Accessing streaming content is easy, keeping it organized isn’t.

Conversations with people in my social circle revealed a shared frustration with streaming platforms: content is scattered across subscriptions, watch history is fragmented and users often forget where their favorite shows live – especially between seasons. As a result, discovering and revisiting content becomes unnecessarily time-consuming and mentally taxing. The Apple TV Hub solves this by providing a centralized way to save, organize and share streaming content across all subscriptions.

My Role

Information Architect, Interaction Designer, Product Designer, Apple tvOS (HIG), Usability Testing, User Researcher, UX Designer

Type

Solo Project

Industry

Entertainment

Tools

Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Photoshop, FigJam, Figma, Google Meet, Maze, Miro, Sketch

Timeline

4 weeks

Research Insights

The problem with today’s streaming experience.

Research Insights

The problem with today’s streaming experience.

In researching this topic, I found that streaming content is extremely accessible, but managing it across multiple subscriptions is increasingly difficult. Users become overwhelmed navigating different app interfaces, remembering where their favorite content lives and wasting time searching for something to watch based on their unique preferences. The diagram shows friction areas I discovered and a opportunity area to capitalize on.

Access

•

Users subscribe to multiple streaming services

•

Users subscribe to multiple streaming services

•

They’re overloaded with content options across these platforms

•

They’re overloaded with content options across these platforms

•

Navigating each apps UI patterns requires memory

•

Navigating each apps UI patterns requires memory

Friction

•

Watch history features are often unreliable

•

Watch history features are often unreliable

•

Hard to remember where content lives when revisiting

•

Hard to remember where content lives when revisiting

•

Suggested content recommendations are generic and biased towards proprietary content

•

Suggested content recommendations are generic and biased towards proprietary content

Result

•

Frustrating and inconsistent UI experiences

•

Frustrating and inconsistent UI experiences

•

Users waste time searching for content

•

Users waste time searching for content

•

They often abandon browsing altogether

•

They often abandon browsing altogether

•

Unfulfilled spending money on several apps

•

Unfulfilled spending money on several apps

Opportunity

•

One centralized platform allowing flexibility to organize streaming content across apps

•

Personalized and unbiased content recommendations

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Content suggestions only from users’ subscribed services

Access

•

Users subscribe to multiple streaming services

•

Users subscribe to multiple streaming services

•

Overloaded with content options across platforms

•

Overloaded with content options across platforms

•

Managing subscriptions requires effort and memory

•

Managing subscriptions requires effort and memory

Friction

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Different UI patterns across platforms

•

Different UI patterns across platforms

•

Watch history features are often unreliable

•

Watch history features are often unreliable

•

Hard to remember where content lives when revisiting

•

Hard to remember where content lives when revisiting

•

Content recommendations feel generic or biased

•

Content recommendations feel generic or biased

Result

•

Frustrating and inconsistent UI experiences

•

Frustrating and inconsistent UI experiences

•

Users waste time searching for content

•

Users waste time searching for content

•

They often abandon browsing altogether

•

They often abandon browsing altogether

Opportunity

•

One place to organize streaming content

•

One place to organize streaming content

•

Personalized recommendations

•

Personalized recommendations

•

Content surfaced only from subscribed services

•

Content surfaced only from subscribed services

What streaming users are saying

During user interviews, participants consistently expressed frustration navigating multiple streaming services, unreliable continue watching features and overwhelmed with the amount of content to browse through.

“The ‘continue watching’ feature doesn’t always remember where I left off, so I end up searching for it again.”

“The ‘continue watching’ feature doesn’t always remember where I left off, so I end up searching for it again.”

Synthesizing my research

These patterns informed the opportunity area to help users navigate multiple apps and quickly find content they care about without relying on memory or repeated searches.

Broken Experiences

Content is spread across multiple streaming apps, each with different UI patterns, making it difficult for users to build consistent viewing habits when switching platforms.

Unreliable Memory

Watch history and “continue watching” features don’t always work as expected, forcing users to manually remember what they watched and where it lives.

App Abandonment

An abundance of choices paired with generic recommendations leads to wasted time searching, decision fatigue and users abandoning browsing altogether.

Design Strategy

Finding something to watch shouldn’t require five apps and a memory test.

Design Strategy

Finding something to watch shouldn’t require five apps and a memory test.

The following insights directly informed how Apple TV Hub was structured, prioritized, and designed. Each insight connects a user need to a specific product decision.

Restore Continuity

Users struggle to track and return to content when watch history, favorites and saved items are siloed across platforms.

Create a centralized hub where users can save, organize and revisit content across all subscribed services.

Seamless Discovery

Generic suggestions and platform-driven promotion make it difficult for users to find content aligned with their preferences.

Make personalized recommendations a priority by only including content from services actively subscribed to.

Intuitive Interface

Navigating different interfaces across apps adds unnecessary friction to what should be a pleasant experience.

Design a consistent, familiar interactive platform that reduces learning curves and supports effortless browsing.

