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Update 2: Apple released iOS 7.0.3 today (10/22/2013), and further enhanced the “Reduce Motion” option. Turning this on gets rid of most of the motion-based animations and switches a fade-in and –out effect. For me, at least, the issue is essentially resolved. I’m still finding iOS 7’s performance to be a bit choppy on my iPad 3, but at least I can use the thing for more than a few minutes without feeling ill.

Update: Okay, it seems like there’s definitely some lag in the UI that needs ironing out, and the parallax effect is without a doubt contributing to this issue for me. The good thing is, there’s a “Reduce Motion” option in Accessibility in the General section of settings that appears to help considerably. (Actually, after more usage, I’m going to say it helps a little. I still find it unpleasant.)

Give it a shot and let me know if it makes things better for you, too.

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I upgraded my iPad 3 to iOS 7 yesterday, and I’m rather ambivalent about it as an operating system in general. Some good things, probably, some bad things. I’m not terribly concerned, because at this point I only use the iPad for HBO Go (the Android app won’t install on 4.3) and for keeping myself in the loop on the goings-on in iOS land.

However, there’s something else I noticed. The animations in iOS, particularly in switching from an app to the home screen, opening and closing folders, etc., are all more aggressive (or slower, or with a lower frame rate, or something). It feels to me like the whole screen is moving, and it generates a sort of motion sickness. I feel dizzy and can feel the very beginnings of nausea kicking in.

This isn’t a new thing. Do a Google search on “FPS motion sickness” and you’ll get an idea of what I’m talking about. I suffer from this unfortunate malady as well—some first person shooter games where the perspective is just right (or just wrong, depending on how you want to look at it) make me intensely ill after I’ve played them for more than a few minutes. I get dizzy and feel like I could throw up without a moment’s notice, and this lasts for a few hours after. I don’t generally get motion sickness when riding in a car, but I have on a few occasions when a passenger on extremely twisted roads, and the feelings are exactly the same.

So, there you have it. iOS literally makes me sick. It might be that the frame rates are a little too low and need some optimization, it may be that I need to look at it differently (haven’t we heard that somewhere before?), it may be the parallax effect, or I may end up completely unable to use the iPad with iOS 7 installed on it.

I’m going to first try switching off the parallax effect, if that’s possible. Maybe there’s that just gives the GPU too much to do, which would surprise me—Apple’s usually pretty good about optimizing things—but not shock me. If that makes a difference, I’ll report back here.

So, anyone else having this problem? Or am I just a freak of nature? Let me know in the comments.

Speaking of comments, thanks to BK for providing a couple of forum links discussing the issue of iOS 7 and motion sickness. If you’re experiencing the problem as well, you’re not alone:

http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=1638996

http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=1595925

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/5322295?start=0&tstart=0

Also, Marissa adds:

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/5322295?start=0&tstart=0

Apple doesn’t always seem to pay attention to their own forums, but maybe this time they’ll give a look and realize this is a real issue for many people.