Bring back Tab Icon colors from UE4

I’m really glad that UE5 got a complete UI overhaul with very flexible settings.
But every time when I working in UE5 I felt something is missing in the UI. After few days of using 4.26 and 5.EA back to back it was obvious which was the problem; Tab Icon colors!

I didn’t saw anyone posted this issue here, so here we are.

I’m naturally more drawn into colors and pictures than text and numbers, because of that I really miss Icon colors from UE4 in UE5 EA.

If the Unreal Engine team could bring this back in Unreal Engine 5.0 that would be really appreciated.

Take Care,
Thank You.

4 Likes

Definitely for it too!!!

Icon colors make the tabs very distinctive, and don’t require to “scan” through the tabs. The eye is immediately picking the right one with a glance, since these colors help to identify the type of an asset immediately, more so than icons! On ultra-wide screens and working with a lot of tabs, even more important.

I’m using the same type of “feature” with other IDEs too, where filetypes receive a specific color, because it really increases productivity.

UE5 skin made away with everything… looks clean, yes, making it similar to black-and-white TV is too much though.

One rule of great UX says: “Don’t change what people are trained on”. The colors have been an essential part of Unreal Assets for many and many years. The brain is trained to them. Changing this radically is a very bad UX decision.

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i realize this is a year old now but the thread got bumped.

I just wanted to second this - I dunno what happened, it seems like the people who made UI first time maybe dont work there anymore an amateur team took over that department?

Lack of colors and standout icons is such a problem for the eyes. If I don’t need to use nanite, this problem alone is enough to keep me on UE4. For anybody who is using a tool for 10+ hours a day, it’s a serious problem if finding content with your eyes is more difficult.

Hopefully some of the heros like the person who made blueprint assist or electronic nodes might be able to make an alternate version for ue5 that reverts back to ue4 style. Or perhaps it is possible to go back already? I havent got ue5 installed, but ue4 has a button to go back to legacy style. I haven’t tried it though, I just assume it does what it says…

Thanks for supporting this,
But this issue was fixed last year when Unreal Engine 5.0 (final version) was officially released!

It’s my fault that I forgot to post any update on this thread after it was fixed.