Apple Watch

Elegant, Ergonomic, Revolutionary

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Quick Sum Up
A new input method to improve interactions
Suggesting and interacting with Apps straight from my watch face
Ⅰ
Problem with current design
Ⅱ
Improve usability
Ⅲ
Do more on my watch
Ⅰ
The Problems with the current design
Research and Observation gave me some insights.
Interacting with the screen of the watch is complicated. The touchscreen is small which is not the best for reaching buttons. Some of them are below the minimal size of 10mmx10mm.
Small Buttons
Some of them are below 10mmx10mm
There are many Gestures with few affordances. That makes them hard to learn and remember. Sometimes it's a long press sometimes you have to touch something that doesn't look like a button.
Low Discoverability
Does not look like a button
Source: NNGroup (link)
How to fix it.
These problems can be addressed with a new design approach. The Objective is to improve Usability by adding more Affordance and Discoverability. A possible solution is to add a new input method to give users more ways to interact than the screen.
Ⅱ
Improving Usability
A revolutionary User Interface
The current Apple watch has limited interactions.

It’s good at tracking activity and health, but interacting with it is a bit complex. The current Apple Watch is based on the design of the iPhone, it’s basically a small iPhone. But the iPhone multi-Touch technology does not serve the interactions of the watch well : difficult to reach the desired button on the small screen, no physical feedback....

The Watch lacks a revolutionary Interface.

We should be able to do more with the Apple Watch. It’s even more true now that iPhones are getting bigger and bigger and therefore less convenient to pull out of a pocket. With the rotating crown you can select more easily the desired button by rotating up or down, or click on the crown to validate a choice.

Each major Apple product came up with a revolutionary Interface.

Apple applied the iPhone recipe to the Apple Watch : a rectangle Multi-Touch screen and a big App Store. Those two things are responsible for the success of the iPhone. But it’s not the best for the Watch. During the 2014 Special Event, a strong emphasis was put on the Apps, but today most people don’t really install many apps because they are too complicated to interact on the Watch. Instead they just use the notification they get on their Watch and not native Apps. Bringing a better User Interface thanks to a better input method will solve it and allow people to do even more with their Watch.

The Rotating Crown
More affordance, More interactions

The rotating crown is an interaction method located on the left side of the watch. It's shape as a circular piece of metal that rotates along the watch. It can rotate up or down. You can also push it like a mouse click. It contains Touch ID, allowing the user for a quick authentication.

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Quick Actions
What you need, When you need it, At the tip of your finger

When someone is calling you, you can quickly answer by rotating the crown up. Depending on your position or activity, Siri can suggest quick action. For instance, when you get home you could have the Home App shortcut. The rotating crown allow for quicker interactions and without hiding the screen with your finger. It's easier to design richer apps and more intuitive interactions.

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Use Case 1: Mail notification

The notification screen takes full advantage of the watch round shape.
Controls appear on each side. The left side indicates what happen when you rotate the crown up or down. The right side indicates that pushing the Digital Crown will bring up the home screen (icon of the home button from the first iPhone). It also indicates that pushing the right button will bring up the dock. The top side shows the name of the current app.

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The notification screen takes full advantage of the watch round shape.
Controls appear on each side. The left side indicates what happen when you rotate the crown up or down. The right side indicates that pushing the Digital Crown will bring up the home screen (icon of the home button from the first iPhone). It also indicates that pushing the right button will bring up the dock. The top side shows the name of the current app.

Interaction explained

The rotating crown gives more affordance. The symbols on the screen are signifiers, they help the user knowing what the rotating crown does.

Use Case 2: Apple Music
This design aims to improve Apple Music on the watch throughout 2 main points

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1

Simplicity

The controls are displayed next to the rotating crown indicating what the rotating crown can do. New users can take it in hand quickly, and pro users can use it almost without looking.

2

Speed

Having a physical control over the UI allow the user to scroll and navigate quickly through the playlist or album list. The same way as the click wheel on the original iPod, you can rotate up to scroll forward and rotate down to go scroll backward. You can rotate multiple times in a row to scroll faster, or keep rotating to go even faster. Then you can use the digital crown to scroll through the playlist or the album.

Use Case 3: Calculator App

Multi-Touch as a last resort.
Use the multi-touch screen to draw numbers, and use the rotating crown to interact with the app. For instance, you can push the rotating crown to get the result or scroll to have more options. You can write literal expression like 59 - 20% and get the result. Or else, talk while pushing the rotating crown to dictate numbers or the full operation.

Use Case 4: Craig Portal
Usability Comparison

During the 2021 WWDC, Craig Federighi used his Apple Watch to trigger a portal. This situation is actually quite representative of a typical Apple Watch use case: a screen with one question and two answers : Yes/No or Forward/Backward. The rotating crown allows for a quick selection : rotate up or rotate down.

Current Design System
  • Can touch the wrong button unintentionally
  • Gloves or wet fingers can cause issues
  • No touch feedback on whether you touched the right button or not
New Design System
  • Easier to understand, quick interactions, physical feedback
  • Up is always Yes or Forward, Down is always No or Backward
  • Optimize screen space
Interactive Complications
Instead of finding and launching the right app, you can directly start a workout from the dedicated watch face. Siri can suggest a workout based on your habits and your current location.

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Interaction explained
Conclusion
All hands on ergonomics.

The round shape of the watch allows your thumb and index to naturally fall on the 2 main input method : rotating crown and digital crown. You scroll with your index and then you select with your thumb.

Select

The key of this concept is the rotating crown. Designed to give more possibilities for interactions, it’s good at selecting an input. It’s more efficient than using the touch screen to touch a button. It can also be used to navigate more quickly between screens of an app.

Scroll

The digital crown is still here, doing what it does best: scrolling through content. The rotating crown and the digital crown work together to cover a greater number of possibilities for interactions.

Ⅲ
Do more on my watch
1
Why the App model didn't work
2
A new model to replace the Apps
1
Why the App model didn't work
People mainly interact with notifications on their Apple Watch.
Why?
Because it comes to me
The notification comes to me, bringing the information and a set of possible actions.
People don’t use Apps on their Apple Watch.
Why?
Because I have to go to it
Most of the time, when a user has to accomplish a task he uses his iPhone. He rarely goes to the watch because finding the right App on the watch and interacting with it is more complicated.
The Watch should be more than just a Notification Reader
Let’s design something between the Apps and the Notifications. Something that comes to me like a notification and that I can interact with like an App.
How?
The watch is the most personal device. It knows everything about me. Let’s use it.
Let’s bring more cleverness
By adding more awareness
The watch can infer what I’m currently doing and suggest actions to help me. It can do that by monitoring the context:
  • Time
  • Current location
  • Personal habits / My Calendar
  • The last task I have done on another device
2
Actions: a new model to replace the Apps
This is the “Context Based Action” (CBA)
Let's take an example
Context:
  • It's 6PM
  • I’m at my company parking lot, walking towards my car
Infer:
Based on my habits, I’m either going to do some sport as I often do after work, or I’m going straight home.
Action:
The watch suggests to me Apple Maps with the possible destinations.
Full Interaction Explained
CBA improves the plasticity of the User Interface
HAMSTERS Task Model without CBA
HAMSTERS Task Model with CBA
HAMSTERS is a Task Modelling software used by HCI researchers to model user tasks
Learn how to read a HAMSTERS Diagram here
HAMSTERS Website
Other examples
Click on a thumbnail below