This might well become the UX debate of the year. Personally not convinced by Eric Schmidt's point. Natural language is powerful — but often not the most efficient way to consume or input information. I’d bet on a hybrid: co-pilot-style paradigms or structured UI components interleaved with natural language, depending on the context. The future UX isn’t NL everywhere — it’s NL where it makes sense.
Google's former CEO says traditional user interfaces are "going to go away." It sounds far-fetched but Google is already rolling out the technology to make it happen. It's called A2UI - and it's quietly transforming how products like Opal and Gemini generate interfaces on the fly, personalized to each user in real-time. ▪️Why this matters for product teams - Instead of designing fixed screens, with A2UI you're defining a vocabulary of components that AI agents can dynamically compose based on user intent. - Designers focus less on screen layouts, more on flexible component libraries. - Engineers build rendering pipelines, not bespoke UIs. A simple request like "book a table for 2 tomorrow at 7pm" can generate a pre-filled form - collapsing 3-4 screens into one contextual interface. ▪️The strategic implications - External agents (OpenTable, restaurant systems) can send UI through your app while respecting your visual identity. - This enables a "headless agent" business model; you provide the specialized intelligence (booking, CRM, expense management), partners provide the surface. Charge per agent interaction, take rev-share on transactions, or license access to your agent network. - Platforms that host these agents become more valuable when they have rich component catalogs that make third-party agents look native and polished. Google's already using this across some of its experimental new products and v0.8 of the protocol is now live. Read the 🧠 Knowledge Series with technical workflows, real implementation examples, and hands-on tools: https://lnkd.in/eXp6yTpy
Well said, Florin Ciontu. This echoes the mobile shift, context and intent over fixed screens. NL + AI works best where it reduces friction, but hybrid UX is where clarity lives. With AI unlocking a huge solution space, rapid prototyping and evaluative research become even more critical. The bottleneck moves from creation to evaluation of what’s actually right.
Cc Richard Britton Raymond Gerber Mark Smith Trent Rossini think about it...
I still believe that interfaces need to be curated and stable in some way. A constant reinvention of the UI (and the UX) is too much cognitive load. Humans like habits, sameness, stability a lot. But I hope the universal grid/table structure gets reinvented....