Signs you should have a dense user interface

Density is a user interface library specifically designed for complex, dense user interfaces.

But should you really make your app’s interface more dense?

Dense design can sometimes overwhelm users, but it has important advantages for specific kinds of apps.

We generally see dense UI in:

• Tools for design, analysis, and monitoring of complex systems
• Data-heavy applications with tables, charts, maps, etc
• Technical, industrial, and scientific software
• Internal tools

Here are some signs you should consider a high-density UI.

Your software is complex by design

Complexity is generally frowned on in software–but simplicity can be equally harmful in some cases.

Software should give users an accurate mental model of the system it describes. When an interface oversimplifies the system beneath it, it makes it harder to use–not easier.

Complex software usually has complex data. This may have thousands (or millions) of rows of logs, geospatial map layers that cover the entire planet, or time series data with months of history and millisecond precision. Users of complex apps need to be able to find the important story within a haystack of information. Dense interfaces can simply surface more data from the at once.

Complex apps also have a lot of actions users can take. Instead of one or two main buttons, a screen may have 50 or more buttons that each take a specific action. Designers must carefully emphasize critical actions, tuck away seldomly-used ones, and still make all actions available when needed.

Your software is used by professionals

If your app is primarily designed to be used by professionals to do their job at work, consider dense UI.

Professionals often spend a lot of time in their software. Often they use it daily, and for many hours a day. They are experts in their field, and often experts in their tools.

These users usually have enough technical expertise to learn a more capable interface when it helps them work more effectively.

Your software is mission-critical

Our customers often have products with mission-critical features. This could be accomplishing important tasks, ensuring regulatory or legal standards are met, or even protecting the lives and safety of real human beings.

When mistakes are costly, users need a high degree of accuracy and legibility. A dense interface can make it easier to passively watch for issues, faster to find the relevant information when needed, and easier to take critical action without hunting through menus and screens.

You prioritize power over simplicity

Dense UI is most common in “power tools”, or tools that are designed with a lot of features.

Apps that prioritize power can have a steep learning curve. They trade some first-time ease of use for more power and speed in repeated use. This is a better tradeoff when people use the app frequently at work, and many dense applications include on-the-job training to help people learn the tool.

One of the most important kinds of power is speed. Consumer apps, which people may use only once or a handful of times, are often better kept simple and slower so users do not misunderstand them. But when people use an app hundreds or thousands of times each day, slowness becomes a serious problem.

Other reasons

More signs you may be a good fit for a dense UI:

• You are building a suite of related tools that need a shared visual language and reusable controls. This could be one app per team, per physical location, per role, or multiple platforms (such as software bundled as a desktop-native application with Electron).
• You have a highly technical team with deep domain expertise, but low design- or UX-expertise. For example, maybe your engineers know how to build a rocket, but struggle with CSS.

Are you considering a dense user interface for your app? Density gives engineering teams a single control surface for building complex UI so they can focus on the actually hard problems.

Explore the Density UI library, see examples of high-density apps, or book a free call with a dense UI expert.