7 Easy Steps to Declutter a Screen

A cluttered interface can overwhelm users, making it hard for them to focus or complete tasks efficiently. That’s why you need to declutter a screen. In this guide, we’ll walk you through seven simple steps to organize and streamline your UI, ensuring a clean, functional, and user-friendly experience.

As you can see in the image below, the screen needs redesigning. Everything is fighting for attention, and the screen is hard to look at.

The screen that we’re going to declutter

The first step to declutter a screen is to clean it up by removing the colors and borders. Let’s use only grays for now. We will add colors purposefully later! Also, there are too many borders that add visual noise, so let’s replace them with subtly colored backgrounds.

Remove the colors and borders to declutter a screen

Step two is to separate the items with whitespace. Add some distance to make everything more breathable. Group items in a way that emphasizes their relationship!

Use whitespace

To declutter a screen, you need to reduce the cognitive load. If additional items help lower the cognitive load, add them. It will still make the screen feel less cluttered because the user gets around easier. Add labels to non-intuitive icons!

Declutter a screen by reducing cognitive load

Subtle shadows and colors reduce cognitive load by making the separation between different areas of the screen easily distinguishable. Make logos and navigational items more distinguishable. Combine “Log out” and “Profile settings” into one item.

Add dimension

Defining a grid is important when you want to declutter a screen. A two-column grid was what the initial content originally required. Inspect your content and context of use, and plan a grid and visual structure that makes sense for your use case.

Defining a grid is important when you want to declutter a screen

This will make the screen easier to scan. Use the primary brand color as the accent color in simple app interfaces. Use it for interactive elements only! Display the most important items users want to see instantly and truncate or hide the rest.

Add titles and sections

To declutter a screen, it’s also important that you introduce scannability. Have a clear difference between important items, so users can distinguish them at a glance; e.g., completed and to-do items. Items and values that are not crucial can be shown only “on demand” (when hovered).

To declutter a screen you need to introduce scannability

When you declutter a screen, you’re not just removing items. You’re organizing content thoughtfully to improve usability. By cleaning up, adding whitespace, defining grids, and ensuring scannability, you can create screens that are visually appealing and intuitive to use. Start applying these tips today and transform cluttered interfaces into streamlined designs!

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Happy designing! 🤗