40 Product Designs That Make You Want To Yell “Who Approved This?”

We’ve all been there, trying to open a package, pour from a bottle, or click a button on a device, only to be met with a stubborn design flaw that somehow still exists, despite being glaringly obvious. Someone on Reddit recently posed this very question: “What widely used product has a frustrating design flaw that the manufacturer has never addressed?” And the answers poured in. Turns out, we’re all annoyed by the same everyday inconveniences.

#1

Image source: Elimdumb

The ‘push here’ perforated part of a cardboard box (like a box of kosher salt or corn starch) that NEVER works and instead just dents the box and makes it even harder to open.

#2

Image source: atxtopdx, vvoennyy/Envato (not the actual photo)

Why don’t toilets have a pedal you can step on to raise and lower the seat?

If you stand to pee, put one foot on the pedal and it will lift the seat. Walk away and it will go down automatically.

#3

Image source: S-8-R, Lazy_Bear/Envato (not the actual photo)

Electoral College voting system for US president.

#4

Image source: Impossible-Grab9889, m0neyba11 (not the actual photo)

Any product that has removable stickers that don’t peel off easily and leave residue that requires Goof Off to remove. Idiots.

#5

Image source: Weird-Statistician, gstockstudio/Envato (not the actual photo)

Every modern car with a touchscreen instead of buttons. It’s just dangerous and needs banning.

#6

Image source: badhairdad1, koldunova/Envato (not the actual photo)

The bag in the box of cereals should be ziploc.

#7

Image source: yelofoley, Mehaniq41/Envato (not the actual photo)

**Blinding headlights!!!**

On newer vehicles.

#8

Image source: poopybuttfacehead, Alicia Christin Gerald/Unsplash (not the actual photo)

Why can’t I push a button on my TV to make my remote beep?

#9

Image source: canscom, polygontoast (not the actual photo)

Plastic clamshell packaging the amount of times I’ve got cut.

#10

Image source: thecakeisali, malyshph/Envato (not the actual photo)

Expiration dates on food packaging. It seems like it’s always a scavenger hunt to find them. It should be standard that they are always on the “front” main label.

#11

Image source: KnoWanUKnow2, Lelia_Milaya/Envato (not the actual photo)

Where are my goddam files?

Windows, Apple, everything tries to hide the location where they’re storing their files. No I don’t want to default to storing on onedrive, I just want to be able to find my goddam files.

#12

Image source: Hooln, AtlasComposer/Envato (not the actual photo)

The toilet brush. It should be fully hydrophobic or something so that it doesn’t retain toilet water after use.

#13

Image source: Jf192323, pakn/Envato (not the actual photo)

Hand soap pump bottles with the tube that’s not long enough to get out all the soap.

#14

Image source: WhitePineBurning, A. C./Unsplash (not the actual photo)

Try unwrapping a bandaid when you’re bleeding.

#15

Image source: theisntist, ilonadesperada/Envato (not the actual photo)

Shampoo and conditioner labels that look identical if you aren’t wearing glasses. I have an idea for a brand called Shampoo (or conditioner) for People with Glasses, and the first letter of Shampoo is enormous.

#16

Image source: shadetreephilosopher, stokkete/Envato (not the actual photo)

Trying to “type” anything on a search with the TV remote is excruciating. It’s 2025, is this the best we can do?

#17

Image source: HawaiianShirtsOR, Petras Gagilas/Flickr (not the actual photo)

I understand that battery compartments needed to be made more difficult for small children to open (specifically the type of small children who put everything into their mouths). But was a screw the best idea? A microscopic screw, threaded into plastic, and made of the softest metal available?

#18

Image source: bavmotors1, LightFieldStudios/Envato (not the actual photo)

“Skip Intro” should be a setting, not something i need to select every 21 mins.

#19

Image source: Oninemo, RossHelen/Envato (not the actual photo)

Shampoo bottles that flip open so easily in luggage but NEVER when you’re in the shower with slippery hands.

#20

Image source: Pettsareme, cold_war43 (not the actual photo)

The seal on bottles that has that itty bitty piece of plastic you’re supposed to pull to get it off. Absolutely never works. They should save the plastic and just have us do what we’re going to do anyway.

#21

Image source: OSCgal, anonymous (not the actual photo)

Any kind of squeeze bottle that can’t be stood on its head. Ketchup, mustard, shampoo, conditioner, etc. When it’s almost empty, let me stand it upside down so the last bit can flow to the opening!

#22

Image source: Abbiethedog, Oscar Nord/Unsplash (not the actual photo)

Volume on streaming channels. Can we all agree on what 6is in volume and just let everyone scale from that. Watching Netflix volumes is ok. Switch to Hulu and IT BLOWS ME OUT OF MY SEat until I can find the remote.

#23

Image source: Brilliant_Joke7774, wirestock/Envato (not the actual photo)

Food packages that are resealable but the glue they use is to adhere the seal zip to the bag is weaker than the seal. So when you go to re-open the seal, the seal zip pulls away from the bag and there goes the resealable feature.

