Overall UXE Score
7.43
14 jurors · −0.7 vs season average
- Recognition
- Featured
- Recognized
- 2 Sept 2026
- Season
- Quarter 3, 2026
- Studio
- Oona Studio, Helsinki
- Categories
- Mobile Experience · Consumer · Interaction Design
- Platforms
- iOS
01/Overview
A podcast player with searchable transcripts and chapter-aware sleep timers.
Aurel turns every episode into something you can read, search and quote. Transcripts scroll with playback; tap any line to jump there.
The sleep timer waits for the end of a chapter instead of cutting off mid-sentence, and the library is organised by show artwork rather than lists.
- Client
- In-house product
- Audience
- Heavy podcast listeners who save and share episodes
- Industry
- Media & Audio
- Platforms
- iOS
- Status
- Live since June 2026
- Markets
- Finland, Sweden, United States, United Kingdom
- Languages
- 3 — English, Finnish, Swedish
02/Honors
Recognized by the editors.
Recognition
Featured
Meets the UXE standard. Earns a public profile, a badge and a place in the quarterly awards.
Conferred by the editors on 2 Sept 2026 · minimum UXE 7.0
Awards · Quarter 3, 2026
Season results- Mobile ExperienceEntered
02 / 12 · Consumer
- Interaction DesignEntered
06 / 12
Competing in Q3 2026. Entries close 30 Sept 2026; results are announced 15 Oct 2026.
03/Jury verdict
In the jury’s words.
“Aurel treats spoken word as text you can search and quote — a quietly important idea for podcasts.”
Diego Ferreira
Frontend Architect, Rede Norte · Brazil
On behalf of 14 jurors
04/Score breakdown
How the jury scored it.
- Overall UXE Score−0.7 vs Q3 2026 average
- 7.43
- Strongest criterionUI & Consistency
- 8.1
- Jury agreementaverage spread ±0.47
- Moderate
- Jurorsof Q3 2026’s panel
- 14
- 7.6−0.7
Usability
Can people complete what they came to do — efficiently, confidently and without error?
- 7.2−0.9
Information Architecture
Is content organized, labeled and navigable in the way people actually think?
- 8.1−0.3
UI & Consistency
Is the visual language coherent and purposeful across every screen and state?
Jury noteAtmospheric and consistent, from artwork to transcript.
- 7.5−0.7
Interaction & Feedback
Does every action respond clearly, promptly and meaningfully?
- 7.3−0.8
Performance
Does it feel fast — perceived and measured — on real devices and networks?
Jury noteCrash rate and cold starts sit just outside our budgets.
- 6.9−0.9
Accessibility
Can everyone use it, including people relying on assistive technology?
Jury noteTranscripts help many users, but contrast on gradients needs fixing.
- 7.4−0.9
Learnability
How quickly does a first-time user become a confident one?
Scores are the mean of 14 jurors. Ticks mark the Q3 2026 average across 6 recognized projects.
05/The jury
14 ballotsEvery vote, on the record.
Each juror scored Aurel independently, from 1 to 10 on every criterion. Nothing is weighted by seniority and no score is discarded — the published result is simply their mean.
One juror Jury mean
| Juror | Usab | IA | UI | Inter | Perf | A11y | Learn | Overall |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lea FischerDesign Systems Lead, Kanton Group · CH | 8.7 | 7.6 | 8.9 | 8.6 | 8.4 | 7.3 | 8.2 | 8.24 |
| Mei TanakaUX Research Lead, Hoshi Labs · JP | 8.2 | 7.8 | 8.7 | 7.8 | 7.5 | 7.1 | 7.7 | 7.83 |
| Chloé MartinContent Design Lead, Plume & Co · CA | 7.4 | 7.7 | 9.0 | 8.1 | 7.7 | 7.3 | 7.3 | 7.79 |
| Kwabena AsanteService Design Lead, Adinkra Digital · GH | 8.2 | 7.6 | 8.4 | 7.5 | 7.6 | 6.9 | 7.6 | 7.69 |
| Priya RamanHead of Product Design, Tessera Cloud · IN | 8.2 | 7.4 | 7.9 | 7.9 | 7.6 | 6.9 | 7.3 | 7.60 |
