Apple TV+

Apple TV+

Integration of Siri on AppleTV and support for major game controllers on tvOS

Role
Role

Senior Product Designer

Company

Apple, Inc

Date

Date
Date

2019-2020

Overview

I collaborated closely with the Siri design team to fundamentally reimagine Siri's role and utility within the tvOS platform, moving beyond basic voice commands to create a more contextually aware and helpful assistant for the living room experience. Together, we explored how Siri could better understand the unique challenges of TV navigation — from discovering what to watch among thousands of options to controlling playback without disrupting the viewing experience.

I also partnered with the macOS Software Engineering and Apple Arcade teams to deliver comprehensive support for major game controllers on tvOS, recognizing that gaming was becoming an increasingly important use case for the platform. This cross-functional collaboration required aligning tvOS capabilities with macOS controller implementations while meeting Apple Arcade's requirements for consistent gameplay experiences across devices.

Project Scope

Siri Integration:

Collaborated closely with the Siri design team to reimagine Siri’s role and utility on the tvOS platform, enhancing its future impact and user experience.

Partnered with the Accessibility team to implement 'Type to Siri,' a feature designed for the accessibility community. This feature enables users to type questions to Siri using a Bluetooth keyboard, expanding Siri’s usability and inclusivity.

Game Controller Development and Customization:

Partnered with the macOS Software Engineering and Apple Arcade teams to deliver seamless support for major game controllers, expanding the gaming experience on tvOS. This software update was showcased at WWDC 2020 as a key part of the Apple Arcade launch on tvOS.

In this role, I was responsible for information architecture, prototyping, and project management, ensuring a cohesive and robust integration across platforms.

Results + Impact

My collaboration with the Siri team helped define Siri's future impact on tvOS and established new interaction patterns that made voice control feel more natural and essential to the Apple TV experience. It also enhanced the accessibility of tvOS by implementing the 'Type to Siri' feature.

Working across macOS engineering and Apple Arcade teams, I helped coordinate the technical implementation and user experience for game controller support on tvOS. We ensured that popular controllers like Xbox and PlayStation gamepads would pair effortlessly, respond with the precise latency that gamers expected, and provide consistent button mapping across different titles. This cross-platform collaboration meant leveraging existing macOS controller frameworks while adapting them for the living room context, where users might be sitting further from the screen or playing in more casual, social settings. The result opened up new possibilities for both casual gamers looking for a more comfortable way to play and serious gamers who wanted console-quality control on Apple TV, ultimately positioning the platform as a more legitimate gaming destination.

Highlights

  • Siri integration into tvOS significantly enhanced both the usability and accessibility of Apple TV. By enabling voice control for navigation, search, and playback, Siri eliminated the tedium of typing on a virtual keyboard with a remote and made it effortless to find specific shows, actors, or genres with simple spoken requests. This was particularly transformative for accessibility.

  • Game controller integration on Apple TV was showcased at WWDC 2020 as a key part of the Apple Arcade launch on tvOS.