UX design is evolving, and the Middle East is no exception to this. As the MENA region’s median age is 29.6 years old, building personalised solutions that cater to these requirements is essential.
Digital products have the potential to connect people across different cultures and bring people together. Hence, incorporating today’s UX trends is essential to building a successful product able to thrive in this unique and dynamic ecosystem.
Changes in design thinking in the Middle East
The Middle East is witnessing a significant shift towards human-centred design. In the 2022 Fast Company’s Impact Council Meeting, experts agreed that humans should be placed at the centre of services, businesses and products.
The meeting talked about the changed thought processes that finds its way into the user experience trends and dictates how upcoming digital solutions shall be designed.
Another common thread was that design and technology should be viewed as something to help humans achieve more and enrich their lives.
These shifts are fostering greater empathy in design, helping organisations anticipate and meet their customer’s needs.
1. Collaborative design approaches
Designers, developers, product managers, researchers, and even stakeholders are now involved in the design process. As everyone works together, it’s easier to address different unique perspectives and bring different ideas together to create a more comprehensive and user-centric solution.
Hence, companies building digital products for the Middle East must build cross-functional teams, embrace open communication, and practice iterative UX design trends.
2. UX innovation in telecoms
The transformation in telecommunications in the Middle East is shifting the entire region forward. Whether it’s fully automated self-service stores such as “Ease” by e& to well-designed applications like Virgin Mobile UAE that offer a store-like experience, tech innovations in telecom are on a rising path.
The increasing demand for seamless connectivity enables telecom companies to invest in user-centric designs. Hence, the trend is leading companies to build intuitive applications and customer service platforms.
3. More focus on local context
Local context and references find their way into the development of digital products and solutions. As companies understand the specific needs of Middle Eastern customers, the design process is meant to enhance user engagement.
For instance, Careem (a part of Uber) has integrated features that cater to regional transportation needs and preferences.
Latest UI/UX design trends in the Middle East
As UX design evolves, it’s essential for companies to follow the latest trends in UX design, leading them to build human-centric designs.
1. Hyper-personalisation and data-driven design
From virtual reality stations in retail stores to personalising debit and credit cards for customers, companies are creating new experiences for their target audiences.
For instance, in-store experiences are elevated with AR/VR-powered scanning, sharing detailed information about the products and services offered in the store. IKEA’s Virtual Reality Showroom is a prime example here as it lets customers explore different products from different angles in different configurations in situ.
Similarly card personalisation services like the ones offered by Wells Fargo “Card Design Studio” lets bank’s customers add a photograph of their choice on the cards.
Using AI, machine learning, and advanced analytics, designers and businesses are tailoring user experiences that meet their expectations and set industry benchmarks.
Localise recommendations: Middle Eastern audiences are more culturally attached, which means creating solutions with localised references is essential, such as running Ramadan sales and adding Eid-relevant gifts, to their stores. As a result, eCommerce stores should use AI algorithms to analyse customers’ regional shopping patterns and provide product suggestions based on local festivities and events.
On the other hand, streaming services that aim to make a name in the Middle East should also add Arabic content while dynamically adapting recommendations based on the customer’s language preferences and view history. Great examples of streaming services that cater content to a localised Arabic audience include Yango Play, Netflix, and StarzPlay.
Dynamic content: Dynamic content ensures that your customers receive personalised experiences in real time. While this trend is applicable to most industries, it’s more important for eCommerces, Fin-tech, Entertainment, Hospitality and Travel applications that are data-driven, where the customers receive personalised information, dashboards, services, and activities based on user profiles.
Smart assistants and chatbots: AI-powered chatbots and smart assistants in Arabic language should be the standard approach when developing digital solutions for Middle Eastern audiences. However, for this to happen, organisations will need Natural Language Processing (NLP) models fine-tuned to understand regional dialects and cultural expressions.
This is already seen in the Middle East’s banking sector, where customers are getting hyper-personalised services like expense tracking, loan eligibility checks, and financial advice tailored to the user’s history and preferences.
