At Front, the inbox has always been where the most important work happens. Over time, though, we started to notice that the very surface designed to keep teams focused was making that focus harder. Clutter crept in. Patterns that once worked no longer scaled. The inbox wasn’t broken, but it wasn’t serving people as well as it could.
That’s what prompted us to take a step back. Our goal wasn’t to chase a flashy redesign — it was to return the inbox to its purpose: helping teams stay focused on the work that matters most.
It started with a design sprint in Paris where a small crew of designers, product managers, and engineers tackled one problem: decluttering the conversation view. No multi-quarter roadmap. No “someday” wishlist. Just a focused sprint in pursuit of clarity, simplicity, and forward momentum.
That early effort sparked something bigger. Once we saw what was possible, we kept going, rethinking how Front presents information, guides attention, and scales with the teams who rely on it every day. This was a reset and a return to what Front is here to do: help teams stay focused on the work that matters most.
Here’s how we approached it and what we learned along the way.
Why redesign Front’s inbox now?
The inbox is the heartbeat of Front where support, sales, success, and ops teams spend their days solving problems, building relationships, and keeping businesses running.
Over the years, we’d added powerful features: AI, integrations, flexible workflows, custom views. While the product evolved, the interface hadn’t kept up. We (and our customers) felt it: too much clutter. Tags, icons, and metadata that buried signals in noise. A UI that leaned a little too hard into its email roots and not enough into the future of omnichannel communication. Components that weren’t built for flexibility and scale.
We needed to break old habits and make room for something better. This redesign was about performance and focus. But it was also about craft and delivering an experience that feels calm, intentional, and one that teams are proud to spend their day in.
How we started: Mapping the inbox architecture
To make sense of the redesign, we broke the inbox into its core layers — considering what belongs where, and when it’s needed.
Top bar (search, settings, tool navigation) → removed and consolidated into the sidebar
Sidebar (inboxes, tags, views) → restructured and now collapsible
Conversation list → redesigned to highlight only the essentials
Conversation view → simplified and streamlined
Integrations panel → unchanged for now, with more updates to come
This layered framework gave us clarity to focus and prioritize. Each area had its own goals, but together they created a more intentional, coherent inbox experience.
Principles that guided us
Every decision we made came back to a core set of principles. Some we had from the start, others came into focus as we worked:
Clarity over clutter. We reduced visual noise, collapsed metadata, and focused attention on what matters most. If it didn’t help you move faster, it was gone.
Intentional by design. We didn’t show 15 tags just because we could. We made strong calls instead of offering endless toggles, prioritizing simplicity over over-customization.
Start bold, refine with care. We stripped things down to the bones, then added back only what earned its place — polishing every detail along the way.
Build systems that scale. We redesigned the inbox and the design system behind it — so everything shipped faster, stayed consistent, and scaled effortlessly.
Prototype, don’t pontificate. We skipped the pitch decks and let people click. Real usage shaped better decisions than hypothetical debates.
Design for what’s next. We weren’t just redesigning an email client. Front is an omnichannel platform, and this redesign makes that future clear.
How we worked: Fast, opinionated, collaborative
We moved fast. Daily standups. Cross-functional huddles. Instant feedback loops. From the start, this was a high-energy, high-trust sprint, and it never let up.
This wasn’t designed in a vacuum. It was built live, and it was scrappy, creative, and collaborative from start to finish. Here’s what we did:
We got on the same page. It began with a narrow scope: tidy up the conversation view. But once we saw the impact of even small changes, we knew we could go further. We worked hard to ensure everyone was on the same page. Our CTO gave the green light to think bigger. Our new CEO was pushing for a bolder product direction. And we managed to get our entire exec team all on board for big change.
We launched an internal beta and experimented. Our teammates didn’t hold back across our redesign Slack channel and during internal calls: they flagged bugs, broke flows, and offered feedback daily. And yes, they complained at first. Over time, many of the initial skeptics began to feel the improvements and became champions of the new design.
We iterated in the open. We introduced Open, Later, Done to match the real way people triage their work: what needs attention now, what can wait, and what’s just there for reference. As tasks and ticketing evolved, our old navigation couldn’t keep up. So we pressure-tested this new model — internally and with beta customers — to make sure it surfaced the most useful filters for staying focused and organized.
We balanced instincts with user behavior. Should our search bar take up this much vertical space? Do people really need to see three rows of tags? Should we tuck away metadata? We leaned on real user behavior and our own experience to guide the way. Designers, product managers, and engineers worked shoulder to shoulder, sketching, shipping, and refining in real time.
