Scrolling with more whitespace vs Everything on one page

Question

Our end-users are used to an old B2B application which contains really small inputs and information that is so close together that it is difficult to distinguish. As a result, users complain a lot about the readability and findability of items in our web application. (Example: first image is old situation)

Therefore we tried to increase the size of our inputs, fontsize and space between items. We also logically grouped content (there are 3 groups of information). Because of these changes, everything is set up more spacious and the readability and findability has increased. However, now users complain that they have to scroll extra, where they used to see everything at a glance (Example: second image is the new situation).

How should we deal with this situation? Our pages contains a lot of information and I have the feeling that we have to choose between no scrolling or bad readability and findability.

Answer 1

Whitespace, mostly referred to as negative space, is the portion of a page left unmarked, the portion that is left blank. Moreover, if the people who most need to increase font size are people 65+, which is the group least likely to be skilled enough to have adjusted settings. So first I think you need to understand whether its an IA issue or UI issue.

Problem Example 1: Site visitors are not visiting two important sections of the site. Potential issues that can cause the problem:

IA-issue: Users do not understand or are not attracted to the names of the sections.

UI-issue: Users do not notice the links to the sections.

Problem Example 2: Site visitors never use a Related Links navigation component on content pages. Potential issues that can cause the problem:

IA-issue: The content links included under Related Links are not relevant to what users need (a classification issue).

UI-issue: Users do not notice the Related Links navigation component (because perhaps it’s too low down the page or is mistaken for an advertisement).

You can also go for:

Tree-testing can use Treejack, User-Zoom Tree Testing
Closed Card sorting can use Optimal Sort, UXSort
Click Testing can use Usabilla Visual Survey, Chalkmark
Usability Testing can use remote moderated tests

Now as other solutions you can go for Accordion, Tabs, Consider Jump-to-Options, Visual Effects on Scroll

Answer 2

As @Awesome Designer asked, we need more data to answer this.

If it is confidential data and since that you have already come up with the solution, you can use both, give options for your users to choose. Example below (Hope you have the information in data table, you can place the image on top of the data table, users can toggle between tightly packed content and the one with easy readability):

Answer 3

You could;

1. Place some filters, "jump to links", or other type of secondary menu (i.e. vertical one), that will enable user to easily scroll down to section he clicks
2. If it is a long page with lot of scrolling, separate content in Tabs, Accordion, or other elements to display it more efficiently
3. After some scroll, offer "Back to top" option

Otherwise, if you need to sacrifice one, long scrolling is better then poor readability in my opinion.
As people naturally tend to scroll both on Desktop and mobile and are used to that.