Android has been so grossly ignored by the design community that the phrase “Android design” is almost an oxymoron. While Apple’s exhaustive Human Interface Guidelines hold designers’ hands through the process, Android designers are left in the dark.
Our Android Human Interface Guidelines were born out of our own struggles with the Android platform. Early on we made the decision that “porting” an app was a faulty term that was resulting in iOS apps being squeezed and refashioned into something that almost works on Android. Often these refashioned apps would carry over Apple design standards, sometimes even ignoring Android’s hardware buttons and sending users into navigational dead ends.
These guidelines are a living document and will continue to evolve as the platform evolves. We hope other designers will use this tool to innovate in Android design and begin to give it the type of attention and innovation that has been showered upon Apple for so long. Let us know how we can improve this guide and what resources you’re using to push Android design further.