I've been an avid Udemy user for a long time-- it has a lot of great courses on UI and UX design that I enjoy learning. In order to keep learning on the go, I downloaded the Udemy app on my phone. However, the mobile learning experience wasn't as smooth as I hoped it would be. I had trouble effectively browsing courses, managing downloads, and watching videos while walking. I decided to redesign Udemy to provide the users a better, smoother mobile learning experience. 

I conducted a qualitative research to see if other users are experiencing the same frustrations as I did. Below are some sample user reviews on Udemy in the Google Play Store:

After analyzing the problems that I discovered in the research process, I came up with the following solutions to make Udemy better meet Brian and Anna's needs:

 

 

Users like Brian like to "collect" courses on Udemy- it makes them feel like they are conquering courses one by one. They want to see their progress because it enrouges them to learn. Therefore, I decided to make the "My Course" screen more personalized. Users will be able to see their profile picture, which makes it more personalized. They will also see the number of courses they learned, in progress, favorites and courses in wishlist. These numbers are like rewards to their hard work. The higher the numbers are, the more accomplished they will feel.

 

 

Currently it's almost scary to download videos in Udemy. Due to the lack of signifier, feedback, and error prevention, users don't know how many lectures will be downloaded, how to stop downloading once it starts, or how to delete downloads. This creates a huge problem for heavy phone users like Brian and Anna who want convenient access to Udemy on the go but are afraid that the downloads will occupy too much space on their phone. In the redesign, I made the download function more manageable -- users can now choose which lectures to download or delete by tapping on checkboxes. An error warning message will also pop up when they're about to delete downloaded contents for error prevention purposes.

 

 

Busy users lilke Anna want to learn even when they're walking/driving to work or doing chores. In those cases they are not be able to look at the screen, and that's when an audio only option is in need. Adding the audio only option makes mobile learning much easier -- it saves data and saves space (if downloaded). For many courses, just listening to audio is sufficient anyways. 

 

 

Video watching experience is improved. There's nothing on the screen but the video when watching a lecture. Tap the screen once and all the action options will appear. 

 

 

Categories visualized and layered. Instead of the long scrolling dropdown menu to see about 15 different categories, I moved the categories into a separate page to make it easier to navigate. I also added an image for each category as a background, which is more visually intuitive and appealing. 

 

Added sort function. Users can easily sort courses based on popularity, price and name in a dropdown menu. 

I mapped out the screens and actions that users can go through in the redesigned app, incorporating all the features I listed above in the solutions. 

Using my user flow, I sketched out the screens and interactions in the app. I used my sketches as a way to quickly test and validate my ideas, while making comments and recording emerging ideas.

 

The sketches also show how my ideas evolved. For example, in the sketch, I originally had a folder option in My Courses for more personalization. However, based on Hick's Law, this complicates the user experience and has the danger of offering the users too many options. Therefore I changed it to a sorting dropdown, which serves the same function -- categorizing courses, but much more easier to use by giving the users only a limited number of choices.