Mastodon 2.9: Introducing the single-column layout (blog.joinmastodon.org)

Hopefully Mastodon 3.0, introducing a new name.

>Notably, we haven’t cut any features with this new layout

Perfect. Simple defaults for new users, more dense interfaces for power users. Other projects take note, you don't need to sacrifice the cool stuff to drive adoption.

Finally! This is great news, I was curious about Mastodon but when I tried it out I struggled with the interface, it was very unlike anything else.

Yay! I had to set this up with greasemonkey so seeing it officially is great!

This will make a big difference for getting new users off of other platforms, I think.

Finally, I hated the column view, there was too much on the screen and not enough space for it

This is a great UX improvement. I have always disliked the visual and cognitive load of the old layout. That, along with it feeling sloooow, is why I switched to Pinafore (pinafore.social) a pretty long time ago.