How CommunityKit showcased the best of WWDC 2026 without going to Apple Park
Who needs a Golden Ticket?
For years, I've been asked if I was going to WWDC, Apple's yearly developer conference. I'd say no, usually down to cost, my interest in Apple being at its lowest point for a long while, iMore's closure in 2024, or the lack of events outside of WWDC. But this year was different.
As my interest in parts of Apple was coming back, I was aware of CommunityKit, a weeklong event that ran concurrently to WWDC 2026. And so I decided to go for it. With the week still fresh in my mind, below is a run-through of each day between June 8 and June 10, from attending CommunityKit to The Talk Show Live.
After some thought, the trip has only further reinforced my belief that developers are the backbone of Apple as a whole, with a refocus on agentic AI apps being seen as a light stepping-stone to full development, rather than replacing the journey of creating an app.
Monday
After arriving on Sunday evening and going straight to sleep after being up for 20 hours, I still woke up incredibly early. I was shattered, but also anxious. Was I here for no reason at all? Was I going to want an early flight? After a ridiculously good breakfast at Denny's, I found myself at the Residence Inn, where CommunityKit was being held.
Showing my QR Code ticket, I was allowed to grab as many stickers and pins as possible before going into the main room, where countless developers were waiting for the WWDC 2026 keynote to start. This was new for me - I've never experienced an Apple keynote with others. It was either talking to others through social media or WhatsApp to keep track of what to cover.
So, to sit with developers was a lot of fun, as well as watching the State of the Union talk after. As my impressions were forming, I could also tell which announcements were good and some that were less so. From Siri AI to the ability to theme Xcode, plenty of claps and jeers whilst I tried to stomach an incredibly sugary Coke.
Around 12, the watchalongs were done - and I was already exhausted. However, with hours to kill, I decided to go to 1 Infinite Loop, Apple's previous headquarters, followed by Apple Park's Visitor Center. I bought a water bottle and a t-shirt, and soon headed off.
I had already met some developers, who invited me to a meetup at a bar. It was a great time, meeting up with others whom I had spoken to for years, such as Arno Appenzeller, developer of a great app called Pipifer, and others. But not long after arriving, I decided to call it a day as bed was needed.
Tuesday
Another breakfast at Denny's with one of the biggest omelettes I've ever had. Because of the time difference, I was watching the Nintendo Direct as I ate. Overall, a good event - I'm curious what The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time Remake will be like, and whether it'll use some ideas from the scrapped expansion title on the 64DD, Ura Zelda.
I'll be covering this in more detail soon, but I decided to choose Waymo to get to the Residence Inn this time for a coffee. This is a self-driving taxi that made me anxious to begin with, but I ended up using it as a main way of travelling for the rest of the trip. After publishing my WWDC 2026 thoughts, I went to CommunityKit for the rest of the day, meeting up with plenty I had long spoken to, such as Charlie Chapman, podcaster and developer, Chris Wu of Please Don't Rain, Neil Hodgson of Widget Cast / Animal Popper, Angelo Cammalleri of Passable and Coca, alongside many more I bumped into.
The first was Step into Vision - a bunch of tables had plenty of Apple Vision Pro developers, and I came away surprised. I was playing a UFO game, experiencing a VR movie called Rashinban Adventure, talking to developer Franck Martin about Sonic Zen Spheres, as well as chatting with others about how the headset could help those in medical scenarios. Admittedly, I have long thought the platform was dead on arrival due to the product's high price, but I feel as if there's huge potential here if Apple brings out a lower-cost model sooner rather than later.
I met up with Ken Case of Omnigroup, and we chatted in-depth about so much - from OmniFocus to where Apple is today, and why I lost interest in the company around 2024.
Another event that stuck out for me was Matthew Cassinelli's App Intelligence Automators talk. Having followed one another for almost 10 years, and Matt being on my podcast in 2017, The Outpost Show, I wanted to see where Shortcuts currently stood in the community, especially with the latest updates.
Despite the event being in another room, it was packed, and justifiably so. With the new ability to create Shortcuts with Apple Intelligence by just using your voice, Cassinelli spoke about how pleased he was to see this and why there should be more eyes on App Intents. For those unaware, it's a framework for using features of apps without being inside the app itself, such as Widgets, Shortcuts, and Siri.
After a quick visit to Paul Hudson's 'What's new in iOS 27' talk, which was a great watch in using some of the new SwiftUI code, it was a break before going to John Gruber's The Talk Show Live.
Admittedly, I've dipped in and out of his podcast in recent years, but I always read his site, Daring Fireball. I've also held a constant candle to Vesper, a note-taking app that he and a few friends were involved in several years ago. The Talk Show Live was fine - it covered everything from Monday's keynote, and hearing Joanna Stern's views about it was great as well. All I'd like to see for next year is to have a developer on stage - someone who can give some insights into how some of the announcements will benefit or even hinder others making apps.
As much as I wanted to stay around and network again, my jet-lagged head ordered an Uber, and I was fast asleep by 22:30.
Wednesday
A short day as my flight was at 17:40, and I needed to be at the airport from at least 3, but two events were crucial for the trip. The first was watching a live episode of the Launched podcast. Having listened to the show since its beginnings, it was great to eat some Pizza and drink some sugary Coke as I watched the show unfold.
One event I didn't expect to go to was one about Linux containers. A small team from Apple hosted a talk about creating a virtualised Linux workstation within a Mac, allowing you to use a Linux OS just like you can with Parallels Desktop or Virtual Buddy. Despite the setup requiring the use of some command-line functions, the end result is impressive.
WWDC 2026 marked the first release of this, and after speaking to a couple of the team, they were understandably excited and almost relieved that they could showcase it all and talk about it. I was reminded of writer Matt Gemmell's recent efforts to move on from macOS to Linux - perhaps this could be a best of both worlds scenario someday.
Nevertheless, the Indie App Fair from 2 PM was the headline event for me, despite starting at ten past, and I had to leave by half past. With tables laid out across the hall, I got to meet plenty of developers, some for the first time. One was Riley Testut of Delta, and it was great to see the table sprawled with different devices and controllers to showcase the emulator.
Plenty more apps caught my eye, some of which will be featured in this month's App Picks - but I left with minutes to spare, and plenty of jet-lag to deal with once I arrived home on Thursday afternoon.
If anything, this week proved that you can have the full WWDC experience without going to Apple Park. CommunityKit proved that in droves. Granted, I've spoken to developers before this via Springboard, TechRadar, and other outlets, but if you're someone who wants to discover app development for the first time, CommunityKit is an ideal way to get some inspiration.
Now, I'm not a developer. I've never had the knowledge or the interest to look into creating an app. But I've always been interested in others who have had a passion for it - those who have found ways to help users - whether that's with to-do apps or just to reawaken some nostalgic memories via playing Super Mario World all over again on their iPhone.
Having met others in person for the first time, like Ken and Riley, as well as going to The Talk Show Live, the week gave me my own side of inspiration, to a part of me that's felt unenthused and discouraged, due to some of Apple's decisions in the past few years, and the way iMore shut down. My time in Cupertino has reversed that, and I believe that the developer community is stronger than ever, regardless of the articles you'll see of agentic apps and assistants that can be big distractions.
I'm taking a wait-and-see approach as to whether I'll be back in Cupertino next year, but I'm grateful for meeting everyone during the week, as well as myself for simply going for it into the unknown - and sometimes that's all you need to do.
Thanks for reading.
If you'd like to chat to me about an app you're working on or improving upon due to these announcements, or even sponsorship opportunities, get in touch.
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