Properly formatting your World of Warcraft UI (also known as User Interface) to make the most use of the other add-ons you have is an essential skill to learn.  Even with all the add-ons in the world, if you can’t make sense of the information presented then you might as well start from nothing.

Basic add-ons to modify your graphical interface are Bartender and X-Perl.  These two World of Warcraft add-ons are among the easiest to set up and get a feel for, and at the same time are fairly pleasant to look at.  Bartender allows you to reposition, resize and otherwise alter your action bars.  Powerful options like hiding or showing certain bars in combat, auto fade out, even mimicking a ten-key number pad.  X-Perl meanwhile allows customizing of party, player and raid frames.  Larger health bars, animated portraits, more easily manipulated raid frames and various target-of-target options.

Using these two add-ons alone can streamline your interface and also make it much more visually appealing. Being able to control what bars are present on your screen and where they appear is easily the most clutter reducing change you can make. X-Perl meanwhile brings a host of options for where you want party health bars and portraits to show up, along with your own health. Using X-Perl to position these in places that don’t obscure the main portion of your screen while still being easily monitored goes a long way to making WoW more enjoyable, and easier.

When considering a UI layout, keep in mind a few important guidelines.  You should always be able to see your character and the area immediately around it.  Keeping that space clutter free is important so you can not only enjoy how all your gear looks, but also to stay aware of any attacks or ground effects targeting you.  Health and Mana bars should be somewhere that you can easily glance at without losing track of your character.  If you have them positioned way off in a corner you will at some point lose track of either the bars or your character.  If you’re still at the skill level that you need to watch your action bars for cool downs and the like, keep them below your character, but as minimal as possible.  An easy method to keep a new UI layout clean and organized is to imagine concentric circles around your character.  The more important the information the closer around your character it should be.