The most successful and enduring designs are based on a deep understanding of how people think, feel, and interact with the world. The principles here reflect this reality, and form the foundation for guidance throughout the Human Interface Guidelines. There’s no one right way to apply these principles. Instead, they’re tools to help you weigh competing priorities and make key decisions on the path to a great design.
Create value. The best designs reflect a constant orientation toward what makes a product genuinely useful. At every stage of development, ask what your product is for and whether the design serves that purpose.
Keep focused. Prioritize your app’s most important features by aligning with how people want to use it, and focus on making those features truly great. A product with a clear use is more effective at helping people meet their goals.
Find new ways to solve the problem. Investigate existing solutions, and avoid re-creating them. Define what sets your product apart, and ask how your design can reflect that.
Stay out of the way. People use your product to get things done. Often the best way to help them do this is to get them directly to the task or content at hand. The best designs are unobtrusive and present when people need them.
Give people the freedom to explore. Let them move through your interface and access features without being locked into specific flows or modes. When a guided flow is necessary, make it easy to skip or escape so people can get to the main experience quickly.
Help people recover from mistakes. When people know they can reverse an action or return to a previous state, they feel free to explore, and that freedom makes your interface more inviting. Build forgiveness into your design, and make it easy. Recovering from the unexpected shouldn’t cost people their time or work.
Be fully transparent about what your product does and why. You have an opportunity to build a relationship with someone from their very first interaction. Make sure your app’s intentions are clear from the start. Provide a clear rationale when asking for permission, and when gathering data, be clear about what you collect and how you use it.
Keep people’s information safe. People trust you to maintain the integrity of their data. Only collect what your product needs to function, and handle it with care. Anticipate ways it could be misused or cause harm, and put protections in place to prevent abuse and unintended consequences.
Use concepts that people know. People bring knowledge of the real world and other software to every new experience. Draw on both to make your interface feel familiar and intuitive.
Keep visuals and interactions consistent. Once you establish a behavior or appearance for an element, apply it throughout your design. Consistency helps people learn more quickly, and gives them confidence that new interactions will work the way they expect.
Provide clear feedback. Give people clear signals about what’s happening as they use your app. Show when controls are available, indicate when content changes, and use system patterns to display alerts and offer choices. Consistent feedback helps keep people informed and in control.
Design for everyone. People are empowered by products designed with them in mind. Think about the diversity of people who may encounter your design, and take the range of their experiences, perspectives, and needs into account. Treat accessibility as a priority from the start. Design inclusively to reach the broadest possible audience and create a better experience for all.
Preserve a person’s context. Help people feel at home as your design adapts across platforms and configurations. Keep content and controls in consistent, predictable positions, and use natural animations to ease transitions.
Consider a variety of input methods. People interact with their devices in different ways. Designing for as many inputs as possible — including voice, touch, keyboard, and more — means more people can use your product the way that works best for them.
Approach every platform with intention. Your software should feel polished and at home wherever it runs. Give each platform you support the same level of care.
Include just what’s necessary. Simplicity isn’t minimalism. Aim for a focused, useful experience that keeps the important things close by and lets the others fall away.
Be concise. When you find the simplest way to say something, it’s often the most universal, and the most helpful. Choose exactly the words you need to convey a concept or label a control.
Establish hierarchy. When form and function are readily apparent, people know how to reach a desired outcome. Prioritize recognizable controls and a consistent structure that helps people understand where they are and what comes next.
Quality sets the tone. Every element of your design shows people how much you care. Be deliberate with each decision, and strive for stunning visuals, smooth animations, precise wording, and thoughtful audio.
Experiment and iterate. Prototype early, try new approaches, and be willing to discard what doesn’t work. Set a high bar for every feature, refine it, and try again. Test your product in real-world settings to make sure it’s durable, reliable, and high-performing.
Maintain your craft. Shipping isn’t the finish line. Keep your interface current with the latest platform capabilities and design patterns, and keep the quality bar high. Design is an ongoing commitment.
Identify the emotion you want to inspire. Not all software feels the same to use. A fitness app might energize; a meditation app might calm; a game might thrill. Know the feeling you want to evoke, and let it shape your design.
Create defining moments. Every interaction is a chance to show what your software stands for. From a simple button press to an error message, consider whether each moment is an opportunity to add a touch of character that reflects the spirit of your design.
Don’t mistake delight for decoration. Keep in mind that people are trying to accomplish a task, so don’t let pursuit of delight for its own sake get in the way of your product’s core purpose. Think about your overall aesthetic: Some designs benefit from a carefully considered practical touch, while others might prefer some whimsy. Experiment to find the right balance.
Consider the whole. Delight emerges as the sum of the consideration that you put into your product. It’s the culmination of everything a person experiences as they use it: the freedom to act, the safety to explore, the comfort of familiar metaphors, and the flexibility to transition from one context to another. When you design with intent, focus, and care, the result is a product that people find naturally delightful.
Date | Changes |
|---|---|
June 8, 2026 | Reintroduced design principles. |