4 ms·

Google's UX took a big turn for the worse about 2-3 years ago, IMO. Not so much in terms of the design language (I rather like Material Design) but just the li

Google's UX took a big turn for the worse about 2-3 years ago, IMO. Not so much in terms of the design language (I rather like Material Design) but just the little bits of actual user interaction polish within their apps. Looks began to trump function and interfaces were often too visually simplified to the point where discover-ability of functionality took a huge nose-dive. As a for-example, the new Google Maps for Android (7.x+) is much prettier than the old one but much more painful to use (still) in that it often makes you do 3+ button presses for things that used to be 1 button press, which is kind of a big deal for an app that people will often interact with (hopefully in some sort of dash mount) while driving.

wpietri 11y ago
Amen. And I could almost stand the more-button-presses thing if it weren't so slow. Now my typical interaction trying to search Google Maps goes like: * Open the app. * Wait for it to load. * See the details of directions from hours ago. * Hit back. * Wait for it to render. * Press back and wait again. * Hit back a couple more times. * Get frustrated that I'm still seeing old directions. * Hit back twice more. * Suddenly I am out of the app. * Launch it again. * Wait. * Finally enter my search. The server-side stuff, like the actual directions, is still amazing. But the UX design just doesn't seem to be driven by actual use.