NHS App homepage

[Graham-Pembrey]

What

Use this issue to discuss the homepage of the NHS App.

The homepage has quick links to the most popular services of the NHS App. We work this out using Adobe Analytics and user feedback. The homepage also displays the name of the user and their NHS number. 

[Tosin-Balogun]

Re-evaluating home tab

Having a home tab in an app isn't uncommon, however, it is important to make the distinction between a tab labelled home and one designed like an home page of a website. Home on most apps are either duplicating functionality that exist elsewhere on an app or showing functionality that is unique but cannot live elsewhere on another tab.

In our current app, we use the home screen like the home page of a website, which are different information structure models.

We need to consider either

• Removing home and replacing it with a landing screen that helps the users move forward like Services or Your health
• Merging some of its features with closely related tab like Your health or
• Re-imagining what a Home tab on the app is

This is very important for the native intent as native apps programmatically mirror their information structures. A child screen is automatically linked to the parent tab unlike a website where we have a breadcrumb structure which shows the underlying document structure

Difference between web & app IA

On websites, we often have a document model as the user is requesting new documents when they visit a url (example www.somewhere.com/page), therefore it makes sense to have "home" be at the centre of the document where the user can jump to the different section of the document. It also make sense to 'cross link' between parts of the document as some web pages might be nested deep within the web resource.

On apps, we have a view model which is programmatic. Unlike a web 'page' which is a document being fetched, an app is more like an instruction to build a screen (hence why page doesn't sound right for apps), these screens are often built and destroyed as the user is moving through the app but the app saves a 'state' which remembers what the user was doing in the previous screen so it can rebuild it again. The concept of 'cross link' on apps is a bit of a no-no or as Apple call it 'tab jump' which can disorient the user. Apps rarely do this and when seen (Spotify), it looked like the phone was hacked as the app recreates what the user would do in step by step so it feels like someone else is controlling your app

User behaviour insights

In the usability testing the native and design system team did in Leeds on 13-14 November. I observed the participants who were low digital confidence hanging onto home as their only navigation element. In one instance, we asked the user to logout, despite the fact they knew the account icon was at the top right, they still went to home before going to the top right, even though they could access the account icon from anywhere on the app. When asked to explain their rationale, they thought they had to go to the home screen first and then access the account icon on the top right. Home had become their default way of understanding the apps navigation.

While in the same session, some users then mistakenly stumbled upon the tabs and realised it opened up more menu, they began to excitedly tab around to see what else was there and began to use it more. This tells us they are able to learn more ways to navigate the app when exposed to it.

The original intent might be to help people discover relevant items from the home tab but instead we are teaching users that is the only way to navigate the app which isn't helping them learn

References

Apple talk about the problematic nature of a home tab on their developer documentation seen below

Next, I want to discuss a slightly related topic, but we see it expressed differently. Avoid duplicating your functionality and consolidating it into a single tab. In content-rich apps like this one, a tab titled Home, may seem like an attractive catchall to showcase functionality throughout an app in a single place. For example, maybe it seems like people aren't engaging with the Itineraries feature, and you may be worried it's because they don't know the functionality exists.

So it may seem logical to encourage engagement by repeating actions in the tab bar for more visibility, such as New Itinerary on the Places cards and maybe creating a version of an itinerary view that has the features front and center, such as inviting friends; or listing the stops with an easy action to add. It might be tempting to do this out of fear that some functionality won't be discovered throughout your app. And to clarify, this isn't about duplicating content. In many scenarios, it can make sense to have similar types of content, like songs or photos, exist on many tabs, but organized in a different way. But when it's your app's functionality, which are the actions people can take to achieve things, the redundancy creates confusion. And in practice, Home tabs disrupt an app's hierarchy. If functionality from different tabs or areas throughout an app are duplicated and added to a single screen without sufficient context, it creates redundancy and confusion. Home becomes the tab where every feature is fighting for real estate, because the tab is trying to solve a problem of discoverability. But in reality, it creates a dissociation between understanding content and how to act on it. If this is your app, consider removing the Home tab altogether.

The redundancy of features prohibits people from understanding where things belong and why. Another concern about Home tabs is that the repeated functionality may cause someone to tab-jump because the action exists in another tab too. Transporting someone to another tab by tapping on an element within a view is jarring and disorienting. Never force someone to change tabs automatically

https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/wwdc2022/10001/

[Graham-Pembrey]

Thanks Tosin. @mariapinillapease @michaelgallagher the above feels really timely as we look into the design hypotheses about improving the IA.