What it is
New skeuomorphism, soft and pressed.
A 2019 Dribbble shot, a name borrowed from a reader's comment, and a style that sits between flat design and the realistic interfaces that came before it.
Where it came from
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The Dribbble shot that started it
Alexander Plyuto (now listed on Dribbble as Oleksandr Plyuto) posted the "Skeuomorph Mobile Banking" concept on Dribbble on November 5, 2019. His description imagines a world where skeuomorphism kept evolving in mobile interfaces.
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Credited as the first neumorphic design
The Interaction Design Foundation says Plyuto's banking app design went viral on Dribbble and is said to be the first neumorphic design. It hedges that credit rather than stating it as settled fact.
Source: IxDF, What Is Neumorphism?
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How the name was made
In a UX Collective article dated December 17, 2019, Michal Malewicz wrote that a commenter, Jason Kelley, called the "New skeuomorphism" trend "Neuomorphism," and Malewicz dropped the "o." So the name grew out of a reader comment he shortened.
Source: UX Collective, Michal Malewicz, Neumorphism in user interfaces (a Medium member story)
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Malewicz gets the naming credit
IxDF credits Michal Malewicz, Creative Director and CEO of Hype4, with coining the term in 2019 after he saw a new take on skeuomorphism on Dribbble and Behance.
Source: IxDF, What Is Neumorphism?
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New skeuomorphism, also called soft UI
The word neumorphism comes from "new skeuomorphism." The style is also called soft UI, and IxDF ties that nickname to its typically low contrast.
Source: IxDF, What Is Neumorphism?
How it works
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Extruded or pressed into the page
Neumorphic elements look like part of the background itself, either pushed up out of it or pressed into it. Soft shadows create that effect.
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One light shadow, one dark shadow
Material-style cards usually have one or more dark shadows. A neumorphic element uses two, one light and one dark, and its background matches or nearly matches the surface it sits on.
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Between flat design and skeuomorphism
Nielsen Norman Group describes neumorphism as a mix of flat design's clean simplicity and skeuomorphism's realistic, three-dimensional elements.
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A reaction to flat design's weak cues
NN/g lays out the sequence: flat design replaced skeuomorphism, but dropping all textures and shadows left interfaces with weak signifiers. Neumorphism grew out of those limits and brought back subtle skeuomorphic depth.