Bluetooth UI Redesign

From AirPods to Alexa and from refrigerators to cars, it seems like there’s no shortage of devices that can be made wireless. More so than ever new devices that enter the market likely will try to connect to your devices regardless of the practicality of pairing. There is no doubt that bluetooth provides us with the freedom to go wireless, however as the number of bluetooth devices in our lives continues to increase so does the difficulty to manage them.

For many users, one of the most annoying things related to bluetooth is controlling which bluetooth device has priority over others. In fact to many it often seems like these devices have a mind of their own as these devices fight to become the superior connection. Additionally as bluetooth devices become as prevalent in industries like healthcare as business these annoying connection management issues begin to really cause some harm.

Take this standard bluetooth management interface found on iOS devices. As shown, my phone has no problem with being connected to multiple devices. However this interface provides no opportunity for users to rank devices that they are connected to. Also there is no way to search or filter this list of devices, whether that’s by type of device or name. It’s time for users to stop worrying about their bluetooth devices behaving uncontrollably which often leads to users forgetting devices or turning bluetooth off entirely. It’s time to redesign the bluetooth interface and put the control back into the hands of the user.

Bluetooth Interface Redesign

The interface redesign that I came up with adds a few key features to the bluetooth management page seen above. Most importantly it allows users to prioritize all of the devices they’ve connected to in the past, defining which device gets preference as the user connects to them in the future. Furthermore, the user has the ability to refresh the current connectivity to devices. This would come in handy whenever the ranked list changes or whenever the user is automatically connected to a new device. Last but not least the design adds in search functionality to allow users to quickly find the bluetooth device they are looking for. Here’s a look at the redesign:

To me and many others bluetooth serves a vital role in our daily lives. However as the world continues to go wireless the ways in which we manage our devices is going to have to improve.