iCloud.com Gets Dark Mode, Reminders Improvements + More

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Apple typically refreshes its iCloud web portal alongside its major software updates each year, often to match new features introduced in iOS, iPadOS, and macOS. This year is no exception, although the changes are less about keeping pace with iOS 18 and more about catching up.
Perhaps the most long overdue among these is support for Dark Mode. The iPhone and iPad got Dark Mode in iOS 13, so it’s about time it came to iCloud on the web.
There appears to be no way to trigger Dark Mode manually on iCloud.com; instead, Apple says it will “automatically match your device settings.” This may be somewhat browser-dependent, but it worked with Safari, Chrome, and Firefox in our testing, at least on macOS.
Apple also promises that you’ll be able to customize the background on the home page by choosing between different colors. Sadly, the ability to change this is tied to the overall home page customization features that are only available for those not using Advanced Data Protection (ADP) to secure their iCloud data with end-to-end encryption. However, it will retain any background color you set before enabling Advanced Data Protection (which means if you really want to change your background color for iCloud on the web, you can turn off ADP, set your preferred color, and then turn ADP back on).
Beyond those cosmetic changes, Apple is enhancing iCloud Drive, iCloud Photos, Notes, Calendar, and Reminders with features that mostly just bring the web versions up to speed with their respective iPhone, iPad, and Mac counterparts:
- iCloud Notes gains the ability to pin notes through the web interface — a feature that’s been available in the iPhone, iPad, and Mac Notes apps since iOS 11.
- iCloud Reminders finally lets you complete recurring reminders and create new reminder lists from the web.
- iCloud Drive has a Shared View that lets you easily see files that others have shared with you.
- iCloud Calendar gets a design refresh to mirror its Mac counterpart more closely. It also adds support for Hijri calendar.
Perhaps the most significant user interface changes are in iCloud Photos. While these are nothing like what Apple has brought to the iPhone in iOS 18, some helpful quality-of-life enhancements should make it easier to find your photos when using the web app.
Chief among these is a new calendar icon that lets you quickly jump to any month or year in your library timeline view — a huge timesaver for those with large libraries that should eliminate the need for endless scrolling.
It’s also now possible to adjust the date, time, and location of any photo directly from iCloud Photos on the web, so you won’t need to pull out your iPhone or iPad or head back to your Mac Photos app when you need to make a correction. Unfortunately, there’s no ability to make batch changes here, but we can’t say we’re too surprised by that.
Similarly, it seems support for Shared Libraries remains half-baked. While shared photos are fully accessible in the Library view, you won’t be able to see them in your albums at all. You’ll need to switch to your Personal Library, at which point you’ll only see photos in your albums that aren’t shared (which may result in some albums showing up entirely empty).
This makes Apple’s last enhancement to iCloud Photos less practical than we’d hoped. While you can now display a custom album in the Photos tile on the homepage, you’ll only be able to see the photos stored in your personal library and not those you’ve shared with others (or that others have shared with you). Like the other Home Screen customizations, this also isn’t available if you have Advanced Data Protection enabled for your account.