What designing for seniors has taught me
By: Joshua Reach
Tags: Product Design, Accessibility, UI, Ts, UX

What designing for seniors has taught me

Designing digital products for people over 65 years old has some very valuable lessons.

Product designers are obsessed with the people we design for. No, I’m not talking about our internal clients (though we should be in tune with them as well), but rather we’re obsessed with the end-user of our products. For three years my world has revolved around senior citizens — working as a designer for a health and wellness company who’s focus is around bettering the lives of the aging population in America. What I never expected was that designing for seniors was one of the best crash courses on becoming a product designer.

Photo by Christian Bowen on Unsplash

These are some lessons that the amazing boomers I’ve been designing for have taught me over the past couple years. I’m sharing these because I’ve realized most of them don’t just apply to seniors, but rather to everyone we might design for, no matter the age.

Never underestimate your user

I’ve always had a soft spot for older adults, mostly because I see my own grandparents when I look at someone who’s lived a long, fascinating life. I love my grandparents dearly and have spent tons of time with them growing up, but because of this I thought I already knew a bit about what made seniors tick. I thought I knew at least some things around how they use technology and what’s important to them.

I was horribly wrong.

This revelation of “don’t assume you know your user” hit me when I started conducting user tests on some products I was designing early on in my role. I assumed that things had to be overly simplified, extra big, and almost a departure from what is considered “trendy” right now. Because, technology is difficult, right? Then the test results started coming in.

As I watched these unmoderated user tests we conducted, I began to see that though there are some limitations with dexterity; seniors were just as capable and knowledgable about their mobile phones and computers as the rest of us. This was especially true for the fitness products I was designing. Then it really hit me when an older lady who was testing a design was trying to work around a usability issue by utilizing accessibility tools in the iPhone that I didn’t even know existed.

From here on, I began to look at our aging population through a new lens — a lens that showed that nearly everyone nowadays has the same expectations and capabilities when it comes to technology, no matter their age. Don’t ever assume you know what someone is capable of.

Accessibility is a win for everyone

Despite me realizing that seniors are just as capable at using tech as a millennial, that doesn’t mean I can just design products as I would use them. No, there’s still so many things to keep in mind when designing for seniors. These are the top things I’ve learned to pay attention to for seniors:

Dexterity : arthritis and years of hard work can make smartphones difficult to use. Even a simple swipe gesture can be difficult for many. An easy fix — provide a fixed button alternative to any swiping elements and keep the over-exaggerated interactions to a minimum.

: arthritis and years of hard work can make smartphones difficult to use. Even a simple swipe gesture can be difficult for many. An easy fix — provide a fixed button alternative to any swiping elements and keep the over-exaggerated interactions to a minimum. Vision : this goes without say that there are definitely issues with small, tiny text on websites and apps with seniors. General rule-of-thumb, keep your smallest text no less than 14pt (16pt preferably). You can still design gorgeous interfaces at this size.

: this goes without say that there are definitely issues with small, tiny text on websites and apps with seniors. General rule-of-thumb, keep your smallest text no less than 14pt (16pt preferably). You can still design gorgeous interfaces at this size. Color: I can relate to this one all too well. As we age, the rods and cones in our eyes can deteriorate or misalign, so colorblindness becomes a very real thing. Make sure you use plenty of contrast in your interactive elements. WebAim has a great contrast checker to make sure you’re meeting the proper ratio.

I can relate to this one all too well. As we age, the rods and cones in our eyes can deteriorate or misalign, so colorblindness becomes a very real thing. Make sure you use plenty of contrast in your interactive elements. WebAim has a great contrast checker to make sure you’re meeting the proper ratio. Accuracy: combine some barriers like dexterity issues and slight vision impairment, and you quickly realize that tiny little buttons that look cool on iOS are a nightmare for someone older. Make sure the target areas for the actions in your designs are big enough to be missed just a little bit, but still take the user to the place they want to go.

combine some barriers like dexterity issues and slight vision impairment, and you quickly realize that tiny little buttons that look cool on iOS are a nightmare for someone older. Make sure the target areas for the actions in your designs are big enough to be missed just a little bit, but still take the user to the place they want to go. Clarity: as the saying goes; “Don’t Make Me Think”. This is especially true for seniors. Not because they don’t understand something, but rather if something isn’t clear, like a result of an action, they won’t tap/click into it like younger people. Exploration isn’t something they care to waste their time on in your app or website. They need to know what will happen after an action is taken or they’ll ditch your product.

as the saying goes; “Don’t Make Me Think”. This is especially true for seniors. Not because they don’t understand something, but rather if something isn’t clear, like a result of an action, they won’t tap/click into it like younger people. Exploration isn’t something they care to waste their time on in your app or website. They need to know what will happen after an action is taken or they’ll ditch your product. Memory: back to the rule of “Don’t Make Me Think” comes “Don’t Make Me Remember”. If someone has to memorize how to perform an action, they probably won’t remember it. For seniors this is even more true. Clearly labeling actions someone can take in your UI will help guide them effortlessly, even if they use your app or site daily.

