Why is Big Sur so ugly?

[Axemantitan]

The most difficult "upgrade" to swallow is Safari. If you have more than one tab (which is common), the UI uses 3 times more space than before.

I went back to Catalina and couldn't be happier. Don't know what to do when I buy an M1 Mac.

I dislike how the "new tab" button, which used to be to the right of the tabs, is now a title bar button. It takes some retraining to get accustomed to, but there was no reason to move it in the first place.

I hate how hard it is to move the Safari window around in Safari 14. This is due to the title bar being so cluttered now, making it hard to find a spot to grab the window by. I routinely work in two windows, one pinned to the left side of the screen and one to the right.

Better Touch Tool helps with pinning the windows (and for some reason that app started working again under Big Sur, when it stopped working on a previous update), but moving the window in the first place is now needlessly difficult.

 

[nsklaus]

I hate the new design. especially the windows title bar height, the tool bar icons and the title bar being the same color. I hate the filling of titlebars with various widgets. it seems it's a growing trends in a lots of different OSes lately. apple went and tried to do like the others and the result is such a waste. titlebar are titlebar. toolbar are toolbar. mixing the two is terrible design choice.

I hope someone will make a theme app to be able to revert to previous look.
macos had a very good look, now they managed to waste it.

- apple m1 soc: very good move.
- apple Big Sur new flat design: awful move.

for reference
on titlebar height:
https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/406378/make-the-window-title-less-chunky-in-big-sur
on possible theming app:
https://github.com/jslegendre/ThemeEngine

 

[planteater]

I hate the new design. especially the windows title bar height, the tool bar icons and the title bar being the same color. I hate the filling of titlebars with various widgets. it seems it's a growing trends in a lots of different OSes lately. apple went and tried to do like the others and the result is such a waste. titlebar are titlebar. toolbar are toolbar. mixing the two is terrible design choice.

I hope someone will make a theme app to be able to revert to previous look.
macos had a very good look, now they managed to waste it.

- apple m1 soc: very good move.
- apple Big Sur new flat design: awful move.

for reference
on titlebar height:
https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/406378/make-the-window-title-less-chunky-in-big-sur
on possible theming app:
https://github.com/jslegendre/ThemeEngine

Thanks for the information.

I don't have a copy of Big Sur running at the moment. Can you post a screenshot, before and after, using the defaults command in the first link?

 

[Zamana]

How could anyone be so thoroughly wrong?

KDE is unparalleled in giving you the power to make it anything you want it to be. Apple? Well..... they seem to come up with new and inventive ways to punish customization or make it completely impossible.

I'm talking about the UI aspects, and not about the functionality.

In other words, Big Sur is too fluffy for me. Too little girl.

 

[Zamana]

https://www.reddit.com/r/MacOS/comments/jb1q0d

Is MacOS 11 Big Sur Really Ugly? And Here Is Why! | UX Bucket

uxbucket.com

Big Sur is ugly - Apple Community

discussions.apple.com

 

[Furka]

I'm talking about the UI aspects, an not the functionality.

In other words, Big Sur is too fluffy for me. Too little girl.

IMHO Big Sur is an operating system focused on touch screens, and I think this is not a good think on a normal portable, or iMac. Plus, the extremely withish theme and the horrendus wallpaper, are certainly spectacular but not suitable for my eyes, causing strain in few hours of use. I prefer the metal general UI of the Catalina OS, for example. Mail app is also a big difference in useability, and I do not like it.

 

[colourfastt]

IMHO Big Sur is an operating system focused on touch screens, and I think this is not a good think on a normal portable, or iMac. Plus, the extremely withish theme and the horrendus wallpaper, are certainly spectacular but not suitable for my eyes, causing strain in few hours of use. I prefer the metal general UI of the Catalina OS, for example. Mail app is also a big difference in useability, and I do not like it.

This is an OS X metal UI I can definitely get behind:

 

[CasualFanboy]

I'm talking about the UI aspects, and not about the functionality.

