Microsoft Teases a New Update for Office UI

THE WOODLANDS, TX -- Microsoft has been hard at work changing the interface for their machine learning. The software giant has been slowly improving their system over the years- adding icons, a dark mode, and cleaning up the toolbar by making it smaller and simplified. The next stage of Microsoft’s office design will minimize confusion and get one step closer to completely clean web experience.

“The next wave of Microsoft 365 UX will go even further by fading brand colors from app headers and exploring adaptive commanding,”explains Jon Freidman, Vice President of design and research at Microsoft. “This lets you move a simplified toolbar around the screen to wherever you find it most helpful, using progressive disclosure to contextual reveal commands.”

This “adaptive commanding” will remove the ribbon interface and replace it with a toolbar that can be undocked and used to give contextual commands for documents. Microsoft is still exploring the interface, but certain features will be rolled out within the next two years.

Microsoft introduced the original ribbon interface (the actual features and tools used in their software) in 2007. They’ve been gradually simplifying it and now they’re ready to retire the old model and bring in their cleanest user experience to date.
Changes include a simple icon to show what app you’re using within Microsoft Office, and a centralized search (or command bar) taking center stage. “Throughout, we’re grounding everything we build in deep research into the nuances of attention,” states Friedman, “Some tasks call for lengthy, sustained concentration. Others, like mobile scenarios, call for microtasking. By designing for multiple cognitive states, focused experiences throughout the Microsoft 365 ecosystem minimize external distractions, lessen self interruptions, jumpstart flow.”

Simplifying the entire experience of Microsoft Office seems to be a pretty big move for the company, although we’re unsure exactly when all of the updates will be released, we’re certain that computers are becoming faster tools for business and technology.