Top 10 2023 UI UX Trends

If you’ve spent any time in the world of digital marketing or web design and development, you have no doubt heard of User Interface (UI) and User Experience (UX) or UI Design and UX Design.

Let’s define what each means since they are completely separate, but often referred to as a single discipline:

• User Interface — UI is a human-first approach to designing how a user interacts with a digital product or site and can include:
  • Designing the user’s touchpoints to encourage interaction.
  • UI uses color schemes, typography and font, and imagery, videos, and animation to add interest.
  • UI focuses on delighting the user and encouraging them to engage or return.

• User Experience — UX can mean digital products or sites, but can also be used for physical products or experience design and can include:
  • Designing a full experience from start to finish.
  • UX focuses on design solutions that address user pain points to make their journey through the sales funnel or site encounter as smooth as possible.
  • UX creates an effective user experience with minimal disruption or site abandonment.

You can see how important these two design principles are when it comes to building websites, posting on social media, conceiving ecommerce customer flows, and developing overall digital strategies. 

They are each a critical component of the design phase in digital marketing and, like all things marketing and business-related, are subject to trends that come and go. Like all tech-related things, they can also both be influenced by upgrades or improvements in technology. 

Take a look at what we expect to see as fast-growing trends in UI UX design in 2023.

UI UX Design Trends 2023 — Top 10 Trends to Expect in the Coming Year

One thing you can always count on in marketing is a periodic, ongoing shift in trends. With websites one of the single most important components of how a business or organization engages with new customers and develops leads and relationships, it’s no surprise that trends in the design and development of websites have become so vitally important.

We have selected what we think will be the top 10 trends in UI UX design in 2023. Some are design focused and many are possible because of increased tech capabilities. All of them improve how a user views and interacts with your website.

1. More Mobile First Design Mixed with Speed 

Used interchangeably with ‘responsive design,’ mobile first design recognizes the fact that Americans (and most people around the world) use their mobile devices for virtually (pun intended) everything. From texting friends and family, searching for information, taking pictures, scanning QR codes, shopping and making purchases, ordering food and groceries, navigating GPS, and tracking their exercise, almost 70% of all web traffic comes from mobile phones.

Designed to work on mobile screens and, secondarily, adapt to larger devices, mobile first design will ensure your site has the appearance and ease of navigation to work well on a mobile device. 

In UX UI design trends for 2023, this trend is expanding to include speed as a defining prerequisite. Not only does your site have to look good and work well on handheld devices, but it also has to be super-fast! If not, you will lose users and potentially miss out on organic search results and rankings with Google which can negatively impact your business.

2. More Motion in Designs

It used to be difficult to create animations for websites and mobile apps with design teams having to constantly choose between animation quality, site performance, and file size. 

Since then, a lot has changed. Larger bandwidth (5G anyone!) and the availability of libraries enable designers to produce gorgeous animations while maintaining small file sizes that equate to brisk performance.

Experienced designers can now add motion design to their toolkit thanks to the adoption of these technologies. No doubt, as time goes on, animations will become increasingly prevalent in designs, not only to make them more dynamic and aesthetically pleasing, but also to make the user experience more seamless.

3. Augmented Reality and Mixed Reality

We can thank Meta for the growing interest in augmented reality! Vogue even hosted the first “Metaverse Fashion Week” with major brands like Tommy Hilfiger, Dolce & Gabbana, and Imitation of Christ participating.

With AR/VR being popularized and commercialized, expect to see more uses of it being used on websites, e.g., trying on products like cosmetics virtually, visualizing paint or furniture in a duplicate image of the customer’s living room, or sharing AR business cards.

4. Designing for Cross-Device Use

More and more, we are seeing users swap from one device to another throughout their journey creating micro moments on mobile devices and more focused moments on PCs and laptops. It makes sense following two years during the pandemic where a great many people worked from home with their preferred devices available simultaneously all the time.

With past Google searches now combined on any device, users can search for the latest products on their phone and then easily follow up later for more in-depth research on their laptop. This means that designers need to understand cross-device user behavior and incorporate that into designs and customer flow.

5. 3D Imagery Design

The upcoming year should see further development and implementation of 3D imagery facilitated by faster speeds, more lightweight development, and a close relation to VR/AR technology which has entered the mainstream. Instead of flat design with standard grids of images and text, designers are adding 3D elements that create interactive, memorable experiences that make indelible impressions on users.

We are seeing designers attempting to present images in more interesting ways by returning to photos (but editing them to be vibrant and lively), employing new, attention-grabbing graphics, or adding 3D objects to websites or apps to enhance or beautify the content. 