There’s a few others I know I’m forgetting at the moment, I know it, but these are the biggest accessibility reminders I’ve learned when designing for seniors. Here’s the catch though: these are not exclusive to seniors.

A coworker of mine mentioned that if you design something that’s easy to use for seniors, then it’ll naturally be easy to use for everyone else. It’s true though — why should someone who’s younger have to think harder about how to use your product? For what, some prettier UI that’s going to win you a shiny award? You can still design beautiful interfaces while meeting our basic human needs of interaction.

Everybody wants a beautiful product

Speaking of beautiful designs, don’t think for a moment that everything has to look like those god-awful Jitterbug phones when you design for an older population. I learned this lesson first-hand when I started as a UX designer and tried to repress the 10+ years of visual designer in me to focus purely on usability. Seniors, just like all of us, expect to have gorgeous digital products that they can take pride in using (and show off to friends).

Don’t think for a moment that everything has to look like those god-awful Jitterbug phones…

This reality check hit me a few months into my UX designer role when I was testing something we had been working on for a while. I won’t share the details of the project, but what I can say is that when you hear the words, “It’s a bit boring, I don’t think I’d use this.” — it hurts.

There were many other choice words by some delightfully honest seniors during these tests as well as some feedback on other tests we conducted — all of which spoke volumes on how they care about the shiny part of a product just like everyone else. Don’t forget that everyone deserves a visually beautiful experience. They’ll remember your product whether it wowed them or bored them, so don’t be an idiot like I was. Stand for beautiful design — your users will thank you for it.

Read between the lines

In my opinion, the aging population is one of the best groups of people to design products for. I came to realize this the more I surveyed, talked to, and tested designs with seniors. Like all of us, they can be brutally honest when discussing what they like or didn’t like about a product, but more often than not I found them to be extremely polite and conscious to my feelings as a designer.

This was not a good thing.

When it comes to feedback from my users, I want brutal honesty. I want whoever I’m designing for to tell me why they can’t stand using something I created. This is how we improve our products — with honest feedback.

Though it might feel nice to get warm fuzzies and hear someone find the good in what is obviously a frustrating experience, it doesn’t do the end-user any good in the long run. With seniors I’ve learned to read between the lines. When they hesitate or struggle to find something good, or let out an audible “huff” while searching for something on a screen — I know to mark down that interaction as something that should be fixed.

Don’t get blinded by the kindness, make sure to focus on fixing the pain points of your product.

Technology is helping

This touches a little on the accessibility deal from earlier, but it was something I began to notice pretty quickly when I observed how seniors interact with computers, phones, and tablets. Technology is helping make things accessible to more people than ever.

I often observe seniors utilizing the larger font settings on their phones, bookmarking webpages at an exponential rate to remember where things are, and ditching computers for the much more portable tablets. It’s clear that while we might think technology is getting more complicated (and it is), it’s also becoming more flexible and easier to use for people of all types.

This means that when we design for seniors, we should really understand how they’re using technology and what tech they’re actually using. If you think that most older adults use Jitterbug phones, you’re wrong. From my observations, it’s actually iPhones and iPads that are used the most by seniors. Though it might be a generation or two behind the latest model, the point is that these devices can be tailored to seniors just as much as those other atrocious devices that are stuck in a bias mentality.

Enjoy every moment

This last thing I learned over the past few years of designing for senior citizens revolves around they joy of learning about someone different than you. A lot of us designers can find exciting challenges in nearly any job we take, but becoming obsessed with our users brings a certain amount of extra delight to our job. In fact, it becomes less of a job and more of a Really Awesome Thing I Get To Be a Part Of™.

When I started to really understand the capabilities of this population and how exciting it was designing for someone decades older than me, I wanted to learn as much as I could about them. I enjoy reading studies and books on the aging population now, especially when it revolves around technology. An example would be books like The Longevity Economy that have opened my eyes to the possibility of what my team and I can tap into.

So enjoy who you’re designing for and keep these lessons in mind, no matter what age you design for. These things I talked about today don’t just apply to seniors, but when you dig deep you realize that they apply to every type of person we design for. Product designers design for people and people are wonderfully complicated creatures.

Be obsessed. Be open. Have fun.