Google leaks its own upcoming Android design changes

The blog post has been deleted, but we now know that the next iteration of Material Design is called Material 3 Expressive, and it’s supposed to be Google’s most researched and easy to use update yet.

The post was spotted by 9to5Google and says that the company went through 46 rounds of refinement and included 18,000 research participants to study how people interact with mobile design. Google also learned how people learn and understand interfaces. It also discovered smaller things like what loading bars are the most appealing and how big to make buttons.

This new design is supposed to help users find key elements of apps faster and Google says it can help level the playing field for all age making it equally as easy to use Android no matter what age you are. The company has been working on it for three years with an overarching goal of making each app stand out. You can read an archived version of the full blog post, but it’s missing some of the images. 9to5Google managed to save some if you want to look at more.

Google’s blog post even says that the new design helps increase the “Coolness” of apps since the more expressive design resonates with people as it feels more modern.

What will be interesting to see at I/O is how widely this new design permeates across Google’s products. Will we see it adopted by third-party Android users, or will it be mainly on Pixel devices? Will it stretch as far as the Pixel Tablet and Google TV as well? What about Chromebooks?

Google has a very wide ecosystem of products and typically, it takes the company longer than you’d want to update them all so they’re uniform. Now that the blog post has been pulled down, it’s hard to tell when this will be shown off. Google I/O this year is scheduled for May 20, but there is an Android showcase set for May 13, so we may see the new design debut for real there.

Image credit: 9to5Google

Source: 9to5Google, Google