How NetEase’s AR Platform Redesign Boosted User Experience and Business Collaboration

NetEase Insight is an AR platform built by NetEase’s AR team for mobile devices, offering a complete ecosystem from AR content creation to publishing on the Insight client or SDK.

Redesign Overview

The article uses the Insight client redesign as a case study to show how designers led the revamp, outlining three stages: discover problems, reverse‑engineer features, and redesign.

1. Discover Problems

Designers experienced the product purposefully to verify usability, consistency, and flow, recording pain points.

Target users were invited to test, revealing curiosity but also frustration.

Key issues identified:

Long AR content access path.

Lack of instructional guidance.

Inability to assess creator capabilities.

Insufficient product feature and brand communication.

Basic visual design inconsistencies.

These translate to low efficiency, poor content transmission, and weak product quality perception.

2. Reverse‑Engineer Features

Stakeholder goals were mapped:

Clients (AR content demand side): Need quick matching with suitable creators; current brief creator profiles hinder selection.

Creators (AR content producers): Seek more exposure and business opportunities; limited sharing mechanisms reduce reach.

General C‑side users: Want to interact, capture, and share AR content; current visual and interaction design does not encourage sharing.

Resulting problem summary: low efficiency and poor referral effect.

3. Design Reconstruction

Design goals derived from the above analysis:

Improve AR experience efficiency.

Facilitate business cooperation.

Highlight AR characteristics.

Enhance overall platform quality.

Goal 1: Improve AR Experience Efficiency

Solution 1 – Add instructional guidance: Introduce an onboarding tutorial that demonstrates basic gestures, reducing the learning curve and sparking interest.

Solution 2 – Optimize content download flow: Pre‑load first‑screen AR assets on Wi‑Fi, limit package size, and auto‑clear old content to shorten wait times.

Solution 3 – Introduce gesture navigation: Replace bottom navigation with swipe gestures, hide the top bar on upward scroll, and add long‑press shortcuts for share and favorite.

Goal 2: Facilitate Business Cooperation

Solution 1 – Creator homepage: Display all AR works of a creator for better evaluation.

Solution 2 – Direct AR content sharing: Enable sharing of AR experiences and creator pages to improve outreach.

Goal 3: Highlight AR Characteristics

Use parallax and multi‑frame techniques to simulate 3D depth on mobile screens, allowing users to view models from different angles by tilting the device.

Goal 4: Enhance Platform Quality

Refine visual style based on product attributes, establishing a premium aesthetic that aligns with the brand’s positioning as a high‑quality AR content platform.

Outcome and Reflection

The redesign was presented in a proposal meeting, emphasizing clear design rationale, user‑centered goals, and measurable improvements. Post‑approval steps include fine‑tuning, rollout planning, and ongoing user feedback to iterate further.

Designers reported increased influence, better communication skills, broader project perspective, and a stronger sense of achievement.