Group project
2026
Making health data easier to understand, navigate and act on.
Apple Health brings together a huge amount of personal health data, but having more information doesn't always mean having more clarity. I explored how its information architecture, navigation and interaction patterns could be redesigned to make everyday health tracking feel simpler and more purposeful.
Overview
The challenge
Apple Health acts as a central hub for health data, bringing together activity, sleep, heart rate, medical records, nutrition and more.
The problem isn't the amount of information itself. It's how that information is organised, prioritised and presented.
Users can struggle to find important metrics, understand what deserves attention and navigate between different parts of the app.
Research
Starting with the existing experience
We began by combining secondary research, App Store reviews, heuristic evaluation and competitor analysis to understand where users experience friction.
The research suggested that Apple Health often behaves more like a repository of health data than a system that actively helps users understand it.
Key problems
01 — Too much information
Dense and unfiltered metrics can create cognitive overload.
02 — Weak hierarchy
Important and secondary information can feel equally prominent.
03 — Difficult navigation
Users may rely on search or exploration rather than following an obvious mental model.
04 — Limited guidance
The interface often assumes users already know what they are looking for.
These findings became the foundation for the redesign direction.
Heuristic Evaluation
Where the interface breaks down
We evaluated the existing experience against standard usability heuristics and assigned severity levels to identify the issues with the greatest impact.
Competitive Analysis
Looking beyond Apple
We compared Apple Health with Samsung Health, Huawei Health and Fitbit to understand how other health platforms approach navigation, dashboards, personalisation and data complexity.
The opportunity wasn't to add more features, but to make the existing information easier to find, understand and use.
Understanding Users
Who are we designing for?
We conducted interviews with 12 participants across different age groups, levels of health-app familiarity and health-related goals.
The study included both people who use Apple Health regularly and those who only open it occasionally.
Two broad user types
Occasional users
Open Health to quickly check specific information such as steps or sleep.
Regular users
Use Health as an integrated tool for monitoring and managing their overall health.
Affinity Mapping
From conversations to patterns
We grouped recurring themes from the interviews to identify common behaviours, frustrations and expectations.
The patterns pointed toward three recurring needs:
Find it faster
Users wanted important metrics to be accessible without navigating through multiple layers.
Understand it faster
Users wanted information presented with clearer hierarchy and context.
Do more with less effort
Users preferred simple actions, gentle reminders and less manual work.
Personas
Three users. One recurring problem.
The research revealed different levels of engagement, but a common expectation: health information should feel easy to access without requiring users to understand the system first.
Rehan Menon
Daily user
A busy professional who relies on automated tracking and alerts but wants quick, trustworthy insights without unnecessary effort.
Tanvi Ravi
Moderate user
A casual health tracker who wants simple wellness tracking but becomes discouraged by clutter and too many metrics.
Nirmal Naveen
Occasional user
A student who primarily wants quick access to steps and calories without navigating through the entire health system.
Card Sorting
Reorganising Health around how users think
To understand how users expected Apple Health's information to be organised, we used card sorting on 5 users to identify patterns in categorisation, terminology and navigation.
Information Architecture
Rebuilding the structure
The research and card sorting revealed repeated categories, unclear terminology and too many micro-categories.
Users preferred information grouped by purpose and context, rather than purely by the system's underlying data structure. They also wanted frequently used metrics surfaced earlier and a dedicated place for adding data.
Condensed Information Architecture showing the key sections and navigation relevant to the redesign.
User Flows
Turning structure into actions
With the new architecture established, we mapped the key tasks users would perform across Home, Browse, Logs and Community. These flows helped translate the new structure into practical interactions before moving into wireframes.
Explore health topics
We changed how users discover health topics by replacing the old browsing flow with a list of suggested topics. From there, users can open a topic and either pin it to the Home page or add its data manually.
Export / share health data
We redesigned the Share flow to make exporting health data more direct and easier to navigate. Users can choose what to share, select a recipient, manage sharing preferences, and preview the data before sending it.
Fitness & daily activity logging
We introduced a new Log section as a central place for manually recording health and daily activity data. Users can choose a category and metric, enter their data, and confirm the entry before it is saved.
Community with friends
We introduced a new Community section to make health tracking more social. Users can add friends, send and manage invitations, and create challenges by choosing a category, metric, and goal. The flows were designed to keep these interactions simple and easy to navigate.
Manual Data Entry
Manually adding health data was identified as a point of friction. Instead of making users navigate through individual health categories to record information, I introduced a dedicated Logs section where users can quickly select a topic, choose a metric, enter their data, and confirm the entry.
Syncing a Health App
Users can connect compatible health apps to Apple Health and choose which information they want to share. The redesigned flow makes the connection easier to understand by clearly separating app selection from data permissions.
Reading a Health Article
Health information shouldn't stop at numbers and metrics. The redesigned Browse section gives users a dedicated space to explore health topics and access relevant articles, making it easier to move from tracking data to understanding it.
Wireframes
Testing the structure before the visuals
Before introducing color and visual styling, We translated the flows into low-fidelity wireframes to validate hierarchy, navigation and task structure.
Design Language
Building within the Apple ecosystem
Since the redesign is for Apple Health, we retained Apple's existing visual language to ensure the new experience felt native to the ecosystem. We followed established patterns for typography, color, spacing, navigation, cards, controls, and interaction states.
Final Design
A clearer way to experience Health
The high-fidelity designs bring the revised structure and visual direction together into the final interface. We focused on clear hierarchy, consistent components, and spacing while keeping the experience familiar to Apple Health.
One Feature in Detail
Designed around progressive disclosure
Health data can become information-heavy, so the redesign prioritizes the most relevant information at each stage instead of presenting everything at once.
Key information is surfaced first, while secondary details and actions are revealed when users need them. This creates a clearer hierarchy and reduces the amount of information users need to process at a time.
The implementation of a new community page also provides gamification and engagement towards staying health focused.
Reflection
What I learned
Working on Apple Health taught me that simplifying a complex experience isn't necessarily about removing information. It's about creating a clear hierarchy and deciding what users need to see, when they need it, and how they can access more detail.
The biggest shift in my thinking was moving from designing individual screens to designing the relationship between information, navigation, and user intent.
