Elon Musk has all the time most popular minimalist design, with as many buttons and controls hidden as attainable, leaving a extra smooth and simplistic look.

That’s the method that he’s taken at his different firms, so it ought to come as no shock to see that Musk can also be seeking to implement a extra stripped-back design ethos at X as nicely.

We’ve already seen this with the modifications to hyperlink previews within the app, whereas over the previous few months, we’ve additionally seen varied examples of X’s extra important pending redesign, which is able to take away all of the operate buttons and metrics from the underside of X posts in-stream, as a way to put extra deal with the content material itself.

That’ll additionally change the way you work together within the app.

With a view to interact with posts, X will quickly change to a extra haptic-focused method, in that customers might want to swipe left to love and put up in-stream, and proper to answer.

Which, once more, clearly aligns with Elon’s minimalist imaginative and prescient, however it is going to be a major change in how folks work together within the app. And with most customers by no means participating with posts already, it looks like a dangerous transfer.

However that’s not the one UI shift coming to X.

X can also be experimenting with extra minimalist reformats, together with a simplified “faucet to develop” operate, to extra simply learn longer posts.

Whereas it’s additionally growing new video controls, primarily based on extra intuitive engagement behaviors.

These are fascinating additions, which align with making the X platform extra of an extension of pure motion and interplay, versus urgent handbook buttons on display screen.

However will customers come alongside for the experience, and observe together with these much less upfront management choices?

It’s price noting right here that Twitter had lengthy grappled with easy methods to simplify the app, with firm execs viewing this as a key obstacle to its development.

Again in 2018, then Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey famous that utilizing Twitter was “a whole lot of work”, with many new customers having a poor expertise the primary time that they use the app, resulting in increased churn charges. Twitter had sought to enhance this, by way of improved suggestions and streamlined account set-up processes, however they may by no means seemingly get it proper, and maximize its attraction amongst internet customers.

With this in thoughts, it’s exhausting to see how X’s coming revamp will assist. Certain, having fewer controls on display screen will imply much less visible muddle, however it’s going to additionally make it way more troublesome for brand new customers to grasp easy methods to work together with the app.

Perhaps, finally, it will higher align with folks’s expectations. However proper now, it looks like a dangerous transfer, particularly for a platform that’s seen little to no person development in nearly two years.  

However Elon has a imaginative and prescient, and it appears that evidently nothing goes to face in his approach of creating it a actuality.

And on the identical time, previous Twitter administration was additionally too threat averse on this respect, hardly ever rolling out any change that hadn’t been beta examined for literal years beforehand.

It appears the optimum method might be someplace in between the 2, however possibly, Elon’s accelerated improvement program is simply what the app wants.