Mobile User Experience (UX) Design
How This Course Will Help Your Career
What You’ll Learn
- How to design mobile interfaces based on mobile usability best practices
- How to use personas and task modelling to plan a mobile user experience
- An understanding of how your UI choices will differ between operating platforms (e.g. iOS vs Android)
- How to evaluate a mobile design and avoid bad mobile user experiences
- How to implement a mobile UX design strategy
Mobile usage overtook that of desktop way back in 2014 according to Comscore; since then, the gap between devices has only widened, with the rise in mobile usage doubling the loss seen on desktop. This increase in mobile traffic has made mobile user experience one of the most important factors in the success of a product or website, and it means that the skills involved are absolutely essential for designers, marketers, and developers if they want to keep up with the times. This course will teach you how to do just that—design great mobile user interfaces, with an emphasis on mobile usability best practices.
When you want to start designing a great user experience on a mobile device, using common sense design approaches or simply learning by doing won’t be enough. With Google reporting that 61% of users were unlikely to return to a mobile site they had trouble accessing and, even worse, 40% choosing to visit a competitor’s site instead, such uneducated approaches could prove disastrous for your product or website. A user’s comprehension is 50% less on a mobile device, which means that content, navigation, and visual design elements must be twice as intuitive as they are on a desktop. With hard facts like that, you must constantly keep in mind the point that little screens mean very little room for error. Designing for mobile means taking the rough of the risk with the smooth of the sheer profit potential, and your need to learn the skills involved in creating an easy-to-use mobile user interface and, consequently, a great mobile user experience is nothing less than vital.
This course is built on evidence-based approaches as well as solid evidence distilled from decades of research and practice. Here, CEO of ExperienceDynamics.com, Frank Spillers, who is a distinguished speaker, author, and internationally respected Senior Usability practitioner, will teach you what you need to know to stay one step ahead as you venture into this exciting, cutting-edge and lucrative field.
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Is This Course Right for You?
This is an intermediate-level course recommended for members from all related business functions of an organization:
- UX, UI, and web designers who want to design products that deliver outstanding mobile experiences
- Project managers keen on incorporating a focus on mobile experiences in the product development process
- Software engineers interested in learning about the unique challenges when building for mobile
- Entrepreneurs looking to create user-friendly mobile websites or apps that will beat the competition
- Newcomers to design who are considering making a switch to UX design and have an interest in mobile UX
Courses in the Interaction Design Foundation are designed to contain comprehensive, evidence-based content, while ensuring that the learning curve is never too steep. All participants will have the opportunity to share ideas, seek help with tests, and enjoy the social aspects afforded by our open and friendly forum.
Learn and Work with a Global Team of Designers
You’ll join a global community and work together to improve your skills and career opportunities. Connect with helpful peers and make friends with like-minded individuals as you push deeper into the exciting and booming industry of design.
Lessons in This Course
- Each week, one lesson becomes available.
- There’s no time limit to finish a course. Lessons have no deadlines.
- Estimated learning time: 27 hours 52 mins spread over 5 weeks .
Lesson 0: Welcome and Introduction
To be scheduled. Estimated time to complete: 1 hour 30 mins.
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0.1: An introduction to courses from the Interaction Design Foundation (37 mins)
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0.2: Let our community help you (1 min)
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0.3: How to Earn Your Course Certificate (16 mins)
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0.4: Meet your peers online in our discussion forums (5 mins)
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0.5: Meet and learn from design professionals at an upcoming meet-up (1 min)
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0.6: Gain Timeless Skills Through Courses From the Interaction Design Foundation (21 mins)
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0.7: Mandatory vs. Optional Lesson Items (7 mins)
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0.8: A Mix Between Video-Based and Text-Based Lesson Content (6 mins)
Lesson 1: An Introduction to Mobile User Experience Design
To be scheduled. Estimated time to complete: 3 hours 49 mins.
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1.1: An Introduction to Mobile User Experience (4 mins)
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1.2: UX Design For Mobile: Introduction (11 mins)
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1.3: One Size Fits All? Definitely Not in Task-Oriented Design for Mobile & Ubiquitous UX (33 mins)
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1.4: Responsive vs. Adaptive Design (41 mins)
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1.5: Responsive Design: Best Practices (17 mins)
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1.6: Adaptive vs. Responsive Design (23 mins)
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1.7: Context of Use for Mobile (29 mins)
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1.8: Making Use of the Crowd – Social Proof and the User Experience (20 mins)
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1.9: Don’t Build It, Fake It First – Prototyping for Mobile Apps (47 mins)
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1.10: Discussion Exercise (7 mins)
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1.11: Lesson Recap – An Introduction to Mobile UX (3 mins)
Lesson 2: The Elements of Mobile UX
To be scheduled. Estimated time to complete: 4 hours 36 mins.
