This year's 10 best-designed Application User Interfaces

Nielsen Norman Group recently announced the winners in its competition to find the 10 best-designed application user interfaces of the Application Design Annual 2008. This is the first competition of its kind and aims to recognise not only the design but usability of web based and hosted applications around the world.

"The differentiator for many of the winners was their ability to attract a broader audience and employ usability-based features such as the ribbon toolbar used in Office 2007,” said usability expert Jakob Nielsen, principal of Nielsen Norman Group. "Mobile is definitively the trend to watch for next year, and any application owner should think hard about whether and how to add mobile features in 2009.”

Ten application user interfaces were singled out as the world’s best designed in this years contest. These offer numerous examples of best practices in application design, and are each analysed in detail in Nielsen Norman Group’s 302-page report entitled “Application Design Annual 2008: Year's 10 Best Apps UI,” co-authored by Nielsen Norman Group User Experience Specialist Chris Nodder, co-founder Jakob Nielsen, and researcher J.M Berger.

The 10 winning applications come from all over the world, covering four continents and include a first time winner from the Middle East and two from the Netherlands:

1) Campaign Monitor by Eyeblaster (Israel): integrated management of multiple advertising campaigns for media buyers.
2) CMSBox by CMSBox (Switzerland): content management system.
3) FotoFlexer by Arbor Labs (USA): photo editor.
4) PRISMAprepare by Océ (Netherlands): print shop software.
5) Seating Management by Magellan Network and DesignMap (USA): hostess stand reservation book for restaurants.
6) SQL diagnostic manager by Idera (USA): database performance monitoring and diagnostics.
7) SugarSync by Sharpcast (USA): synchronizing files across multiple computers.
8) SuperSaaS by SuperSaaS (Netherlands): creating and hosting scheduling and reservation systems.
9) Wufoo by Infinity Box, Inc. (USA): online forms, surveys, invitations, and payments.
10) Xero by Xero (New Zealand): accounting for small businesses.

In addition, Nielsen Norman Group’s annual User Experience conference will be held this year in Amsterdam from November 16-21. Taking place over six days and offering 29 full-day tutorials, this conference is aimed at both web usability beginners and veterans.

Associated Link: Nielsen Norman Group

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