Dark Mode is coming to iOS, though it might be a while

After Dark Mode was discovered in the stock iOS 10 Message app through the Xcode iOS simulator, unsurprisingly, curious techies kept digging around the code for more tidbits of what's to come from Apple's mobile OS in the future.

Programmer Andrew Wiik – one of the people who posted the first screenshots of the Message app in Dark Mode – has now discovered the same functionality in the iOS 10 Settings app. His new findings further back the theory that Apple might indeed be preparing a system-wide dark theme for iOS.

On a slightly unrelated note, Wiik's exploration of the iOS 10 code yielded another interesting finding – a sixth, blank button near the top of the Control Center. While its purpose is unknown, Wiik speculates that it might be reserved for a cellular data toggle.

Rumors about an upcoming dark theme for iOS have been going around for a while, even before WWDC 16, but with the release of the first iOS 10 beta people have been finding some convincing clues that Apple's developers are at least playing around with the feature internally. For example, asking Siri to turn on Dark Mode results in her saying, “Sorry, but I'm not able to change that setting”, rather than yielding a generic response. Although the feature was not demoed or even mentioned during the keynote, the new Clock app for iOS 10 introduced a slew of changes, among which is a new dark theme spanning across all tabs and settings of the app.

Whether Dark Mode will make it into the final release of iOS 10 this fall remains uncertain. Apple might be holding off until next year's iPhone which will purportedly feature an OLED display, as dark UIs are particularly well suited for this type of screen.