Card Based Designs to Enhance User Interface Development Designs of applications get a complete makeover with users preferring seamless access across devices. Web and mobile apps move away from pages, towards completely personalized user experiences.
Cards Changing the Expectations from UI/UX Development Cards are the little rectangles full of images and text all over the screens with varying sizes. Cards become a practical design option today to balance user interface aesthetics with good usability displaying content composed of different elements. Implemented correctly, cards completely change the User Experience delivered by the new trends in mobile application design. Due to their functionality and shape, they add an interesting UI element which is intuitive to use. Cards are Excellent Metaphors Cards are nothing new. We have seen them all around us before the era of mobile devices, especially the business cards or the visiting cards. When the UI designer implements the design using cards they become excellent metaphors since they look like real-world tangible cards. Cards are an interaction model that is spreading and being accepted fast. They are intuitive and represent content just as a user would be seeing in real life. It is a great concept to communicate quick stories.
Content Organization Made Simple Cards divide content into meaningful sections optimizing the screen space. Just as the text, the cards group sentences into distinct sections, and gather various pieces of information to form one coherent piece of content. It is really the acumen of the UI designer which takes charge and delivers this amazingly fresh user experience. Visually Pleasing User Interfaces This mobile design concept offers a most suitable and appealing way of representing information which is heavy on visuals. The emphasis on visuals is the strength of cards and these elaborate graphics elevate site or app design, as they catch the fancy of the users very easily and make it attractive too. Digestible and Concise Cards are design containers that hold almost anything. Placing content wisely in cards makes it digestible and more comprehendible for users. UI/UX development adopts this new style of designing to suit the new age users. The user explores the content of choice with ease, being empowered to engage in the way they desire. Responsive and Mobile Design Cards can be manipulated to the heart’s desire. Card-style design works well both for desktops and mobile devices, because cards offer content in more flexible chunks. They are good choice for responsive design since cards act as content containers that easily scale up or down. Cards make it easier to create a single aesthetic across multiple devices. Cards rule the responsive design platforms today offering an easy way to create consistent experience across devices regardless of the platforms and are a huge change for the user interface development.
Design with the Thumb in Mind Cards are made for a thumb which change the user gestures in a very big way and very appropriately so. This is a major factor leading to their success in mobile app design as sliding them, swiping them becomes so easy with a thumb, making it a comfortable experience for the users. The simplicity and the intuitiveness of the cards makes information access very
easy for a card and the gestures are consistently implemented within a card collection with limited swipe gestures within a view to prevent overlap. Facts & Figures Related to the Use of Thumb Facts •Average size of a thumb is 1 inch which is 72 pixels •49% users use hole their phones in one hand and use one thumb
Touch Target Size •Studies indicate user errors decreased as target size increased •Apple suggest a minimum target size of 44 pixels wide and 44 pixels tall •Microsoft suggests an ideal target size of 34 pixels with a minimum touch target size of 26 pixels •Nokia suggests a target size should be no smaller then 28*28 pixels How do users hold mobile phones •Cradled- 36% •Finger on screen-28% •Thumb on screen-72% •One handed- 49% •Left Thumb- 33% •Right Thumb- 67%
Where to Use Cards in User Interface Development Stream Cards are in a continuous stream, creating a natural timeline of events Cards mean is disaggregation They break the infinite stream into small packets making them sharable Discovery Cards allow control to the users
Content of interest naturally reveals itself Promotes the content view as preferred
Dialogs Cards are content containers, appropriate to represent actions Each card is a primary action itself and replace Dialog boxes tactfully Workflow Cards are easily grouped into tasks making it easy to derive workflows
Where Not to Use Cards Specific Content Homogeneous content with less actions is better implemented with Cards Image galleries too do not require Cards and come across as unnatural representations Large Screen Size Mobile design for apps are suitably done up with Cards, not larger screens Cards lack comprehension and aesthetics on a large screen
Shifting to Cards a Thoughtful Process by the UI Designer It is suggested to incrementally redesign an application and shift to a card based design to make the visual transition very smooth for the would be users of cards who are oriented to the traditional mobile designs. A good design entices the users and goes a long way for the software, the first step to ensure loyalty from patrons.
Visit http://www.spec-india.com/services/ux-ui-design.html & Request a FREE POC to Test Drive our services