And of course, we used Front to run the whole thing. From feedback routing and inbox rules to tagging themes with Front AI, we built and shipped the redesign inside the very product we were redesigning.
That made the feedback loop fast and incredibly real. Front AI helped us automatically sort thousands of messages, spot patterns, and respond with more clarity and care than ever. When someone flagged a bug or asked a question, AI helped route it to the right person and gave us context to reply quickly and helpfully.
As our co-founder Laurent put it, “When you redesign an app beloved by thousands of users, you’re playing with fire.” But thanks to Front AI, AI didn’t just help us listen, it helped us act.
The hard calls and our favorite details
Not every idea made it, and that’s a good thing. We had to say no (even to things we loved) to keep the experience focused and fast.
Here are a few examples of features that didn’t make the cut (yet) and why:
Redesign of our inbox tabs: familiar, but not future-proof. We started by exploring sleek, interactive tabs inspired by tools like Linear. But we quickly realized that simply re-skinning our old structure (Open, Archived, Snoozed, Trash, Spam) wasn’t enough. So we rethought the architecture entirely. The result: a new top-level tab system — Open, Later, Done — that better reflects how people triage work. Less-used folders like Trash and Spam were tucked into a “More” menu, and we introduced new tabs to help users easily switch between external conversations and internal collaboration. It wasn’t just a redesign, it was a deliberate shift to surface what matters most.
Properties in P4: too hidden to be helpful. Metadata placed in the integrations panel felt disconnected from where decisions were being made and competed with other valuable plugins. User testing made it clear: key context needs to live within the conversation itself.
Some of our favorite moments, on the other hand? The tiny ones:
A new icon set that feels crisp, clean, and unmistakably Front
Smarter tag placement and visual hierarchy
Micro-interactions that make the product feel alive
A dark mode that actually delights
Check out other quotes from Fronteers on their favorite features.
The result: A calmer, more focused inbox
So what does the redesigned inbox actually look like? The changes are immediately visible but intentionally subtle. The goal wasn’t to add flash, it was to remove friction. Here’s what you’ll notice the moment you log in:
More space, fewer distractions.
The top bar is gone, freeing up vertical space. Sidebar elements have been reorganized and can now be collapsed entirely, giving you more room to work, especially in focused modes.
A cleaner conversation list
We reduced visual noise by limiting tag overload and reorganizing metadata. Only essential details are shown by default, so you can scan faster and find what you need.
A streamlined message view
The conversation view has been decluttered to help you stay focused on the message, with a clearer grouping of key actions and fewer competing elements on the screen.
Thoughtful visual hierarchy
Tag styling, icons, and spacing were reworked to better reflect signal vs. noise. Important info stands out. Everything else steps back.
A refreshed look and feel
We updated our design system with sharper icons, calmer colors, and polished micro-interactions to make the whole experience feel lighter, faster, and more cohesive.
It’s still Front — just clearer, calmer, and more focused. A workspace that scales with your team’s needs, without getting in your way.
Navigating the change
We know big changes like this don’t land easily. Teams build habits around familiar workflows, and any shift — even a positive one — can feel disruptive. This redesign wasn’t about change for its own sake; it was about creating a foundation that supports smoother, more focused work in the long run. Already, feedback from customers has shaped meaningful improvements, and it will continue to guide how we iterate and refine the experience moving forward.
What’s coming and closing thoughts
Redesigning a product is hard. Redesigning the surface your customers use all day, every day? That’s even harder.
This project challenged us in all the right ways. It forced us to get scrappy, stay opinionated, and sweat details most people will never notice — but we notice, and we know our customers do too.
It wasn’t always comfortable, but we pushed ourselves to make bold decisions, break old patterns, and rebuild something better.
This launch isn’t the finish line. We’re still shipping daily improvements. We’re reading every piece of feedback (right now there are about 1,300 customer emails tagged in inbox redesign feedback!) that comes through our inbox and still iterating in real time.
Here’s a sneak peek of what we’ll be exploring next:
Smarter, context-aware AI prompts in the conversation view
Quickly search and apply tags, tasks, and custom fields from the "+" menu
Better filtering and wayfinding to complement search
Thanks for following along. If you’re planning your own redesign, we’ll be cheering you on!
— Maggie and the Front Design Team 💌
🎬 Want to see it all in action?
Check out the live walkthrough from our recent webinar (start at minute 30:41) for a guided tour of the new inbox — and the thinking behind it.
👉 See what else we launched at our recent Control Shift event, including our newest suite of AI features.
Written by Maggie Lamas
Originally Published: 21 August 2025