Jef Raskin: "In every study that considered the question, icons were demonstrated to be more difficult to understand than were labels, especially at first viewing, which contradicts one of the most frequently cited reasons for using icons, namely, comprehensibility for beginners."
It doesn't appear that today's Apple is even bothering to study usability.
https://unsung.aresluna.org/in-every-study-that-considered-the-question/
Seems like that would only apply if the users will always be able to read the language used.
I'm still beyond lousy at picking out an application icon in a list. For applications that I've been using for years.
But application icons are a lot less related to the thing they select than those automoibile light settings. Those are learnable. The image for "the banking app associated with the card that's best to use at the grocery store" can't be represented by an easily interpreted image. But that's a task I want to do sometimes.
Oct 17, 2026, 1:22 AMThank you for doing that study.
I've been annoyed for years that I have to hold a mouse-over to figure out what the button does. I don't even learn them. I've been using the same email for years and still have to mouse-over their buttons.
@Uair I… am not Jef Raskin.
Oct 17, 2026, 1:30 AMMiscommunication there. I knew that, just expressed myself poorly.
You? Thanks for posting it so I got to see it.
Just generally, thanks. I'm glad it's not me. If you're late-diagnosed autistic you learn to appreciate learning that.
Oct 17, 2026, 1:52 AM@lapcatsoftware Duh.
(Note added: Apparently, that level of sarcasm and eye rolling was a bit much for the OP, who has now blocked me. Sorry about that.)
@lapcatsoftware I noticed recently an app, or maybe it was a website, that had a row of buttons that were all labeled except the search button, which used a magnifying glass icon. There was plenty of room for the word "Search", but no, they had to make that one button, which I happen to use frequently, not only communicate the idea less clearly but present a target that's harder to click. I guess nobody studies Fitt's Law either.
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@lapcatsoftware Over the years I've noticed a clear preference for text over icons in many contexts. Like every other self-appointed expert in good UI, I had a nagging feeling my preference was the "correct" one, but I've also suspected part of it was an individual thing, and the opposite might be true for people who are more "visual" than I am. Naturally I am delighted that the quote from Raskin supports my bias.
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@lapcatsoftware When Adobe overhauled their icons to have big letters on them, my vague recollection is that they were mocked for being, of all companies, so short on visual imagination. I don't use that suite of applications, but I liked those icons. And I like how the Microsoft Office icons now have letters on them. At one point I made letter-based replacement icons for some of the apps I used, to make them easier for me to find on the Dock. Come to think of it, I might try that again.
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@lapcatsoftware One thing that's bugged me for years is Command-Tab. Because of your post, I'm realizing now just how irritated I've been and why: my brain sucks at processing the list of app icons, which are only given small text labels when you highlight them.
Just now I turned on Keyboard Maestro's list-based UI for application switching. I've tried it before; I'm not sure why I didn't stick with it. Even Keyboard Maestro's option to use a row of icons is better than how Apple does it.
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@lapcatsoftware I’ve never gotten icons. They are supposed to represent something so you know what the icon is for but I don’t see the object that is being represented. I have to remember this weird symbol in this specific place means this thing and that weird symbol in that specific place means that thing. Then they move them and change them and I have to start over figuring out what each weird symbol means. And then they move them and change them again.
At work all our phones were replaced with models with only icons. I had to go through the entire manual and then add paper stickers to the phone with the actual words for the buttons in order to understand how to use it.
Oct 17, 2026, 10:10 AM@lapcatsoftware the article describes the symbol right of 'auto' wrong, though:
Symbol 0456 from ISO 7000 https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:ISO_7000_-_Ref-No_0456.svg is position lights, not parking lights https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:ISO_7000_-_Ref-No_0240.svg.
Also, position lights selection actually activates both front and back lights, hence the _two_ lights icons in that symbol.
FWIW, parking lights are usually activated by activating the blinker when the car is turned off.
What only activates the front lights is 'Daytime Running Light' - no symbol.
@lapcatsoftware Alan Dye, the man who foisted Liquid Ass upon us, is an advertising man, not a UX one, and was known for his contempt for experienced UX experts. It was designed to look cool in ads, nothing more. And the guy had the chutzpah to quote Jobs "design is what its does, not what looks like".
@lapcatsoftware That switch – once used in pretty much any VAG car, from a 25k € Škoda to a 250k € Bentley – is IMO not a good exhibit.
There is a legitimate reason for their use (space constraints), and the icons are industry-wide standard.
Short learning curve, flawless Auto mode, physical design enables "blind" operation.
= Pretty good usability.
(Today's touch-panel lightswitch: welp).
Its main issue is hidden navigation (pull for fog light).
But here, it is documented.
With Apple: nada.
@gummibando I honestly skipped over the first part of the article. ;-)
