When Design Ignores Users: A Gallery of UX Horrors

There's a peculiar kind of sadism that disguises itself as "user experience." It's that moment when a designer (or more often: a programmer who thinks they're a designer) creates an interface that is technically functional but from the user's perspective represents the seventh circle of hell.

Over years of work, we've seen things. Things that required a walk outside to clear our heads. Here's a selection of the most memorable.

Registration as Interrogation

Picture this: you find an interesting app, you want to try it out. You click "Sign Up." And a form appears with fifteen mandatory fields. First name, last name, email, password, confirm password, phone, address, zip code, city, country, date of birth, gender, how did you hear about us, favorite color (okay, not that one, but the rest — yes), and consent to four different documents.

This isn't registration. This is a tax return.

We took over a SaaS application that had this exact problem. Analytics showed that 87% of users abandoned the registration form without completing it. Eighty-seven percent. The company wondered why they had no users. We wondered why they even had the remaining thirteen percent.

The solution? Registration via email and password. Everything else can be filled in later, once the user recognizes the product's value. The conversion rate tripled after the change.

The "Are You Sure?" Dialog and Its Siblings

Confirmation dialogs serve a purpose. The question "Do you really want to delete your account?" makes sense. But there are applications that have taken this concept to the absurd.

We saw a system where deleting a single item from a list required three confirmation dialogs:

1. "Do you really want to delete this item?"
2. "This action is irreversible. Continue?"
3. "Please type the item name to confirm deletion."

To delete a row from a shopping list.

And our absolute favorite: an application where the "Cancel" button in the confirmation dialog opened another dialog asking "Do you really want to cancel the cancellation?" Dialog inception. At that point, the user no longer knows what they even want and closes the entire application.

Navigation as a Labyrinth

A client once showed us their company's project management application. To get to the detail of a specific task, we had to navigate this path:

Main menu → Projects → Project categories → Active projects → Project X → Project phases → Phase 2 → Tasks in phase → Subtasks → Task detail

Nine clicks. No search functionality. No shortcuts. No breadcrumbs. If you got lost along the way — and you did get lost — you had to start from the beginning.

Compare that to how Trello does it: open a board, click a card. Two clicks. Done. Nobody ever said: "You know what Trello needs? More clicking."

Forms That Hate Users

Few things generate as much frustration as a form that erases all your data when you make one mistake.

We took over an insurance portal where clients filled out an extensive form (four pages, about 40 fields). On the last page, they clicked "Submit." The server returned an error — the social security number was missing on page two. The form returned to page one. Empty. All data gone.

This didn't happen once. This was by design. Intentional, production, "finished" design.

Another gem was a form that validated phone numbers and rejected formats with spaces. The user entered "602 123 456" — error. They had to enter "602123456." But the password required a special character. And the email validation was so strict it rejected addresses with hyphens in the domain — which is a perfectly valid format.

Dark Patterns: Technically It Works, Morally It Doesn't

So-called dark patterns — design patterns that deliberately manipulate users — deserve their own chapter.

We saw an e-shop where the "Add to Cart" button was large and green, but the "Cancel Order" button was grey, small, and hidden in the page footer under the text "Terms of Service." Technically it was there. Practically, no one found it.

Another favorite technique: pre-checked checkboxes for newsletters, insurance, or premium services. The user must actively uncheck what they don't want. And because most people don't carefully read forms, they end up paying for things they never wanted.

And our all-time favorite dark pattern: a cookie rejection button that was so visually understated it looked like part of the text. Accept cookies? Big blue button. Reject? A small underlined link at the end of the third paragraph.

Yes, dark patterns work in the short term. But in the long term, they destroy trust. And trust is the most valuable thing you have in the digital world.

Responsive? What Responsive?

In 2026, you'd think responsive design would be a given. And yet we still encounter websites and applications that look on mobile like you're viewing a desktop through a keyhole.

Our favorite example: a company intranet that required horizontal scrolling on every page on mobile. The navigation menu was 1,200 pixels wide with no hamburger menu. Tables overflowed the screen. Buttons were so small you could only hit them with your fingernail. And the IT department wondered why employees weren't using the intranet.

How to Do It Right

After this catalog of horrors, let's talk about how to avoid them. It's not rocket science:

Test with real users. Not colleagues, not family. People who have never seen your product before. Five people will uncover 85% of usability problems.

Less is more. Every extra field in registration lowers conversion. Every extra click in navigation increases frustration. Ask yourself: is this really necessary?

Don't underestimate mobile. More than half of web traffic comes from mobile devices. If your design doesn't work on a phone, it doesn't work.

Respect your users. No dark patterns, no manipulative forms. Short-term gains aren't worth the long-term loss of trust.

The Lesson

Design isn't about how a product looks. Design is about how a product works. And a product works well when the user achieves their goal without frustration, confusion, or the need to call support.

Moral of the story: Design for humans, not for your ego. Every design choice that ignores the user is a debt — and it will come back to haunt you in the form of an empty user database and a full complaint inbox.