Quick Controls
30 second version
Problem
R1 owners unsure about what to expect under the Settings App and Vehicle App in the Center Display. Also, excessive hopping between Vehicle App and other apps.
Opportunity
Define a smarter model for owners to use and think about when it comes to accessing controls from the Center Display. More clearly define a control versus a setting and have the system reflect that level of simplicity.
Outcome
A new Center Display framework that elevates common vehicle controls to a system-level panel (Quick Controls). The re-homing of less commonly used preferences to respective areas in the Settings App.
Before
After
4 minute version
Vehicle and Setting were designed as two separate apps, always available one tap away.
However, insights from guided user interviews revealed 3 big issues that needed solving.
Vehicle App · 2021
Settings App · 2021
Problem 01
Inconsistency
Many owners struggled figuring out when to visit one app versus the other. We started to realize our approach to content was inconsistent across the two spaces.
Problem 02
Interaction Imbalance
Features that were most commonly needed weren’t positioned in a way to quickly access them. This made the system feel imbalanced and quirky.
Problem 03
Pogo-sticking
Drivers had to exit their current full-screen app just to open the hood or liftgate, then navigate back again. This three-tap pogo-sticking felt unnecessarily tedious and made the Vehicle App an unintended focal point in the everyday user experience.
After working through several concepts, and a year+ of iteration, the team felt there was promise in elevating common controls to system level status and keeping the Settings App as a space devoted to all set-and-forget preference-like features.
Snapshots of a few working prototypes designed in ProtoPie
With a lot of iteration and discussion we pushed the boundaries of this concept. In doing so we uncovered several key advantages to this new direction.
The Pivot
New Design Advantages
Less jarring
Providing quick access to a floating panel made it much less jarring to do simple tasks and return to the previous task.
Easier to follow
This new design made it easier for us to separate vehicle controls from system settings and provide an extensible framework for more features to come.
More natural
If felt way more natural to get quick access to common controls in a transient panel than to find them in a permanent App.
Auto-show in Park
With common controls in a system panel format we could easily push relevant controls when the vehicle is placed into Park.
That wasn’t really possible when the controls lived in the Vehicle App because we’d be changing apps on the user.
All the
sh*t
that didn’t work
I prototyped a lot of concepts we didn’t end up going with for one reason or another, but these prototypes helped drive needed conversation and refine our thinking.
A compilation of fully interactive framework explorations I built with ProtoPie
Quick Controls made it easier to access closures and features used regularly. More importantly it shifted the Center Display framework in an extensible way for exciting future updates to come.
Impact
Feedback
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"Kudos to the UX team at Rivian for this, it's a huge improvement."
— bladel (Reddit, r/Rivian)
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"I think this is a pretty substantial improvement in usability of the truck. I really like the Quick Launch widgets and especially like the fact that it pops up when I put the car in Park."
— InfinitasTria (Reddit r/Rivian)
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"The UI changes are huge for usability though."
— OverZealousCreations (Reddit, r/Rivian)
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"This new vehicle slide out is going to be so much more useful. The old vehicle app was so slow to open. Having this auto open when in park is also a game changer.
— 1pxoff (Reddit, r/Rivian)
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"I always noticed that the two car symbols in the UI were confusing... One was for drive modes. The other was for everything they moved under quick actions. It's definitely an improvement."
— hungarianhc (Reddit, r/Rivian)
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“The quick control is very convenient as well. Good minor update.”
— PretendAdvertising67
BONUS Content
Responsive Framework
Responsive Apps
Dynamic-width content and Fixed-width content approaches for all of the apps in the system
Why it matters
Lorem Ipsum
Dual-sided Media Player
Media Player combined with Quick Controls on the driver-side and standalone on the Passenger Side for simple access no matter who’s playing DJ.
Why it matters?
Lorem Ipsum
Drive Mode Controls in Quick Controls
Quick Access to Drive Mode controls for when you want it. No more pogo-sticking to the Drive Modes app just to make a single change.
A smart and flexible approach to the interplay between Drive Mode controls visible in the panel and visible in the App.
Why it matters
Lorem Ipsum
Dynamic Tab
While the vehicle is charging, it’s Parked an unable to change Drive Modes. Furthermore, while it’s Driving, live charge session information isn’t accessible. The mutual exclusivity could be combined into a single dynamic tab.
If the vehicle is plugged-in, the tab displays live charging session information, and while driving, the tab displays Drive Mode controls.
Why it matters?
Lorem Ipsum
Editable Shortcuts
Giving owners agency over the arrangement of shortcuts with a framework for easily selecting and editing shortcuts.
