UX
USER RESEARCH // PROTOTYPE DESIGN // DAILY CONNECTION RITUAL
Connecting Through a Daily Activity: Word Up
A daily-word app that helps friends and family across all distances answer one small question: how was your day?
CONTEXT
TIMELINE
TEAM
CONTRIBUTIONS
01 / CONTEXT
Word Up is a mobile app for friends and family. Every day the group gets the same word. Each person shares how it showed up in their day with a sentence, a photo or a song, and once you've answered, you see everyone else's as they come in.
TODAY’S WORD
noun · wurd-UP
A daily word your group answers together; an easy, regular way to help answer the question, "how was your day?"
02 / CHALLENGE
The longer the gap between check-ins, the bigger the question feels, and the harder it is to answer.
Where do you begin?
How might we…
connect long-distance groups through
convenient, frequent & emotionally impactful interactions?
In other words: help people answer how was your day?
03 / Process
We looked at how people already keep up with each other and scored each example on the three things a good check-in needs:
None of the existing options covered all three.
How long do these existential prompting questions actually take to answer? It’s a high effort routine that is easy to fall out of.
Testing & iterations
We cut three other features because they didn’t explicitly support our design question.
We tested Word Up over several rounds, and each round we tried different iterations of the word pool. Every version split the room. The people it didn’t win over were our target users: word lovers, daily learners and reflectors. So we cut all three versions.
IDEA TESTED
Word Category packs
The group picks a theme like sports or pop culture, and every daily word comes from it.
WHAT WE HEARD
Some testers found it entertaining. Others were flat on it, asking "how can a word pack be relevant to everyone in the group, every time?"
DECISION
✕ Cut
A themed word is a familiar word. The challenge associated with the game would be weakened.
IDEA TESTED
A pool seeded by the group’s play
The group’s own play builds the starting word pool, so every word is relevant to them.
WHAT WE HEARD
Fun for some. The people who came for new words weren’t interested.
DECISION
✕ Cut
Words you already use can’t stretch your thinking. It traded the challenge for potential relevance.
IDEA TESTED
User-submitted words
Our compromise: players add a word to the dictionary, and it can come back later as a daily word.
WHAT WE HEARD
Still split, and it raised a new question: does this bias the game?
DECISION
✕ Cut
It tilts the pool toward whoever submits most, and away from one shared, random word.
The test we kept coming back to: does it support convenient, frequent, emotionally impactful check-ins?
WHAT TESTING TAUGHT US
Each idea sparked conversation, but none of them helped anyone answer the question: “How was your day?” Cutting each of these features sharpened our argument: a random, advanced daily word gives just enough of a prompt to answer, without boxing in the response.
Testing didn’t just change our features. It clarified who we were designing for.
04 / EVIDENCE
Our design worked best for three kinds of people.
Word lovers
People who like word games and vocabulary.
“
I could see myself using this with someone close to me like my girlfriend. I like words, she likes words, it’s a win.
Usability tester
Daily learners
People drawn to a small daily dose of learning.
“
I think my parents would like it. The fact that English is their second language kind of makes it like a game for them.
Usability tester
Reflectors
People looking for reflection and mindfulness.
“
My family is big on sharing our peaks and valleys. I could see us using the app for that.
Usability tester
And people thought it was fun:
“
Wait, I love that. I would actually use that.
Tester
“
I like it! It totally seems like something my family would do together!
Tester
“
I really like this idea because it promotes mindfulness and reflecting on your day.
Tester
“
I like this idea! Do you need a VC?
Tester
05 / Solution
One word a day, answered together. Every day the group gets the same word, each person shares how it showed up in their day, and everyone’s answers are revealed together. Each part of the app answers one of the three criteria.
Click screen to enlarge
01
Today
Answers: Convenience
The word lands on the lock screen, so there is nothing to plan or remember. A single word is a smaller ask than “tell me everything,” and it can be answered in under a minute.
“
I would definitely use this with my friends back at home as a different way to connect because we barely even talk as is.
Usability tester
ITERATIon from testing
We added the lock screen widget after testers said they didn’t want the effort of opening the app just to check the word at the start of the day. After adding the widget, the issue was no longer raised in subsequent tests.
Click screen to enlarge
02
Calendar
Answers: Frequency
A new word every day keeps check-ins small and regular, so nothing piles up. The calendar records each day the group showed up, and a streak gives people a reason to come back tomorrow.
“
I love the streak feature. I feel like it would motivate me to come back every day.
Usability tester
iteration from testing
Testers were initially unsure how Word Up worked. We added the calendar page, and it helped the concept click right away.
Click screen to enlarge
03
Dictionary
Answers: Emotional impact
Answers come as text, photos and songs, with reactions instead of comment threads. Over time the dictionary becomes a record of the group’s words and the moments attached to them.
“
You get a word that’s somehow cute or connects to an experience we’ve had together; that’s huge.
Usability tester
iteration from testing
The dictionary icon first lived outside the nav bar, in the word definition box, and testers couldn’t find it or weren’t sure what it was. Moving it into the nav bar cleared up their confusion in subsequent tests.
06 / REFLECTION
What the project taught me:
(A)
This product is not for every user, and that's okay.
By catering to every piece of user feedback, sometimes a product loses its focus. Identifying our core users (word lovers, daily learners and reflectors) led to intentional design decisions about what Word Up should and shouldn't be.
(B)
Rapid prototyping (made possible by AI) is key.
We used Claude Code for Figma wireframing and Cursor for prototype app development. Rapid prototyping made testing easier, giving users something to work with rather than an idea to give feedback on. Prototyping a solution first and then working backwards meant every round of testing showed us what to keep, what to cut, and what was missing.
(C)
A great solution is worth nothing if you can't communicate it.
My team spent lots of time on our presentation because the audience would only get a few minutes with Word Up. They needed to feel the problem before they would care about the answer, so we built the story around one question everyone recognizes: how was your day?
Because, maybe even just a little, everyone wants to be asked, and to answer,