Custom pixels are cheap. Custom implementation comes at an exponential cost.
Last week I was invited by Apple to talk about how we implemented Liquid Glass in Detail to a room packed with talented Dutch app designers and developers.
What we do looks simple at the surface. But we unlock long-form video editing on a mobile device – from recording to ready-to-share content. It's our job to hide the complexity and reduce friction, while chipping away all the boring and time-consuming chores.
One of the challenges of a small team trying to build a stand-out product, is balancing when to stick to standard components and building blocks, and when to invest in the custom work and polish that makes us unique.
The Slack message below from 4 years ago to our design team summarizes the cost of custom, and how we make sure we create the bandwidth on our team to invest in the areas where we can make the biggest impact:
As we’re expanding our feature set and growing the surface area of our product, I think it’s important to stay aware of the real cost of custom.
Custom pixels are cheap. Custom implementation is exponentially expensive. Designing a custom contextual menu component in Figma takes about as much time as using standard Apple UI components. But the cost of implementing and maintaining the component is exponential.
It costs time to exactly specify custom. It costs time to build. It results in a new open ticket in our repository that takes mental bandwidth and is weighed against 1000 other things. It results in multiple new files on our code base that need to be written, tested, and maintained. It results in complexity when we add new platforms like iPad or iOS support. It results in code that can break when Apple updates their interface with a new OS. It results in extra testing on different devices. The cost of custom is not the actual implementation, it’s the compounding effect of maintaining a code base with custom everything.
Each time we make decisions about our designs, we need to weigh the real cost of custom. When we build custom, we’re not only taking time away from other high impact features today, but also tomorrow. Customization can be valuable and help build a world class experience. Customization is what makes us stand out from other apps. But for a lot of features, the real value is often lower than the cost. Let’s be aware and use our time where we make the biggest impact.
Our product surface area exploded since I shared this with our team. The team didn't grow. But their focus and tight collaboration enables us to ship faster than ever.
