Duration:
March 2024 - April 2024
Design Role:
Redesign, Research, Prototyping, Usability Testing
Sector:
Fitness, Health, Lifestyle
UI/UX Design
Redesign
Case Study
Apple Fitness Recovery Mode
Redesigning more comprehensive metrics for injuries or changes in mobility
Problem
Solution
Currently, users are not able to robustly customize their Fitness metrics to fit personalized fitness goals tailored to their abilities(ie. disabilities, injuries, life changes). While the Health app has mobility tracking features, they are not well integrated into the Fitness app. The lack of visual communication between the two apps prevents Apple watch users from accessing more detailed movement metrics in their Fitness app.
Last year, I had an unexpected back surgery that affected my mobility and while in recovery for six months, my Apple Fitness app was no longer able to provide me with the metrics I needed to track my less than normal mobility levels. This made me question - How can users who have sudden health changes that affect their physicality better track their recovery?
Fitness
Health
A Recovery Mode feature can help users who have an injury track their recovery progress through the following capabilities:
Users can choose to track additional metrics integrated from the Health app in their daily fitness metrics
Users can log symptoms and level of pain to track their recovery progression
User Research
How do others relate to this problem?
Redesigning the App
How can we bring this solution to life?
How can we capture the a more diverse definition of Fitness?
User Feedback
Do users think this feature is reliable?
How did I get here?
5 Participants(Apple Fitness Users, Experience with Injury)
In-Person or Video Call
Interview Objectives:
Understand what fitness means to different people, how they choose prioritize it in their life, and what their routines are
Investigate the types of injuries people have had, how it affected their daily life, how they dealt with their recovery, what symptoms affected them the most, & what type of metrics were important for people whe measuring the progress of their recovery
Key Insights
From all the interviews with users who all had unique relationships to fitness, it became clear that the overarching theme in participants’ concerns was the lack of customization and detailed information available in the Fitness app.
How might we provide comprehensive metrics that give users the clarity they need to feel confident about the trajectory of their recovery?
“I’m not that familiar with the Health app and I find the interface too overwhelming.”
How can we better integrate the Health app into the Fitness app so that it is convenient for users to access on the daily?
“When I was injured, I was most cognizant of my pain levels and range of motion.”
Is there a way the Fitness app can keep track of recovery metrics like pain levels and range of motion?
“When I was injured, I would keep notes of my progress with exercises or how I was feeling so I could update my doctor at my appointments”
Can the Fitness app help users document more qualitative data?
After putting all of these key insights together, my goal for this Recovery feature became clear:
Enhance the capabilities of the Fitness app to better acommodate a more diverse definition of how fitness can serve people’s overall health needs.
With my goals in mind, I made sure to focus on redesigning the Fitness app to maintain the integrity of it’s original elements while introducing a new feature that would belong seamlessly in the existing UI.
When activating Recovery Mode, there will be two main features:
Users will be able to add three additional daily metrics that will include a larger range of measurements pulled from the Health app
Users will be able to log their pain symptoms in a daily log that can help users map
out quantitative and qualitative data over time to better track recovery
The following user task flows were taken from lofi to hifi wireframes to showcase how users would integrate the new features after they’ve been injured:
To activate Recovery Mode, users must answer a questionnaire about their injury to understand how they’d like to track their recovery. The questions are meant to help target the diverse issues that people may face with their recovery.
Activate Recovery Mode
View Daily Activity Rings
Complete Daily Symptoms Log
Activate Recovery Mode
This intent of this user flow is to walk new users through the seamless process of activating the new Recovery feature and giving them more control over the personalization of metrics and information users may want to record based on their level of mobility.
How can we make it accessible for users to view more detailed metrics?
Once users have chosen their additional daily metrics during activation, they can view the new metrics they’ve added integrated into their daily activity summary for easy access.
Users can choose to complete a daily log that allows them to log their current pain levels, insert symptoms they’re feeling, write their own personal notes, and be able to see their pain levels plotted on a chart.
It’s important that the app gives feedback from user’s inputs - if a user is noting that they are having high pain levels then the Fitness app will recommend the user to pause their daily movement rings until they feel better.
