In any industry, trends come from current processes and while some fade away, some trends remain for years. In 2015, UX was believed to be the champion of free thought in the world of design, today, UI is the in thing. Even if a trend stays for a couple of years, it will change because of the technology and cultural forces. For instance, mobile device app trends change with the development of new operating systems and changes in the mobile world technologies. In this post, we will look at the 7 wonderful design predictions for 2017. It is always important to know what is coming because you get a chance to prepare yourself adequately.
The internet is changing especially now that people are accessing the World Wide Web using phone more that they are using desktop computers this means that most of the changes that are happening are geared towards giving mobile device users a better experience. A part from mobile related changes, there are many other changes in the design world that we should expect in 2017.
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There Will be Micro-Mini Interactions
There was an internet buzz in 2015 about microinteractions referring to the single task-based interaction with products such as liking a comment, setting alarms or clicking on a login button. When you open your social media account, you are in micro interactions too small to notice.
The applications world is becoming grittier and specific such that you can use Vine to share short videos, Yo to send Yo’s and many other interactions. These interactions will allow us to move to atomized microinteractions with single microinteractions being further broken to smaller pieces. These are known as micro-mini interactions and by 2017, we will be engaging in them every time we take out our phones.
In our everyday lives, there will be micro-mini interactions and the way we experience devices will change significantly. Every scroll, zoom, tap, touch and click will be full of animation and feedback.
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Functional Animations
We have come to know that functional animation is equal to delicate animation; it embeds in the interface design and is part of the processes. It is clear and logic in purpose and is in the list of UX design tools.
Functional animation is a trend that is not just about making animation, it is about creating a motion and shape that can deliver logical and clear purposes. The language that needs to be followed should be responsive, simple, vivid, fast and meaningful. It is expected that functional animation, as an idea, will rule mobile devices across different platforms in 2017.
This trend will probably stick around and will be used to take users from context to context and provide explanations in case there are changes in the element arrangement on the screen.
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Creative Navigation
Creative navigation is one of the most important factors when it comes to mobile apps. In 2017, it is expected that different innovative options such as a hidden navigation, parallax scrolling and modular will be experienced.
In 2016, the hidden navigation feature started gaining popularity and is expected to be bigger in 2017. This is especially useful in apps that have huge content. The navigation displays on the screen but if there is no action, it disappears.
If the app has heavy content, modular scrolling will give users a clear view by allowing them to scroll through the individual columns or rows. The infinite strolling feature is another trend that has taken over social platforms such as twitter and Facebook.
The introduction of parallax scrolling has brought in a new creative option for intuitive navigation. This is a trends expected to continue with its popularity while giving users a better experience in 2017.
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Weather Applications
Weather is an important part of our lives especially because changes can affect our daily lives and activities. The way we experience other things such as phone applications in relation to weather is also important. Whether sun is shining in summer or behind the clouds in winter, we always want to track the weather for proper planning.
While weather has been constant enough to give designers an easy time of designing weather apps according to past occurrences, things are changing a bit. There are unpredictable events such as hurricane and El Niño and this means people will be going to weather apps more. Designers are expected to shift their attention where most people are looking and this will take them to climate change issues.
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Increased Typography Emphasis
In the world of application design, it is clear that typography is in the back seat as far as important considerations such as complete aesthetics, navigation and color are concerned. In 2017, it is expected that designers will give scalable typography and fonts the attention they deserve.
They are looking for a typeface which will fit all devices especially because fonts are a representation of hierarchy between the existing types of content. For instance, since Apple released iOS 7, Helvetica Neue has become a standard in all operating systems. This font is an important part of the appearance and design of app interface.
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Moving From Design Evangelism to Proselytism
Design evangelism is all about adopting a great design aimed at converting a non-designer to a design thinker. They show the importance of design non-believers and this means they are probably going to follow good design practices to the letter in their professional and personal lives. Design evangelism has great support especially because of the good work they do in encouraging good design. Though this is the case, there are many offline designers coming up with their own craft and standing by it. All designers are pressing towards a world with great designs and we expect that their voices will be louder in 2017.
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Textile Design
In 2017, it is highly likely that material design will discover that it brought a paper and a pen in a fight full of guns. The fundamental architecture of material design is unequipped in the handling of the multi-dimensional World Wide Web of the future. While material design has been showing up in prediction of trends since 2013, it appeared in 2015 and became the norm in mainstream web design. Material design simply evolved from the conventional physical paper the significant difference being that the modern design can expand and reform in an intelligent manner.
These are some of the predictions expected in 2017 and they will affect functionalities and features in web design. The key to always being up to date is working with professional web designers who live to deliver according to current technologies and trends.
