8 Design Guidelines for Complex Super Apps

Despite great diversity in the services and target users, designing super apps requires a well-planned workflow. The key is to excite the user about its ability to solve any delivery problems without putting forward too much information at once. In this blog, find eight guidelines for designing a rich and attractive super app.

Introduction

Super apps are gradually taking over the market due to their simplicity, utility, and convenience. While keeping users engaged, super apps are known to save time and minimize the hassle of managing multiple apps. However, designing such an app requires remembering various things. Let’s go over such guidelines in a streamlined manner.

Super Apps Design Guidelines

Super App design combines UI and UX design and follows the same style as a normal mobile app. Here, the main difference is the range of services bundled into one platform. For instance, food, grocery, medicine delivery, ride-hailing, car wash, or beauty salon service can be found in Super Apps.

Many popular Super Apps have been on the market for quite some time, such as Gojek, Grab, Rappi, Careem, and much more. Despite being labeled as highly intuitive apps, they have followed a specific navigational pattern and user-friendly home screen UI. So, how do you design an excellent super app?

Break Down Complex Actions

Super apps bundle many services into one platform, which can overwhelm users. Therefore, you should break large tasks into bite-sized steps so users aren't faced with everything. For example, break checkout payment forms into separate pages for shipping, billing, payment details, etc. Moreover, use visual guides like arrows or highlights to direct attention. You can also make font sizes and color contrast high so essential elements stand out on each screen.

Maintain Consistent Navigation

Use common navigation menus, icons, and screen flows so your app feels intuitive. You can do this by allowing swiping between pages, having prominent "back" buttons, and ensuring the "X" icon only ever closes screens. Adhere to platform-specific design guidelines published by Apple and Google for ideal navigation standards. Remember that the app testers use these guidelines to check the app’s overall features and functionality.

Follow Basic App and Navigation Laws

Use the "3 click rule" to allow users to access any part of your app within 3 clicks or touches from the home screen. Here, you must strive to make the user feel closer to what it intends to be in the app by three touches. This will continue the cycle without making the user feel disbanded. Moreover, keep menus streamlined and use universally understood icons and symbols for standard functions like search, user profile, etc., so users recognize them instantly. Don't reinvent what "X" buttons or other familiar buttons or icons do; the function should match user expectations.

Prioritize Important Content

Depending on the format, structure information follows F or Z pattern scanning models for web pages. Call out the most useful elements prominently through increased size, contrast, color, etc., in areas where users will look first. Using this pattern, Super Apps will provide clear, descriptive labels for menu items and products to showcase the differences between options.

Maintain Brand Consistency

Buttons, icons, and form fields should all align with the color schemes, fonts, and stylistic choices that reinforce your brand identity. If the app mirrors an existing site or products, keep navigation controls working similarly. Don't confuse users unnecessarily.

Minimize User Input

Don't ask for unnecessary login or personal details upfront when opening the app. Let users access some functionality freely first. Replace free text fields with select menus, radio buttons, and other structured input formats with validation rules for less typing. To auto-populate data, use device functionality like cameras for scanning ID cards, barcodes, etc.

Optimize For Fast Loading

Use caching, compression, streaming, and other technical methods for fast loading times under seconds. Moreover, you can also rapidly display placeholder content, like skeleton layouts. Hence, the user knows something is happening even if full data hasn't yet been loaded. Furthermore, these design guidelines also entertain users with animated loops, progress bars, and distracting visuals while loading large chunks of data.

Design For All Users And Devices

Layouts should automatically scale from mobile app portrait mode to landscape orientation on 12-inch tablets. You can achieve this by limiting text line length and using ample line height that supports vision-impaired users through additional aids, captioning, etc. You don’t have to rely solely on color to convey meaning. Use color as a byproduct of a good design system in Super Apps.

Starting A Super Business With a Super App

Super apps allow businesses to sell products and services directly on one platform, leading to increased sales and revenue. Through in-app advertising, Super Apps also offer opportunities for businesses to monetize by showing ads to their engaged user base.

However, from a design perspective, users are using Super Apps to perform an action. If they can’t do what they want easily, they might close your app and never return. Therefore, prove value by immediately giving users what they want and trying to make a great first impression once they open your app. They shouldn’t view the task as a chore that needs to be done. In other words, the design should be effortless.

For instance, the checkout process should ask users to fill in information in multiple steps instead of all at once. Moreover, your design should make it clear what the user needs to do and use visual aids like a highlight or arrow to explain what needs to be done. Design your super apps to allow the user to focus on the most important elements on the screen. You can do so by increasing the font size and contrasting the color well with the background color.

Conclusion

A great design is the perfect combination of elegance and performance, and that is exactly what you should aim for when building Super Apps. But don’t try to build a perfectly designed app on the first attempt. Use customer feedback to reach the final product, treat your app as a continually evolving project, and use user feedback to improve the experience.