over 4 years ago from Tiago Franco
Just upgraded and went back to white mode after less than 5 minutes. The eco-system is too inconsistent to make the dark theme work properly.
Is it just me?
It's not incredibly obvious but if you pick Graphite as the accent colour, you get an even darker shade across the UI.
well spotted! thanks!
This happens because every accent colour aside from graphite use your desktop background to infer the background of the window. So if your background is black, or very dark, then the accent colours may lead to darker UI overall.
Interesting! Didn't notice this.
"went back to white mode after less than 5 minutes" - this might be an issue here, give it time ;) Like all new UI, it gets time to get used to.
There are some "shitty things" like the border, etc. but don't forget this needs to be balanced for everyone and there are lots of constraints (age - young/old, physical state - good/bad eyes, conditions - indoor/outdoor, better/worst screens, accessibility etc.), it's not only for a designer's eyes :) If this would be done like dribble shot, it would fail.
Looks fantastic for me, especially if every app is in dark mode. I can go into details and complain, but there is no reason to do so. I'm sure the UI will improve in the future. Just give more time, use it and enjoy.
"this might be an issue here, give it time ;)"
Like all new UI, it gets time to get used to." - this is IMHO a mistake. A user doesn't have to get used to the UI if it's well executed.
If a user needs to "give an interface time" to get used to it, there is a huge problem with that interface.
I disagree. The change as I see it is more of a getting used to inverted colors on each and every app. There is NOTHING anyone could have done to prepare and massage the UI for that level of change. The biggest problem I run across is that tone of section dividers. The background changes but the color used to divide a sidebar or info column stayed the same gray as before and while it might have looked fine in the light mode, in dark mode it's too bright and sticks out like a sore thumb. It's still a mixed bag with some Apple apps and some third party apps doing this but I'm sure this will get smoothed out over time and app developers will learn to better prepare their code to work with a shifting UI instead of hardcoding every little thing (or they'll hard code it twice; one for light and one for dark).
I don't think that's true. That may be true for a completely new interface—sure, a well-designed interface should be intuitive from the start. However, after navigating macOS X's interface for more years than I'd like to count, it will obviously take some time to become familiar with a shift in color. The interface isn't completely broken, but an opposite shift in color can be daunting for any interface.
Wait, so you've never ever encountered a situation where you've improved something someone used a billion times before, and they complained?
Henry Ford would like to have a word with you.
Not arguing either way on the original statement, just following up on your comment that you don't believe time-spent has an effect on user acceptance.
Dark mode is not an improvement. Themes were an improvement on Windows 95. This is just a poorly executed marketing stunt.
Not arguing either way on the original statement, just following up on your comment that you don't believe time-spent has an effect on user acceptance.
Ah. Nothing against that. I just think its not a big deal to make it a release flagship. Either way, unfortunately I'm getting used to Apple releasing just a few improvements as part of their product roadmap.
The Mail app looks absolutely horrific. Like a 3rd party windows Vista addon, not an Apple-designed UI.
Yep. And imessages looks very strange too.
It actually works really well for me, I do not like how they designed the Finder (with the alternating rows).
Spark, my favorite email app, looks fantastic. Things 3, looks fantastic as well. Books looks good as well, aside from the horizontal scrolling that still persists.
Which app do you mean to imply when you say "ecosystem"?
I'd be curious to know why you like dark mode Spark, to me it feels like a horrible idea:
I agree here. Spark and Things don't look great in Dark Mode, and for app that require a lot of reading, white mode is much better. I"m fine with the OS being dark mode, but it's frustrating that you can't turn it off for specific apps.
IMHO, mail looks terrible, messages doesn't look that nice too. And if I start listing 3rd party apps, the list will be big.
I'm using Airmail and looks awful. Checking Things 3 right now.
Overall, dark mode is nice but I need to get used to it and apple needs to polish the UI a little bit. Looks a little bit like web 2.0
I agree, it's not great, and to make things worse, there is no easy way to keep a dark dock/menu bar. There is a way to do it but it's not perfect, it will have some inconsistencies such as dark dock icons or bezels around some apps.
