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The UX/UI Complications of Common
Applications For The Visually Impaired
Arugollu Rebekah
Dept of computing
Bournemouth university
Dorset, United Kingdom
s5431101@bournemouth.ac.uk
Victor Adesuyi
Dept of computing
Bournemouth university
Dorset, United Kingdom.
s5520755@bournemouth.ac.uk
Abstract - Many visually impaired people find it
burdensome to operate everyday applications
independently. Accessing and interacting with these
applications like SMS, calls, emails, Google maps,
clocks, calendars, browsers, and social media
applications should have essential UX/UI that could
promote self-reliance and independence of visually
impaired people. Some of the major accessibility issues
that need to be considered are font and size of the text,
finding and interpreting icons, the poor focus of google
maps, colour contrasts, poor responsiveness across
devices, financial incapacities etc. This paper evaluates
the complications of these everyday applications and
some specially designed apps for visually impaired
people and provides solutions for a less complex and
usable User experience and User Interface (UX/UI).
The suggested solutions to this research tailor
designers, product managers and government to
support designing for a visually impaired-friendly
interface by improving the user experience for
independence and better living.
Keywords - UX/UI, Visual impairment, accessibility,
design app
I. INTRODUCTION
Visual impairment is a medical condition of the
eye that may cause a person’s difficulty in doing
daily tasks including walking or reading [1].
Macular degeneration associated with old age,
cataracts, diabetic retinopathy, glaucoma, and
uncorrected refractive errors are the main causes of
vision impairment [2]. According to a recent
publication by the World Health Organization
(WHO), among the 2.2 billion people that are
visually impaired or blind across the world, at least
1 billion people, or almost half could have been
treated or have not been addressed [3]. This is seven
times the rate of the number of visually impaired
people in 2012 (WHO 2012) [4]. The increase in the
number of blind and visually impaired people will
have an impact on their quality of life and lead to a
societal imbalance in the future. Disabled people or
people with impairments often find it difficult to
make use of digital equipment. Furthermore, it is
evident that disabled people are often at risk of being
left over in this era of digitization especially when
the websites are poorly designed [5]. As much as
there are advancements in technology and
improvements in accessibility for the visually
impaired, it is not enough, as there should be no
difference in the digital experiences of people with
perfect vision and those who encounter visual
problems [6].
II. PROBLEM STATEMENT
The usage of the present assistive applications for
the visually impaired and blind are in many ways
technical and impractical. The screen reader's ability
to scan easily may be hampered by several features
and interface components. Communication can
suffer greatly from the absence of appropriate
alternate textual (alt-text) treatments for images. The
constraints associated with the visible (interface),
invisible (system), and assistive technologies should
be considered in the designs of the applications
across devices Accessibility is the term used to
describe anyone's ability to enjoy products, services,
and information that are a part of social life,
independent of their physical-motor abilities, social
status, or cultural background [7]. K. Russ [8] said
“Apps for blind and visually impaired now on the
market are considered hard or cannot be used by
many visually impaired people, resulting in low
market penetration. Therefore, we would like to find
out what the service is lacking based on user
experience and accessibility. This research is based
on users' daily life experience, with very thorough
and detailed observation and interviews to find out
userbilities and accessibilities, the essentials of
service and development, for the service provider
and developer”. We will therefore consider some of
the complexities in applications like font, colour
contrast, icons, and responsiveness across devices.
A. Poor Colour contrasts
Contrasts in colour have a big impact on how
people engage with and use applications.
The difference is between the colour contrasts which
makes a design complex to understand and the
colour contrasts which makes a design simple [9].
These play an important role in making a successful
and accessible application. It is crucial to clarify the
word complexity in colours in order to prevent any
confusion and misconception. Generally, too many
colours with dark complexion and with different
wavelengths creates complex colour combination.
They disrupt others and find it difficult to establish
a visual message. Complex colours can ruin simple
designs by making it complex. Only the subject's
visual appearance can be impacted by the
complicated colour choice (e.g., mobile phone
design). It tells of colour palettes that highlight
colour contrast (contrast of hue, contrast of value,
contrast of temperature, complementary contrast,
simultaneous contrast, contrast of saturation, and
contrast of extension).
B. Difficult font
Mobile and web designers frequently fail to
consider the impact that font styles, font designs,
and typography can have on how legible and visible
designs are for viewers who are blind or visually
impaired.
