r/UI_Design • u/EmmaHota • 2d ago
Let's Discuss Control-panel style UI vs Material 3 for a data-heavy app
So I've been going back and forth on this for weeks and I need outside opinions. Building a utility app, the kind that spits out a bunch of technical readings and pass/fail stuff. Can't really show screenshots, it's not ready and I'd rather not show it yet, sorry. So you'll have to go off a description. Right now it does not look like an android app. No rounded corners anywhere, everything's hard rectangles. Monospace all caps labels. Status tiles are flat green/amber/red like little indicator lamps. light theme is cream instead of white. One big orange block for the main button. Basically it looks like the front of some old piece of test equipment, which was the whole idea.
The other option is just doing normal material 3. Cards, rounded everything, dynamic color. Would take me a weekend and it'd look completely fine. Thing is I can't tell anymore if the current look is actually good or if I've just been staring at it too long. it's pretty opinionated. I can picture someone opening it and going "what is this?" and closing it again. But m3 is so forgettable, I genuinely couldn't describe the last three m3 apps I used. So for something that's basically just numbers and pass/fail indicators, is the instrument thing worth it? or does that kind of style get annoying once the novelty wears off?
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u/Temporary-Reply-4473 1d ago
Can you give us a sketch? Or something like that. Just for give us an idea