6. Conversational Experience Design

Voice activated devices are a part of the bigger smart home ecosystem with combined experiences that include IoTs, like the living room TV. With that comes conversational experience design — the idea that all interactions with digital systems should be modeled after human discourse. 

Through conversational experience design, we hope to establish a better and more natural dialogue with systems by applying the ideas of what makes regular human interactions interesting and impactful.

7. More Advanced Micro Interactions

Micro interactions are website tools or events that have a single purpose and are meant to delight the user, direct their attention, engage them somehow, and enhance the feeling of active participation. Think of a call to action or animations that show by example (such as the strength level when you choose a password) — these micro interactions engage the user and keep them moving forward.

In 2023, look for more intricate and advanced micro interactions that lead a customer along a story or journey. Micro interactions will be more entertaining and imaginative.

8. Immersive Scrolling

Most designers used to think about how users would scroll through websites in terms of the order of the material. For instance, what hierarchy should be employed to express the stories that their clients want to share and what order was ideal for users to understand the message? Even with the occasional animation or video, everything was still.

It’s now simpler than ever to apply component behaviors on scroll and create fluid animations. We can deliver content in a more strategic, narrative-centered manner since designers have control over what content to display and how it will appear to users. 

With the technology available today, many businesses will take advantage of the new opportunities that immersive scrolling has created for presenting compelling stories.

9. Dark Mode as the Norm

More and more people are using dark mode as the go-to interface for all their devices – over 80%. Users like the elegance and clarity that can be achieved with dark mode, and we think you will see more and more websites using a dark mode aesthetic as 2023 unfolds.

As for current UI UX trends in 2023, whether you are scrolling and reading information, proofreading, or developing code, dark mode is much easier on the eyes and actually affects your sleep patterns less dramatically than light mode. Here’s to good eye health!

10. Health, Wellness, and Eco-Design

A big (and recurring) trending UI UX design in 2023 is based on the word “sustainability” — frequently used to define the ways we are trying to avoid the exhaustion of natural resources and maintain an ecological balance. But more than that, design is taking a turn toward highlighting health and wellness, in addition to sustainability, and bringing a holistic approach that consumers are drawn to and represents a cultural shift taking place. 

There are various methods to incorporate eco-design characteristics in website design, from discreet pro-environmental notifications and friendly animations to goods aimed at lowering consumption and waste.

Designers can encourage their clients to use ecologically and socially “responsible” design features on the websites and applications for their brands. In 2023, we anticipate designers creating eco-friendly environments that support this worthwhile effort.

How Can You Incorporate the Latest UI UX Trends in 2023

When designing a website using UI UX latest trends for 2023, there are some key principles that you want to keep in mind when developing your marketing strategy and site journey or flow.

• Know Your Audience — Before you begin the design process on your new website or app, you must have a clear understanding of who the target audience is. You can determine their needs and preferences and create the ideal design for your website or app once you have a good understanding of who will be using it. 

• Look to Your Competitors — This is where a comprehensive competitors’ analysis can come in very handy. You can see examples of how your competition is engaging customers. Note the styles, colors, hues, design, and features of their websites and what seems to work.

• Create a Strong Visual Hierarchy — Understand the most important visual elements and highlight them so that they draw the user’s eye and leads them down the page or to Calls to Action.

• Focus on Ease of Use — In the latest trends for UI UX 2023, UX designers should take advantage of technology to make using and navigating a website as easy as possible. You never want to make UI or UX too complicated or difficult to interact with or follow along. Your overall design should create a friendly guide that shepherds users through the site to the ultimate goal – clicking the buy button.

• Remember that Websites are Scanned — To appeal to the audience, make sure your site is easily scannable with tons of interesting images and visual elements. Visitors will scan the site until they find something that piques their interest – only then will they switch to reading content.

Creating World-Class Websites Using New Trends in UI UX Design in 2023

With a solid understanding of UX and UI trends in 2023, it’s time to look at implementing these ideas into a new website or an existing website refresh. 

This is the time to look to an expert design and development group that specializes in creating top-tier websites using new trends in UX UI design. Experience is key. You want to engage a group that understands the difference between UI and UX design AND has the expert design and development resources to make it happen in a captivating and engaging way!

UI UX design trends of 2023 will include incorporating the overall feel and functionality of good UX design with the look and appeal of UI design to manage the user’s journey as they interact with your product or service.

Remember, 76% of consumers will search online for a business before ever visiting a physical location or purchasing a product or service. Today, a business or organization can only thrive when they have an engaging website that can be found on Google’s organic search pages (read more about SEO here and here).  

Contact Lounge Lizard to learn more about UI and UX trends in 2023. We have a full-service digital marketing company that specializes in UI and UX design and development to create world-class websites for your business.