Designing Clean Interfaces
Learn the visual rules and interaction patterns behind intuitive websites and mobile apps. Build layouts that guide the eye, eliminate confusion, and feel effortless to use.
Like Duolingo, but for Designing Clean Interfaces. Tomo turns the whole topic into a game you play five minutes a day, until it actually sticks.
24 levels across 3 sections, about 48 minutes end to end, roughly 10 days at five minutes a day. It moves through Structuring the Screen, Designing Actions and Flows, and Handling Real-World Conditions. It starts from scratch.
Free forever · No credit card · iPhone & Android
Key ideas in Designing Clean Interfaces
- Users scan screens quickly across headlines and left-aligned anchors rather than reading every word
- Key information needs to appear where users naturally scan first rather than buried in paragraphs
- Large, bold text immediately registers as the primary headline
- Medium-sized, regular-weight text serves as secondary subheaders
- Small, lighter-weight text signals supporting body details or metadata
- High contrast draws immediate attention to key actions like primary buttons
- Lower contrast lets background information and secondary details step back without cluttering
- If every element is emphasized, nothing stands out and the interface turns into visual noise
- Clear hierarchy requires intentionally leaving most interface elements calm and subdued
- Whitespace visually groups related items together without needing extra divider lines
- Empty space creates visual resting spots that keep screens from feeling overwhelming
- Packing every pixel with content harms readability and makes navigation harder
- UI designers use multiples of 8 (8, 16, 24, 32) instead of picking arbitrary pixel numbers
- A consistent spacing scale removes guesswork and keeps UI elements visually harmonious
- Items placed closer together are naturally perceived as belonging together
- Placing a label closer to its own input than to neighboring inputs groups them without lines or boxes
You've tried the other tabs
Thirty open tabs. Four facts you actually kept.
You watched. You nodded. By Sunday it was gone.
One answer, then back to scrolling.
Eight weeks. You meant to finish. You didn't.
Tomo gives Designing Clean Interfaces the Duolingo treatment: levels, streaks, and quick quizzes that test what you just learned. That game loop is what the tabs above never had, so it's the one you actually finish.
Here's what playing it feels like
A real question from this course. Take your best guess.
Where should you place your most important message on a page?
Get it right to open this lesson and 23 more in the app.
Where Designing Clean Interfaces takes you
- 1
Structuring the Screen
- Visual Hierarchy: Guiding the Eye
- Spacing, Alignment, and Grids
- Typography and Functional Color
- 2
Designing Actions and Flows
- Buttons and Interactive Elements
- Forms and User Input
- Navigation and Wayfinding
- 3
Handling Real-World Conditions
- Responsive Layouts Across Devices
- Feedback, Empty States, and Errors
3 sections · 8 units · 24 levels. Built to play, not to enroll.
Tomo is in ChatGPT
Tomo is also a ChatGPT plugin: the same playable courses, built and played inside your chat.
Add Tomo to ChatGPT- What to ask
- “Make me a Tomo course on black holes.” “Turn this chat into a Tomo course.”
- What you get
- Quick questions with instant feedback, hearts and stars, ready to play in about a minute.
- Where it goes
- No sign-up to start. Connect your Tomo account and your streak carries on in the app.
You pick the voice
Designing Clean Interfaces is taught in the Explain Like I'm 5 style: no big words. promise.. Want a different feel? In the app you can spin up the same topic in any of Tomo's teaching styles. Same facts, totally different vibe.
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Start Designing Clean Interfaces today.
Download Tomo, search Designing Clean Interfaces, and play your first lesson in under a minute.