timeline
Winter 2025
(7 weeks)
ROLE
UX Designer
Team
Valerie Legates
Disciplines
Interaction Design
UX Research
Prototyping
introduction
Uncovering Communication Challenges
3.3 b
121+
Notifications come in from text, email, Slack, Discord, DMs… the list goes on. No wonder people feel emotionally exhausted just trying to keep up
Defining our problem
In the early stages of our project, we knew people were struggling with messages but needed to understand exactly how and why. Before we could even draft a problem statement, we had to explore the communication landscape.
OUR CORE NEED
How might we help overwhelmed individuals to respond to messages so that they can maintain timely connections in their personal and professional lives?
Given that people struggle with managing their incoming messages across multiple platforms, leading to missed and delayed responses…
research
How do people feel about managing and responding to messages across multiple platforms?
50+
uneasy
busy
overwhelmed
anxious
stressed
annoyed
59%
69%
Through 50+ surveys with working professionals and students, 4 user interviews, and competitor analysis, we discovered 3 core emotional patterns:
overwhelm
GUilt
anxiety
These insights shifted our focus to ease emotional stress, not just fix the workflow →
For this design, we decided to focus on the task of processing and responding to all pending messages from a unified inbox
designing
Concept Exploration
From sketches, we then translated our concepts into real, testable interactions including:
Lo-fi
Lo-fi
When bringing everything together, we designed a system focused on resolving those original emotions we discovered
overwhelm
unified messaging hub
clarity
GUilt
ai-powered smart replies
Confidence
anxiety
workspace sorting
control
solution
Can’t remember which app has that important message you need to reply to?
No problem. View, sort, and respond to everything with Auri
unified messaging hub
Link all messaging apps and accounts to view all unread messages in one place, from emails to text messages to social DMs
Customizable workspace sorting
Personalized organization that can match each user’s lifestyle
ai-powered smart replies
Self-prompted suggestions to write or refine messages before sending
Workspaces
Users can look through messages separated by workspace and priority (ex. 'Work' only displaying work emails or 'Business' showing messages received by your small business account)
STREAMLINE THE READING & RESPSONSE PROCESS
responsive as content changes
Dashboard
See eveything in a glance and with customizable widgets
see everything in a glance
Customize widgets
Auri Mascot
Little lovable mascot that helps send gentle reminders and lighten the mood of looking through a full inbox
16 day reply streak
3 more messages left!
s
m
t
w
th
f
s
reply streaks
Focus Mode: Complete!
Time to take a breather—your focus session is over.
Important message detected!
Auri has flagged this one as needing your attention soon
Jump to Message
Focus Mode Activated
I'll keep the stars aligned on what matters most!
in-app notifications
View our case study presentation here!
To see more of the nitty gritty details of our solution (competitor analysis, journey maps, & all the customizable features we wanted to include)
reflection
Inbox anxiety isn’t a productivity problem — it’s an emotional one.
People aren’t disorganized -> they’re overloaded.
They’re not lazy -> they’re human
By addressing not just the what but the why behind missed messages, we created a product that helps people feel seen, supported, and a little more in control.
Future Improvements
This prototype represents our initial vision, but with an extended timeline, we would have had more opportunities to sharpen our solution by: