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Ask HN: Why is Apple's new design referred as flat design?

by BuddhaSource on 6/13/13, 7:04 PM with 6 comments

Is flat design over hyped?

Apple design still have gradient, layers of transparency and text shadow to show depth. How is it flat? Well it is less skeuomorphism but I don't think that means flat.

I agree Microsoft's metro is flat, no shadow, no gradient and feels everything is on same plane.

  • by kevinchau on 6/13/13, 7:08 PM

    Apple themselves isn't calling it flat.

    It was just rumored that Apple would move to a flat designs before the keynote, and people just stuck with it.

  • by 27182818284 on 6/14/13, 11:20 PM

    It is actually an old, old, old, design term. "Flat design" isn't new to the designers I know who were designing back in the 1960s.

    Just like everything else, software has fashion trends. Right now, flat is in. Once people get used to flat, something else will appear with the "innovative" look.

  • by meerita on 6/15/13, 9:58 AM

    It's clearly not a flat style as we know it as the actual trend. It has some parts that show flatness, but overall is pretty not uniform. I watch the whole documentation, even installed on my iPhone and it's clearly buggy in terms of design's unity. It has a lot of work ahead to make it well executed.

  • by hugovie on 6/14/13, 5:17 PM

    I think this style is really bad for iOS. Actually, I dislike the way Apple changes its style.

  • by sp332 on 6/13/13, 7:33 PM

    "Flat" is the name of the style. It doesn't always literally mean flat.