An observation is that the font style does not have
to be complicated or disrupt the design's overall
beauty. It is suitable to choose the appropriate font
for the user's print layout or website to increase
accessibility.
Researchers Madiah and Hisham (2010) [10]
studied people with low vision. They carried out the
study using a reading application prototype, and
they looked at four different font kinds with varying
sizes and colours on diverse background colours.
Depending on their vision issue and visual acuity,
partially sighted youngsters had different
preferences for font type, font size, and foreground
and background colour. This was revealed by the
study's findings. Henceforth, the designer should
add the font selection option for the applications
related to children.
Whereas visual impairments or blindness are
majorly caused by age-related macular
degeneration, that is most individuals who are blind
or have vision impairment are over 50 years old.
Many visually impaired older persons need to learn
how to adapt to using application and technology
devices from the ground up before they may fully
realise their potential. They may be unable to reap
the benefits of applications, softwares and the
internet if they lack the necessary technical
knowledge [11]. If text elements are included in
websites or applications, it is advisable that
designers use common serif fonts which are less
complex in visibility.
C. Difficult icon identification
Even the simplest designs can benefit from the
aesthetic that icons can bring. By using icons
effectively, the designer may improve the user
experience and the usability of their products. Also,
icon sizes are important when interacting with
applications, especially when advertisements or
cookie preferences are being displayed. Some
interfaces have the closing icon size tiny and hidden
in a corner of the interface. This increases the pain
points of visually impaired users and would reduce
the visitation time in those kinds of applications.
Designers can become productive if they
possibly understand the anatomy of an icon and
master how to use tools like grids and keylines to
make the designs organised.
D. Poor responsiveness across devices
Designing websites that display well on a variety
of devices and screen sizes is known as Responsive
web design [12]. When responsiveness is not
considered in designing user interfaces, text or
images are cut out partially from the screen. Visually
impaired people may not fully grasp the content on
the page. This might not be only for the visually
impaired but for others as well. Even with a good
responsiveness, font sizes tend to become smaller
and difficult to read. At the component level,
responsive design and functionality should be the
primary concerns for mobile and web designers.
Designers must adopt responsiveness into both their
systems and processes.
III. CASE STUDIES
In this section, we will analyse some of the
frequently used applications on android and iOS
with their weaknesses.
A. Google map
Google Maps is being used each month by more
than a billion individuals in 220 various countries
and territories [13]. With Google maps, restaurants,
transportation, and other locations on their map are
represented with a range of colour. Nevertheless, the
colours they use do not contrast well with the
background, making it difficult for people with
visual impairment and colour blindness to properly
find a location. Also, the address details are not
magnified even when the map is zoomed. If a bus is
being tracked on Google Maps, the exact location of
the bus and the route cannot be magnified. A firm
the size of Google should put more focus on
accessibility features when designing applications.
This also demonstrates that proper accessibility
practices, if not considered, will reduce reliability
and good user experiences from applications
designed by large giants of technology like Google.
B. WhatsApp
In the context of WhatsApp, there is an
accessibility feature in the settings that can help
enlarge the font size from small to medium to large.
But this adjustment is only limited to the
conversation section. The font sizes in other screens
remain the same. This inconsistency would not
encourage visually impaired individuals because of
the difficulty in finding a contact name or searching
through the history of chats. Also, a study with five
visually impaired persons on the accessibility of
WhatsApp by testing what issues they discover from
the point of creating a group to leaving the group
showed that the biggest difficulties were related to
the absence of button labels and problems with
understanding the reading of WhatsApp options.
Usability issues like the lack of audio feedback for
some actions have also been reported [14].
C. Gmail and Facebook
Gmail is still the most popular email service
provider in the globe, with over 1.8 billion users
[15]. Email is considered to be simpler to use for
maintaining social contacts than other technologies
by many older persons who are visually impaired.
They stated that they preferred emails to phone calls
since they believed using a phone was difficult due
to eyesight impairment.
The difficulty in seeing the caller's name, phone
number, and phonebook on the screen was
frequently cited as the cause [11]. However, it is
impossible to magnify the interface when opened in
the mobile view. The font sizes are originally small,
and clarity of vision is less especially for the visually
impaired people. The same issue is also common in
the Facebook application. This could be made better
by including a magnifying option. Visual impaired
users will continue to use social network sites like
Facebook despite difficulties because they consider
the importance of visual media for fostering
relationships and acquiring knowledge, as
mentioned in some recent studies [16] [17]. That
does not, however, negate the difficulties visually
impaired users currently face in interpreting and
sharing inaccessible images and videos. It still needs
to be investigated further [18]. Also, if a guest logs
in their Gmail account in the mobile browser, there
is difficulty in logging out as the option is not user-
friendly. For android mobiles the dropdown icon
that leads to the signing out option is not present.
