Material Design Pros and Cons
Pros
Google provides detailed guidelines that make it easy to design a high-quality website with Material Design.
Following pre-determined guidelines can speed up the design process.
There are lots of design options, so all Material Design websites can look unique.
The design options are still minimalistic.
Material Design provides a framework so your team will work from the same foundation.
It’s designed with the user experience in mind, which makes websites easier to use.
It’s designed for smartphones, so websites work great on mobile.
Material Design is consistent from one device to another.
It’s more visually appealing, so websites have a better chance of looking great.
User interfaces are more intuitive.
It includes options for animation.
The Material Design website provides all the information needed to develop websites and develop apps with Material Design.
Google provides a Figma design kit with customizable styles and components.
Cons
It can take time to learn and implement all of the guidelines.
The guidelines can limit the web designer’s creativity.
Due to the guideline’s limitations, it takes a lot of effort to make the site look unique.
Some of the guidelines are better suited for apps than for websites.
The website seems unfinished if elements are left out.
Adding too many elements can make the website slow and sluggish.
How to Choose Between Flat Design vs Material Design
Both Flat Design and Material Design have things in common and several key differences. Both design tools are different from skeuomorphism, which attempts to make all the elements match their real-world counterparts to look as familiar as possible. They’re also different from Rich Design, which adds lots of bells and whistles to the visuals.
Why Choose Flat Design?
Flat Design loads faster and still looks good on the screen. If it’s designed well, the graphical elements look amazing. It’s responsive, so your website should look good on any device. The main downside to flat design is it’s often difficult to know if something is clickable. If you choose Flat Design, it’s best to use it as a guideline and not stick to it too strictly for anything interactive. This can require designers to be more creative.
Use Flat Design for images, graphics, illustrations, icons, typography, and backgrounds, but add a touch more styling for anything clickable so it stands out. If the design is too flat, it can make it difficult to know what is clickable and what is not. So, giving a button a shadow or a border can make it stand out from everything else.
Why Choose Material Design?
Material Design is the more popular choice. It has the backing of Google, so it’s found all over the web and on Android devices. Overall, Material Design has better visuals and is easier for visitors to use. It’s clearer that something is a button, which improves user experience. Google developed Material Design to look the same on all Android devices. So, the experience will be the same from one user to another. Material Design builds on the advantages of Flat Design while avoiding its limitations.
It’s also easier for developers to use because Google provides extensive guidelines. Since it was developed by Google and they want it to be popular, Google provides lots of tools and training. The guidelines specify what web designers should and should not do with their web designs. This does provide a good set of guidelines, but it can also be limiting to creativity.
The Material Design website provides lots of information, so users have access to all the knowledge they need to build successful websites. Google also provides a free design kit for Figma with customizable styles and components. This makes it easy to get started with Material Design. These guidelines are easy to navigate and use, and they’re always available. This makes it easy for anyone to get started with Material Design.
Which Design Method Should You Choose?
Choose the design method that best fits the goals of your website and branding. If you want your website to look uniform on Android apps, the Material Design is the best choice for you.
Choose the design method that best fits your level of skills and creativity. Material Design has guidelines that are easy to follow, but it’s more limiting. Flat Design doesn’t offer as many features and doesn’t have clear guidelines. This can open up creativity, but it also requires more creativity.
Choose the design method that gives you the best user interface (UI) for your needs. With Flat Design, you might need to add Material Design-style features to anything clickable. If this is the case, it’s best to use Material Design. If your UI is simple and no elements are getting in the way of something clickable, then Flat Design would work well.
Here’s my recommendation: if the UI is the simplest possible design, and there are no elements to get confused with something clickable, then use Flat Design. If you want something a little fancier, then use Material Design. Most of the time, this choice would lean toward Material Design.
Regardless of the design method you choose, make sure that you provide an amazing user experience. For more about improving UX, see the article Empathy in UX Design: How to Create a Website that Meets the Needs of Your Users. For more information about user interfaces, see the article 6 Ways to Test the UI Of a Website. If you want to learn more about layouts in web design, see the article Visual Hierarchy in Web Design: A Guide to Creating Effective Layouts.