Why Design Matters (Yes, even in Power Apps)

Let’s be honest: most internal apps don’t exactly scream “award-winning user experience.” And maybe that’s fine - until it isn’t.

When users don’t engage with your app or when support requests start piling up, it’s easy to point fingers at functionality. But more often than not, the real culprit is design - or the lack thereof.  The apps you build today will live longer, cost less, and work better if you get design right from the start.

Design Drives Adoption

We have all been in the place where we quit something and walk away because it feels overwhelming, and your users are no different. You can build the most functional Power App in the world, but if it feels clunky, cluttered, or confusing, users will avoid it. Design is not decoration, it’s communication. Your design should communicate to users where to look and what to do.

Good User Experience (UX) Extends the Life of Your App

Apps with poor UX age faster. They break under the weight of user frustration. They get rewritten, reworked, or worse - abandoned.

On the flip side, a well-designed app becomes a reliable part of a team's workflow. People learn it faster, require less training, and adapt to changes more easily because the foundation is intuitive.

People tend to invest in the success of things that are more attractive to them. They excuse small errors and are more likely to contribute to its success by providing feedback.

The better the UX, the longer your app stays useful and relevant.

Quality Design = Lower Long-Term Cost

Quality user experience often gets missed in project budgets: Good UX might cost more upfront, but bad UX costs you every day after launch. Poor design slows adoption, increases support needs, and leads to avoidable rework.

Designing for the user early reduces long-term friction, minimizes maintenance, and saves serious money – whether measured in hours, help desk tickets, or actual rebuilds. Good design isn’t an expense. It’s an investment.

Show, Don’t Tell

Telling you is one thing, but a picture is worth a thousand words. Take the example below:

Don’t worry, we’re not using a real app for the “bad” example here. But I’d be lying if I said I haven’t seen designs this rough out in the wild. The consultant who helped me mock it up practically needed eye bleach, and rightly so. It’s cluttered, overwhelming, and hard to use.

Both screens are meant to show color options for a templating app, designed to help users build Power Apps that follow a consistent brand style. And yet, one of them is clearly worse. Why? The colors are similar, and the core functionality is the same.

Now take a look at the cleaner version. Instructions are still available, but they’re tucked behind clearly labeled buttons instead of being splashed across the screen. You’re not losing information. You’re gaining clarity. The original version is packed with controls meant to showcase how your color choices might look in action. But the updated screen achieves the same goal with a single large image that demonstrates gradients and contrast more effectively.

Ask yourself: Which one would you rather use? Which one feels more approachable? Which one would your users be more likely to adopt and give feedback on?

Here’s the real kicker. The well-designed app screen was built over two years ago, and it’s still in use today with very few changes. That’s the power of good design.

How to Level Up Your Design Game

First of all, you don’t have to hire a graphic designer or become a creative professional to implement principles of good UX. The internet is packed with resources teaching the basics of interface design, and if you want to improve the design of your Power Apps – or anything else you’re building – you can start here:

• Learn the principles. Start with the basics of visual hierarchy, spacing, alignment, and contrast (they’re simple, but powerful). Check out https://lawsofux.com/ for a great series of resources that covers the basics (with advanced topics as well).

  
  

• Watch how people use your app. User behavior is a better guide than your opinion. Create interfaces, then physically watch users interact with your app, either in person or via screenshare. You’ll learn a ton by watching mouse movement – are your controls placed intuitively, or is there a lot of searching around to find where to click? If your test users have to ask questions, consider that an opportunity to improve your design. Remember, every question you get from your test users is a possible support call down the road. Design in such a way that instructions are unnecessary.

  
  

• You don’t have to reinvent the wheel. Study interfaces you enjoy using. Figure out why they work. Study designs on sites like https://dribbble.com/ and try to replicate them in the Power Apps Studio. Check out the training projects on https://www.frontendmentor.io/ and complete the challenges in Power Apps.

  
  

• Don’t trust defaults. The current generation of Modern Controls lacks a lot of customization options. And the default settings for classic Power Apps controls are, quite frankly, ugly. But classic controls still give you the most flexibility, and you can make them look good.  Just get to know all your properties.

  
  

• Get professionally trained!  PowerApps911 offers hands-on training to help you raise your game. Check out our live Extreme Makeover, Power Apps Edition training, offered throughout the year.

  
  

Of course, the other option – if you’d rather skip the learning curve – hire us. We offer:

• UI/UX design services for Power Apps. Maybe you’ve got a brilliant app that is functional but lacks in the design department. We can handle the design load and help bring creativity to your great functionality.

  
  

• Ground-up app design.  We can handle it all, from start to finish, and you can get a strategically and creatively designed app that hits the ground running from day one.

  
  

• Workshops and trainings to help your team get hands-on design skills that actually apply to what you’re building

Final Thought

Design is often treated like frosting on a cake. In reality, it’s the flour. You can’t bake a good cake without it. If you care about usability, longevity, and return on investment, design can’t be an afterthought - it has to be built in from the beginning.

And if you’re ready to do that, we’re here to help!

👉 Power Apps Makeover – our hands-on course to level up your app design game!

Our need help with something else? Just Contact Us!