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2.1: The Elements of Mobile User Experience (4 mins)
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2.2: 5 Steps for Human-Centered Mobile Design (19 mins)
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2.3: What Comes First in Mobile Design: Tasks, Content, or Mobile Optimization? (1 hour 1 min)
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2.4: How to Craft Effective Mobile Experiences: The Role of Content Strategy and UX Writing (35 mins)
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2.5: Functionality and Mobile Design – Don’t Shrink the Screen, Focus on the Tasks (20 mins)
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2.6: How to Design for Micro-Moments (20 mins)
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2.7: The Heart of the Matter, Information Architecture in the Mobile Age (16 mins)
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2.8: Understand the User’s Perspective through Research for Mobile UX (30 mins)
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2.9: Mobile Usability Research – The Important Differences from the Desktop (17 mins)
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2.10: User Research Methods for Mobile UX (13 mins)
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2.11: If Your User Can’t Find You, You Won’t Have Any Users – Mobile Applications and Discoverability (18 mins)
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2.12: Getting Your App into the Hands of Millions – Marketing for Mobile Apps (20 mins)
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2.13: Discussion Exercise (7 mins)
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2.14: Round Up – The Elements of Mobile UX (3 mins)
Lesson 3: Fit the task
To be scheduled. Estimated time to complete: 7 hours 27 mins.
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3.1: Design That Fits the Task (4 mins)
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3.2: Goals of Mobile UX (51 mins)
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3.3: Simple Guidelines When You Design for Mobile (18 mins)
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3.4: The One Thumb, One Eyeball Test for Good Mobile Design (18 mins)
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3.5: How to Reduce Cognitive Friction in Mobile (44 mins)
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3.6: Mobile UX Issues (32 mins)
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3.7: Understand Your Users (37 mins)
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3.8: Best Practices for Mobile App Usability from Google (14 mins)
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3.9: Personas for Mobile UX Design (52 mins)
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3.10: Persona: Toward Best Practice (1 hour 7 mins)
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3.11: Creating Lust, Desirability and the Mobile User Experience (16 mins)
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3.12: Usability vs Desirability in Mobile UX (16 mins)
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3.13: Before the Design Process Starts: It’s Time to Get Out Of the Building (18 mins)
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3.14: How to Use Mental Models in UX Design (19 mins)
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3.15: How to Transform Mental Models into Conceptual Models for Mobile UX (15 mins)
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3.16: How to improve your UX designs with Task Analysis (24 mins)
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3.17: Discussion Exercise (7 mins)
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3.18: Lesson Recap – Design That Fits the Task (3 mins)
Lesson 4: Fitting the UI style guide
To be scheduled. Estimated time to complete: 7 hours 5 mins.
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4.1: The UI Style Guide for Mobile (3 mins)
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4.2: Smartphone vs. Tablet (41 mins)
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4.3: How to Optimize Your Designs for Smartphones vs Tablets (19 mins)
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4.4: Mobile Comprehension – Do Smartphones Make Us Stupid? (16 mins)
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4.5: Visualization (1 hour 14 mins)
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4.6: Skeuomorphism is dead, long live skeuomorphism (16 mins)
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4.7: Don’t Make Me Think – Key Learning Points for UX Design for the Web (16 mins)
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4.8: Make it Easy on the User: Designing for Discoverability within Mobile Apps (16 mins)
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4.9: Augmented Reality – The Past, The Present and The Future (16 mins)
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4.10: New UI Patterns (51 mins)
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4.11: Discussion Exercise (7 mins)
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4.12: Mobile UX Lifecycle (38 mins)
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4.13: Native, Web or Hybrid App: Which One is Better? (1 hour 10 mins)
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4.14: Mobile UX Design Checklist (48 mins)
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4.15: Lesson Roundup – The UI Style Guide for Mobile (3 mins)
Lesson 5: UI mobile components and patterns
To be scheduled. Estimated time to complete: 3 hours 25 mins.
