Let me start out by saying that the new Solidworks 2016 User Interface (UI) is horrifically abysmal! If you haven’t upgraded yet, don’t! I suggest you stay with 2015 or an older version.

The low color contrast is causing me extreme eye strain and tremendous end of day headaches!  I’ve been struggling to adjust to the bland color scheme chosen by SW for the 2016 software for several months now I still find myself looking for icons I was easily able to find in the previous versions. I’m struggling to find highlighted parts/assemblies in the feature tree. With the old UI, I could tell which parts were hidden in the feature tree. I could differentiate the extrude icon from the extruded cut icon. Now, they look the same. Good luck trying to find suppressed items in the tree. I can’t tell whether I’m making a part/assembly transparent or hiding it. I keep selecting the wrong icon. Hidden or visible – what a joke. Looking for a slashed line, really?

After a quick Google search, I see that I’m not alone. It’s absolutely terrible that they chose to make such a major change in an area that didn’t need to be changed thereby degrading the quality of their product. I’m told it was done to appease 4.5% of the population who are colorblind, however this was done at the expense of the majority of us who aren’t. As it turns out, I’m finding that even the colorblind are struggling with the low contrast icons used! Really sad! They say it was needed to support future high resolution displays. Oh really? What a band-aid of an excuse to cover up their software blunder! Is this the best they could do?

Lack of color and contrast results in severe eye strain. There is just not enough variation between the dark grey text and the light grey subdued text, and the off white background. Green and Yellow are highly visible, high contrast colors. It’s shameful that they decided to change something that was already good. Contrast of blue on light blue on off white is not easy to pick up. My eyes strain enough sitting at a computer all day but now I work them harder by searching for things that were easily found before. I don't need to strain them more trying to find what icon I need because they look the same. Forget about going to System Options and changing the Interface brightness to medium or dark unless you like looking at chocolate pudding all day.

There were plenty of other areas that Solidworks could have put their efforts instead of playing around with something that wasn't broke! Why didn’t Solidworks focus on the real issues with the software such as system crashes 3-4 times a week, slow response times and incessant mouse clicks hitting the rebuild button? Why not have a user setting to toggle the colors & contrast back into the icons to make it convenient for those that can't get used to the bland monochrome background they've created? How about a "classic mode" in order to fix your ugly mistake?

Not only is the new monochrome color scheme dull and boring, it’s actually quite depressing! Forget what they tell you that you will get used to the new interface colors, you won’t! Two months later and I haven’t! Arguably, I would venture to guess you would get used to the smell of cow manure, but it still smells and why in your right mind would you want to? I sure hope that this is fixed with the next service pack and that the fix comes out real soon. My eyes can’t take this anymore.

Bottom line, the Solidworks 2016 UI really stinks!