Art of Minimalism in Mobile Apps

With the art of app designing taking a more aesthetic approach, designing the UI in a way users will perceive as something simple and satisfying has become more significant than anything. Today, building a minimal UI has not only become vitally important but necessary to engage an ever-growing audience. The skeuomorphic way had its share of days when people loved to see lots of elements and a play of different designs encapsulating a variety of information. Now the scenario has changed. As you already have several million established apps, it’s important to make the path to your minimalistic mobile UI clear and simple for the users. The only basis that users judge your app is by gauging the minimalistic app design which provides a clear, informative, and straightforward prism for them. You only need to figure out two important things before you head on to inculcate minimalism in mobile apps. The first is form. The second is function. If you nail this part, your app design will have a minimalist mobile UI.

When we talk about minimalist mobile UI or minimalist apps, we have to understand the essential aspects that form the underlying foundation of minimalistic app design. You must use relevant information and ultra-important that you use bare minimum graphics elements. If you bombard it with information and clutter it with too many elements, your app will more likely be perceived as desperate rather than an aesthetic, and a minimalistic app design.

What are those minimalist UI design principles that result in a minimalist app? Let’s walk through them.

Color is the apex

You have to maintain a color scheme that represents your brand or business and stands as a symbol for it. You cannot have a blue color scheme today and change the color scheme to yellow tomorrow. Colors leave a subconscious effect, making a user connect to a UI, and it works. This is precisely why different users choose different apps as per their preferences. You have to select a minimalistic color scheme for your minimalistic app design and provide a common plug point for both your brand and users to achieve higher UX. You can use Simplistic color schemes like Monochromatic color schemes or Analogous color schemes for minimalism in mobile apps. You can also use a specific and vibrant color to emphasize some vital information or primary elements in the app.

Typography for connection

Chaos is not a ladder, my friend. When you sit down to figure out how to epitomize the art of minimalism in mobile apps, you will have to decide on one typeface for your communication. Period! If you use different fonts for different sections of communication, the chaos ladder will fall on you and wreak havoc on your minimalistic app design. To get more understanding of this, you can go through different mobile UI design examples that used a single typeface and communicated better than those that chose to have different fonts inside the app. Choose one standard typeface according to iOS or Android. Stress on important information with better use of typography.

A play of whitespace and shadows

According to Medium, the use of white space where you don’t place any content is considered to be the backbone of minimalistic app designs. And this is a worldwide accepted practice of minimalism in mobile apps these days. You can use vertical and horizontal lines, placing them with enough whitespace in between so that you give visual clarity. You can also use elevation and shadows to make some information or elements evident. There is no doubt that there is no perfect minimalist mobile UI design out there. But eventually, you can hit the right node if you keep it simple and effective.

Icons work like a miracle

You can have the most simple icon in your minimalistic app design and yet achieve seamless interaction and perfect deliverance of communication. But don’t get it wrong. We are not asking you to draw stick figures. You can have an ideal icon that helps the user in navigation without the icon being overly graphic which makes it very complex. A user runs his eyes through the interface within a fraction of a second. You need to harvest this attention using effective icons for primary functions. You can use both solid and hollow icons to incorporate minimalism in mobile apps.

Finding minimal UI design inspiration has become easy today. As developers and UI designers both invest efforts in perceiving app design from psychoanalytic and scientific behavioral standpoints, you get substantial information on user behavior. And this has led to the art of minimalism in mobile apps being no rocket science today. It’s just emphasizing relevant, valuable information and designing accordingly. Some of the many minimalist app design inspirations include apps like

• Minimalist Habit by Hasan Yavaş
• Forest App by Shaokin Pi and Amy Jeng
• Tenant Management by Johny Vino

All these apps have minimalist mobile UI. They tend to be perfect mobile UI design examples that inculcate minimalism in mobile apps, and their popularity is proof of creating a successful minimalistic app design. As we have elucidated above, skeuomorphic mobile UI design examples like Paper iPad App, Timer App, National Geographic National Parks App, and many others seem to have worked in the past. But today, we only see minimalism in mobile apps as the underlying aesthetic philosophy that defines a successful UI design with notably higher UX.

Go minimal!