2026 ~ TV app design
Rapid recap
Role
Senior UX Designer
Team
Senior UI Designer
Product manager
Developer squad
Timeline
3 months
Skills
UX Research
UX Design
Product strategy
Workshop facilitation
Accessibility
Brief
Catching up on a live match shouldn't mean missing more of it
When a fan joins a match late, they face an immediate tension: catch up on what they've missed, or jump straight to live and piece it together as they go. Neither option is satisfying. Rapid Recap is designed to resolve that - a short, lean-back catch-up experience that brings fans up to speed quickly, with clear expectations about how long it takes, before handing them seamlessly back to the live broadcast.
I led UX end-to-end, from early discovery through to a fully validated product definition. The feature is designed and ready — with a launch target of early 2027.
Challenge
Catch-up formats already exist. The problem is nobody uses them during a live match.
Traditional recap formats, lists of clips, highlights menus, see low engagement when a game is live. Fans don't browse when a match is in progress; they want to get back to it as quickly as possible.
The challenge was to design something that felt genuinely different: low-effort, time-bound, and transparent enough about its duration that fans would feel confident committing to it, knowing they weren't stepping away from live for longer than necessary.
Discovery
Validating that fans want a faster, more guided way back to live
Two phases of research shaped the direction. The first tested comprehension and perceived value against the existing stacked recap format. The second explored how users consume clips during a live context — how they navigate, when they disengage, and what brings them back.
The findings were consistent: fans wanted a quick way to catch up when joining late, preferred auto-play over manual browsing, and needed to know how long the experience would take before they'd commit to it. Time and progress visibility weren't nice-to-haves, they were the deciding factor. Fans needed to know upfront how long recap would take before they'd trust it enough to start.
This established a clear direction: recap as a short, guided experience, not a library to explore.
Design process
Exploring entrypoints based on different use cases
The entry point was as important as the experience itself. Recap needed to appear at the exact moment a fan joins a match, relevant, immediate, and never blocking the path to live. But also, it should serve as a dip-in to relive recent moments without too much time jeopardy, when a moment is missed or wants to be relived, to fuel the game story.
I explored contextual entry points pre-entry, in the overview tab of the FanView sidebar to improve discoverability, and revised the purpose-built recap tab for those who catch up with intention.
Experimenting with AI for initial ideation
To accelerate the early design process, I used tools including Figma Make and Claude to generate white-labelled prototypes using anonymised requirements. Working with AI at this stage gave a perspective largely free of internal bias — it didn't know our product constraints, only the platform, industry, and user stories. That distance produced ideas worth pressure-testing, and helped move the design forward without anchoring too early on familiar patterns.
Establishing a relationship between sidebar and full screen viewing
TV interaction is fundamentally different to mobile or desktop. There's no free-form clicking or tapping — navigation is constrained to focus states, and every extra step carries more weight.
Rapid Recap needed to work in two distinct contexts: full screen playback, and alongside the sidebar. The challenge was making both feel like the same experience, so fans always knew where they were and what to do, without letting the full screen version become cluttered. Bringing too much UI into a full screen view risks invading the content itself, which is exactly what we were trying to support.
The solution was a consistent interaction model that scaled back gracefully in full screen, retaining the essential controls and orientation cues without the weight of the full sidebar treatment.
Outcome
An enhanced recap experience that serves the right needs at the right time
Pre-launch research validated strong demand for a lean-back catch-up experience, with clear preference over existing recap formats. The design is complete, the patterns are established, and the product is scoped for launch in early 2027.
Rapid Recap introduces a new viewing behaviour to the Sky Sports app — one that makes live sport more accessible to fans who can't always be there from the start.
The work delivered:
A fully validated UX concept ready for development
A new lean-back interaction pattern for live sport catch-up
An excitement score model for prioritising AI-generated clip content
A defined entry point that positions recap as part of the live viewing journey
Key decisions
A user-triggered, auto-play flow for optimal full screen catch up
Keeping recap sequential and auto-play removes the decision-making that makes traditional formats feel effortful during a live match. Fans opt in once, then let it run. Control is available, but never required.
Integrating entry points strategically to meet different use cases
Joining a match late, missing a key moment, or filling half time are all different needs with different levels of urgency. A fan joining late can afford a fuller, immersive recap before entering live. Mid-match catch-up is more time-sensitive — entry points need to be discoverable, set clear expectations on duration, and offer an easy route back. Same experience, different context.
Making duration and progress explicit throughout
Fans won't commit to a catch-up experience if they don't know how long it will take. Clear duration upfront and visible progression through clips gives fans the confidence to start — and the reassurance to stay.
An excitement score to manage AI-generated content
AI-generated clips introduce variability in volume and relevance. The excitement score acts as a quality filter — surfacing the moments that matter most and keeping the experience tight, regardless of how much content the pipeline produces.
Reflection
Designing for time, attention, and real-world behaviour
The central insight from this project was simple but easy to underestimate: during a live match, time is the most precious thing a fan has. Any experience that asks them to spend it needs to justify the ask clearly and immediately.
That shaped every decision, from the auto-play flow to the duration indicator to the excitement score. The research validated the demand. The design challenge was building something trustworthy enough to act on it.
Testimonial
Quote