new technologies Articles & Videos

  • How AI Works and How Users Think About It: Study Guide

    Unsure where to start? Use this collection of links to our articles and videos to learn about how artificial intelligence works, and how users think about it.

  • Designing AI Products and Features: Study Guide

    Unsure where to start? Use this collection of links to our articles and videos to learn about recommendations for designing AI products and features.

  • Artificial Intelligence: Glossary

    Plain-language definitions of the AI terms that come up in product and design work, from tokens and context windows to agents, evals, and prompt injection.

  • How to Decide When an AI Tool Is Worth Keeping

    Pressure to adopt AI isn't evidence that a tool helps. The PROVE framework tests one tool against one task and produces a provisional decision you can defend.

  • Designing AI Agents: 4 Lessons from China’s Qwen Agent

    A study of Qwen's AI agent reveals 4 design lessons: support discoverability, reuse familiar patterns, handle personal data carefully, and protect user autonomy.

  • Humanizing AI Is a Trap

    LLMs humanize by design. Adding personality/emotion amplifies risk. Design real tools, not fake friends.

  • Explainable AI in Chat Interfaces

    Explanation text in AI chat interfaces is intended to help users understand AI outputs, but current practices fall short of that goal.

  • AI-Assisted Prototyping: Promise and Pitfalls

    AI tools turn static designs into working prototypes fast, but speed can mask flaws. Use them to explore, not as a final product.

  • The VR Hype Cycle: Lessons for the Age of AI

    Hype happens when messaging becomes divorced from good experiences. Learning from the virtual reality hype cycle can help us avoid future distractions.

  • Initial Impressions of ChatGPT’s Agent: Successful, Shaky, and Slow

    ChatGPT’s agent successfully booked a restaurant reservation. But the process was time-consuming and vulnerable to misunderstandings and errors.

  • Wizard of Oz Method in UX

    There are five steps to run the Wizard of Oz Method, a moderated research method in which a user interacts with an interface that appears to be automated but is actually controlled to some degree by a person.

  • When Should We Trust AI? Magic-8-Ball Thinking

    It’s easy to place too much trust in genAI tools. Use only information you can verify or recognize to be true.

  • The Smartwatch Notification Formula

    Maximize the value of your smartwatch notifications by making them personally relevant, appropriately timed, non-repetitive, and sufficiently informative.

  • New Users Need Support with Generative-AI Tools

    First-time users of Chinese gen-AI chatbots struggled to understand the tools’ functionality. Better onboarding is necessary to avoid confusion.

  • The UX of AI: Lessons from Perplexity

    The NN/g UX Podcast featured Henry Modisett, head of design at Perplexity AI, who shared how to make AI tools usable and efficient for information seeking.

  • Should You Build a Smartwatch App?

    Applications native to smartwatch operating systems get used the most. Just because a new smartwatch app could offer basic functionality, it does not mean that users will find it valuable.

  • 6 Types of Useful Smartwatch Interactions

    Smartwatches are for more than just receiving notifications and tracking steps. They afford at least 6 different types of interactions that users find useful.

  • Virtual Queues: 13 Best Practices for Managing the Wait

    Well-designed virtual queues help manage the wait to free up users to do other things.

  • ChatGPT Lifts Business Professionals’ Productivity and Improves Work Quality

    In a study of business professionals using ChatGPT to write business documents, task time decreased, while rated quality improved substantially.

  • How Much UX Do You Need?

    Spend more on UX design projects that have a higher risk of failure from bad design or a higher payoff from great design.