Apple competing directly with its developers results in better software. More often than not, however, it kills an app—just ask the developer behind Watson, the web search tool of yore.
Apple is notorious for “sherlocking,” which eliminates or shrinks the market for established third-party software due to a free, built-in feature. Sherlocking is not quite the same as Apple buying an app like Dark Sky, whose engine now powers the redesigned Weather app.
In this post, we’ll discuss what sherlocking means with a few typical examples and whether sherlocking should concern anyone nowadays.
Where Does the Term “Sherlocked” Come From?
The origins of the term can be traced to the early 2000s. In 1997, Apple launched Mac OS 8 with Sherlock, a search utility named after fictional detective Sherlock Holmes created by British author Arthur Conan Doyle.
Mac users could not only search local files and their contents with Sherlock but also conduct web searches. In 2002, Sherlock 3 arrived alongside Mac OS X Jaguar with an interface and features closely resemblingWatson, Karelia Software’s popular $29 app.
Watson launched the year prior as a Sherlock companion with more powerful web searching, fueled by simple plug-ins anyone could create. The app referenced Sherlock by its very name—Dr. Watson is Sherlock Holmes’s associate and confidant in Doyle’s detective stories.
Soon, Watson fizzled out because Sherlock had the advantage of being integrated deep into the bowels of the operating system. Watson fans cried foul, coining the term “Sherlocked.”
Watson’s lead developer, Dan Wood, took to theKarelia blogto explain the situation, mentioning that Apple’s co-founder Steve Jobs even gave him a buzz to acknowledge that Watson inspired Sherlock. Henceforth, the word “Sherlocked” has been used to refer to any time Apple innocently implements a feature that makes one or more third-party apps unnecessary.
Which Popular Apps Has Apple Sherlocked?
Since the Watson days, Apple has Sherlocked many apps, including the following:
Konfabulator
Konfabulator offered JavaScript widgets, but its days were numbered after Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger launched in 2005, offering a similar capability called Dashboard. Konfabulator even included a so-called God view of all widgets called Konsposé, a reference to Apple’s Exposé feature. Yahoo later bought Konfabulator to power its own widgets.
Growl showed notifications from supported apps at a time when the Mac lacked a native notification system. The Notification Center’s debut in Mac OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion in 2012 instantly rendered Growl obsolete.
Camo turned iPhones into Mac webcams. In 2022, Apple introducedthe Continuity Camera featurealongside macOS Ventura, eliminating the need for wireless webcam apps.
Bump, the once immensely popular app for sharing contacts and files by physically bumping two phones together, was discontinued in 2014. Bump lost its iPhone users to AirDrop, Apple’s device-to-device file transfer feature. And with iOS 17’s NameDrop feature, Apple has brought a sleek contact-sharing experience to iPhones.
1Password, LastPass, Dashlane, and Other Password Managers
These popular password managers have an increasingly strong competitor in Apple’s password manager called iCloud Keychain due to overlapping functionality—especially since iCloud Keychain picked up support for two-factor verification codes in 2021.
Google Lens
Google Lens leverages AI to recognize objects in photos. But because iOS, iPad, and macOS now offer compelling on-device machine learning features like Visual Look Up and Live Text, which lets you extract text from photos and videos, Apple users no longer need apps like Google Lens.
Talk about bad timing! In 2022, Figma released an iPad collaboration tool, Figma. Later, in the same year, Apple launched itswhiteboard app called Freeform, enabling iPhone, iPad, and Mac users to share notes, photos, doodles, and so on out of the box.
Sleep Trackers
Popular apps like Oura and Whoop have been Sherlocked by the Apple Watch’s evolving sleep-tracking features. Apple doubled down on this space after buying Beddit, a startup behind an under-the-sheets strap for advanced sleep monitoring.
Duet Display and Luna Display
Created by ex-Apple engineers, Duet Display and Luna Display turn your iPad into an additional Mac screen and drawing tablet with imperceptible lag. But withApple’s Sidecar featurein macOS Catalina and later, folks can use an iPad as a secondary display for free. And don’t forget that the Apple Pencil alone can turn your iPad into a very capable graphics tablet.
The f.lux app helped reduce sleep disruptions by adjusting a display’s color temperature and blue light intensity at night. But you already know how its story ends. In 2016, Apple introducedthe Night Shift featurefor iPhones, iPads, and Macs, killing f.lux overnight.
Is Sherlocking Still a Thing?
Yes, very much so. You could say the rate of Sherlocking has increased in recent years as Apple has been sharply focused on adding quality-of-life features that people want.
Withinteractive widgets in iOS and iPadOS 17, watchOS 10, and macOS Sonoma, for example, users won’t need specialized apps such as Widgetsmith and WidgetWall. Although a subset of users will continue using these apps for edge cases, most people will simply take advantage of built-in functionality that costs nothing.
Apple’s Journal app, announced alongside iOS 17 at WWDC 2023, has instantly Sherlockedspecialized Mac journaling appsandcasual note-taking softwarelike Day One and Obsidian. As formood-logging appssuch as Daylio and Moodnotes, Apple’s answer is a mood-tracking feature in iOS 17’s Health app.
The Sherlocking trend will likely continue, as we don’t think Apple would stop replicating features from popular third-party apps across its operating systems.
The Pros and Cons of Sherlocking
Sherlocking benefits users but is a nightmare for developers. From Apple’s standpoint, Sherlocking is the result of free market research derived from the company’s detailed statistics on the most downloaded apps and how people use them. As a user, you’ll prefer to use a built-in feature because you may’t be bothered to download a dedicated app.
Things aren’t nearly as rosy for a developer who just saw their hard work Sherlocked unapologetically by Apple. At the very least, the app will face an uncertain future. In the worst-case scenario, its revenue will tank. Apple’s use of private APIs and its deep insights into what’s popular make Sherlocking an uneven, unfair playing field for developers.
But for a massively successful app that many people want to use, like Google Maps, Sherlocking can legitimize its space and create new growth opportunities.
Sherlocking: Fair Play or Theft?
Getting Sherlocked isn’t the end of the world. Most folks don’t care about Sherlocking as long as the App Store provides apps that solve their problems.
Still, a small but vocal minority of people who value high-quality software will argue that Sherlocking equates wholesale copying and theft. It might even eventually draw antitrust scrutiny, they argue. So far, however, no lawsuit has been filed over the practice.
