UI2 is Better. We design going from left to right, from top to bottom. The toolbar at the bottom obstructs the flow. 

Now that UI3 has been rolled out to all users, I’d be curious if Figma would be open to polling all users whether they prefer UI3 or UI2. Here’s what my own answers would look like for something like this (q’s off the top of my head):

How do you agree with the following on a scale of 1-10?

(1 - strongly disagree, 5 - neither agree nor disagree, 10 - strongly agree.)

1. I prefer using UI2 - 10

2. I prefer using UI3 - 1

3. I have taken the time to get used to UI3 - 8

4. UI3 slows down my workflow - 7

5. I’d be willing to go back to UI2 if it meant losing the new features of UI3 - 10

6. I’d be willing to pay more for figma to revert/continue to support to UI2 - 8

UI3 is genuinely one of the most wrong-headed UI refreshes I’ve ever run across in any software. How is this what comes out a company that makes software dedicated to design? Who asked for the tools to be put in the worst place they could possibly be at the bottom of the screen?

It’s simply unreal. Figma, who do you think your customers are? Do you think they need every field highlighted at all times? Do you think we need AI slop embedded in our software? Did you spend a little too much time in Webflow? Are you trying to compete with Canva for inexperienced users who need theirs hands held? Did you notice PenPot puts the toolbar at the top of the design canvas and you just wanted to be different, even if it makes your software less useful, and despite copying that software’s UI almost verbatim elsewhere?

Either way, my team is already looking for alternatives.

If even seasoned professionals frequently need tutorials, the product's UX is likely hindering productivity and needs improvement.

UI company makes horrible UI. It’s almost like this is an April fools joke.

Unfortunately it’s real, and it’s affecting people’s work and income now.

Now the question is do they lose more trust from the community, or do they do the right thing and change it back...

UI3 – this is disaster. Okay, any company can make an experiments / mistakes / etc. Your right. We, as product users, need an option to choose and switch back to UI2 if we want. Otherwise, it feels like Adobe, where bugs NEVER fixed / users NEVER heared / UX is counter-intuitive and inconsistence.

I’d say this is a good example of the kind of nonsense changes that gave Figma a chance at market penetration against Sketch to begin with. That Figma is now making the same kind of obvious mistakes shows the organization has learned nothing.

Unmovable toolbar RIGHT IN YOUR FACE. Panels forms got grey tone that distracts so much. Figma we knew and loved is dying((( Shame on you!!! It is not too late to repent and bring everything back to normal. You had to discuss such drastic changes with community!!!

You’ve demonstrated that your definition of “improve” does not line up with the community’s.

So, understandably, it’s hard to buy into statements like this.

I’ll be switching programs until UI2 is back.

Yes, literally everything is worse and convoluted now.

Very annoying to have to open a drop down to add properties to a component now

I’m huge fan of these changes, however it should be more useful to have the same view for one function. I mean corners and autolayout that looks different in draw and design. I can’t understand why is it in draw - grat switching of corner smoothing. In design - old version. In Draw - I can turn on autolayout by shortcut but i can’t edit it in menu. it’s strange...

What do you like about the changes?

I haven’t seen a single person say these words yet so I’m curious...

I would suggest creating a petition for freedom of choice between UI2 and UI3. Apart from the obvious inconveniences - purely technically in UI3 Figma became slower and less responsive at the moment, compared to UI2. The metaphor for UI2 in Figma is "Does it work? Don't touch it!"

Gotta love how the spacing input field just keeps moving around in UI3…  what is going on

In a tool used to build, design and create UX… we shouldn’t need to “Find where something is” by wasting time watching videos. Video watching should be for user growth. 

Um, I’m not sure this is about hard to get used to. This is more about non-logical ux and destroying user workflows by hiding things behind clicks and moving items and changing icons. A style refresh is “getting used to”

Here’s Mine:
 

How do you agree with the following on a scale of 1-10?

(1 - strongly disagree, 5 - neither agree nor disagree, 10 - strongly agree.)

1. I prefer using UI2 - 10

2. I prefer using UI3 - 1

3. I have taken the time to get used to UI3 - 9

4. UI3 slows down my workflow - 9

5. I’d be willing to go back to UI2 if it meant losing the new features of UI3 - 10

6. I’d be willing to pay more for figma to revert/continue to support to UI2 - 7

The biggest challenge for Figma’s staff that I see with UI3 right now, is if they will swallow their pride and make things right or buck the user complaints and dismiss us with internal justification because of the amount of cost spent to release UI3

The UI3 is a UI/UX disaster in all senses, first of all in the sense of mastership, craft and commitment to the values of the profession. I struggle every day since the new UI was forced to all users. It slows down my process by at least 25%, making it painful to adapt and re-learn.

