The two things that pain me the most are:
(1) Clickable elements no longer visually signifying that they're clickable. Words aren't underlined or written in a special font, sometimes the profile avatar is the clickable link to the profile but sometimes the name is, etc.
(2) No more clean, compact directory trees. We used to have high-contrast compact UI design to look through nested ontologies. Now it's rounded-edges card-based, often without trace lines, and barely ever compact. RIP
> No more clean, compact directory trees
Even plain old tables with sortable rearrangeable columns, a staple of all of the traditional desktop UI frameworks, are increasingly falling by the wayside in favor of mobile-style single-column lists with cells consisting of stacks of labels.
It's incredible. And the labels are all turned into pills or chips. Then they don't allow pivoted views of their lists, or if they do allowed pivots it's a visual nightmare.
This is exhausting with web stuff. Every designer wants flat everything, not even so much as underlining links, let alone enough design to actually make it obvious what's a clickable button.
I think it's this cargo cult attempt to tap into what Apple had pre-2010 on the iPod and first iPhone. They're missing that the design leadership and attention to detail was unparalleled at Apple in that era, so they just flatten everything for a streamlined look and miss every signifier Apple put in its UIs in those days
How about on windows, no visible borders just overlapping off-white
Drives me nuts. It makes everything feel like working on a poorly organized desk.