This post reviews ayeris, a new theme for jailbroken devices running iOS 7 that brings a subtle, but welcome, redesign to the iOS 7 icons and interface.

One of the benefits of jailbreaking an iOS device is installing custom themes that change the icons and interface. Arguably, themes became even more beneficial with the advent of iOS 7’s controversial icon redesign. ayeris is a new theme by renowned designer Surenix that takes iOS 7’s design influences and enhances them, bringing subtle changes and a pastel-neon color palette. In this post, we’ll hold ayeris under the magnifying glass and show why its the best theme currently available for jailbroken iPhones and iPod Touches running iOS 7.

Surenix is well known for crafting another theme, the benchmark iOS 6 theme, ayecon. This theme was certainly one of the most downloaded themes for jailbroken devices running the now outdated software. The idea behind ayecon was taking the design aesthetic of iOS 6, which drew heavily on skeuomorphism, and taking it to its logical conclusion. ayecon had a ridiculous level of detail and realism, utilizing Apple’s then relatively new Retina Display technology to create a rich and immersive experience on the iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch. ayecon’s popularity was further confirmed when Surenix, to much fanfare, updated it for iOS 7. A lot has changed visually, though, with iOS since iOS 7 came out, and many people thought that ayecon’s skeuomorphism looked out of place and hoped that Surenix was working on a new theme that more closely matched iOS 7’s new flattened design. ayeris is his answer to these hopes: a theme that feels truly at home on an iOS 7 device and improves many of the controversial design choices Apple made with iOS 7. Here are three major improvements that ayeris brings to iOS 7.

1. Icon Colors – One of the biggest differences between the stock iOS 7 icons and ayeris’ icons is their color palette. Where the stock icons are almost infamously eye-meltingly neon, ayeris’ colors are somewhat softer and less harsh. If the stock icons are a set of highlighter markers, ayeris’ icons are a tasty’ bowl of rainbow sherbet. A good example of this is the Music app. Check out the difference below. The stock icon is on the left and the ayeris icon is on the right.

Stock Music Icon

ayeris Music Icon

2. Improved Icon Visual Design – When looking at iOS 7’s stock icons, I often wonder why Apple’s designers made some of the choices they did. Though Apple made a point to talk at length about iOS 7’s design aesthetic when iOS 7 was announced, there are some visual choices the company made that seem odd or inconsistent. It’s almost as though different independent designers worked on iOS 7’s various stock icons without talking to one another or to the people who were designing the rest of the operating system. ayeris, on the other hand, brings a greater level of cohesion to the default apps as well as to many third party apps – ayeris currently contains over 200 re-designed icons with more on the way.

As an example of how ayeris improves the visual design of the icons on iOS 7, check out the Reminders icons below. Notice how in ayeris more attention to detail is paid to the lines on the icon: they are color coded to the dots and don’t awkwardly extend all the way to the icon’s right edge. The ayeris version of the icon also implies how the Reminders app is used – the blue dot, one of the reminders lists, appears to be selected. The ayeris version of the Reminders app is more visually appealing while also communicating more about the app it represents. ayeris’ other icons take a similar approach.

Stock Reminders Icon

ayeris Reminders Icon

3. Interface Improvements – ayeris also brings a few subtle interface changes to the table that make iOS 7 feel more cohesive and intuitive to use.

Status Bar – Much of the status bar in ayeris remains unchanged, with one exception, in my experience: the Location Services indicator. Typically in iOS 7, the Location Services indicator is a familiar arrow that points up and to the right. Surenix has redesigned this status bar indicator to more closely match the “pin” icon he uses to represent location in the rest of his theme – another subtle touch of consistency.

Safari Navigation Bar – ayeris brings some fresh architecture to Safari’s navigation bar as well. Surenix has redesigned the Back, Forward, and Share icons with rounded edges that seem to fit better within the overall design of iOS 7. The Bookmarks icon remains unchanged, taking the “if it ‘aint broke, don’t fix it” approach. The Tabs icon, however, is radically different and better visually represents how tabs open in Safari on iOS 7. The stock one has always confused me.

Extra Wallpapers – ayeris also includes six beautiful new wallpapers that accentuate the theme. Find them in the Wallpapers & Brightness section in the Settings app.

Installing and Setting Up ayeris – ayeris is available on one of Cydia’s default repositories which means you can find it by searching on the Search tab. The asking price for ayeris is $3.99, which is definitely a reasonable price to pay so that Surenix can be reimbursed for all the time he put in to designing this theme. ayeris is currently only available for iPhone and iPod Touch. Surenix did release a version of his iOS 6 theme ayecon for the iPad, though, so it’s reasonable to expect he will do the same for ayeris in the not too distant future as well.

Using ayeris requires the popular theming application Winterboard which will install automatically alongside ayeris if it’s not installed on your device already. Once you’ve downloaded ayeris and Winterboard and have performed a respring on your device if necessary, open up Winterboard. You’ll then want to select the four ayeris theme packages: ayeris Status Bar, ayeris Interface, ayeris Home Screen, and ayeris Control Center. After respringing again, which you can do via a button in Winterboard, you’ll be all set to go and ayeris will be up and running on your iPhone or iPod Touch.

As mentioned above, you’ll need to have jailbroken your iPhone or iPod touch to install and use ayeris. For more information on jailbreaking, please see our series on the subject starting here. To find out how to jailbreak iOS 7, click here.

To close this post, I thought I’d just get out of the way and let some of my favorite ayeris icons do the talking. They can probably convince you to download this theme better than I can.