2. Accessibility and inclusivity in design
Creating designs that incorporate audiences of all ages, abilities, and technical maturities is pivotal to a truly inclusive user experience in the Middle East. A brand’s commitment to accessibility and inclusivity ensures digital experiences are equitable and user-friendly for everyone.
Arabic voice interfaces: Voice interaction tailored to Arabic-speaking audiences adds to the digital product’s accessibility. Similarly, applications featuring voice recognition that also understands Arabic regional dialects and colloquialisms can also be integrated with smart home devices further adding to the device’s and app’s inclusivity factor.
For instance, Yasmina, an AI-assistant at par with Alexa is an advanced smart speaker that understands Arabic and English and all their different dialects.
Inclusive design principles: Inclusive design focuses on removing barriers while ensuring seamless usability for users of all ages, groups, and backgrounds. As a result, websites and applications should have adjustable font sizes and high-contrast modes.
3. UX design for super apps
The Middle East is a strong contender to build a one-stop-shop for all digital services, in other words, a superapp. The origins of such applications lie in China and South Korea, where the concept of offering several services through a single application is common.
For instance, WeChat is a superapp in China used for messaging, social sharing, payments, ordering food, eCommerce transactions and more.
The concept of superapps is relatively new to the Middle East, hence as an upcoming user experience trend in the Middle East, it’s important to create a balance between usability, scalability, and consistency.
Create an omni channel experience: To create a seamless omnichannel experience for customers, consistency across multiple platforms is crucial. Start by integrating user data and ensuring that personal information is synchronized across all digital touchpoints.
For example, if your business offers multiple applications or platforms, a user’s preferences, account details, and history should be accessible and consistent across all of them. This ensures that customers experience a unified and personalized interaction, whether they are using a mobile app, website, or in-store system.
Additionally, leveraging advanced analytics and centralized data management can help maintain this continuity and enhance user satisfaction.
A great example of this can be found in Careem, a popular Middle Eastern superapp that offers several services in a single platform,including ride hailing, shopping, food delivery, and cross border payments.
Micro-interactions: Micro-interactions are essential to enhancing user engagement within superapps. such as subtle design animations to nudges for completing an action.
4. Privacy-focused UX design
With the Middle East’s digital ecosystem expanding and users becoming more aware of the importance of data privacy, ethical UX design practices are among the leading UX design trends. Privacy-focused UX design focuses on transparency and complete user control.
Data transparency: When building digital solutions, inform your users how their information is collected, used, stored and shared, if applicable. Several platforms have explicitly highlighted how user data is handled, ensuring compliance with local data protection laws.
- Companies are supposed to establish data protection and compliance programs, including regulatory requirements, data protection, and cybersecurity measures.
- For a transparent invoicing system,in Saudi Arabia h , an electronic invoicing system to facilitate easy transition from paper-based invoicing to digital invoicing. While Zakat refers to the mandatory Islamic religious obligation, in this context ZATCA oversees the implementation of religious and secular financial systems.
Permission-based features: With permission-based UX designs, organisations must prioritise user consent at every stage of interaction. As a result, users now enjoy granular control over applications, enabling them toggle on and off location access, notifications, and personal data sharing.
Security-first design: Security is an essential part of ethical UX design as it ensures the user’s personal information is always protected. Achieve this by adding encryption protocols to safeguard sensitive information and implement two-factor authentication (2FA) and biometric authentication methods to secure access.
not sure this make sense. Zakat looks like is this: “Zakat is an Islamic financial term. As one of the pillars of the faith, it requires all Muslims to donate a portion of their wealth to charity”
Conclusion
By adopting these trends in UX design, applications can be primed for mass adoption and engagement in the Middle East. , empowering organisations to have human-centred user experiences that focus on the region’s cultural, social, and technological context.
To build a user-centric solution, it’s important to know your users, isn’t it? Well, this is where UserQ comes in; we are a leading platform to conduct localised user testing and conduct surveys to help you build relevant and impactful experiences for your target users.
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