Designers should understand from users’
perspective and make logging out easy by adding the
button in the menu.
D. Phone book and call logs
As mentioned in (c), names and numbers are
small to read and therefore magnifying options or
zooming in and out can be an advantage for the
visually impaired. The bigger the texts, the more
visual it becomes.
IV. ACCESSIBILITY GUIDELINES FOR
UX DESIGNS
Every design which is aimed at giving the best of
satisfaction to all kinds of users should endeavour to
follow proper accessibility guidelines. Woo et al.
[19] conducted an analysis of the user experience
(UX) designs of 140 well-known health applications
chosen based on the number of downloads in app
stores and presented a set of standard-compliant UX
design principles to help the visually impaired
access visual data. These apps are the ones
downloaded majorly in the USA, Canada, Japan,
Australia, South Korea, Germany, and Britain as of
November 2015. These apps were tested with
patients having Retinitis Pigmentosa (RP) which is
one of many cases of visual impairment. The
analysis checks how perceivable, operable,
understandable, and robust these health applications
are. The check was according to the Mobile Web
Accessibility Guide (MWAG) provided by the
World Wide Web for mobile contents [20]. Among
different countries, the average ratio of MWAG was
60 to 80% whereas the overall was 83.2%.
Unfortunately, only 12.8% of the apps analysed
noticed "non-text items (images, sounds, and
videos) with no text alternative.". The analysis
stated:
“For a user with low vision, colour blindness, or
visual field defect, access to data is not supported
with alternative methods by the majority of apps,
which results in lowered data accessibility for the
visually impaired.”
Alternative to non-text objects is important for
visually impaired persons for images as they can be
blurry to the eyes, or rapid visual movement on a
computer screen which makes perception
problematic. The alternative could be
comprehensible audio, captions or transcript which
explains the image or that follows the video. This
comprehensible audio can also be in text-to-speech
format and voice over like Be my eyes, Ariadne
GPS, Audible, Kindle and more. Some of these
specially designed applications will be discussed
below.
V. SPECIALLY DESIGNED
APPLICATIONS
Be my eyes is a mobile application that gives a
connection for the blind users to pair up with the
sighted volunteers through a video and audio
connection [21]. It is available in 180 languages in
150 countries and is used by 449,515 blind & low
vision people and volunteered by 6 million people.
It is an innovative application to support those with
low vision and help them in achieving
independence. UX design is not only about user
interface, but it is also the experiences the users had
while using the applications. Be my eyes has done
well with giving the visually impaired people the
ability to complete simple tasks by facetiming
volunteers while not having to rely on personal
relationships. One of the reviews of a volunteer on
the app is that there were too many volunteers for a
single request [22]. This will encourage the visually
impaired to believe digital platforms have them in
mind and have enough support to give for their
independence.
Ariadne GPS is an iOS app that uses the map
service, voice over screen readers, and the location
system built into iOS devices to assist blind persons
with mobility tasks. It is not a navigator like other
commercial navigators in that it does not provide
turn-by-turn directions. Users are unable to enter an
address and request a drive there. However, it can be
used in conjunction with other commercial
navigators [23].
Audible is the platform by which Amazon creates
and sells audiobooks, podcasts and songs. It has a
large library of over 200,000 titles to pick from [24].
Audible maximizes the use of comprehensible audio
as discussed earlier and encourages even the visually
impaired to learn and read books. One of its
advantages is the whisper sync feature that resumes
audio timeline at where it stops even if the user is
following lots of audiobooks. Nonetheless, not
much comes free from this platform. Even though it
has a 30-days free trial period, Audible puts a fee on
most of the audiobooks. Books with fewer pages
cost less and larger works frequently have higher
prices. As much as this application has a great UX
in interface, downloading books and its whisper-
sync feature, a user with low financial capacity will
not find Audible useful.
One of the major problems of visually impaired
persons with applications, specialized devices and
technology is cost. In recently published research in
the United Kingdom (UK) [25], it is stated that the
access to internet and digital devices of sight-
impaired people increased from 65% to 78% from
2012 to 2016, compared to 79% to 84% of non-
disabled in the same range of years. The research
surveyed the use and opinions of 396 Royal National
Institute of Blind People Gymru (RNIB) which
consisted of roughly 52% visually impaired and
40% having sight and hearing dual impairments.
