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Bobby Zhang

What are your thoughts on Neumorphism?

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Neumorphism seems to be getting popular lately, but the Neumorphic UI kit that launched yesterday got a lot of hate. I've never seen that level of negative feedback for a product before. The main criticism I'm hearing is that its bad for accessibility but that doesn't seem like that big of a downside to me. I personally like neumorphic design but the design community doesn't seem to be fully on board with it. What is your expanded, unabridged opinion on neumorphism?

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Randolph
Accessibility is, in fact, a big deal. This is the reason you will never see any actual business or designer pick up on this "trend". Not being able to easily differentiate buttons, input fields, etc from the rest of the page is terrible for design and cognition. The style is also claimed to be "what futuristic UI will look like" and that is furthest from the truth. Futuristic UI will get rid of shadows and move towards outlines/borders. Think about wearing glasses that overlay UI in your sight— there is zero need for shadows. The future of UI is still flat, minimal, purposeful design. (Which is what you see with any successful designer/company) Neumorphism is a giant mess.
Bobby Zhang
@hoffertr Do you have a specific demographic in mind for which accessibility will be impacted? For example, I know that overuse of some colours is really bad for colour blindness. I suppose my confusion mainly stems from the fact that nobody has offered any data to back up any claims - good or bad, so I have no idea just how large their supposed pro or con is, for lack of better wording.
Randolph
@bobbyzhang I'd argue that all demographics suffer, not only, for example, those with poor vision. It takes a lot for our brain to process this style. I think you're seeking in/validation with hard data, when you can invalidate it with the abundant data on good design. It goes against all design principles. - Noisy and strains eyes after few seconds - Hard to find/separate objects from actions - Good design = only using what is needed, no fluff - Unnatural light physics - Shadow rendering hinders performance The list goes on...