MKBHD Shutting Down Controversial 'Panels' Wallpaper App
Panels, a wallpaper app launched by well-known YouTuber Marques Brownlee (MKBHD), is shutting down at the end of 2025.
According to a notice on the Panels website, the "makeup of the development team" changed earlier this year, and MKBHD wasn't able to find other collaborators who were the "right fit" to continue work on the app. Brownlee said in an accompanying video that he wasn't able to turn Panels into the vision that he had.
The Panels app is being shut down on December 31, 2025. The Panels app code will be open-sourced under the Apache 2.0 license in January 2026 for anyone who wants to create new projects based on the code.
Panels users who have downloaded or purchased wallpapers can continue to use them, and wallpapers can be downloaded until the end of December. When the app is removed from the App Store, active subscriptions will be automatically canceled, and annual subscriptions will be proactively refunded. Purchases in the app have been discontinued as of today.
Panels was heavily criticized when it launched in September 2024 due to pricing and aggressive data collection. The app cost $11.99 per month or $49.99 per year to download full resolution wallpapers. There was an option to watch two ads to download a wallpaper, but only at a limited 1080p resolution. It also asked to track activity across websites and apps, requested location information, and displayed ads in the feed.
Brownlee updated the app to address user concerns and dropped the subscription price to $2 per month, but Panels failed to catch on after its initial problems.
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