Accessibility: Improving iOS apps for businesses.
To protect client confidentiality, specific details have been omitted from this case study.
Background and context
Apple’s iOS apps prioritise accessibility, ensuring inclusivity for users with disabilities. As of 2021, over 98% of iOS apps support VoiceOver, 95% have Dynamic Type enabled, and 90% offer support for closed captions. These statistics highlight Apple's commitment to accessible design.
The client in this study requires all its staff to have their iOS devices on-hand to complete their jobs, but the company apps their staff were using had limited features for accessibility.
It became my mission to research and develop solutions that addressed one aspect of accessibility to improve the usability of these apps, which was text size. Apple symbols also change with text size, so SF symbols was included in this project.
Below is a GIF which shows my initial designs of whole-page components in action.
Who was involved
Vasuda Mistry
Cameron Graham (iOS developer)
Stakeholders: A large Cooperative in New Zealand
Why I did it
Our client already had a designated design team; however my agency had decided to propose design solutions that addressed aspects of their apps which were being overlooked.
I started with investigating only text size - Dynamic Type and larger accessibility sizes - for two reasons:
Our client reported that over 40% of their staff (the users in the study) used contact lenses or glasses to correct their vision.
Vast considerations around accessibility and its features meant that I needed to start with one aspect at a time. Because of the high statistic of staff with vision problems, I chose text size.
My process and my role
For the apps being used by the client’s staff
I analysed the design brief for details of the users and accessibility.
For Dynamic Type and the larger accessibility sizes
I conducted secondary research of Dynamic Type and the larger accessibility sizes provided in native iOS apps to uncover what I would need to include in my designs.
I experimented and created a working prototype, with components for 12 different text sizes. This meant 12 times the work, but after many attempts I reduced the work by half.
For custom symbols
I conducted secondary research on custom symbols for Apple devices, because they respond to text resizing and font. I wanted to find out how I could create accessible symbols in this way.
I problem-solved to use and create templates which broke the SF Symbols app several times, to create symbols which supported different font weights.
Click here to see some of the tested symbol templates.
Project outcome
Client buy-in. After significant research, many failed attempts, some successes and presenting our findings to the client, they requested our custom-made symbols which responded to and adjusted with changes in text size.
Deeper knowledge of accessibility and its intricacies in design and development.
Retrospective
Challenges
The SF Symbols app has very specific criteria for symbols to be validated - so it was incredibly challenging when some symbols could be validated, while others could not. To overcome this, I sought advice from a senior designer as well as the developer on my team and made single changes to symbols and careful note-taking of the results - this resulted in a more robust problem-solving strategy and a more thorough understanding of what was and wasn’t working, and reasoning.
Future learnings
I would like to continue to explore designing for accessibility for iOS - specifically for aspects I haven’t researched yet: VoiceOver, and closed captions and incorporating these learnings to future designs. I am also keen to learn about and incorporate accessibility to android apps.