Hopefully, Bitwarden management is able to resist the Sunk Cost Fallacy…
The underlying problem is that Bitwarden does not appear to use any kind of data-driven or evidence-based approaches in their design process. Bitwarden has described their “design philosophy” and process here, and it doesn’t seem to include any quantitative usability studies other than simple surveys. In contrast, they seem to rely almost exclusively on community feedback from social media and feedback forms.
Would love to see some professionals conduct a rigorously controlled A/B study on the old vs. new UI, but that would require Bitwarden to hire outside consultants.
Finally, for all that is wrong with the new UI, there are also some bright spots. For example, it is great to no longer have to click a Confirm button on the passkey prompt, and to no longer have to click through the superfluous “Overwrite password” prompt when generating a new password for an existing item. The search filters (and the ability to toggle the filter visibility) are also a positive addition, in my opinion.
If the Sunk Cost Fallacy is overcome, and the UI reverted, a post-mortem analysis (data-driven, please!) could be done to decide which of the new features to keep.
If the Sunk Cost Fallacy is not overcome, then we need to push hard for implementation of a functional “Ugly Mode” that prioritizes efficient functionality over appearance.