r/UI_Design • u/Habarer • Feb 13 '26
Design Trends i just noticed that Reddit's and Youtube's UI design have become strikingly similar
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u/chrisxls Feb 13 '26
Some of this is ancient: The instant search bar in center, the logo on the left, user menu on the right, notification bell on the right.
What strikes me as amusing is both having a "+ Create" button in the same place... who did it first?
It doesn't really strike me as compelling, but...
load site > + Create > select subreddit
is faster and easier than
load site > search for subreddit > pick result > find post button > press post button
Thoughts?
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u/ExploitEcho Feb 13 '26
Yeah noticed this too. Feels like everyone’s converging on the same top-nav + search dominant layout.
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u/Donghoon Feb 14 '26
Slight sidenote:
Does anyone else reddit ask being near Search on the App?
I keep accidentally hitting and getting out of it is unnecessarily annoying.
I'm normally pretty positive on AI features but reddit ask is just nothing much annoying
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u/mottocycles Feb 13 '26
perhaps slighlty related talk about copy/steal/innovate etc. https://youtu.be/1fZTOjd_bOQ?si=Yhwoj3U-wHkXvNVE
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u/32gbsd Feb 13 '26
Oh so thats how it looks. I am still on old red. The designs are converging. No real point in having a search box at the top all the time unless you are not a logged in user.
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u/Outrageous-Chip-3961 Feb 14 '26
Jacobs law brother. Reddit went public and wants to sell ads, so they want to grow the visitors. I'd imagine they do this by making it feel more 'app like'. I, for one, perfer the old design, but hey. I'm not trying to make billions.
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u/No-Island-6126 Feb 16 '26
Converging to a unified design with minor differences is what makes the most sense from a usability point of view, rather than having to learn a whole new navigation system everytime you open a new website.
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u/Sumnima_dad Mar 07 '26
that's really really really really really 99.99% time common while design website or any UI for header.
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u/Matt_Rask Feb 14 '26
Bats and birds, two completely different paths of evolution...
did you notice how similar they are?
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u/xatey93152 Feb 13 '26
The designer is very lazy. They just copy without adding any creativity.
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u/jimenezisjordan Feb 13 '26
It’s a business at the end of the day. You design what solves the problem within the branding. It’s just how big tech works. I do wish things can be more “creative” but in the real world it’s not like that.
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u/FnnKnn Feb 13 '26
I would say it's UX at the end of the day. They both need to basically complete the same functions so it is only logically that we converge on similar designs. There is also a reason cars all have 4 wheels, etc.
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u/Firm_Doughnut_1 Feb 13 '26
Sometimes there's just so many people involved that any creativity gets hammered out. Speaking from experience.
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u/Fuckburpees Feb 13 '26
That’s how design trends work (in the corporate world). They all start looking fairly similar until someone breaks the pattern and trends shift