Why it matters?
Owners want personalization, but that often comes at the cost of engineering complexity. A way for owners to get what they want and for development efforts to feel confident what they’re building can scale is taken into consideration with this approach.
Media Player/Queue availability on both sides
Drive Modes/Live Charging Session dynamic content
Responsive App layer
Tap.
Swipe.
Or Park.
Designing flexible access to closures and features used everyday.
Buckle up.
I used ProtoPie to build advanced prototypes that could be tested on target hardware. They would be used for executive demonstrations, usability testing, technical reviews from software teams and eventually documentation. Moreover they served as means for the team to try out different system-level concepts without the cost of developing real software. Our rapid prototyping cadence gave us the confidence to go wide with our explorations and ensure solution validity.
I made several prototypes to explore the boundaries of how our framework would adapt; affecting the app layer and providing more personalization.
We heard users asking for more flexibility with our system making requests for things like “split screen,” a multi-tasking view, or even a sense of ‘home’ like what Apple Carplay users are accustomed to. We also heard them ask for more simple and straight forward requests like bring the media player from the passenger-side to the driver-side of the Center Display. Other owners requested access to have drive mode controls and cameras simultaneously while off-roading to enjoy experiencing terrain from various live angles.
Defining the vision
What we made had to be dynamic and solve for a broad range of limitations in the current R1 Center Display framework. We used prototyping to feel out the kind of experience we ultimately wanted users to have. We called this the vision work, and it was meant to inform how we’d chunk the work for software releases.
planting the seed
At first, our concepts weren’t well received by leadership. It would take some time and some usability testing feedback before opinions would change. While we pushed on other concepts we kept coming back to the advantages of a floating, temporary panel. A few key user experience advantages had executives eventually wanting to see more:
Content that was vehicle access related was showcased in a more appropriate form factor.
Additional gestures like swiping from the edge to reveal added significantly to ease of use.
Being able to trigger the panel upon vehicle states like entering PARK was a really desirable way to cut down on interaction cost.
“The day you plant the seed is not the day you eat the fruit.”
Testing at the Farm
Getting away from the desk and interacting designs how they’ll be experienced is critical to in-vehicle design. A team member who owned a farm and kindly offered his truck as a testing platform allowed us to learn from our designs firsthand.
We drove routes that began on pavement and ended with a muddy crawl across uneven terrain that gave us an accurate sense of how our designs would be perceived. With sticky tac we mounted a large tablet loaded with various prototypes in the vehicle and tested our designs while driving.
Delivering Version 1.0
I partnered with a front-end development manager to understand how we could package our work into a first release. We focused on the smallest body of work that would create the most value for users while moving toward the vision we’d created.
Our first release would be a simple swipe-able panel with just two sections: Access and Shortcuts. All other content from the original vehicle app (that were more like settings) would be moved to the Settings app for a cleaner mental model. With our concept scoped and properly resourced for development, we moved into the production stage that would end with an over-the-air update to Rivian vehicles nationwide. A content leader casually referred to the panel as Quick Controls in a design review, and the name stuck.
After several visual design iterations, we came up with a concept of placing the vehicle overtop of access tiles with soft borders to show where to press.
We deliberately designed R1T and R1S access views in tandem so neither one was just adopting design decisions from a different vehicle. We used Confluence for documentation so that’s where I documented in depth all the details for consideration by software teams.
I made a demo of each permutation of R1. This was a part of the documentation used to convey to engineering teams exactly how we planned to solve for the variation in our product lineup.
Testing on target hardware
Once integrated with some test vehicles, I’d get hands-on time with Quick Controls where I’d video record bugs or areas of the experience that needed more polish. This was a critical stage that required constant communication with development partners. It’s also where my attention to detail really shines.
Released into the wild
Quick Controls arrived for R1 owners in mid-February 2024 via a software update. After almost three years in the making, our hard work was getting into the hands of the Rivian community of owners. It was met with overwhelmingly positive feedback. We succeeded in making a more easily understandable framework and set the foundation for exciting future updates.
Below are snippets from Reddit where R1 owners gave unsolicited feedback of the software update.
Other notable comments:
“The EV maker (Rivian), meanwhile, isn’t putting up any cash; all it’s contributing is its knowledge and intellectual property. This is unquestionably a good deal for Rivian.”
“So if working with Rivian puts software in those vehicles that’s reliable and user-friendly, VW would be well on its way to realizing its ambition to be a force in the EV market. If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em could be VW’s winning strategy.”