inner
Helping people navigate the intricacies of long-distance relationships — whether it’s with a romantic partner, close friends, or family members.
Duration
10 weeks
My Role
UX/UI Design, UX Research, Branding
Tools
Figma, FigJam, ProCreate
Team
Solo project
The problem
People who find themselves in long-distance relationships struggle to maintain the closeness and bond with their loves ones, which often takes a toll on their emotional and physical wellbeing.
The solution
An app that allows people to:
See their loved one’s schedule and status.
Plan dates and share experiences.
Save and revisit precious memories.
average length of a long-distance relationship, compared to 7.3 years in a proximal relationship
of people have been in a long distance relationship
Long distance is hard… right?
The fact that long-distance relationships (both romantic and platonic) are difficult is something of a truism — so I was surprised to discover there wasn’t a lot of readily available research around this. While Google search leads you to articles upon articles about different ways to stay close, there is very little information out there about the specific challenges that LDRs pose, factors that lead to their decline. Still, some statistics I found made it clear that lots of people experience long distance relationships, and that they can be tricky to maintain:
Since my initial research did not yield as many insights as I hoped, I went directly to the source: I interviewed 5 people who have had experiences with long-distance relationships. I wanted to understand more about the unique challenges of being in a long-distance romantic relationship — but also, whether they are similar in long-distance friendships (read the full interview script here). Here’s what the folks I interviewed said:
“Time zones are what makes long-distance relationships hard. I’m always conscious of the time difference.”
“I wish we did some kind of activities to get to know each other with my partner, rather than just talking on the phone.”
“I’m very deferential, so when it comes to scheduling, I’m always stressed about the back and forth.”
“We’ve been trying to think of activities to do together, and that’s challenging.”
“Sometimes staying in touch with friends can feel like work.”
“With my partner, the time difference meant that it was hard to find a time to talk, and we’ve had miscommunications over it.”
Talking to folks who’ve experienced long distance relationships and friendships made it clear that there are three main areas in which LDRs tend to suffer:
Scheduling
Coordinating communication in long-distance relationships and friendships is significantly hindered by time zone differences and unpredictable schedules, requiring flexible and adaptive time management strategies.
Emotional Impact
The complicated scheduling and lack of face-to-face contact often leads to heightened feelings of insecurity and guilt, as well as feelings of emotional disconnect. On the other side, having a partner or friend who lives far away makes people value and deeply appreciate time spent together.
Findings Ways to Connect
Maintaining meaningful connections in long-distance relationships and friendships requires proactive efforts to overcome communication barriers and keep interactions engaging, often necessitating thoughtful planning and consideration of each individual's communication preferences and emotional needs to foster closeness and sustain the relationship over time.
Starting with empathy
But before brainstorming solutions, I tried to empathise with people who are trying to keep meaningful relationships with loved ones who live far away. What does it take to schedule some precious time together? What are the frustrations people face along the way? To understand this, I created my persona, Olivia:
And tried to imagine what happens in a typical scenario where she wants to have a call with her long-distance partner, James:
Clearly, even something as simple as finding time for a call can be riddled with stress: doing the endless scheduling back-and-forth and then being let down due to some miscommunication is an all-too-familiar experience for anyone with loved ones in a different timezone. How could this be avoided?
How Might We
How might we help people have meaningful and bonding interactions with loved ones who live far away, in a way that does not feel like extra work?
v1: Sharing everyday moments with loved ones
The first concept I developed was based on the idea of helping people share more of their everyday life with loved ones.
In order to do that, users could create Circles with loved ones – safe spaces where they could chat, reminisce, and plan.
Within Circles, users could share Moments with their loved ones – life events (like attending the concert of their favourite musician) or simply snippets of their day (like a photo from their lunch break spent at a park).
That didn’t quite work
After creating an initial prototype, I conducted one round of 5 user testing sessions. Users were between 22 and 35 years old and has previous experience with long distance relationships and/or friendships (read the full report here).
Unfortunately, this round of user testing revealed some fundamental problems with the concept.
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While users expressed enthusiasm for the Moments feature, it was not clear to them what it was or how to use it until I explained it.
Users were confused about the prominence of the chat feature because it seemed too similar to existing messaging apps.
Circles home screen and features were also confusing. Out of 5 users, only 2 could share a Moment with their Circle without help.
I tried to understand why the initial concept did not work as I expected by asking myself:
What did I miss?
While I focused on the idea of being able to share more of your everyday life and special moments with loved ones, there are many other challenges of LDRs that I missed. For example, people struggle with scheduling difficulties involved in LDRs – what kind of solution could address them?
What did I assume?
The solution was very heavy on creating a small circle of loved ones – I assumed this would be an easier way for people to interact, but this solution neglected the unique challenges of relationships between just two people.
What could I make more intuitive?
The biggest issue with the initial concept was that by trying to make different to alternatives like WhatsApp etc, I made it a little too different. People were confused by the whole idea of moments – what they were and how they were supposed to be used. They also tried to interpret inner’s features in terms of familiar apps — and got frustrated when things did not work the way they’d expected.
v2:Scheduling dates and sending notes
For the second concept, I focused more on the challenge of scheduling time with a loved one and sharing experiences beyond a catch-up call.
I still wanted to include a feature that would allow people to be able to show a loved one they are thinking about them — without the high-pressure/ stress-inducing of keeping up with a messaging app inbox.
My solution was to let people send their loved one a note — a little note sharing something that made them think about them.
User testing: second round
I did another round of user testing with the updated concept to make sure it was actually improving the user experience, and thing went much better this time around. Overall, participants understood the app’s main functionalities and could navigate it without any issues (see the results of the user testing session here). There were still some issues that I tweaked before moving on to the high fidelity prototype:
Contact screen only showed actions a user could perform to interact with a loved one.
Before
Before
Users did not get any information on what happens after they invite someone on a date.
Notifications appeared on the Contact screen and were difficult to notice.
Before
After
After
After
Contact screen contains information about a loved one’s schedule and availability, as well as some recent interactions.
Users get detailed feedback about what’s going to happen after sending an invite and can see status updates about its status (e.g. whether it’s been accepted).
There is a dedicated notification icon on the home screen.
High fidelity prototype
I used the learnings from the last user testing session to build a high-fidelity, interactive prototype for inner.
Marketing website
I also crafted a marketing website for inner to introduce prospective users to the app and its key functionalities.
Something to remember
This project included a significant pivot: the initial concept did not go as I thought during user testing, and I had to switch gears in a very short amount of time. However, this turned out to be a blessing in disguise: once I realised that it was taking me in the opposite direction from the problem space I had identified, I quickly saw that there were more promising directions that aligned more closely with the goal and the HMW. In retrospect, here are some things I wish I could have told myself:
Don’t get too attached to one idea…
…because you will likely have to change it. From the beginning, I was kind of set on the idea of creating a safe space for friends to share snippets of their life – it was hard to let go of even if it wasn’t clear how it would address the problem I was trying to solve.
Don’t be afraid to change direction…
…especially if that’s the most logical next step! This is scary to do when working with a deadline, but it’s a better option than keeping working on an idea that you know isn’t right.
Keep in mind the problem space and HMW questions…
…and revisit them frequently. Thinking about my design process more strategically from the beginning would’ve saved me a lot of time and panicking.
Thank you!
Have any questions or would just like to chat?
Fell free to reach out to me at natalia.talmina@gmail.com!