While I see people praising Apple for how thorough Dark Mode is, I don't agree with that, not only is the mode itself not as polished as Light Mode (which had decades to evolve), but also every developer is doing something different and I think without more help and guidelines from Apple, it will take many years before designers and devs figure out what good dark interfaces should look like on the mac.
And my feeling is that Dark Mode is the only big change on Mojave. Sad for a major release.
+1, at least with my usage there's nothing else new.
Stacks are nifty.
For people who have messy desktops yes, but they provide zero value for people who already have good folder structures in place.
Good point.
Screenshots are amazing. Cmd+Option+5. You can do screen recordings and then immediately after trim the clip, also annotate right after you take a screenshot. LOVE it
I love how the screenshots work now. You can take one with Cmd+Shift+4 then drag the little preview window directly into Sketch. No more messing around with redundant screenshot files on your desktop :)
This feature as been there at least since 2008... The only change is the CMD+SHIFT+5 feature, which is similar to CMD+SHIFT+4 but allows annotations.
He's talking about the new little preview window, not the keyboard shortcut. That part is new, and it is AMAZINGLY NICE.
Gotcha. A nice detail.
Since 2008 (or something) you could add CTRL to the key combination and there were no redundant screenshot files on your desktop :)
Stacks are nice and right clicking your desktop to use your iphone as a scanner are pretty cool.
i dont know why everyone is surprised by this. reversed text (white on black) will always be harder to read that traditional black on white, and when you have lots of it (finder, mail, etc) it's very apparent.
And after Mojave, it just doesn't show the image files thumbnail, so sad... I'm waiting for 10.14.1 update now
I made a macOS app a few years ago and I for one dread the work to update it to support dark mode, so I probably won't.
If you don’t mind, would you go into more detail about what the app does and what the process for updating it would be like? I’m learning Swift myself and I’d be curious how well this sort of thing is handled by apple.
If you are curious, I recently open sourced the app. It's called Keynote Extractor. Here's the repo.
The kind of work is to study how dark mode is implemented and to change assets based on the dark mode API. There's a few icons in there and basically it's a single view app.
I don't have Mojave yet so I don't know how much is automatic but I assume most of the app will look broken on Mojave in dark mode.
Actually, not a single thing about it is broken:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/pd04gd0w7ui7po0/Screenshot%202018-10-01%2020.07.22.png?dl=0
https://www.dropbox.com/s/mb6abncmg8shxew/Screenshot%202018-10-01%2020.07.26.png?dl=0
https://www.dropbox.com/s/e809a46iwe9z7qd/Screenshot%202018-10-01%2020.07.32.png?dl=0
https://www.dropbox.com/s/pdw4qiaocpdjlpj/Screenshot%202018-10-01%2020.09.38.png?dl=0
https://www.dropbox.com/s/fjt4u9j9fav1c9b/Screenshot%202018-10-01%2020.09.43.png?dl=0
Merlin Mann and Dan Benjamin feel the same way and talked about it around the one-hour mark on Back to Work last week.
It may get a bit of time to get used to it.
I've done the same when I first installed it and switched back directly to white mode. Right now I'm on dark mode, got used to it and really love it :)
The web is mostly white, so you set yourself for blindingly harsh contrast with dark mode on.
This is from someone currently in dark mode... :/
The first thing I noticed was, "Wow, basically every website is designed with bright white backgrounds..." So now I have these massive bright, white squares with black borders..." I wonder if dark mode for content will become a thing.
I've been living with it for a few days, and I generally like the "aesthetics" of it, but I'm finding small UI labels slightly harder to read.
If I had the option to bump up the font sizes by 1pt system-wide, that would probably do the trick.
Maybe I should take this as a sign to lower my display resolution?
I've used it for a couple of days and I too find it annoying in some cases.
I dislike the stroke line surrounding windows. I dislike that I cannot choose which apps to keep light or dark, and the fact that if I now only want to have the Dock and menu bar in dark and the rest in light, I can't.
The menu bar now has a dark line underneath. I used to have backgrounds of the same colour as the menu bar so that it would look as there is no background, but now I can't anymore.
