Re-imagining Reddit's Saved section.
Background
The Challenge
Pick an App you like and make a brief analysis of a component (i.e. onboarding, home, dashboard, sign up, etc.) and how to improve that component's user experience.
The app I chose: Reddit
The component I chose: Saved
Process
Understand
Analysis
Users
Problem
Ideate
Comparable Problem
Sketches
Build
Solution
User Flow
Wireframes
Understand
Analysis
Currently Reddit lets you look at all of your saved content, separating posts and comments. Everything you’ve saved is sorted from new to old.
This is a very simple functionality that lets people reference something they’ve saved from Reddit, regardless of what it was saved for. I personally use it to save everything from design resources and inspiration, helpful life tips, recipes, and funny memes.
Potential problems: there isn’t a lot of flexibility in controlling what saved content you want to see, other than posts vs. comments. If someone saved a recipe and wanted to refer back to it in a few days or even the next day, it may take a lot of scrolling to find.
The Users
Before deciding what I would add to or change about Reddit’s Save page to improve the experience, I wanted to learn a little more about the component, why people use it, and what their goals are.
I spoke to some of my peers who use Reddit and it’s save function on a regular basis. Some of the questions I asked included:
Why do you save posts on Reddit?
What are your goals when visiting the Reddit Saved section?
Are there any struggles you have when looking for something you’ve saved before?
Affinity Diagram
I grouped the information I received into three groups to gain clarity on the data:
Saving on Reddit, Pain Points, and Goals.
The Problem
After speaking to my peers, I found that their goals when using the Saved feature are:
Quickly finding something specific that’s been saved
Having a comprehensive idea of what is saved and where things can be found
Reddit’s current Saved page fails to reach these goals:
The only way to find something specific is to take the time to scroll and look for it
Reddit doesn’t offer any overview or breakdown of saved content
Problem Statement
People struggle to navigate the Reddit posts they’ve saved, and can’t easily find the content they look for.
Ideate
Comparable Problem
I evaluated existing solutions in other industries that I could draw inspiration from. When I was looking for parallels to draw between other industries and Reddit, I asked: “What are services that offer intuitive and customized ways for users to navigate their saved content?”
Instagram, Facebook, Youtube, and Apple News provide different ways to browse your saved content.
These include dividing the content into categories, media types, allowing different ways to sort through the content, and including a (non global) search function.
Sketches
I brainstormed my ideas on paper, and sketched out possible layouts and features. I also planned the user flow for my solution.
Build
Solution
A new “Saved” page that gives users options to filter their saved posts in different ways, browse by post type, or search.
User Flow
Screens
Next Steps
Usability Testing
The most important next step would be to test and validate the design choices I made based off of my limited research. This would also inform future design decisions.
Responsive Design
The added features in this design should be properly implemented in Reddit for desktop, tablet, and Android.
Minda 2023
Toronto