Ever since smartphones really began to be smart, and as mobile internet speeds became faster, mobile web design started to take off. Now, 7 years later, mobile web and app design is an ever-important field of design, with many complex and conflicting philosophies, such as the issue of graceful degradation vs progressive enhancement.
But when I mentioned in the title that mobile UX design is changing desktop design, I wasn’t referring to mobile-first design and how we progressively design for richer UX as we move to a desktop. Rather, this is about how UX elements previously only found in mobile platforms are starting to cross over to desktops, with great results.
By looking at a few examples of mobile UX elements that crept into desktops, we can understand why they work, and how to design better desktop experiences.
Hidden navigations & large typography
We don’t need to look hard to find the first example of UX elements crossing from mobile to desktops.
It’s not difficult nowadays to differentiate between newly (re)designed websites from old sites. In almost all cases, new sites feature minimal or hidden navigation bars and large typography.
This shift in web design can be traced back to mobile design, when the limited real estate of mobile devices meant navigation bars had to be streamlined and tucked away to allow more space for content. The small displays on smartphones also meant that typography had to be enlarged to be legible.
With time, however, designers found that the streamlined mobile UX design makes sense on desktops too, because larger fonts and streamlined peripheral content means greater focus and clarity in the experience of browsing the site. And when websites become more streamlined and focused, they become better.
Selected text pop-up menu
Medium pretty much changed the UX of creating articles. Besides the ease and power of its WYSIWYG text editor, one of my favourite UX elements of Medium is the menu that pops up only when text is selected.
If you’ve used Medium’s text editor and felt that the experience was strangely familiar, that’s because you’ve probably used it for years before it appeared on Medium.
Why mobile UX elements work great on desktops
Future, meet gestures
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