San Diego, CA

MasterClass TV app immersive hero featuring Roy Choi

MasterClass TV Apps

About

Unlocking human potential in everyone

MasterClass is the go-to streaming service for learning from global leaders. Following the TV app redesign, 30-day user retention climbed by 18 percentage points, average session length increased by 25%, and the app rating rose from 3.5 to 4.9 stars.

Editors' Choice, Webby Awards, and Emmy Awards nominee recognition

Role: Staff Product Designer
Tools: Figma, ProtoPie, FigJam, Kap, Gifski, Miro, UserTesting.com
Skills: ADA, interaction design, information architecture, prototyping, storytelling, Apple TV HIG, usability testing, user interviews, and design systems
Platforms

The problem

It’s been a while…

The MasterClass TV app was three years old and did not include the latest features, layouts, functionality, or updated brand. The OTT experiences also lacked consistency across Roku, Fire TV, Smart TV, and tvOS, creating significant support effort.

Skills: Information architecture, user-feedback analysis, user interviews, and competitive analysis of 20+ TV apps

People

“Limited new content and poor personalization made me lose interest quickly.”

“Navigating the app was confusing, and I couldn't find content that interested me easily.”

“Chromecast is not working properly.”

Based on App Store and Google Play reviews, customer-support feedback, email, and social comments; validated with data and user interviews.

Business

Outdated TV app
Expensive support across fragmented TV platforms
Need for an Immersive Hero informed by Falcon success
Reflect the new MasterClass brand
Address low ratings and member feedback
Reduce customer-support tickets

Legacy MasterClass TV app alongside collected member reviews

Market research

Understanding the Streaming Landscape

Research showed that the MasterClass TV app primarily supports a lean-back viewing experience. We examined the streaming apps our students already used to understand their preferences and expectations.

Streaming competitors reviewed: Paramount Plus, Disney Plus, Prime Video, YouTube, HBO, Apple TV Plus, Peacock, Hulu, and Netflix

Competitive feature analysis across streaming TV apps

Execution

Project Strategy

We aligned the team on the member problems, product goals, and measurable outcomes that would guide decisions across the TV redesign.

MasterClass TV app redesign strategy workspace

Planning

Timeline and Prioritization

We collected problems from internal research, student interviews, customer-support feedback, app-store reviews, and business needs. Then we brainstormed solutions and used the Value Proposition Canvas to align around priorities.

Skills: Prioritization, RICE model, planning, Value Proposition Canvas, and brainstorming

Coda prioritization and project timeline for the MasterClass TV redesign

This Coda document kept the team aligned on what needed to be built—and, most importantly, why.

Design thinking

Immersive Experience

The main feature of the new TV experience was the Immersive Hero. It helped members discover full classes.

Miller's Law

Applying Miller's Law focused the immersive hero on seven classes. Fewer choices simplified interaction, improved content accessibility, and created a more intuitive interface.

MasterClass immersive hero showing seven prominent classes

Center Stage

Center Stage increased focus and engagement by letting members begin a class directly, improving quality breadth.

RuPaul class centered in the MasterClass TV interface

Endowment Effect

Saved classes created a sense of ownership and strengthened members' connection to the platform, contributing to higher membership renewals.

Immersion From the Start

Working with Audio, Content, and Marketing produced tailored splash screens for new and returning members while navigating legal approvals, sound engineering, and design review.

I just downloaded the app

I have the app and a membership

Parallax Posters

Parallax reinforces focus on tvOS, adds visual depth, improves navigation, follows Apple's interaction language, and increases accessibility.

Aspect Ratios

Using 16:9 for video and 2:3 for class destinations improved navigational predictability. A/B testing showed a 7% increase in how quickly members found the content they wanted.

Immersive Class Pages

Video captured attention immediately and encouraged deeper exploration, increasing minutes watched and producing a 10% increase in click-through rate.

Testing showed that a three-second video delay produced the strongest result.

7 TV Platforms

Each TV app had to work with specialized buttons, touchpads, and motion sensors across a total of 18 remotes.

Roku, Fire TV, Apple TV, and smart TV remote controls

The team

Fully Remote Cross-Functional Team

During the pandemic, I led the TV app redesign with a distributed team spanning product, engineering, data, customer support, content, motion, research, marketing, audio, and an external agency.

Kris Jenner saying this is MasterClass, I'm such a boss today

Kris Jenner, MasterClass instructor

Outcomes

Easier discovery. Longer learning.

The redesigned TV experience brought discovery and playback into a consistent system across platforms. Members could find a class, start watching, and return to learning with less friction.

As Staff Product Designer, I shaped the interaction design and shared design system through prototyping and usability testing. The results below reflect the cross-functional team’s redesign.

User retention+18 pts

Before the redesign, the 30-day user retention rate was 40%. After the redesign, it increased to 58%.

Problem solved: Limited new content and poor personalization made me lose interest quickly.

Session duration+25%

After the redesign, average session duration increased by 25%, showing that the new experience kept members engaged for longer.

Problem solved: Navigating the app was confusing, and I couldn't find content that interested me easily.

User ratings4.9

The MasterClass TV app rating increased from an average of 3.5 stars to 4.9 stars after the redesign.

Problem solved: Poor ratings and reviews.

Reflection

v1 Was Just a Beginning

Members gave outstanding feedback, but the work also exposed the next opportunity. TV viewers preferred committing to full classes over short videos, so version two shifted toward personalization and category exploration.

To be continued…

Now You:

Watch Now You on YouTube ↗

“Misha was an excellent collaboration partner for the work done on OTT platforms at MasterClass. He was thoughtful when considering how one change would affect all four platforms and eagerly incorporated user research into his designs.”