Just a few things to spot (as said multiple times above):
1. Breaking the patterns. Breaking the muscle memory. Breaking the spacial memory. Improving the interface and interaction is not about changes, it’s about evolution and building upon what’s already working. If it works and works well, and is adopted by the users, first make sure you REALLY TEST the new solution for effectiveness, speed of use, orientation, identification, visual spotting, learnability, transferability, etc. Now it seems that there are NO essential REASONS for the changes, aside from making the UI more systematic (which isn’t necessarily a good thing per se). The good things for a professional tool are for example: Learnability, Memorability, Ease of identification and spotting (visual cues), Predictability, Ease of Spacial orientation, Ease of forming cognitive paths and muscle/spacial memory — almost none of them are addressed by the changes, some of them are even undermined by them.

2. Size & Position detached from each other. WHY??? It’s like putting the speedometer at the passenger side of the car, probably useful in some cases, but nonsense in all the reset.

3. Size & Position below the Component properties. It’s SOOO FRUSTRATING. The panel keeps jumping up and down, sometimes appearing below the screen edge (when the Component has many props). I find myself setting the component props WAY more rarely than setting their Size&Position, as well as Autolayout properties. The job of visually spotting (instead of space spotting based on muscle memory) is made even more difficult to to low contrast and visual similarity of all fields and icons. This gives us lots of unnecessary cognitive load, making us scan and READ (!!!) instead of instantly moving the cursor to a once defined persistent point in space

4. Visual clutter, low contrast, outlined icons, lack of distinctive visual cues. Makes it very hard to scan, spot and identify things, which all seem very much alike, forces us once again to READ (!!!) instead of spotting by visual cues.

5. Making changes just for the sake of making changes. Why regroup elements and move them to other panes? Why just swap places of the elements (i.e. gaps and alignment in Autolayout)? Yes, there might be some logic underneath. But that logic is just as valid as the previous one, it’s just an opinion — not better, or worse — JUST OTHER. As a result we have to RE-LEARN and RE-TRAIN for the new logic, just for the sake of making changes. That’s completely ANTI-USER-EXPERIENCE, that’s actually undermining user experience all-in-all.

If you’d like to understand what makes a professional effective tool, I’d recommend starting with the basics — read the “Augmenting Human Intellect: A Conceptual Framework” by Douglas Engelbart (1962), “Design of everyday things” by Don Norman (1988), “Don’t make me think”  by Steve Krug (2000). Start with the basics and build up, not the other way around.
 

Thanks, that’s a good one. Mine would be:

How do you agree with the following on a scale of 1-10?

(1 - strongly disagree, 5 - neither agree nor disagree, 10 - strongly agree.)

1. I prefer using UI2 — 10

2. I prefer using UI3 — 1

3. I have taken the time to get used to UI3 — 9

4. UI3 slows down my workflow — 10

5. I’d be willing to go back to UI2 if it meant losing the new features of UI3 — 10

6. I’d be willing to pay more for figma to revert/continue to support to UI2 — 5

I literally wrote to sketch sales saying basically the same thing! I told them to “Seize The Moment”, that if they finally really caught up they need to make a huge splash on the market promising users they will never bury clicks, move tools, change motor muscle memory workflow elements, and change icons!

I received an pretty nice and kind response! 

This, This is beautiful. Logical, intelligent, educated, and 100% accurate. Thank you. My frustration has made me knee jerk respond and be non-productive or constructive. You give me inspiration to be better.

I just had to click 4 times into my assets only to find out I had to back out and click into another asset folder to find an asset I couldn’t remember what the name was. Instead of screaming in the forums, I should have pointed out what and how to make it useful. 

RATE 1 - 100 = -100

Figma team, please just bring back the option to switch between the old and new UI. Is that really so hard to do? Respect your community, for God’s sake. I’ve really tried to get used to it for weeks, but I’ve finally come to the conclusion that it’s simply a bad redesign

I understand that you've added new features like AI, and I respect your effort to evolve. But please don't ruin what already worked so much better just to follow new trends.

Not a fan of the new UI, too much visual noise. The right hand sized panel has become so busy and it’s hard to find things, yet the functionality is the same. Simply the UI or allow users to go back to UI2. Not a good upgrade at all.