental home screen mechanics. iOS 18 finally brought free icon placement to the iPhone layout in 2024, and iOS 27 is expanding that canvas to support giant 4×6 widgets. This gives information-heavy apps a massive surface area to display glanceable data, which will be an immediate quality-of-life upgrade for stock tracking, expansive calendar views, and deep note-taking views.
Right now, only a handful of Apple’s first-party apps leverage the new extra-large 4×6 size, but that’s par for the course given that iOS 27 has only just rolled out as a developer preview. We can expect third-party support to ramp up significantly as developers adapt their codebases over the summer ahead of the stable public release this fall.
When it comes to more apps, the functionality will attempt to mimic Android’s flexible approach (but not quite): users can either drop an extra-large 4×6 widget directly onto an empty pane or simply long-press and stretch an existing smaller widget to expand it. However, you’re still missing true Android-style freedom over the exact aspect ratio — but perhaps iOS will finally get there in the next few updates.
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