When will we start seeing Spectrum 2 in After Effects beta?

Forum|Forum|5 months ago
November 3, 2025
1 reply
234 views

After two years since Spectrum 2 was announced, I expected to see something at the recent Adobe MAX, but that wasn't the case.

A year ago some minor changes were introduced to AE, but I was wondering if in the coming months we will actually see a redesign based on Spectrum 2.

Thanks team.

Question

Shebbe

Community Expert

One single design philosophy for all applications was the worst idea ever. Software's looks and functionality should be based around it's capabilities so you can work effectively, instead of prioritizing making everything look 'fancy' and homogenus accross the board. Spectrum's general design makes everything rediculously spaced out as if it's designed for phones and tablets. The way things are implemented in Premiere with it's redesigned export panel for example is attrocious. I'd rather not see this downgraded mess trickle further into software I need to use daily.

QuietRobotAuthor

Known Participant

The challenge of a good UI is precisely finding a balance between functionality and design; making that design unified is part of the challenge. I respect your opinion, but I prefer a unified nice design, where everything feels part of the same brand, the same experience.

I like spaced and defined elements, by 2025 we already have high resolutions and large screens so there's no need to cram UI elements together.

Shebbe

Community Expert

Perhaps you do not see the same things as I do. If a design causes information to become a list of things you need to switch between, unfold and scroll down on a 4K display while it's previous design didn't need to even on a 1080p monitor, the design is bad for that particular feature set. If you have 1 application that has 4 dropdown menus but your other application has 50 of them, you cannot say let's just use the desired design for having only 4 on your screen without stupid consequences. But this is what's happening with Spectrum because the designers behind it do not care about application specifics and the way users need to work and navigate in them.

I do not have a problem with redesign where it matters. But it is completely redicolous to me to think that a single design rule can provide sensible UI/UX experience regardless of what the intent of the application is.

Sign up

To post, reply, or follow discussions, please sign in with your Adobe ID.

Sign in to Adobe Community

To post, reply, or follow discussions, please sign in with your Adobe ID.

Scanning file for viruses.

This file cannot be downloaded