Self checkouts
of the future

We started with gathering good practices and benchmarks from self checkouts available in 8 different chains of stores used by thousands of clients every day. We had a few iterations and performed expert analysis of these interfaces. Some of them were unique and inspiring, some showed us what to avoid.

After benchmarking we met with clients and decided on mapping a user journey. That meant deciding what to put on particular screens and deciding on the scope of MVP. We also had to take into account the unique features the self checkouts offered, that is voice control – a revolutionary feature.

We designed a clickable prototype adjusted to the client’s hardware. We wanted to include all the features in the prototype so we built a prototype which resembled the final construction of the self checkout. The main challenge was designing the interface in a way which would make it easier to understand voice control of the self checkout.

The mockup and the prototype we created were prepared for user testing. We decided on Rapid Iterative Testing and Evaluation |(RITE): after testing the prototype with a few users, we implemented some changes, and then tested the prototype again. We had to change some of the processes we designed before because the users thought they should work differently.

It was our client’s wish to create something modern, with slick design, so that it matched the minimalistic kiosk itself. We discussed our ideas for the interface and as a result we decided on neumorphism. The look and feel of the design made buttons appear convex or concave. At the same time we made the interface accessible for people with different disabilities. We tested it on the screens that will be used in the shops. We designed both dark mode and light mode to match two models of the kiosks

After the first round of tests and final UI designs, we wanted to simplify some microcopy used in the interface based on the recommendations from the first round of our research. The aim was to prepare the interface for the next round of tests.

We oversaw the implementation process, checking how the self checkout worked in the development phase. We also added some extra steps in the processes and sent our comments to the developers in order to make the process seamless.

The final round of testing was performed on the actual kiosk. We could test out the real product in its alpha build with users. The alpha build could scan the products what helped us identify some pain points in the whole process. We tested two versions of the kiosk, smaller and bigger. We also invited people with disabilities to the tests so that they could help us make the product accessible. As a result, we made some final refinements to the project.

We created an intuitive interface with “a premium look” as our research participants suggested us. Thanks to the research we performed, it turned out that the new features that are not yet available on the market, are easily understandable by all of our users.