What do you think about custom designed plugin/theme options UIs?

Custom UI is great where it improves the experience and makes the task easier.
After all, a plugin extends WordPress and therefore a lot of the time is extending the user interface. This might mean a screen that is arranged completely differently to any other screen, but if it is logical and understandable then there’s no cause for confusion.

Where custom styling is being used to ‘brand’ a plugin, it’s just annoying and naff.
Custom UI should respect the colour choice of the admin backend.

I much prefer plugins that could be mistaken for being part of the core, and that should pretty much be the goal.

So, respect the core UI but don’t be restricted by it.

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