DAZN: Downloads

Context

In mid 2016 DAZN’s product design team split its work between the launch in the DACH markets and the features planned to follow it, among them the sports schedule, a new navigation, event tiles, alerts and downloads.

In the July 2016 leadership review, the brief for downloads was a one-tap download of any available video from the player, and later from browse, with automatic downloads of the teams and sports a user follows. The navigation brief in the same review, a native pattern with room for downloads, following and a schedule, is the subject of Navigation v2.

Mapping the downloads tab

I worked through a series of quick prototypes, testing versions in internal team workshops and guerrilla sessions, until I settled on a simple section where users manage and watch their downloads, and which explains the feature on their first visit.

Downloads had a tab of its own in the native apps. An empty tab shows a line on downloading catch-up events to watch later, suggestions with a download action on each, and the download settings.

Once there are downloads, they are grouped by state, in the order Ready to watch, Continue watching, Downloading and Watched, with the suggestions and settings after them. The version for the leadership review used the tiles then in the app, in a two-column grid, with only Downloaded and Downloading.

01Round one

Designing each state at eight breakpoints

I drew seven states on both platforms, 46 renders in all: the empty tab, more suggestions loading and loaded, a download in progress, one ready while another downloads, the full list, and the actions on a download.

Each downloaded tile names what the user can do with it: Ready to watch, Resume watching or Watch again. A download in progress shows a blurred image, the time left and a progress bar, and its menu opens Pause download and Cancel download over the tile. The bin on a tile and the Clear button on a section remove downloads.

On phones each section is a carousel, and pulling past the last suggestion loads more. The iPad and the 600 dp Android tablet show the suggestions as a two-column grid with Load more. Android has its tabs at the top, under a Watch app bar.

02Round two

Moving downloads into Navigation v2

Downloads stayed in the tab bar in Navigation v2. The tile of a download in progress now has a cancel button and a pause button ringed by its progress. A finished download moves up into Ready to play, above the ones still running, and a removed download can be brought back with Undo. In the iOS presentation to Apple in January 2017, downloads was the only flow marked as a future release. Downloads used the same tiles as the home page, so I redesigned them while working on it, and the result replaced the old tiles across the service.

Downloads could also start from a tile. On an event still live, the tile’s options offer add, play and a scheduled download, a download icon with a clock. In Settings, each team, player or competition a user follows lists Alerts and Downloads, the automatic downloads in the brief.

Downloading from the player

The player came first in the brief. A colleague mapped that flow in July 2016 by what the user is watching and what can be downloaded now or later. In the 2017 player states for iOS and Android, a sheet offers highlights or the full game with the size of each, or only the full game while highlights are not ready. An event not yet available can be queued with its expected time, and a download on a full device ends in a message to free up space.

03Round three

Rebuilding the list around storage

In Navigation v2.1 I redrew the tab for iPhone, on the Sketch page kept for its InVision prototype, with Search in the tab bar and cast and edit in the header.

My handover includes the v2 icon font, exported for iOS and each Android density, with glyphs for download, scheduled download, pause, bin, edit and undo.

Outcome

Downloads was still marked as a future release in January 2017, and v2.1 was the last version I drew. After I left, DAZN was trialling downloads with some users in Japan by June 2019, with a choice of full match or highlights and a Download tab (Appllio).