#24

Image source: KarockGrok, astakhovyaroslav/Envato (not the actual photo)

Why the hell does my stove / oven / microwave not have a battery in it that can withstand a .008 second power outage so I don’t have to reset the time?

#25

Image source: OpposeConformism, Christin Hume/Unsplash (not the actual photo)

When trying to highlight something to copy and paste it elsewhere, why has the highlighting become less and less precise and harder to use? Sometimes it picks up a space after the words highlighted (even if no space exists). On some webpages it simply will never select the portion of text you want. Microsoft products, Salesforce, and online are all big offenders. It also seems worse in some browsers than others (one of the few things I don’t like about Firefox).

Do people know what I’m talking about? This is on multiple PCs in multiple environments so no it isn’t just that my setup is jacked. The UI just seems to get worse and worse.

Oh and if Microsoft can keep their hands off Notepad that’d be nice. I want a place where I can paste stuff to strip off any invisible markup tags/language.

#26

Image source: HumorTerrible3505, MiniMiller (not the actual photo)

The doors in bathroom stalls. Why is the gap so big? And why do they insist on making them swing inward on such a small space? I practically have to climb the toilet to get around the door to get out.

#27

The clear plastic film on things like potato salad with a tiniest little tab you are supposed to grab to pull it off. And the indestructible battery packaging.

Image source: Zealousideal_Rent261

#28

Image source: Penya23, Mohamed hamdi/ Unsplash (not the actual photo)

The human body. Like why is my breathing apparatus a choking hazard when I eat or drink??

#29

Reaching for the Immodium anti-diarrhea box you hurriedly bought only to discover the pills are individually bubble-sealed in plastic that takes 10 minutes+ to separate to get just 1 pill at a time. Solution: Just c**p yourself & apologize to everyone with you in the car for the rest of the 10 hr trip.

Image source: groovebro

#30

Image source: start0vah, Ana Klipper/Unsplash (not the actual photo)

Playgrounds.

Somehow 90% of playgrounds were designed by people who haven’t interacted with a child since they were one and have amnesia of their entire childhoods.

Let’s make sure the slide is a dark color and angled in a way that it is baked directly in the sun for the majority of the day, that shouldn’t be a problem, right? The bottom will be shaped so that all the gross rain water and dirt pools at the end for days after it’s rained, so that will take care of that!

There are a lot of other toys and baby products that were clearly not designed by parents, but playgrounds are one of the worst.

#31

Successfully getting plastic wrap pulled to the length needed, cut and actually placed on the item in a nice rectangle or square.

Image source: MediocreLawfulness66

#32

Image source: OverLove5465, balls340/Envato (not the actual photo)

30 thousand buttons on TV remotes. Personally, I use like 5 at most 😅.

#33

Those stretchy b******e seals on some condiments, e.g. ketchup, that doesn’t allow anything to come out of the bottle until you’re squeezing it hard enough to drown whatever you’re trying to put the condiment on. “Oh, you wanted a thin line or a small dollop? Best I can do is half the bottle…”.

Image source: wufnu

#34

Image source: Glittered_Fingers, mk. s/Unsplash (not the actual photo)

Whoever set the arbitrary length of the average bathtub needs dangling out of a window by their ankles, IMHO.

#35

It used to be that the next tissue would effortlessly pop up out of the Kleenex box, ready for use. Now you have to reach into the box, fish around for a tissue edge, peel one off the clump, and hope you don’t rip it getting it through that awful plastic portal.

Image source: rhetoricity

#36

Image source: French_Window, YuriArcursPeopleimages/Envato (not the actual photo)

Anything I had to adjust as a left handed person to use because the standard is right handed only.

#37

Scissors that are in packaging that can’t really be opened with anything other than scissors.

Image source: ForPrivateMatters

#38

Women’s public restrooms. Older people and disabled need a bar to pull on to get up in all stalls. Seats need to be a trusted design not something to squat over or line with toilet paper. There need to bee multiple hooks so nothing has to touch the floor, for coat, purse, shopping bags. And wider stalls so you don’t bump into your things. And toilet paper that you don’t have to scratch for the edge. Maybe just bidets. Other countries have solved these problems (and many others) but we are stuck in our dysfunctions.

Image source: SuzieMusecast

#39

Image source: Kind_Ad5304, freestocks/Envato (not the actual photo)

Trying to place your cursor on iPhone texts. Like if I mess up a spelling two sentences ago, it is almost impossible to get the cursor to go the right place to make the correction. It highlights the entire word, or goes one or two letters over or entire words over from when I’m trying to correct. You can “drag and drop” the cursor too but that always seems to work worse for me.

#40

Deodorant caps are smooth plastic and impossible to open with wet or recently moisturized hands. Would it k**l them to put a couple ridges on those caps?

Image source: SciFi_Wasabi999