User persona

I created the following persona to represent users who regularly stream content across multiple platforms. Lena reflects highly engaged streaming users who value organization, efficiency and personalized content recommendations.

I created the following persona to represent a core audience segment identified through research. Jordyn reflects fans who are deeply invested in women’s basketball but feel underserved by existing sports media platforms.

I created the following persona to represent a core audience segment identified through research. Jordyn reflects fans who are deeply invested in women’s basketball but feel underserved by existing sports media platforms.

Lena Lang

Age:

43

Occupation:

Marketing Coordinator

Location:

Chicago, IL

Streaming Habits:

4–8 hours/week across multiple subscriptions

Overview

Lena enjoys streaming a wide range of shows and movies across several platforms. With a busy schedule and many streaming subscriptions, she often struggles to remember what she’s watched and where content lives – especially when returning to shows after long breaks. She wants a simpler way to track, organize and rediscover content without wasting time searching.

Frustrations

•

Forgetting which platform hosts a specific show or movie

•

Forgetting which platform hosts a specific show or movie

•

Inconsistent or unreliable watch history across apps

•

Inconsistent or unreliable watch history across apps

•

Repetitive, impersonal recommendations

•

Repetitive, impersonal recommendations

•

Spending too much time browsing instead of watching

•

Spending too much time browsing instead of watching

Goals

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Keep track of watched and saved content across all subscriptions

•

Quickly rediscover shows after time away

•

Receive recommendations that match her preferences

•

Spend less time searching and more time enjoying content

Goals

•

Keep track of watched and saved content across all subscriptions

•

Keep track of watched and saved content across all subscriptions

•

Quickly rediscover shows after time away

•

Quickly rediscover shows after time away

•

Receive recommendations that match her preferences

•

Receive recommendations that match her preferences

•

Spend less time searching and more time enjoying content

•

Spend less time searching and more time enjoying content

How might we help users quickly organize, rediscover and enjoy their favorite streaming content across multiple services without relying on memory or repeated searching?

Lena Lang

Age:

43

Occupation:

Marketing Coordinator

Location:

Chicago, IL

Streaming Habits:

4–8 hours/week across multiple subscriptions

Overview

Lena enjoys streaming a wide range of shows and movies across several platforms. With a busy schedule and many streaming subscriptions, she often struggles to remember what she’s watched and where content lives – especially when returning to shows after long breaks. She wants a simpler way to track, organize and rediscover content without wasting time searching.

Frustrations

•

Forgetting which platform hosts a specific show or movie

•

Forgetting which platform hosts a specific show or movie

•

Inconsistent or unreliable watch history across apps

•

Inconsistent or unreliable watch history across apps

•

Repetitive, impersonal recommendations

•

Repetitive, impersonal recommendations

•

Spending too much time browsing instead of watching

•

Spending too much time browsing instead of watching

Goals

•

Keep track of watched and saved content across all subscriptions

•

Keep track of watched and saved content across all subscriptions

•

Quickly rediscover shows after time away

•

Quickly rediscover shows after time away

•

Receive recommendations that match her preferences

•

Receive recommendations that match her preferences

•

Spend less time searching and more time enjoying content

•

Spend less time searching and more time enjoying content

Solution Development

How research patterns became design decisions.

Solution Development

How research patterns became design decisions.

Focus Areas x4

To provide users flexibility and make content discovery easier, the below research patterns guided the design of this Apple TV added feature. Each decision was centered on helping users find, easily access and manage content across all of their streaming services.

Streaming content hub

Position Apple TV as a central content hub where users can manage, organize and revisit their favorite content in one place across all their subscriptions.

Flexibility to customize

Give users full control by providing freedom to customize and prioritize their content preferences based on their specific viewing habits.

Content discoverability

Improve content discovery through interactive Siri conversations where recommendations are relevant to the user’s mood and available on their streaming services.

Save collections

Allow users to create and save collections of their favorite content to revisit anytime and also share with others in their iCloud family.

User flows

To validate how the above focus areas work together, I designed three core user flows based on the most common patterns identified in research.

Create a Collection

Siri Conversation Search

Set-Up Notifications

Siri Conversation Search

Another friction point is the difficulty of searching and finding specific content. This flow explores an efficient search method by engaging directly with Siri through questions and answers. Siri knows which apps the user subscribes to and also searches across the web. The search results lists where the content is available, app pricing if users aren’t currently subscribed, purchasing and rental cost if applicable.

Create a Collection

Siri Conversation Search

Set-Up Notifications

Siri Conversation Search

Another friction point is the difficulty of searching and finding specific content. This flow explores an efficient search method by engaging directly with Siri through questions and answers. Siri knows which apps the user subscribes to and also searches across the web. The search results lists where the content is available, app pricing if users aren’t currently subscribed, purchasing and rental cost if applicable.

User Testing

Need copy here.

Home Page

Player Bio

Home Page

Low-fidelity wireframes were used to validate layout, navigation, and hierarchy before moving into high-fidelity design. These wireframes helped confirm that core actions—saving content, searching, and resuming playback—felt intuitive and accessible within the Apple TV experience.