Inconsistent UX/UI patterns across deletion and confirmation dialogues

[cpmarexel2f]

Description

First of all, thank you for your incredible work on Home Assistant. The platform is powerful, versatile, and it completely transforms how we manage our homes. I truly appreciate your dedication and continuous efforts to improve the ecosystem.

As an active user, I have noticed some UX/UI inconsistencies across different dashboards. Specifically, there is a lack of a unified design pattern for confirmation dialogues when deleting, removing, or disabling items. These feel like legacy holdovers from different development phases.

Here are four main issues regarding this fragmentation:

1. Terminology Mismatch (To-Do List)

The pop-up title asks "Remove completed items?", but the main action button is labeled "Delete". The wording in the title and the button should match (either Remove/Remove or Delete/Delete) for a consistent UI.

2. Redundant Text (Device Deletion)

The dialogue title is "Are you sure?" and the description immediately repeats "Are you sure you want to delete this device?". This duplication is redundant and underutilizes the dialogue space.

3. Clashing Text Logic and Fragmentation

There is a fundamental contradiction in how object details, naming, and titles are handled across different sections:

• The Dynamic Text Pattern (Helpers): Generic question title ("Delete helper?") with the object name dynamically injected into an interrogative sentence ("Are you sure you want to delete Moj pomocnik?").
• The Dynamic Title Pattern (Users & Persons): Dynamic question title containing the name ("Delete Test?"), while the body text remains rigid and generic ("This person will be permanently deleted...").
• The Static Statement Pattern (Dashboard Sections): Plain statement title with no punctuation ("Delete section"), followed by entirely static body text ("This section and all its cards will be deleted.").
• The Hybrid Pattern (Scenes): Generic question title ("Delete scene?"), but the body text switches to a flat statement starting with the dynamic name ("Moja scena will be permanently deleted.").

Proposal

We highly recommend establishing a single, unified design system (a strict style guide) for all confirmation events across Home Assistant. Deletion, removal, and modification screens should share identical layouts, punctuation, button phrasing, and color logic.

We would love to see the development team align these dialogues stylistically in whichever way you deem best and most appropriate for the overall Home Assistant design language, as long as it becomes a single, consistent standard across the entire platform.

[mbb365]

Thank you @cpmarexel2f. I totally feel your pain and totally understand!

Matt here - designer on Home Assistant and in the product area of Interactions & Touch points, so this is totally on my radar.

A couple of questions...

1. Do you have a particular workflow where it really sticks out? Something really unmissable?
2. Do you see a difference in something being 'Edited' to something being 'Updated'?
3. Do you feel that there is a bias for this issue being more vocabulary choice (text logic, redundant text and mismatches) around removal/ deletion, or is it something HA wide?
4. 2. Do you see a difference in something being 'Deleted' to something being 'Removed'?

I have been collecting dialogue issues here . So please, if you can chuck them in here and they can be addressed.

Am checking out the cases you pointed out. Something else to think about (sorry if this derails it) is the expectation to be able to hit 'enter' to confirm a highlighted option. For example, in the case of removing helpers, the 'Delete', you can't do it, but you might expect to.

[cpmarexel2f]

Hi Matt,

Thank you so much for the quick response! It is fantastic to hear that this is already on your radar, and I appreciate your focus on refining these touchpoints.

First and foremost, I want to emphasize that none of these issues affect the functionality or core performance of Home Assistant—the platform works incredibly well. My only goal here is to help polish the UI stylistically, tighten up the design language, and make the terminology as accurate and consistent as possible.

To answer your questions from a user's perspective:

1. Where it sticks out the most: It becomes highly unmissable during system maintenance or spring-cleaning workflows. For instance, when I am restructuring a dashboard, deleting old helpers, removing devices, and cleaning up a to-do list all in one session. Constantly switching between completely different dialogue layouts and logic within a 10-minute window makes the fragmentation very prominent.

2. Edited vs. Updated: Yes, I see a difference. "Edited" feels user-driven (e.g., I manually changed a name or configuration). "Updated" feels more system- or state-driven (e.g., a component, integration, or entity refreshed its data or version).

3. Vocabulary Bias vs. HA-Wide Issue: While the terminology confusion (vocabulary choice) is most glaring around removal and deletion, the underlying issue—the lack of a unified design layout, punctuation, and structural pattern—feels HA-wide, particularly inside the settings and configuration screens.

4. Deleted vs. Removed: This is a crucial distinction for UX.

   • "Deleted" should imply a destructive, permanent action where data is completely destroyed (e.g., deleting a User, a Helper, or an Integration).
   • "Removed" should imply unlinking or hiding something without destroying the underlying object (e.g., removing a completed item from a list, or removing a card from a view, while the entity still exists).

5. The 'Enter' Key Accessibility: You hit the nail on the head! Not being able to hit "Enter" to confirm a dialogue is definitely a papercut that breaks the expected keyboard workflow. Implementing that alongside a visual focus state on the primary button would be a massive upgrade for accessibility.

I would be more than happy to contribute these examples to your collection link so the team can address them. Thank you again for taking UX consistency seriously!

[mbb365]

Brilliant. Thank you! These are perfect examples of how we'd set the rules. I'm pretty sure we can just take these examples and set them in stone.

I'm (a helper ;) ) is currently trawling through HA to get all the instances of dialogues. Then myself and Marcin will figure out how to tackle it.

Not sure if you've seen this discussion too - something is in the air about dialogues!