Year
2014
Company
AppGeneration / Internal
Role
UI Designer + Branding
More info
fews is an news reader app for the essential local and world news, from more than 25 countries, with Text-to-Speech technology and notifications alerts.
fews
Users
The research revealed the on-the-go user of smartphone as the primary user, and we tried to understand which features were the most sought after. What was possible to understand right away was that, considering the different interfaces of different media outlets apps, and the interest of several users to check different media about the same subject, the aggregation system under the same interface would promote adherence of the user, because the “jumping from media to media” or consulting different apps would be tiresome.
fews
Problems to solve
Focusing on the news consumers on-the-go, the app was trying to solve 3 problems:
Reliable Alternative
Create a reliable alternative to the individual news outlet apps
Easy to Use
Create an app that is easy to use, navigate and customize.
To use on-the-go
Make it easy to play on-the-go, through Text-to-Speech technology, and customize and identify news of interest at a glance
fews
Design Approach
01 Clean and Minimal
The design approach was focused on keeping the interface as clean as possible, using colour only when needed, and using it to clearly map the categories the user was looking for.
02 Color Mapping
With such a small colour scheme, the learning curve was very small, and the users could select visually the news they were interested in.
03 Easy Access
While mapping the interface, it was decided to keep the main sections menus on the standard position for menus, depending on the OS.
04 Context Access
On the context of the news feed, the filter, play and add new media source features were placed at the top of the screen, so these options could keep visible and easy to access with one hand.
05 Structure and Content
The sections deemed necessary to the user were established as News, the user news feed; Trends, the world news trends; the Notifications, where the user could set up their own keywords, searchable on the news; and the Settings, where accessibility standards could be adjusted to the user.
Fews app main screens.
Fews app onboarding tutorial.
fews
Ideation & Testing
Along the process, we understood several things:
- The app icons should leave space for the content to shine – in an early stage, we’d have the icons of the category in the user’s feed news line;
- 5 categories for the app were enough to help the customer navigate the content.
- The map was easier to navigate on smaller devices if it was a globe, because it allowed for rotation, instead of dragging or slidding over a flat map, which was easier on a tablet;
We’ve been testing the project in-house and with other users to whom we had access back then, so we could fine-tune the usability of the app.
We pivoted towards a more minimalistic approach, which made it easier for the user to navigate without design or colour overload.
When adding a new news feed, we simplified the task for the user. On the settings menu, the use of icons instead of text made it faster to understand the settings’ meaning.
fews
Conclusions
Believing it was the simplest way of building this app, and paying close attention to users’ feedback, we decided to launch the app as-is. Since its inception in 2015, the app has had few changes, until its last update in 2017.
It was featured on https://thenextweb.com/news/fews-app-for-ios-and-android-is-a-highly-customizable-source-for-global-news with a positive thorough review.