The grey looks a little washed out in some areas..
There are also a few bugs I've encountered for instance I can't see thumbnails anymore.
I really like Mojave because at it's core, what it represents is choice. You're not forced to be on dark mode, there is freedom to switch. There are people who don't like dark mode and others who do. From my experience as a UX Designer, one thing I learned is that every user is different and that's okay. We should embrace differences. Just because you like pickles and someone else doesn't like pickles, it doesn't detract from the value that you take out of liking pickles (:
Sure Mojave isn't perfect but I never expect anything to be perfect right out the gate. I understand that they will improve so long as they listen to feedback. Change aversion is also a very real thing when it comes to UX, there are users who do not like change even if it is better for them. I'm not saying this is the case for you but something to be mindful of when it comes to any design change.
Well... themes were first introduced by Microsoft on Windows 95. They gave us choice by then.
The way I see it, this is just a poorly executed marketing stunt.
With all due respect, may I ask what was your intention when you posed this question? Are you trying to convince others why Mojave didn't meet your expectations or do you want validation for your feelings? Again, I don't mean to come off as rude - I think knowing your intentions will help me better understand how you're approaching other comments here.
Hi Jennifer,
The reason was pure curiosity. Most opinions that I've found about Mojave was about how great the dark mode was, and I was very disappointed after the update. Glad to see I'm not the only one judging by the answers to this post.
I prefer it for sure, even in its half-assed state. They have a lot of work to do yet on consistency and how it's applied across different applications. Not sure if developers have a part in the process or not, but seems like a lot of conventions need to be established.
Dark mode seems like a rare "give the internet people what they want" move from Apple. It's not very well executed or well-considered, but I struggle with what that would even be anyway? As designers, we have to think constantly about contrast of white on dark—and after 30 minutes in Spotify's cave-like UI, for example, I am done. So I think the question really should be why was this implemented at all? The biggest flaw I see is that even when 'dark mode' is on, content is still glaringly white by comparison. I guess I just don't really get it.
I actually am really liking it! The biggest benefit over the long run is the reduced light pollution to my eyes. I think my eyes will be healthier in the long run because of it. I think it just takes some getting used to! Has anyone done a study on reduced electricity usage while using a dark UI vs light? The results are probably more dramatic on OLED screens.
Btw, are you using this? https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/material-incognito-dark-t/ahifcnpnjgbadkjdhagpfjfkmlapfoel?hl=en-GB
I really like it.
Already have too many plugins... chrome is sluggish as hell because of that :)
I agree I would have done it differently. I suspect they made it that way so that it can be used during the day as well. I have noticed some dark themes look better during the night. The theme for Ora I am making is the same way but I actually plan to leave it this way.
I've been using it for a week and I would say I generally like it. I might be in the minority though.
Wow, I may be the lone ranger here but I love it and I think it's overdue. Literally zero complaints from me and I've been using it for months through the beta program.
Think it's something thats nice in peoples heads and maybe in a mockup but in reality it's pretty hideous. Lots of the details become harsh like the thick borders around menus.
End of the day it feels like something I'd have downloaded off Deviant Art 15 years ago.
(Used it for a week now so it's not a "give it time" thing)
it looks like any lazy interface from the early 2010's.
I don't know why they had to add those hard lights and borders, there is really no reason for that in my opinion. I don't have issues with other apps not considering the dark mode - I am used to basically the opposite, where as I use dark mode anywhere I can but the OS has no dark mode. What truly bothers me is that it looks just so damn ugly and old, and inconsistent as well. Some party are supposed to look 3-dimensional, whereas others are just plain flat.
I find some apps haven't done it as well, even some Apple apps.
I'm not a big fan of full dark mode at the best of times, tho. I like it for peripheral things, like the menu bar and the dock. And for things that don't require a long time looking at because dark mode always increases reflection.
So, prefer light mode for browsing, email, reading, coding, writing. Fortunately most of those apps support overriding dark mode. Thus, I have a mixed environment.
I agree it still needs a lot of work IMO.
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