Samsung Food: Health Dashboard

Context

Engagement in Samsung Food stopped at recipe discovery and planning: no retention loop beyond them, and the app positioned as a consumer food tool.

The goal was to integrate Samsung wearable data with our food database across the app lifecycle, from meal discovery to planning to the profile, to create a positive engagement loop.

Mapping the brief

Food tracking was about to land in the app. Tracking and meal planning were separate workstreams I was leading in parallel; this one picked up where they ended. Once we hold a user’s intake data, how do we return value on it and sustain a healthy habit loop?

I started by mapping the brief to experiences. Each objective (foster engagement, align inspiration with goals, celebrate milestones) became a candidate experience (consumption over time, guidance where habits fall short, badges), and each experience became a set of concrete ideas. The mapping stayed at the top of the first iteration for the whole of round one, so every screen on the board traced back to an objective.

01Round one

The inferred score

Round one focused on meal plan and profile integration. The primary metric was an inferred nutrition score: a single ring on the profile with a qualitative verdict (“You can do better”) and a line of guidance. Below it, last week’s meals tagged by inferred deficit (low fibre, high fat), and recommended meals selected to move the score.

Around it we explored quick views, placement across the app, and home feed modules: tracking helpers, nutrition-based suggestions, post-workout ideas, trend and goal cards, achievements and streaks. Some of the gamification patterns were borrowed from Samsung Health, where quantified energy saving had performed well.

How the iteration ran

Each iteration is one Figma page, reviewed with the product triad (PO, dev, design), and the next iteration builds on the outcome. Iterations labelled DR were design reviews with the wider team. Each DR opened with a structured ask: what you like and do not want removed, questions, what you would improve, in that order. It kept feedback actionable and kept reviews from collapsing into taste.

Concept tests

I run user research across the full design process, with two distinct purposes.

This round was to inform. We ran moderated interviews with our own users; in each session the researcher showed several concepts for the same feature and probed what worked, what was confusing, and what was missing. I built the concept boards and the prototypes used in the sessions.

Descoping to hard metrics

The concept tests surfaced something the plan had not anticipated: the POs disagreed on what should power the main user-facing metric. It had been scoped and designed as an inferred score, but there was no agreed answer to the question beneath it: inferred from which inputs, by which model, and who owns that model.

This is the decision I would point to if asked what the lead role added here. The design work held up. Descoping most of it and shipping the hard-metric version first is what got the feature released.

02Round two

Trends

Round two took the simpler approach with the nearer win: nutrition and meal trends on the profile, so users can read their progress over time. Apple Fitness trends were the reference. Weekly bars per macro, a goal line, and a trend row beneath (carbs, protein, fat, fibre, meals tracked, meals planned).

The open question was chart form. Bars were already in delivery as part of dashboard improvements; rings were closer to Samsung Health. I put both on the board in light and dark and asked the team directly: is moving to rings worth the effort, and should both ship with a user toggle? Three chart variants went to users to answer the first part.

The final iteration in this cycle is the post-DR pass, with feedback from the wider team and the Samsung Health team incorporated. It also carried the first treatment of the Plus subscription inside the trends page, kept clear of the free view.

Usability and comprehension

Once direction was agreed, the designs went back to users to validate. Moderated usability and comprehension sessions: can users read the chart, do they understand the goal line, do they know the next action. I supported the researcher in building the tasks and the studies.

03Handoff

Into the design system

The agreed designs were rebuilt as design system components and mapped into ready-for-dev iterations, reviewed and iterated with engineering. Handoff iterations document components by state rather than happy-path screens: the weekly progress card with one macro and with all macros, goals set and unset, empty, loading, and the upsell. The feature was split out of the wider Food Diary Dashboard work and taken through three product and dev sprints.

What was cut, and what shipped

Every cut had the same rationale. Everything on the left depended on an inference model the team had not agreed. Everything on the right depended only on data the user had already entered.

Outcome

After the feature shipped, wellness became a core part of the Samsung Food experience, with strong user adoption. The profile dashboard was the first piece of it to reach users. By IFA 2024 Samsung was describing Food+ as “integrating a health profile and goals, providing personalized meal plans with recipe recommendations”, and the meal planner page still leads with weekly progress: see what is working and what is not.