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5.1: UI for Mobile – Components and Patterns (3 mins)
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5.2: The Anatomy of a Smartphone – Things for Designers to Consider for Mobile Development (17 mins)
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5.3: The Rumble in the Board Room – Mobile Splash Screens What Clients Want and What They Should Get (15 mins)
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5.4: User Input and the Mobile User Experience – We’re All Thumbs Now or Maybe Not (16 mins)
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5.5: Tell Me About Me – User Profiles for Mobile Applications (15 mins)
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5.6: Getting Lost and Found – Maps and the Mobile User Experience (16 mins)
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5.7: Best Practices and UI Design Patterns for Help in Mobile (20 mins)
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5.8: How to Design for Mobile Search (48 mins)
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5.9: Evaluating Your Design (38 mins)
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5.10: Discussion Forum (6 mins)
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5.11: Lesson Roundup – UI for Mobile – Components and Patterns (3 mins)
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5.12: Course Summary (14 mins)
Lesson 6: Course Certificate, Final Networking, and Course Wrap-up
To be scheduled.
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6.1: Get Your Course Certificate (1 min)
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6.2: Course Evaluation (1 min)
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6.3: Continue Your Professional Growth (1 min)
Learning Paths
This course is part of 4 learning paths:
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UX Designer Learning PathBecome a UX Designer through 21 courses in 4 parts
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Interaction Designer Learning PathBecome a Interaction Designer through 18 courses in 4 parts
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UI Designer Learning PathBecome a UI Designer through 15 courses in 4 parts
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Front-End Developer Learning PathBecome a Front-End Developer through 8 courses in 4 parts
How Others Have Benefited
Hemant Panchabhai, India
“The course covers all the major aspects of mobile user experience design. It has definitely equipped me with a great knowledge to build great mobile experiences. I would say this course is crucial if your users are mobile users.”
Matthew Shenton, United Kingdom
“Great content, I loved how much the instructor sets practical design tasks for you to do. I also loved the feedback on open question answers.”
Jennifer Steiner-Kotch, United States
“The overall organization of this course was great. I really liked the overview and wrap-up included in each module that introduced and summarized the information that was presented. The overall material was in-depth and very relevant to current trends and best practices.”
How It Works
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Control your learning.
Lessons are self-paced so you’ll never be late for class or miss a deadline. Learning and life, hand in hand.
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Earn Course Certificates.
Your answers are graded by experts, not machines. Get an industry-recognized Course Certificate to show you’ve put in the work.
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Advance your career.
Grow your professional knowledge by watching Master Classes, networking within our UX community, and more.
Start Advancing Your Career Now
Join us to take “Mobile User Experience (UX) Design”. Take other courses at no additional cost. Make a concrete step forward in your career path today.
Advance my career nowFrequently Asked Questions
When I finish a course, do I have to pay extra to get my certificate?
Can I take more than one course at a time?
With a Student membership, you can take a maximum of two courses at the same time. You can still take as many courses as you would like – free of extra charges – just as long as you finish or drop them so that you don’t have more than two ongoing courses.
I missed the enrollment, and now the course is closed. What can I do?
Don't worry if you missed the course. We will re-run it shortly. One of the reasons we continually open and close courses is in order to control the classroom size.
Networking is a large part of our value proposition, so we want just the right number of people inside the courses. That is also why we display the "XX % percent booked" on our course icons.
Do I have to be online at an exact time to study?
No. You can set your own study schedule. There are no "live sessions" since we have members from all timezones around the world. We are a truly global community.
Thus, once you are enrolled, you can take all the time to complete a given course. Every "classroom" in each course will never close, so you’ll have permanent access to your classmates and your course material (as well as your own answers).
Will I receive a Course Certificate?
Yes. You will get a digital industry-recognized course certificate every time you complete a course. Certificates never expire and can be saved as a .jpg file, so it's easy to be shared. Also, there is no limit to how many certificates you can earn during your membership.
You can see an example of a Course Certificate at the bottom of the Course Catalogue.
I have answered questions in a lesson; when will they be marked/graded?
I have updated my name, but my course certificate is not updated — how can I change it?
Don't worry; once you change your name, your certificate will be updated automatically in the next 48 hours.
I have started my course later than the specified date, are my answers still going to be marked?
Sure! We will be marking all your answers for as long as you are an active member.
How are courses graded?
For how long will I have access to the course materials?
