Designing Music for Smartwatches
Master's thesis research that laid the groundwork for Spotify's wearable app strategy
Context
As a master's thesis student at Spotify, I researched how people find and control music on small wearable screens. Its output, a set of design guidelines and interaction patterns, later fed into Spotify's official smartwatch apps.
Research & Discovery
I started with stakeholder interviews and a competitive scan of smartwatch music players to understand the landscape.
Then I recruited and interviewed 20 U.S. users, mapping their behavior into personas, journeys and user stories.
Design & Prototyping
To test in realistic conditions, I built Axure and web prototypes that played real music on a wrist-mounted iPhone, a working stand-in for a smartwatch.
Across five rounds of prototyping and testing I validated the core hypotheses and refined the button-mapping patterns.
Results & Outcomes
1st
Spotify wearables research
1st
Spotify wearables guidelines
1
Published master thesis
The study surfaced gestures and UI patterns that product teams later picked up across multiple smartwatch platforms.
It was published as the thesis "Designing a User-Centered Music Experience for the Smartwatch", Spotify's first wearables research and first set of wearable guidelines.
I carried the work into my Spotify internship across Garmin, Wear OS, Fitbit and Apple Watch.
Endorsement
“Oscar rapidly generated ideas, fearlessly gathered feedback, and structured user studies that led to real impact. His self-determination and product sense impressed everyone.”
