IOS’s swipe from the bottom (and left-right for basically alt-tab) is genius in my opinion. Not sure how true is it, but the designers of the then new iphone caught themselves multiple times trying to swipe gesture on their older, home-buttoned devices.

While I don’t believe a sufficiently complex UX could be totally intuitive (it can at most depend on existing knowledge of similar devices), it does extend the app as a physical rectangle idea very well, the animation strengthens the memory, and the movement becomes second-nature in no time.

(Also, credit where it’s due, I believe this feature was first introduced by Palm?)