You will have access to the course materials for the entire duration of your membership. So, if you pay for a one-year membership, you will have access for one year. Renewing your membership for a second year means you will have access to one more year, and so on.
New lessons are starting before I have completed the previous lesson(s). Am I going to be locked out of these unfinished lessons?
No, you will not be locked out of any lesson or course. You will have access to all course materials throughout your membership, so there is no pressure to keep at the same pace as the specified lesson release dates.
All we recommend is that you try to stick to the same schedule as other participants. The reason is they may have moved on to other lessons, thereby meaning you could miss out on the social aspects of the course(s).
Do I have a specific date to award my certificates?
No, you can generate your certificate as soon as you score at least 70% of the total course points.
When will I receive my Course Certificate?
Course certificates will be given to participants when they have scored more than 70% or more of the total course points. For example, if a course contains ten lessons each with ten questions, you will receive a course certificate when the instructor has awarded you at least 70 points (70% of the total course points).
There is no specified time that certificates will be awarded — instead, they are given to participants as and when they have answered all questions, even if this is long after the official end date.
How do I add my Certificate to my LinkedIn profile?
Below is a step-by-step guide on how to add your Interaction Design Foundation course(s) to your LinkedIn profile:
Log in to your LinkedIn account, then go to your profile.
Below your profile description, click on the button Add profile section, choose Recommended and then select Add license or certification.
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3. In the following fields add:
Name – Course name
Issuing organization – The Interaction Design Foundation
Check the field “This credential does not expire”
Issue date - Input the date written on your certificate (e.g., May 2021)
Credential ID – Your membership ID number – it's written on your certificate. (For non-members, you can leave this field blank or, if you prefer, insert the certificate ID, which can be extracted from the certificate link. This ID will begin with "mcc_" and be followed by a string of numbers and letters.")
Credential URL: Input the certificate URL provided on your course page
4. Click the Save button.
Congratulate yourself! Earning the certificate is a great accomplishment and now you can share it with the world!
How do I add the Interaction Design Foundation Membership Certificate to my LinkedIn Profile?
Below is a step-by-step guide on how to add your Interaction Design Foundation course(s) to your LinkedIn profile:
Log in to your LinkedIn account, then go to your profile.
Below your profile description, click on the button Add profile section, choose Recommended and then select Add license or certification.
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3. In the following fields add:
Name – Membership Certificate
Issuing organization – The Interaction Design Foundation
Check the field “This credential does not expire”
Issue date - Input the date when you joined our community (e.g., May 2019)
Credential ID – Your membership ID number (it's written on your certificate)
Credential URL: Input the certificate URL provided on your profile page
4. Click the Save button.
It is as simple as that. Now, anyone who visits your profile can see your certificate!
How much will I have to pay for the courses?
After you pay for your membership, you can take as many courses as you want with no additional costs. There are no further charges on top of the membership fee.
Do you provide mostly beginners' or more advanced courses?
How long does it take to complete a course?
You will need approximately 5-8 hours to complete one lesson. Each course has between 3 and 16 lessons.
Once enrolled in a course, you will gain access to a new lesson each week, which you are free to complete without any deadlines and no end date, either.
I scored less than 70% in a course, so I didn't qualify for a certificate. Can I try again?
Yes! Everyone's learning journey looks different, and we'd never stop our members from trying again. To retake a course, just follow these steps:
1. Go to your profile and click on the relevant course you'd like to retake.
2. Underneath your progress bar, you'll see a phrase "UX Courses" with an arrow (>) pointing to a clickable landing page of that course. Click on that link.
3. Once on the landing page, scroll all the way down to the bottom of the page. You'll see a red button, which you can simply click to drop the course.
4. Head back to our main list of UX Courses, and re-enroll yourself in the course. You'll all set to try again!
Please note that when you drop a course, you will lose any answers and progress you submitted. We advise that you screenshot or save any answers you'd like to reuse.
In some cases, we can open up lessons for members who are retaking a course, so that they don't have to wait for familiar lessons to unlock each week. If you'd like us to do this for you, please get in touch with our support team at hello@interaction-design.org, and we can help you out.
How do I drop a course?
To drop a course, the following should be done:
1. Visit your profile page and click the 'continue lesson...' button for the course you want to drop.
2. Click the course name link breadcrumb near the top of the page that opens (this only appears in unlocked lessons, not upcoming lessons)
3. Click the red 'drop my course now' button at the bottom of the page that opens
