MSNBC.com homepage redesign

Client

MSNBC.com

Roles

UX design

The design team at MSNBC.com was asked to redesign the homepage to better serve readers who wanted to skim headlines and see what's live on TV. We were also asked to design a newsfeed that could show minute to minute updates during big events.

Ultimately the project fell through because of tech bandwidth constraints, so we didn't get to explore the visual design as much as we wanted.

 
 
 
msnbccom.jpg

The current homepage worked best only on mobile devices, where the reader is used to scrolling, but on desktop—where “above the fold” is still king in the media world—it didn't test very well when we looked at the analytics.

We mocked up wireframes with various options, including different newsfeed positions.

 
 
 
 

After we settled on the basic skeleton, we did some higher-fidelity wireframes in order to be able to show executives and development teams.

Because of the short timeline, we did not have time to put the various options in front of users to do usability testing.

 
 
 

On mobile, the newsfeed would be pinned at the bottom of the screen and accessible with one tap.