Many front-end tools and frameworks exist to help designers and developers build the front-end part of an application or a website. In 2014, Google presented the concept of Material Design with the aim of standardising its various services. Subsequently adopted by other companies and brands, Material Design sets out the rules to follow in order to apply this graphic style and achieve a coherent visual identity.
What is Material Design?
Material Design is a set of rules laid down by Google in 2014 concerning interface design. Presented in the form of a guide, these rules make it possible to unify the graphic style across the various platforms used by a brand. As a result, the interfaces offered to users provide a pleasant and harmonious experience.
The inspirations behind this interface design are based on real-world elements such as paper and ink. That is why it was given the name Material Design.
The graphic style set out by the rules of Material Design brings three guiding principles: simplicity, fluidity and consistency. Material Design uses blocks of flat colour and clean, minimalist representations with small touches of shadow and gradient. If you think this is also the inspiration behind Flat Design, you are partly right — but, as you will see below, the two differ in several ways.
With the evolution of technology and the proliferation of screen sizes, Google has placed the emphasis on responsiveness. The main goal of Material Design is for interfaces to be adaptable to the various platforms used by users. Indeed, this interface design is geared towards mobile-first applications while remaining easy to adapt to any platform. Material Design was notably used from version 5.0 of the Android operating system onwards.
The shadows and gradients used help to bring a sense of movement that improves UX and affordance. Every animation aims to be intuitive and realistic, sometimes imitating the real handling of an object — for example, imitating a page being turned, or an animation on mouse-over indicating to the user that an action needs to be carried out. In this way every action becomes natural and fluid, and the user easily understands how the interface works.
One major drawback has, however, been held against Material Design: being too rigid, not allowing designers to express their creativity and confining them to endlessly recreating the same interfaces.
Material Theming for greater customisation
Presented in 2018, Material Theming is a tool designed for the graphics editor Sketch, which is very well known among designers. This tool stems from Material Design and keeps the same philosophy while offering greater openness.
To give designers more flexibility, Google decided to withdraw its colour palette in order to leave them free to use whatever colours they wish — provided they respect the guidelines given by Google, namely:
- Establish a hierarchy of colours
- Pay attention to legibility
- Use expressive colours (red for a refusal, green for an acceptance)
In addition, a bottom navigation bar is offered, allowing users on mobile devices to reach it more easily with their thumb. Finally, a component library has been created, making it possible to integrate icons more quickly.
This Material Design tool allows the use of a less rigid, more customisable framework. However, interface design will continue to evolve over the years, taking customisation to an even greater degree.
Material You for total customisation
Presented in 2021, Material You is a significant update, because above all it brings endless customisation!
Google wanted interface design to adapt to each user’s personality. The goal is no longer to please as many people as possible — the goal is to please each individual. A palette is therefore created and adapted for each wallpaper chosen by the user. These colours are applied across the whole interface, from notifications to the lock screen and widgets.
In the same vein, Material You aims to be highly accessible by including people with visual impairments, colour blindness, and so on. Thanks to this Material Design update, users can vary various visual aspects such as contrast or borders.
With Material You, Google wants to place the user in a co-creation role so that every interface is unique and tailored.
Material Design vs Flat Design: what are the differences?
Material Design (created by Google) is often described as Flat Design (created by Microsoft) with a few extra details.
Flat Design is indeed characterised by a flat, minimalist and clean visual style using bright colours, sharp, simple shapes and very easily legible typography. Its aim is to use only the essentials and to remove all gradients, shadows, reflections, unimportant details, and so on.
Material Design, on the other hand, plays a little more on realism while retaining that minimalist aspect. It adds certain details, shadows or gradients for stronger affordance. For example, by adding a shadow to a button, users understand more easily that an action is expected.
Material Design is a graphic concept that has evolved at users’ request. Initially judged too rigid, it has become a widely customisable graphic style, to the point of being adaptable to each individual person.
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