2025 is shaping up to be a wild year for interface design—and software development in general. Here are some predictions for the year ahead.
Dark, darker and darkest
We had dark mode, but can we go darker? A shift in the cultural mood is underway as the world moves away from the cute, cuddly tech aesthetic of the past 15 years. Forget the rounded corners and fluffy drop shadows. Instead, we are stepping into a world shaped by Trump 2.0 and The Traitors being the biggest show on TV.
Dark mode isn’t just about looks anymore — it’s a whole new attitude. The friendly, polished designs of the last decade are out, replaced by something sharper, bolder, and more raw. You can see this in crypto and Web3, where design has ditched the clean, approachable fintech vibe in favor of brutalist layouts, glitchy text, and high-contrast colors. Interfaces aren’t trying to hold your hand anymore; they expect you to keep up. We might even dare say minimalism is out (?)
Interfaces That Adapt (or Cease to Exist?)
AI has the potential to create interfaces that rapidly auto-adapt and personalize based on user preferences. Imagine your banking app reorganizing itself to hide expenses you don’t care about while prioritizing upcoming payments. Or your music app changing color schemes to match your tastes.
This shift is contentious. Most users prefer simplicity and consistency over excessive customization and unpredictability. Visiting Monzo or YouTube after years of use and finding the navigation changed to suit your "preferences" could disrupt muscle memory. Product teams already love mixing things up—so would this really be any different? A built-in help section, made by AI-powered interfaces, could be far more effective than today’s trawl through Reddit or Stack Overflow.
Alternatively, interfaces might disappear altogether. The advent of zero UI has been predicted ever since Alexa and Siri and voice-activated interactions came round, but advancements in AI are now making natural interfaces through speech, gesture, and expression genuinely effective. Why even have a screen when you can just talk to your product to get what you need? And why have a product at all if your AI agent can handle everything for you? Ambient Personalization could be the next big thing, although its important to still keep Accessibility in UX in mind.
Foldable Devices and Screens
As foldable devices go mainstream, it will be fascinating to see how interfaces evolve to accommodate greater flexibility and dynamic layouts. Most app designers still start with one screen size (usually the most common iPhone width) and only adjust for larger or smaller screens when needed. These designs are generally portrait-first.
Foldable devices change the game by introducing multiple screen sizes and aspect ratios for a single device and app. This technology has not yet fully taken over, likely due to the investment required to adapt, but that could be about to change. As more users adopt foldables, developers will need to rethink their entire approach to responsive design. Instead of designing for a static screen size, they’ll have to create interfaces that support Cross-Platform UX.
Another challenge is interaction. Foldables introduce new gestures, hinge-based UI elements, and dual-screen functionality that traditional apps aren’t built to handle. Some devices even allow users to partially fold the screen into a laptop-like position, requiring interfaces that update in real time. But if Apple’s Dynamic Island has shown us anything, working around constraints can often lead to exponential returns.
Immersive Design with 3D and Textures
AI tools have democratized 3D aesthetics and interfaces, making them accessible to everyone. This trend is set to grow rapidly now that creating models has become so simple. The metaverse may not have taken off yet, but the big tech players haven’t abandoned it—we are seeing more and more Interactive 3D Objects in everyday websites.
At the same time, modern hardware has caught up, increasing its capacity to render complex sequences with ease. As we explored in a previous blog, this allows websites to take a step further and truly visualize their vision for users. Pair this with Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR), and we have a game changer.
Building on the last decade of UI gradients, we’ll also see more texture and depth in backgrounds, graphic treatments, and overall art direction. We’ve already started seeing these graphic elements and assets work in tandem with the traditional approaches, like bento boxes and microinteractions.
Andrew Burton is the founder of Shoreditch Design, a global creative agency. Follow him on LinkedIn for more posts on interface and brand design: https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrew-burton-shoreditch/.
