When minimalism is not enough

After implementing a minimalist, flat design - expecting that the lack of visual flourishes would reduce the clutter, noise and mental load of an extremely complex engineering UI - we noted reduced user comprehension and engagement.

Users complained about not understanding the controls and talked about how their familiarity with competitors comes, in part, from their understanding of how the interface controls reflect their physical instruments.

We were reacquainted with how many of our users have years of experience with optical software that mimics closely a physical environment - even when much of that environment has been irrelevant for years, replace with software equivalents. Leaning into our user’s expectations and their comfort zones, we updated the software to better reflect physical controls - mimicking the look and feel of physical buttons and improving the reactions of those to feel haptic, physical and grounded.

The response was overwhelmingly positive.