| Olivia GrantVP of Design, Harbor & Pine · US | 7.5 | 7.8 | 8.7 | 7.4 | 7.0 | 7.5 | 7.1 | 7.57 |
| Nina PetrovaDesign Director, Graphit · BG | 7.5 | 7.1 | 7.8 | 7.4 | 7.3 | 7.2 | 7.7 | 7.43 |
| Diego FerreiraVerdictFrontend Architect, Rede Norte · BR | 7.7 | 7.0 | 7.8 | 7.5 | 7.5 | 6.7 | 7.6 | 7.40 |
| Min-jun ChoDesign Lead, Seoul Form · KR | 7.5 | 6.9 | 7.8 | 7.5 | 7.2 | 7.2 | 7.3 | 7.34 |
| Ravi MenonWeb Performance Engineer, Quickline · SG | 7.5 | 7.2 | 7.4 | 7.1 | 7.2 | 6.6 | 8.0 | 7.29 |
| Marco BelliniSenior Product Designer, Studio Vetro · IT | 6.9 | 7.0 | 8.5 | 7.3 | 7.0 | 6.7 | 7.0 | 7.20 |
| Yusuf DemirProduct Design Manager, Kuzey Labs · TR | 7.6 | 6.7 | 7.3 | 7.2 | 7.3 | 6.6 | 7.2 | 7.13 |
| Camille RouxCreative Director, Atelier Nuit · FR | 6.8 | 6.6 | 7.6 | 7.3 | 6.5 | 6.1 | 6.7 | 6.80 |
| Liam O’ConnorAccessibility Engineer, Cardinal Web · IE | 6.7 | 6.4 | 7.6 | 6.4 | 6.4 | 6.5 | 6.9 | 6.70 |
| Jury mean | 7.6 | 7.2 | 8.1 | 7.5 | 7.3 | 6.9 | 7.4 | 7.43 |
| Spread (σ) | ±0.56 | ±0.44 | ±0.56 | ±0.49 | ±0.48 | ±0.37 | ±0.41 | ±0.39 |
marks each juror’s area of expertise. Deeper tint, higher score.
01
Submitted
10 Aug
Entry received, free of charge
02
Jury scoring
16 Aug – 1 Sept
14 independent ballots
03
Recognized
2 Sept 2026
Featured
04
Awards
Results 15 Oct 2026
Competing in Q3 2026
06/Screens
3 screensThe product, screen by screen.
07/Case study
From problem to proof.
The challenge
Listeners couldn’t find the moment they wanted to share, and sleep timers cut episodes mid-thought.
The approach
Oona Studio made the transcript a first-class view and taught the timer to respect chapters.
Research
Listener interviews
28 heavy listeners
Diary study
Listening moments logged for 3 weeks, n=20
Key insights
- 01
People remember what was said, not when it was said.
- 02
Falling asleep mid-sentence ruins the next morning’s listen.
Outcomes
38%
Sessions using transcripts
weekly active listeners
+2.3×
Clips shared
vs. previous player
Outcomes are reported by the submitting team and reviewed by the jury.
08/Accessibility & performance
Built for everyone, on any device.
Accessibility
Partial WCAG 2.1 AA
Audited by In-house audit, May 2026
6.9
Jury
- Transcripts make audio content accessible to Deaf and hard-of-hearing users
- Playback speed from 0.5× to 3×
Known gaps
- Gradient backgrounds reduce text contrast
- Library grid relies on artwork without text alternatives
Performance
2 of 4 within budget
iPhone 11, median of 30 cold launches
7.3
Jury
| Metric | Measured | Budget |
|---|---|---|
| Cold start | 1.3 s (over budget) | ≤ 1.0 s |
| Transcript sync drift | < 150 ms (within budget) | ≤ 250 ms |
| Crash-free sessions | 99.7% (over budget) | ≥ 99.8% |
| Install size | 41 MB (within budget) | ≤ 60 MB |
Within budget Over budget
09/Design system
Nocturne, the system behind Aurel.
- System
- Nocturne
- Components
- 36
- Design tokens
- 90
Color
- #1C0F24
Plum night
- #7A2A3A
Wine
- #D9643A
Ember
- #FFB36B
Apricot
- #FFFFFF
White
Typography
Outfit
Interface & display
Google Fonts
UX patterns
- Media players
- Transcripts
- Sleep timers
- Artwork grids
- Sharing
10/Credits
The people who made it.
Studio
Oona Studio
Helsinki, Finland
Audio-first product design, from podcast players to spoken-word archives.
- Founded
- 2017
- Team
- 1–10
- Recognized
- 1
Team
- Aino VirtanenFounder & Designer
- Eero MäkineniOS Engineer
- Sanni LaineAudio Engineer
- Client
- In-house product
- Industry
- —
Built with
- SwiftUI
- AVFoundation
- On-device transcription
- Figma
→/More from the showcase
Whole seasonMore from Q3 2026.
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Verde
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