PRODUCT DESIGN CASE STUDY
UX Overhaul in Galaxy Enhance-X
ROLE
Design Lead
TIMELINE
3 months
TEAM
HQ UX (Korea), PMs, Engineering & Testing
Enhance-X is Samsung’s downloadable photo and video editor for experimental features, first launched in 2021. In 2023, a re-launch was decided. For this, a UX revamp was planned, that I was given to lead. We worked as a team of 3 designers, with frequent discussions with senior stakeholders, product managers, and the development team.
DOWNLOADS SINCE RELAUNCH
1.3M+
Within 15 months of the June 2023 relaunch
BACKGROUND
Our aims for this revamp
There were multiple issues with the older app version, which we sought to fix, and the app also needed to align to Samsung's latest design system. A major task we had, however, was figuring out navigation within the app, for a list of features that was ever-increassing.
01
Align with One UI 6
Enhance-X needed to visually and structurally match Samsung’s native editor, since well-performing features here would eventually graduate into that editor.
02
Fix a “More” menu that couldn’t scale
The app was adding features faster than its current navigation could handle — most of the catalog was buried one tap deep, with no logic separating what got a top-level spot.
03
Clean up UX backlog
A long list of usability issues were identified, and this was our opportunity to fix them
APPROACH
Understanding what we need to fix
The app we inherited
Before any of the fixes below, this is what was shipped in 2021, the older version of the Enhance-X app:
Splash screen
Landing page
Main editing screen
More menu pop-up
Second-depth for any feature
To begin with, we conducted a full heuristics analysis and quick user testing to furnish a comprehensive list of usability issues in the existing app. We also collected issues that had been mentioned in the comments in the app store, and flagged by stakeholders. We then used a severity/effort matrix to prioritise the fixes. I have used 12 of the issues shown below to demonstrate our process:
01
Lack of feature information or explanation
02
Increase-resolution feature is hard to find
03
“+” icon for a new image isn’t intuitive
04
CTA on landing page doesn’t match app visuals
05
Misleading value slider — only applies discrete values
06
No micro-interactions indicating taps
07
Landing page is an unnecessary extra step
08
Feature icons aren’t explanatory of function
09
“Save” at second depth misleadingly implies saved
10
Before/after slider breaks at extreme ends
11
Crop is separated from the other tools
12
No distinction between upfront and “More” features
Prioritizing by severity and effort
Each issue was then plotted against severity (how much it broke the user experience, and how often it came up during testing) and the effort required (from both design and engineering) to fix it, then worked top-left outward with stakeholders.
Low Effort
Medium Effort
High Effort
High Severity
09
01
10
Medium Severity
05
11
08
02
12
Low Severity
03
04
06
07
A few of these issues were to be fixed in either the visual One UI 6 alignment, or through the "More" menu redesign. The remaining, based on priority, were picked up in the final phase of UX fixes.
SOLUTION
Our work, in 3 parts
We worked on the 3 directions mostly simultaneously, in the interest of time. Each solution underwent multiple rounds of review with seniors and was then presented to the stakeholders.
PART 1 — ONE UI 6 ALIGNMENT
Updating the visual identity
Because Enhance-X’s best features were destined to migrate into Samsung’s native editor, the app needed to speak the same visual language. Further, One UI 6 had shifted Samsung’s app identities from flat colour to gradients, layered blur, and asymmetric layouts — Enhance-X’s older flat-purple identity was now out of step with every other app on the phone.
Changes in other apps
OUR VISUAL ITERATIONS
We ultimately fixed on the following gradient, to try to maintain the existing identity as far as possible, while also aligning with the new guidelines.
Old app icon
Updated app icon
We also played around with the other key themes of One UI 6, like asymmetry and blurs, to enhance the experience of Enhance-X, while carrying through the identity across the rest of the app.
OLd Splash Screen
New Splash Screen
PART 2 — REDESIGNING THE “MORE” MENU
Why it couldn't sustain
Every feature past the first 4 was added to a single 'More' pop-up. It had three compounding issues: lower discoverability for those features, no real distinction between upfront and “More” features, and no scalability as the catalog kept growing. The issue with scalability was our biggest concern. With Enhance-X being positioned as a testbed, a large number of features would keep being added to the app, and dumping all of them into an ever-growing 'More' menu wasn't acceptable.
Main editing screen — “More” buried at the end
The old “More” pop-up itself
Exploring the options
We began by ideating on possible layouts, to figure out the best way to display all features.
We weighed a number of structural directions before settling on Feature Categorization, because it was structurally consistent with the native editor, intuitive for existing Samsung and Google users, and scalable as the catalog grew.
Creating the categories
With a number of incredibly diverse features, it was hard to find obvious similarities on the basis of which they could be grouped. We wanted categories that matched how users actually think about their editing tasks. We ran a competitor analysis across multiple photo-editing mobile apps, and took our observations to create rough categories. We also performed a quick card-sorting exercise with 8 participants, which helped us refine the categories further, from the point-of-view of an actual user.
LAYOUT EXPLORATIONS
Horizontal scroll for all features
Divide the features into categories
Vertical scroll for all features
Suggested features upfront + pull-up tray for the rest
COMPETITOR RESEARCH
Consistent categorized interface
Categorized, divided by lines
Long scroll, no division
Similar tools placed together
“I don’t know when to use which feature.”
This was the most common complaint we had heard during our earlier user testing, and categorization alone didn’t solve it. We considered info icons and inline tutorials, but neither addressed it directly. Instead we introduced Suggestions as the first category, which used AI to recommended features based on the input photo. This change alone significantly boosted the usage of features like 'Fix Moire', which till then, our users had never looked for, or known to use.
The final categories
PART 3 — OTHER SMALLER CHANGES
Three more fixes, worked in detail
Landing page
before
AFTER
PROBLEM
Upon opening the app, users landed on an interstitial screen which did not serve much purpose, containing only a CTA that didn’t match the rest of the app’s visual identity
FIX
Redesigned the landing page and aligned its CTA with the new app identity, rather than removing the step outright.
WHY IT WORKS
Creates genuine interest and curiosity for the app, instead of being seen as an annoyance.
Increase resolution
before
AFTER
PROBLEM
The Increase Resolution (Upscale) feature was placed within the Save workflow, and not with the other image editing features, leading to confusion for users that came particularly for upscaling.
FIX
Increase Resolution was placed with the rest of the features within the categories, specifically within the Transform category
WHY IT WORKS
Increases discoverability, and also lets users increase resolution first, then apply other edits on top — which is sometimes the preferred order.
Tap microinteraction
before
AFTER
PROBLEM
Taps had no feedback, inconsistent with the rest of Samsung’s app ecosystem.
FIX
Added a reactive tap state across interactive elements.
WHY IT WORKS
Tells the user a tap has registered, with clear visual feedback.
OUTCOME
Launch and Reception
The updated Enhance-X launched in June 2023 with the changes we made. It was met with a wholly positive response, with the release being covered by multiple tech blogs and vloggers, like Jimmy is Promo and Velian Speaks Tech.
By September of 2024, the app had amassed 1.4 million downloads, a huge win for Samsung Research Bangalore, as an app designed and developed entirely in-house.
Enhance-X in the Galaxy Appstore
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