In other words, Big Sur is too fluffy for me. Too little girl.

Oh, then yeah. But in this respect it more closely resembles GNOME than KDE. They both share the overuse of empty dead space, padding, and the trend toward a dumbed-down interface continuously stripped of options and features with each iteration.

To top it all off, both GNOME and the current macos interface are notorious for the complete lack of ability to customize anything to your liking. Sometimes you might be lucky enough to find a 3rd party hack, but you can be sure its compatibility will break in the next minor release.

Basically, the interface is like a marketing campaign to display utter contempt for anyone who uses it.

Their contempt hasn't quite caught up to Windows 10 yet, but they're quickly closing that gap.

 

[Zamana]

I'll try to stay with Catalina as long as I can. At least in Catalina I can see the clear separation between the tabs, the body and the Safari's top bar.

 

[CasualFanboy]

This is an OS X metal UI I can definitely get behind:

View attachment 1687972

The 3D dock is questionable, but those were definitely better times. Makes me kinda sad really.

 

[CasualFanboy]

I'll try to stay with Catalina as long as I can. At least in Catalina I can see the clear separation between the tabs, the body and the Safari's top bar.

It's hard to imagine ever "warming up" to this new design. I know what I like, and this isn't it. If I ever do eventually end up using it, that simply means everything else either sucks _worse_ (Win10), or Linux simply doesn't support a feature or application that I need for work. But Linux is pretty good for my use case. Until recently, macos provided the best of both - UNIX-like system AND good hardware/software support - along with a decent UI.

 

[posguy99]

KDE is unparalleled in giving you the power to make it anything you want it to be. Apple? Well..... they seem to come up with new and inventive ways to punish customization or make it completely impossible.

KDE is unparalleled in providing form over function. It's been my experience that function is so far down the totem pole as to not even be an issue, as long as it looks pretty.

The closest FOSS parallel forApple would be Gnome. The Gnome team will not be satisfied until the UI is a blank screen with a single button on it that says "Shut Down"... unless someone decides to remove that feature too. Apple is following this path.

 

[Alwis]

What I really dislike in the Linux UI is, that it is not consistent between different applications.

The overall look in Big Sur ist OK for me, not great but OK. What is rally bad is, that some things need more mouse clicks or movement, eg. fast switching between users or searching in the mail app.

 

[Macbookprodude]

This is an OS X metal UI I can definitely get behind:

View attachment 1687972

I like this much better and it gives OS X a future like look.. Big Sur's UI sux and its got tim cook all over it.

 

[tkermit]

 

[Macbookprodude]

Really, what is the difference it makes ? Nothing at all.

 

[tkermit]

I really can’t decide what I hate most about Big Sur’s toolbar. The fact that it hides buttons and proxy icons or that it cuts off long window titles or that there’s often barely any space left for grabbing a window.

 

[Macbookprodude]

I really can’t decide what I hate most about Big Sur’s toolbar. The fact that it hides buttons and proxy icons or that it cuts off long window titles or that there’s often barely any space left for grabbing a window.

Really, I don't like anything with Apple except for the new iphones. Big Sur's desktop UI looks like a toy and not a real viable platform.

 

[ErikGrim]

Is MacOS 11 Big Sur Really Ugly? And Here Is Why! | UX Bucket

uxbucket.com

Literally everything in this article was fixed in the beta process except for the notifications icon. The menus are intentional as has been noted several times.

 

[Luposian]

I also wish, Apple would go back to this:
View attachment 927962
Now THAT is a "professional" look!

(I am being sarcastic, btw 😉)

My first Mac was a Power Macintosh 6100/60 with System 7.1.2. And the last pre-G3/G4 Power Mac I had was an 8500/120 running System 7.5.5. Ah... those were the days. I wish there were an open-source version of System 7/8/9... I'd love to run it again... and even see new apps for it. It was the days when Macs were still "old school" (68K/early PowerPC). I have many fond memories of those days...

