Hacker Newsnew | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submitlogin
What do you think of Hacker News' design?
7 points by _v9nk on Feb 28, 2024 | hide | past | favorite | 10 comments
I really liked the website design of Hacker News. It does not resemble the designs of existing websites and blogs. What do you think about this issue?


The font sizes are screwed up in Safari on iOS. At 100% the font is too small on my phone but at 115% it's way too big — double the size of the font at 100% — and the line length is too long and doesn't wrap to the screen.

I like the minimal design and low page weight, but the markup is archaic: nested tables instead of lists and CSS (but strangely enough replies are not nested in parent comments). It's light weight but could be leaner and cleaner.


It's OK on desktop but not great. I always accidentally hide or flag posts I don't mean to. It's impossible to keep track of discussion threads and replies. The threading is pretty unclear.

On mobile it's just terrible. The links are too small and too small together. The reply box is small and you can't drag it bigger. The contrast ratio of light gray on beige is really bad for my eyes, especially at night in dim light.

I actually strongly dislike the UI of this site, but there are so many old timers who like it that way that a redesign would probably kill it like it did for Slashdot and Digg.

There are some apps that do a better job, but I haven't found one that works well with reply tracking yet.

Making an alternative frontend has been on my to do list forever now, but I imagine it would be a niche (and definitely controversial) take that most of the old timers would hate.


Harmonic on Android is pretty slick and solves most of the UI issues, but yeah, tracking your replies is a lost game with HN.


I like that HackerNews doesn’t include stock photos for each submission and ample whitespace that you see on other sites like CNBC and CNN.


It's endless scrolling based, not truly paginated, and it does nothing to protect you from losing 20 minutes of work if you were writing a high effort comment and accidentally used the _+#-$-#ing pull to refresh feature.

It's OK but I still think circa 2004 forums were the peak of social platforms.


A perfect specimen representing state of the art website for software enthusiasts.


I agree with you.


The tap targets are a challenge on mobile. Recommended targets on iOS are 44x44.


What issue?


PERFECT




Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: