Client
Qardio
Year
2015
Brief
Translate the benefits of the physical product, digitally
Solution
UX design that feels special and human
Press
—
Awards
Red Dot Award for Product design 2016
CES Innovation Award
CES Innovation Award
Keywords
UX Design, UI Design, Human-centered Design
QardioBase UX & UI
The UX design of QardioBase, an empathetic IoT body scale that communicates with you through smilies, translates the benefits of the physical product digitally, helping people connect with the product on a personal level and discover its multiple health benefits.
The product reduces the anxiety associated with an ideal body weight by replacing numbers with reinforcing smilies to communicate with you about your fitness goals and overall health. The decision to replace numbers with smilies was informed by the research we carried out which revealed how seeing numbers displayed on the body scale left people feeling uncomfortable.
To design a truly human-centered product that was going to be functional and universal, delightful and surprising, and, most importantly, non-judgemental, we began by designing its “personality”. First came the display. A visible, delightful 32 x 32 pixels LED matrix, custom-made by Qardio for this particular project. Designing for the limited pixels was a huge constraint, which made the experience challenging, yet the result all-the-more rewarding. Then came the vocabulary: smilies instead of the dreaded numbers. With the help of a “cuteness consultant”, we designed a set of smilies and a smile algorithm that follows your weight progress, adapting its expression accordingly. Using illustration within a digital context gave the product a more physical feel, making the whole UX feel more special and human.
By designing adaptive responses for unpredictable situations, (running out of power, or a low wifi signal) the personality of the scale was kept consistent, ensuring that the human touch was conveyed throughout the experience.
Detailed data about your full body compositions are available via a companion app, but it’s not displayed on the scale’s screen. The app focuses on the progress and context rather than on the weight and there is also a pregnancy mode available which programmes the scale keeps smiling at you as your weight increases.
If you’d like to learn more about the research we carried out for this award-winning project and how it informed our design decisions, please check the QardioBase project here.
The product reduces the anxiety associated with an ideal body weight by replacing numbers with reinforcing smilies to communicate with you about your fitness goals and overall health. The decision to replace numbers with smilies was informed by the research we carried out which revealed how seeing numbers displayed on the body scale left people feeling uncomfortable.
To design a truly human-centered product that was going to be functional and universal, delightful and surprising, and, most importantly, non-judgemental, we began by designing its “personality”. First came the display. A visible, delightful 32 x 32 pixels LED matrix, custom-made by Qardio for this particular project. Designing for the limited pixels was a huge constraint, which made the experience challenging, yet the result all-the-more rewarding. Then came the vocabulary: smilies instead of the dreaded numbers. With the help of a “cuteness consultant”, we designed a set of smilies and a smile algorithm that follows your weight progress, adapting its expression accordingly. Using illustration within a digital context gave the product a more physical feel, making the whole UX feel more special and human.
By designing adaptive responses for unpredictable situations, (running out of power, or a low wifi signal) the personality of the scale was kept consistent, ensuring that the human touch was conveyed throughout the experience.
Detailed data about your full body compositions are available via a companion app, but it’s not displayed on the scale’s screen. The app focuses on the progress and context rather than on the weight and there is also a pregnancy mode available which programmes the scale keeps smiling at you as your weight increases.
If you’d like to learn more about the research we carried out for this award-winning project and how it informed our design decisions, please check the QardioBase project here.
