What is everyone's favorite era of starship design?

TNG movie era - Sovereign, Sabre, Steamrunner, all of it!

I'm going to get crucified for this, but I really dig Discovery's design language (both the show in general and the ship herself). In particular (I'm ready for those nails), I like their take on the Enterprise in season 2 (and subsequently SNW). In my mind it's tied with late-TNG era stuff which is what I grew up watching. I have mad respect for the older designs, but I find that modernizing the classics isn't diminishing my enjoyment even though I'm very acutely aware of the canon issues.

@DigitalCam The II - VI OG movie era. Harder lines but upgraded from the series. There was a harshness and realness to the ships, almost armored looking which fits the more conflict oriented tone of those movies.

No one's shown any love for my favourite ship design yet, so I'm gonna speak up about my love for the Intrepid class. Voyager just looked so sleek and graceful compared to other ships of the era — the comparatively lumbering Galaxy glass, the oddly square shaped Defiant class, or the cold and sterile Sovereign class.

I love the late TNG / Dominion War era, but less for the designs themselves and more for how many different ship types we see from all over the Alpha and Delta quadrants.

Probably the TNG films... or maybe call it "post Wolf-359?"

Defiant, Steamrunner, Luna, Akira, and my dear, sweet, beloved, gorgeous Sovereign; everything produced in response to The Borg just looked so fuckin' good.

Honestly? Probably the 'Lost Era' between TOS and TNG.

Excelsior and Ambassador classes were excellent.

Dominion War/TNG film era for me, and further stuff that's extrapolated from that. I prefer ships to be flatter, having a neck just seems to scream "weakpoint".

Connie Refit. Mmmhm those are gorgeous lines. 80s swagger on top of that classic chassis.

Sometimes I watch TMP just for the Enterprise porn (yes, some is also in TWOK, but sometimes the slow pacing is warranted).

Edit: and speaking of TWOK, Reliant/Miranda Class was nice too. Same parts mostly, different configuration. Exactly what I would expect from a vessel serving a research group; no nonsense.

ENT era.

Externally speaking Starfleet ships march to the beats of NACA/NASA X-planes, Klingon embrace a very soviet yet alien look in contrast, Vulcans look advanced and sleek yet ancient and mythical with the biggest pointiest toys on the block.

Internally speaking construction is depicted as having limits, tech and interfaces are familiar to real world, cramped ship like rooms are the norm, and there's no handwaving over how everything might fit inside the ships.

The Dominion/Borg/DS9 era of ships. The Akira, Steamrunner, Defiant, Prometheus, Sabre, and Sovereign are awesome (and the Galaxy even though that came earlier). It represented a reality check when Starfleet finally snapped out of complacency.

Era: TNG

Specific ship: NX-01

It peaked with the Excelsior.

The Enterprise F we briefly saw was also an absolute beaut.

The fat one

Agree with ye OP. I'm even a fan of the Miranda and the Oberth, I feel like nobody likes those classes. There's just something special about the TOS film ships. Those sexy nacelles 🥰

TNG but SNW is really nice even if I don't understand it chronologically

TMP Era is just the best looking classic Star Trek experience some of the designs in my opinion were in things like Starfleet Command the video game like the Akula class, but I have a soft spot for the DS9/First Contact/Star Trek Armada period.

TOS or OG movies for me. They are just too iconic and cool. I am also a sucker for retro-futurism so I love to see those chunky computers paired with unbelievably high tech spaceships. Plus Kirk's charisma somehow improves the ships too, at least in TOS.

The DS9-Prodigy (~2370-2385) era gave us several lovely ship classes-- the Sovereign, Intrepid, Parliment, Obena, and Protostar classes come to mind for me

Kelvin timeline Enterprise. It’s like the muscle car of Enterprises IMHO.

I agree with OP, TMP ships are beautiful and graceful and yet still have some nice angles... and while TMP uniforms must be as uncomfortable as all get-out, I also think they look the best. Excelsior is one of my favorite classes, and a lot of the ships they introduced for the first two Starfleet Command games, extrapolating outward to other classes, are also really fun.

DS9, Defiant & Kelvin Timeline Enterprise versions (bonus points for the Vengeance)

Loved some of the TNG ships as well, but in terms of uniqueness the above still stands.

I have seen almost all the Star Trek content, and never developed a love of the ship structure. I like the Defiant because it doesn't look like it will snap in pieces when it turns a corner. It also proves you don't need to put the propulsion on sticks.

I'm partial to the Galaxy class. It's big, sleek, and luxurious, which is great for when you need to be diplomatic. “Join the Federation! We have abundant resources and advanced technology, like this cool starship.”

For when you don't need to be diplomatic, it's also got plenty of firepower (enough to melt 20% of an unadapted Borg cube in one phaser blast) and speed (it can soundly outrun a D'deridex).

TOS/TAS/Kelvin/32c

I like the TOS/TAS and 32nd century designs for pushing the envelope for what a star Trek starship could look like, instead of just iterating on the same basic designs over and over, or repeating generic Sci-Fi starship designs. A starship that's just a giant disco blob, a bunch of loosely-connected pods, or a space doughnut/colony, are all unique ideas we've not seen before or since. Even the Enterprise was unique compared to the rocket-ships of the time, taking a lot of design work to give it that iconic look, unlike any other starship seen before.

By comparison, a lot of series after TOS/TAS tended to mostly iterate on the same design. For its flaws (like using a millennium-old drive mechanism), the 32nd century ships appear to try and buck that with radical changes. Chain and Courier ships look nothing like alien vessels of the time, and the Federation starships are rather different, with ships like the Eisenberg class being tall instead of wide, compared to previous Federation ships we'd seen before.

Kelvin is just a fun modern take on the TOS, even if I'm not entirely convinced about the interior, and like Discovery, lays the groundwork for the TMP style of ships, with their square-ish nacelle designs.

ENT era, and specifically the Andorian Kumari-class.

For ST, the Voyager looked good, but I didn't like the moving nacelles. The updated Enterprise from the first movie was my favorite iteration of the Big-E.

But, my favorite ship is the Omega class destroyer from Babylon 5. (sue me)