What 2017 UI/UX Interaction Trends Will Shape Mobile Apps?

After reviewing yesterday's visual design trends, Hujiang UED's interaction team presents the 2017 design trends for interaction.

Multi‑Layer Menus & Horizontal Selection

Mobile applications are no longer limited to simple "small and beautiful" designs; expert‑oriented apps such as VUE, VSCO, and Polarr use multi‑layer operation menus and extensive horizontal sliding selections.

When scenarios are well segmented and interface expressions are concise, even three to four layers of menus can remain clear and efficient. Horizontal sliding, despite an initial learning curve, feels intuitive thanks to card‑style, direct‑feedback interactions.

More Natural Gesture Operations

Platform makers have been improving mobile usability with gestures like iOS 3D Touch, SmartisanOS BigBang, Zhihu's shake‑to‑feedback, and WeChat's swipe‑to‑close. These shortcuts provide surprising delight compared with traditional taps.

Cross‑App Interaction

Cross‑app linking is gaining traction as platforms continuously optimize integration. Examples include LuoBo's clipboard‑based content sharing, Price Tag’s iOS share‑panel integration, and workflow tools like IFTTT that let users create mini‑programs spanning multiple apps.

Chat UI Evolution

1. Rich Potential of Conversational Interfaces

Chat UI, first highlighted by Silicon Valley startups in early 2016, now powers travel planning, personal assistants, pre‑sales consulting, and customer service. Apple’s Messages app added support for emojis, images, videos, and multi‑source content.

In China, WeChat service accounts and Mini‑Programs have become standard channels for many internet startups.

2. Natural Language Recognition Adds Emotion

Advances in AI enable more natural, emotion‑aware human‑machine interaction. Google Allo converses like a person; Duolingo’s chat bot facilitates daily dialogues; Tribe extracts keywords from video calls to generate subtitles and recommendations.

Domestic platforms such as Zhihu Live, Qianliao Live, and Hujiang CCtalk enrich live sessions with interactive features, yet summarizing massive chat streams remains a design challenge.

360° Video and Real‑Life Interaction

VR/AR breakthroughs give panoramic cameras new opportunities, turning flat media into immersive, three‑dimensional experiences for film, advertising, and entertainment.

In 2017, VR panoramic content is expected to explode: games like "The Walking Dead" and "Destruction Earth" will launch VR versions; major video sites plan AR‑enhanced VR videos; social platforms experiment with "VR + social" concepts, offering users a sense of presence.

Examples include the interactive H5 film "活口" that combines panoramic touch with video feedback, and The New York Times’ VR piece "The Displaced" viewed via Google Cardboard.

Image recognition is moving from simple image search to scene understanding in video, enabling playful applications such as attaching an emoji to a face that follows it throughout the clip.

Conclusion

Reviewing 2016 design cases reveals trends like the sharing economy’s demand for real‑world experiences, big‑data‑driven personalization, and AI integration in vehicles and home devices. Interaction design continues to evolve: micro‑interactions become quality benchmarks, voice and text input switch seamlessly, and product complexity is steadily reduced.

This trend report aims to spark discussion among industry peers and designers, encouraging focus on core technological and product directions to advance overall user experience.