Rita El Khoury / Android Authority
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This is a rather obvious statement, but you won’t find every single person in a group of millions agreeing with a decision, and this makes designing something as integral as an operating system’s UI rather tricky. Google has been pretty good at it in the past few decades — at least I haven’t met anyone who outright hates the look and feel of Android.
We’re currently in the Material 3 Expressive era, which sees the likes of Android 16 play with more colors and fluid animations while placing greater emphasis on personalization. I feel that it’s Google’s best work, and it looks splendid on modern Android phones. However, this is by no means the end of the road for the design langauge.
As the first images of Android 17 come trickling through, there’s one additional design decision that Google is seemingly pushing hard this year: it’s turning that blur dial all the way up. For some, this is brilliant news. Blur and transparency do look decidedly gorgeous on the right screen and with the right UI elements, but I’m not entirely sure how necessary they are, at least for improving information delivery to the user.
I remember the first iteration of Material Design on Android 5.0 Lollipop rather fondly. Although I do enjoy the flourishes of modern Android, Lollipop introduced solid elements that were easy to see — much like ink on paper, albeit a digital version. It didn’t sacrifice visuals for usability, something that I fear future Android versions are heading towards.
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This got me thinking — while my eyes adore Material 3 Expressive, I’m not quite sure that it is the best Google design language thus far from a usability and accessibility standpoint. Sure, you can disable the blur, but how many novice users would know to do this?
So, I want to hear from you: what do you believe was the best era for Android design language in terms of user experience and usability? Which design language or Android version was your favorite in terms of aesthetics, and why? And what do you think of Google’s move towards more blur and transparency in Android 17?
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