Majority of these individuals are highly motivated
when using digital technology. According to the
results, 77% believe in the power of social media
applications, 20% believe digital technology gives
educational opportunities. Moreover, many of these
sight-impaired find the applications or devices too
costly. This is because most sensory impaired users
are unemployed and most of the present applications
only offer basic services for free while the advanced
features need to be paid for [25]. The research also
stated that some charities like RNIB are promoting
the use of free accessibility software. It will be
advisable with the increasing number of visually
impaired people in the world that there are
governmental interventions that can help these
individuals afford digital devices and applications
through a governmental health scheme
Nearly 60% of visually impaired Americans who
were not institutionalised were unemployed in 2015,
according to a 2017 U.S. News article [26].
When discussing the price of digital applications,
Eric Duffy, director of the assistive technology team
at the National Federation of the Blind (NFB).
Since, the gadgets are not treated as medical devices
the insurance is not applied and hence the costs are
not waived which was written in the paper.
Aira, a mobile application as reported by this
publication that connects visually impaired people
to agents in a call centre to help guide them through
routes or complete daily tasks through live video
stream is one of the second major investments of the
NFB. Though it works on a subscription, it is with
varying plans. Governmental or NGOs’ investments
as such can make more of these applications
affordable through subsidies or even free to visually
impaired people.
VI. SOLUTIONS
There is still more work to be done to make
mobile or web user experiences more accessible to
those with visual impairment. Attainable and
practicable user experiences not only reduce
accessibility obstacles and make the internet easier
to use, but they may also empower persons with
visual impairments by providing freedom and
independence online.
It is recommended to consider the colour contrast
and contrast ratio on the Google Maps application
for better accessibility. If the contrast ratio is too
low, people with visual impairments might face
difficulty in viewing a particular content. The text
on the background should be made obvious as it
captures detail of the design, and it builds clear
differences [27].
In addition to this, font sizes can be larger as the
user zooms into the map for readability. WhatsApp
interfaces can also adopt this and consistently apply
the increased font size on all the screens.
S. Sayago [28], pointed out that an easy layout,
using a larger font, proper icons, and understandable
terms should be used when designing user interfaces
for elderly people. Icons are a major part of
designing a great user experience. It is
recommended that the scale of icons for closing ads
and cookie notifications, or pop-ups should be
increased. Transitioning from a bigger device to
mobile devices can be a burden if responsiveness is
not prioritised when the UX/UI is designed. The
responsive check across all the devices should be
considered by the developers before launching
products.
Seeking out users’ pain points and stating the
problems is the first and foremost step to designing
a better product that will have a good impact on the
user. A successful product goes above and beyond
the present needs of its users and predicts their needs
and habits in the future. The user's experience on the
applications is affected by the products and services
they use, and this raises expectations for aiming for
better user-friendly interfaces in the future.
According to experts, it is still difficult to convince
people that accessibility is not an option [26].
VII. CONCLUSION
This qualitative research aimed to analyse the
UX/UI weaknesses of commonly used applications
like Google Map, WhatsApp, Gmail and Facebook,
and specially designed apps for the visually
impaired both on android and iOS.
This was done by looking at features like the font
type and size, colour contrast, icons, responsiveness
across devices and cost of these applications or
devices on which the applications work. One of the
observations made is that little work has been done
in the past years to analyse the accessibility standard
of these commonly used apps and popular social
networking platforms. As each case study was
observed, we discovered that Google Maps has poor
colour contrast that will make location disappear in
the background for some visually impaired persons.
WhatsApp did not keep a consistent increase in font
size across its interfaces. The issue of the small font
sizes that cannot be magnified, is common with
Gmail, Facebook and the phone logs.
In order to execute one or more tasks, application
complexities frequently need the presence of a good-
sighted user, which can be frustrating [14]. Raising
the accessibility functions of applications both in the
UI and UX should be a necessity. Designers of
applications or devices also need to know that
accessibility features in their product benefit the
economy. Laws and legislation can be made to raise
the standard of including accessibility features for
websites or applications when designing. The
outcome of this research revealed that there is room
for improvement in the UX/UI design of common
applications for more accessible. This will make
navigation for the visually impaired more unbiased
and encourage their independence.
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