I've been working as a frontend developer for 5 years now, and already in the early days of my job I learned to pay attention to things I didn't notice before. I'm actually pretty sure users don't notice many of the things we developers focus on, but these are some of the things I personally notice, and they give me the ick. In this list there are a few classic bugs, a bit of bad UX, and some criticism of AI content.
Background scrolling that isn't disabled
I'm talking about the scenario where the mobile menu or a modal is open, but background scrolling isn't disabled. This was one of the first bugs that was reported on the Trello board when I started working, and since then I notice it on every page. The user scrolls behind the open menu without realising it, closes the menu, and suddenly finds themselves in a completely different section of the page. I don't think an average user would notice this, but it really stuck in my memory.
Too many animations
I think animations are mostly unnecessary. A few simple, subtle animations are more than enough. If the entire page and every section are animated, it creates visual noise and the content of the page loses its purpose.
Animations are also often poorly implemented, which can cause the page to lag, make some parts fail to render correctly, and give the impression of a low-quality product.
Testimonials I don't trust
I don't trust testimonials on websites, and I don't think anyone really does. If Google reviews are shown on a site, only the 5-star ones are usually displayed, and if user testimonials are curated, the same thing applies: only the good ones are selected. Anyone can make them up and present whatever suits them.
Wrong year in the footer
This is a common bug and it always makes me laugh a bit. You know how the footer usually shows the year and an "all rights reserved" label? It often happens that an outdated year is displayed there because the year is hardcoded. The wrong year can give the impression that a website is no longer active, and I’ve actually avoided ordering something a few times because I was afraid it might be a scam. This can easily be prevented by adding a function that calculates the current year, so we don't have to manually update that value on the site every year.
Input fields that aren't marked as required
Designers often decide that all fields are required unless there's an "optional" label next to them. That often confuses me on a page, especially if the form has a lot of fields to fill in. It might not be an issue for the average user, but I find it a bit odd.
I always assume that none of the fields are required and then click submit, only to be surprised.
The missing favicon
I always notice when a site doesn't have a favicon. Maybe that's because my favourite part of building a site is adding the favicon, OG image, and updating metadata. It always makes me a bit sad when I see that someone didn't add a favicon, because it takes a maximum of 2 minutes, and the site immediately looks more professional.
Sites that look like Linear
If a page looks like Linear or Notion, I stop using it. This might be controversial in today’s development world, where almost every new project looks like this, but I think users will eventually get tired of seeing the exact same interface every time. Pages that look like Linear and are heavily inspired by Notion feel tiring to me and show that the owners don't value design, but instead want a quick solution. I'll copy the behavior of a flow if it genuinely provides great UX, but copying an entire design just for the sake of quickly shipping a product doesn't appeal to me.
I prefer old-school design or even really bad design over Notion-style design. I also know that most websites with that kind of design are just AI slop.
AI-generated images on blog posts
When I see a blog post with AI-generated abstract images, I immediately assume the whole blog was written by AI and that it's not worth reading. AI images were interesting two years ago when it all started, but now they're starting to feel a bit cringe. I recently came across some lifestyle blogs written in very simple sentences. They were such a refreshing change and genuinely nice to read because you can feel that a real person wrote them. I hope we’ll soon reach a saturation point with AI-generated content and that online content will start to change again.