The symptoms log uses similar strategies as the Health app UI by using colors to help users visually identify on a graph or calendar if their pain levels have improved or gotten worse.
Activate Recovery Mode
View Daily Activity Rings
Activate Recovery Mode
View Daily Activity Rings
Activate Recovery Mode
View Daily Activity Rings
Activate Recovery Mode
View Daily Activity Rings
How can we make it accessible for users to view more detailed metrics?
Activate Recovery Mode
Complete Daily Symptoms Log
“I love how the circular rings tie in well with the existing Fitness app UI. It’s feels so intuitive, I can understand my progression just by looking at the colors”
Users were satisfied with the usage of familiar colors to identify their pain levels. It felt impactful to see the continuation of the colors throughout the UI of the feature.
Users were excited to see the new metrics in their daily activities summary. It gave them another layer of analysis that improves the way they get to see their progression.
Users are used to relying on other apps to document additional information about their recovery. They liked that everything could be streamlined into one place.
What Worked Well
“The ability to log notes in the daily symtpoms log really adds a layer of qualitative information that is great for my doctor’s visits”
“The new graphical information is exciting to see - it makes me feel enticed to track my daily movement again”
Usability Testing
5 Participants
In-Person or Video Call
Avg. completion time - 12:00 Mins
Testing Details
Particpants were asked to complete the three tasks thinking back to the time when they were injured and how this may have been helpful.
Final Prototype
From my personal experiences of losing my mobility, I was able to empathize with those who may be facing these changes in their physicality. With all the ups and downs that come with recovery, people need to be able to see the overall positive trajectory in their recovery and thats where comprehensive metrics like Recovery mode can really help.
Final Takeaway
Activate Recovery Mode
View Daily Activity Rings
Complete Daily Symptoms Log
Competitor Analysis
What can we learn from the current market?
Fit Bit
Whoop
Samsung Health
Fitbit is one of the most well-known brands in the wearable fitness technology market. It has established itself as a pioneer in activity tracking devices, with a strong reputation for quality and reliability.
Whoop is a fitness-tracking and fitness-coaching wearable and app that uses physiological data to simultaneously improve your training and fitness.
The Samsung Health app is a fitness tracking app that helps track health and daily activities.
What works well:
Fitbit devices offer a wide range of health tracking features, including activity tracking, sleep monitoring, heart rate monitoring, and guided workouts. These features provide users with valuable insights into their overall health and wellness, helping them make informed decisions about their lifestyle habits.
While Fitbit devices provide valuable health insights, they are primarily designed for consumer wellness purposes rather than medical use. This limitation may hinder Fitbit's ability to penetrate the medical market and partner with healthcare providers or insurers for more comprehensive health management solutions.
What could be improved:
What works well:
Whoop has advanced sensors and analytics algorithms track metrics such as heart rate variability (HRV), sleep quality, respiratory rate, and strain to offer personalized recommendations for optimizing performance and recovery.
The Whoop is more specialized for athletes and fitness enthusiasts - placing a different emphasis on metrics that may not work for everyone. Whoop measurements are mainly focused strain and sleep recovery, which may not be specific enough for a larger market.
What could be improved:
What works well:
App provides more health focused comprehensive metrics that other competitors do not have. These metrics include: Food and water intake, Sleep patterns, Blood oxygen levels, Body composition, Weight, Calorie intake, Stress levels, & Blood pressure
Compared to other competitors, like Whoop, Samsung Health may lack some advanced fitness and performance analytics. It focuses more on general health and wellness rather than providing in-depth training metrics such as VO2 max, detailed recovery insights, or athlete-level data, making it less appealing to elite athletes or users looking for performance-oriented metrics.
What could be improved:
What is the opportunity that can be taken here?
To understand if the same gap exists in the market, a competitor analysis was done to answer the question - How are other products currently on the market approaching fitness metrics and recovery?
While each fitness tracking product presents it’s own unique metrics that contribute to advancement in fitness customization, there is still yet to be a feature that focuses on qualitative and quantitative metrics to help users who are facing mobility issues. Creating a Recovery Mode for Apple Fitness by integrating existing metrics from the Health app can give Apple an easy edge that helps the product cater to a wider audience.
Try out the prototype for yourself!