Good user interface design aims to remove as many obstacles, bottlenecks, stumbling blocks, and potential sources of confusion from the user experience. Above all, the goal is to create an easy and simple-to-navigate environment for all users, allowing them to achieve their objectives with minimal effort.
In this article, we’ll go over the Top 5 Important Concepts to help you understand the fundamentals of UI design.
Let’s get started.
- Maintain a simple user interface design: Human loves simple things. That is just how UI design ought to be. However, staying focused on your objectives is vital, and a designer’s personal pleasure should always be at the bottom of the priority list. Remembering who you’re designing for and why you’re designing for them is the most important of all the key UI design principles. The goal of good user interface design is to make it functional rather than decorative. Self-indulgent or too formal design only adds to the clutter, detracting from the elements that are truly vital to the user.
- Consider yourself as an end-user: Users should believe they are in complete control, whether or not they are. This requires you to act like a user. You should integrate the user interface with the surrounding environment. It should, of course, always be available when the user needs it. It will also be precisely where they expect it to be. However, no one should ever feel compelled to do something or that the interface is making decisions for them. Even though this is exactly what is happening in some cases.
- Avoid complexity: Attempt to keep the number of steps and screens to a bare minimum at all times. Use overlays like bottom sheets and modal windows to condense data and reduce the size of your program. Ensure that the information is organized in a logical, autonomous, and self-contained manner at the same time. Indeed, not just philosophically but also practically, one of the golden rules of UI design is to always group duties and subtasks together. Above all, avoid burying subtasks on pages where they will go unnoticed. Nobody expects to find a closet in the backyard, a shower in the kitchen, or a television in the bathroom.
- Provide feedback: Keep users informed about their progress. Allow them to know that their actions were noticed. Assure them that everything is in good working order. Significant, important, and/or unusual actions demand a lot of input. Smaller, more frequent actions, on the other hand, are deserving of smaller tokens of appreciation. As previously said, one of the most basic UI design fundamentals is to keep information to a bare minimum. Few things, however, are more vital than knowing your current condition, therefore don’t make customers look for it. Information about a project’s status should always be readily available and totally accurate. Users should constantly be aware of what is going on; they should not be left in the dark about whether or not the software is still operational.
- Make “accessibility” a priority: Don’t make the mistake of assuming that all users are like you and your pals. This holds true for all technical skills and abilities, as well as a worldview. Apps are used by people from all walks of life and in all situations. While it’s obvious that you won’t be able to account for every possible variation in social and cultural custom, don’t assume that the way you do things is the only way to do them. Because many people read from left to right in various parts of the world, placing objects from left to right does not guarantee that all users will encounter them in that order. Rather than delivering answers, design with the purpose of prompting inquiries.
Final Thoughts: That’s all there is to it. The above concepts will help you understand the fundamentals of UI design and help you become a better designer. You can learn more about UI design from blogs, video tutorials, and other resources. The good news is that there are numerous free resources available on the internet. Our advice is to learn from youtube. It’s fun and entertaining. There are plenty of videos on Youtube if you search “UI design.” The only problem is that you have no idea which video to select. And the one you select might not be the right one for you.
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