 

[Luposian]

This is an OS X metal UI I can definitely get behind:

View attachment 1687972

I got on-board MacOS X during the 10.2-10.3 era... left the whole scene (except for my G4 DA/QS, ipod nano, ipod touch, iphone 4S, 5C, and 6S during the dry years) when Apple went Intel in 2005. 15 years later, sad to see how flat and boring "macOS" (lowercase "mac", ugh!) is nowadays, but totally thrilled we finally have REAL Macs (M1's) back again! Not those horrid PC's posing as Macs! So, as much as I hate the look, I'll just pretend I'm back with my first Mac (6100/60) and start all over again! Yay!

 

[nsklaus]

The closest FOSS parallel forApple would be Gnome. The Gnome team will not be satisfied until the UI is a blank screen with a single button on it that says "Shut Down"... unless someone decides to remove that feature too. Apple is following this path.

that is spot on. i completely agree.
also, unless i'm mistaken, gnome is the first one that came up with this "genius" (read: mongoloid) idea of mixing titlebars with toolbars. gnome is _The_ perfect example in designing horrible UI and taking all the bad choices that makes users and devs life ugly and miserable. i haven't touched gnome since gnome2 era.

now back to macos, i bought a macbookpro m1.. i had to. and it is a joy to use. i never hear the fan. no noises, even when running heavy games and stuffs.. also, being a MBP, it's built like a tank, it's very sturdy and that's what i like. i've been enjoying tremendously the raw power that the M1 soc delivers. i'm so very satisfied with my acquisition. the only downside is macos new look "flat design". it is such a step down compared to previous macos releases. it is so unfortunate apple felt the need to do this. i wish they would let us apply custom colours to the various UI elements (titlebars, toolbars, statusbars ,etc ..) that could ease the pain and sense of wasted UI. if only someone could make an app to let us tweak UI colours .. we could restore a bit of sanity in this "big sur UI refresh"..

 

[colourfastt]

The 3D dock is questionable, but those were definitely better times. Makes me kinda sad really.

I'm rather a fan of the 3d dock.

 

[JohnnyWalker]

https://www.reddit.com/r/MacOS/comments/jb1q0d

Is MacOS 11 Big Sur Really Ugly? And Here Is Why! | UX Bucket

uxbucket.com

Big Sur is ugly - Apple Community

discussions.apple.com

Every example in that article was from a pre-release version and is no longer valid

 

[nickdalzell1]

Kinda odd that while OS UIs are getting flatter and flatter (we'll be using Pip-Boys and command lines again before too long!) but in the areas of animation, 3D/skeuomorphs have replaced 'traditional' 2D animation (mostly due to Pixar, which was Steve Jobs' involvement iirc). Kinda an odd opposite. Our eyes are intended to favor perception of a 3D world so the whole Flat UI trend never appealed to me. I hated it in the days of DOS/Win1.x and was finally glad to see the evolution to skeuo, and websites finally getting off the Geocities 'blinking text/comic sans/under construction GIFs' crap and finally giving way to Web 3.0, but now, it's a total regression while in contrast, CGI animation is off the chart amazing to look at. Just think where UI design could have gone if we hadn't tried regressing to the Amiga days or some nostalgia trip to the era of OS/2...

Also, early smartphones had rather flat UIs (Palm OS Garnet PDAs with cellular flash cards inserted, Palm Treo smartphones, some of the later Nokia days) and the iPhone changed everything with the skeuo UI. It amazed me. I wanted to think smartphones a fad during the Treos, or the PocketPC era. Now, I just want so badly to go back to the iPhone 2G again. Or at least, see us go back to skeuo with modern apps. As much as I adore my S4, Relay, etc, keeping support is harder and harder. Eventually 4G will die, as AMPS once did, and one day, the in-built browser will stop pulling up Google or YouTube. either way I'll be forced into the present/future where DOS is the new way instead of a true evolution to holographic UI design.

Big Sur is only the beginning of the end... I've switched to Linux. At least you can get proper traffic lights and a 3D dock..