5 UX/UI trends for 2019
While researching the prevalent UX/UI trends for 2019, one thing became clear: the trends that seem to be gaining more momentum have already started during the previous years and in 2019 we are going to witness them being more broadly adopted.
Here’s five major trends that will keep UX and UI designers busy:
Mobile First!
Google made responsive design an absolute must for companies a few years back, after announcing its mobile first indexing. And mobile first indexing led to mobile first design. This not essentially a trend, since it has been widely adopted in the last two years and shows no signs of going anywhere soon. But it is slowly morphing into a new approach: the device-agnostic design, which is to design and deliver a seamless experience no matter what device it is being delivered for.
Motion Design & Animation
Flat design had its long reign, but now a successor is slowly emerging to claim the throne: motion design. 2D animations, 3D renderings and custom animations have been made possible through new browser capabilities. Motion and animation are two very effective storytelling tools that capture a user’s attention and can convey important information. It’s only natural that motion design will be explored more extensively during 2019.
Dark themes
It seems that everyone wants to move to the dark side since dark themes are here to stay, but there is major room for improvement and experimentation in this area. Bright colours and gradients work well with dark themes and various combinations will be tested in order to enhance user experience and accessibility.
Coding
Every new year brings new answers to the burning question of whether designers should learn to code! One the one hand, the main argument used by those who believe that designers should learn to create code is that this knowledge will make them able to communicate and collaborate more effectively with developers. On the other hand, the argument favoured by the opposite view is that designers should spend their time getting better at designing. Both have a point, but the emergence of new tools and the new features added on existing ones make it easier for designers to create dev-ready websites and applications. As these tools will start to be more widely employed, it remains to be seen whether this question will finally get a definite answer in 2019.
Voice Interfaces
Intelligent voice assistants have taken 2018 by storm and the market for them is only going to grow from now on. This development has affected the UX and UI processes and the design of voice-activated interfaces is a complex field worth exploring since it elevates the concept of no UI and is more concerned with the concept of language processing than with aesthetics.
