Android apps, cease utilizing Apple’s Liquid Glass design

If I needed Liquid Glass, I’d purchase an iPhone. It doesn’t belong on Android. And but, I’m seeing increasingly of Apple’s design language — or half-baked variations of it — pop up in apps on my Google Pixel.

Android has lengthy been identified for its customization choices. For that cause, I don’t thoughts a few of the third-party launchers which have added Liquid Glass-like design packs. For me, the problem just isn’t a couple of third-party developer giving the person the choice; on the contrary, the problem is when an app developer chooses Apple’s design language over Google’s Materials 3 Expressive because the default, resulting in an expertise that feels overseas.

Some apps are leaning on Liquid Glass greater than others. The newest and blatant implementation I’ve seen is in in style note-taking app Obsidian. This app was just lately up to date and the UI screams iOS. The round floating buttons on the prime proper and left of every display screen, the floating bar on the backside, the shortage of coloration — it’s all straight from iOS. To provide credit score the place it’s due, I’ll admit that the app feels native and snappy to make use of, however I’d recognize even just a bit effort to make the expertise fitter for Android.

In Obsidian’s case, even simply a few small adjustments would go a great distance. For one, to distinguish from Apple’s design requirements, I’d begin by altering the 2 floating buttons on the prime of the display screen. Taking some inspiration from Google’s Screenshots app, I’d change the buttons’ form to extra of a squished circle, with a narrower prime and backside and longer sides. I’d additionally take away the shadows from beneath the circle and go away them flat, as you generally see with these buttons on Android.

Google’s design language does an awesome job at incorporating colours of your alternative all through the UI, and app builders may benefit from this. With Obsidian, I’d like to see the choice to use my system’s Materials You coloration system to the app’s UI. These buttons may use the identical coloration theming I see in different apps that correctly implement this, corresponding to Gmail and Google Messages. I have a tendency to alter my system’s coloration system as soon as a month — often correlating to a season like summer season or fall or to that month’s largest vacation — and I like seeing these colours all through the apps I take advantage of. Materials You, when applied correctly, does an awesome job utilizing these colours as accents and in the proper locations in order that it’s nice and never overwhelming to take a look at.

Telegram is one other vastly in style app that may’t determine if it desires to make use of Liquid Glass or one thing else that’s positively not Materials design. It just lately launched an overhauled design of its Android app that, at first look, seems like a watered-down model of the iOS model, however upon deeper inspection, it will get even worse. Private chats nonetheless have Telegram’s previous design on the prime of the display screen, whereas the highest bar in channels — Telegram’s one-to-many broadcast possibility — now seemingly resembles iOS design language.

Telegram is often a design-forward firm, with stunning animations and a well-designed person expertise, and whereas the animations are nonetheless top-notch, this combination of Liquid Glass and different design decisions is a bit disappointing to me. If an organization desires to create its personal design system, that’s high-quality. In that case, you don’t have to make use of Apple or Google’s techniques. With Telegram on Android, we’re not seeing both of these choices, however slightly a mixture of the 2. I see parts of Liquid Glass and a proprietary design system, combined into one hodgepodge of an app. The app works, however the expertise is distinctly not Android.

As I alluded to, I’m alright with an organization designing its personal UI. This will help an organization hold its model identification uniform throughout all of the platforms it operates on. An excellent instance of that is Robinhood. You received’t discover any bits of Liquid Glass or Materials 3 Expressive in its apps, however you will note a constant design system you could rely on from Robinhood, irrespective of the place you’re accessing it from.

Normally, growing a customized design system like Robinhood’s requires loads of sources, which is why many builders select to make use of elements supplied in a platform’s native tooling. Within the case of Telegram, though it’s not a small developer by any means, it nonetheless selected to make use of some native tooling, nevertheless it’s fully missing in consistency on Android. I really feel like I’m utilizing a wanna-be iPhone app on my Android cellphone. In the meantime, its iPhone app was rapidly up to date to stick to Liquid Glass pointers and animations.

I get it, these apps are companies, companies like to economize the place they’ll, and utilizing just one design throughout a number of platforms is certainly a cost-cutter. All I’m asking for is a bit more love for the Android facet. When Google introduced Materials 3 Expressive, it confirmed off some extraordinarily daring concepts for what apps would possibly appear like with the developed design language. We’re approaching a 12 months since that announcement, and I don’t see something remotely near what Google showcased, even from Google itself. Materials 3 Expressive has a lot potential, and I actually don’t need it to go to waste.