Tapworthy: Designing Great iPhone Apps

by Josh Clark

So you've got an idea for an iPhone app -- along with everyone else on the planet. Set your app apart with elegant design, efficient usability, and a healthy dose of personality. This accessible, well-written guide shows you how to design exceptional user experiences for the iPhone and iPod Touch through practical principles and a rich collection of visual examples. Whether you're a designer, programmer, manager, or marketer, Tapworthy teaches you to "think iPhone" and helps you ask the right questions -- and get the right answers -- throughout the design process. You'll explore how considerations of design, psychology, culture, ergonomics, and usability combine to create a tapworthy app. Along the way, you'll get behind-the-scenes insights from the designers of apps like Facebook, USA Today , Twitterrific, and many others. Ten Tips for Crafting Your App’s Visual Identity

Voices (left) has a Vaudeville personality appropriate to a funny-voices novelty app. iShots Irish Edition (right) creates a gritty dive-bar ambience for its collection of drink recipes.
Wine Steward uses standard lists (known as table views in iOS) but creates a vintage ambience by draping a backdrop image across the screen. The app adds a parchment graphic to the background of each table cell, making each entry appear to be written on an aged wine label. The burgundy-tinted navigation bar maintains the app’s wine flavor.

Genres: Design, Technology, Nonfiction, Programming, Reference, Computer Science, Website Design

320 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2010

About the author

Josh Clark is founder of Big Medium, a design agency specializing in connected devices, mobile experiences, and responsive web design. His clients include Samsung, Time Inc, TechCrunch, Entertainment Weekly, eBay, O’Reilly Media, and many others. Josh has written several books, including “Designing for Touch” (A Book Apart, 2015) and “Tapworthy: Designing Great iPhone Apps” (O’Reilly, 2010). He speaks around the world about what’s next for digital interfaces.

Before the internet swallowed him up, Josh was a producer of national PBS programs at Boston’s WGBH. He shared his three words of Russian with Mikhail Gorbachev, strolled the ranch with Nancy Reagan, hobnobbed with Rockefellers, and wrote trivia questions for a primetime game show. In 1996, he created the uberpopular “Couch-to-5K” (C25K) running program, which has helped millions of skeptical would-be exercisers take up jogging. (His motto is the same for fitness as it is for software user experience: no pain, no pain.)

Reviews

[Dave · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very insightful stuff, wish he'd write a new book!

[Trey Piepmeier · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a bit punny and silly in parts, but is full of great information and terminology for someone who is a great appreciator of iOS apps, but who knows nothing about designing or building them (me). However, I would even recommend this book to experienced iOS folks. This book is filled with best practices and examples of how *not* to do things -- including some choice examples of Apple's own apps (notification badge icon on the Phone app shows "2" for a single missed call if the caller leaves a voicemail).

I attended Josh Clark's workshop a few months ago at WebVisions. This book is a little out of date compared to the material he covered there. There's very little mention of iPads, no mention(?) of the retina display, and, of course, no mention of the impending iOS 5. I look forward to an updated version.

Note: this review written on an iPad, which is my absolute least favorite way to type.

[Alex · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've been waiting for somebody to write this book for the last year. It's not a technical book on iPhone development. Its also not a survey of best apps. Instead, it's a review of design paradigms (and effective examples that skirt these paradigms) for iPhone app development. Think of it as a companion to Apple's Human Interface Guidelines. That is, it's a review of design patterns, practices and recommendations made by a careful observer outside of Apple.

[Karen Harris · Rating 5 out of 5]

I just started doing mobile application development and needed a solid book on iPhone UI design. I have nothing to compare this book to, but it's excellent, exactly what I was looking for. It describes every widget and its correct usage, as well as offering alternative solutions to common UI problems. It's also precise - it details the pixel dimensions of elements in the iPhone's built-in apps. Very highly recommended to anyone doing iPhone development.

[Jennifer · Rating 5 out of 5]

Tapworthy is a great guide to mobile app design, and really interface design in general. This book details how to develop your ideas, design experiences that reward, why you should embrace Apple's design sensibility, and what considerations to keep in mind when designing for touch. Anyone working with mobile apps should give this book a read, you'll be surprised at how much you'll learn.

[Jack Gidding · Rating 5 out of 5]

Josh Clark does an elegant job describing how to design good UIs for the iPhone. A must read for anyone working with XCode and IB.

You must read this one in color, so paper or iPad versions are recommended.

[Vytas Ramanauskas · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good read, however, this is quite an outdated for 2019. But totally worth for the principles! Principles are universal, the path is yours!

[Almudena · Rating 3 out of 5]

Un manual útil

[Hp Terbaru · Rating 5 out of 5]

A good read, however, this is quite an outdated for 2019. But totally worth for the principles! Principles are universal, the path is yours!

[Laurian · Rating 5 out of 5]

Given that this is the *only* book that I've read on mobile design, I was still really really impressed. This books keeps it super simple: it covers the mobile design space - i.e., what you can and cannot/should not control; the best practices surrounding the designs; and, how really smart people have done it before. The use of case studies, and the break down of each chapter is really clean. And, let me not skimp on the great use of graphics to explain. The book is beautiful and the writing is easy to follow. While not explicitly a UX book (it doesn't really get under the covers of how to step through the design process), I think this would be a great book for anyone doing mobile design.

[Shawn Grimes · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of the best books about iPhone development that doesn't have a single bit of code in it (which is a good thing). This book is completely focused on making good design and interface choices when building your iPhone apps. As a developer with very little design skill, I can't recommend this book enough. It takes a practical approach to design that makes it easy to understand design principles and why you need to make certain choices in your app design. Every iOS developer should read this book!

[Chris Hitchcock · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pretty good overview of how to design an app that would make a good iOS citizen. While it is focused on the iPhone, I think a lot of the points made in this book would apply to mobile website design as well as other touch-focused operating systems like Android or webOS.

The way the different design areas were broken down in the book will make it is to refer back to certain areas when starting a new project.

[Renee Valdez · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book. The author provides a smooth read with interstitial articles written by people working on application design. This book is great for someone wanting to know the basics of app development from a UI standpoint. You'll get best practices and how to approach using the built in standards iOS.

[Matt on Books · Rating 3 out of 5]

Like any technology book, it's become quickly dated, but if you know nothing about interface design, especially for mobile, this is a great summary of the basic concerns.

I've been designing interfaces for a while, so only 3 stars, as I found myself skipping large chunks, but it's a good introduction to the world of (mostly iOS) mobile design.

[Joe · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is an invaluable resource for anyone designing iOS apps. Although it's now slightly out of date, it provides a better interface guide than Apple's own by surveying the field of iOS apps for good and bad examples; the interviews with makers of well-known apps discussing their UI decisions are particularly interesting.

[Bernardo · Rating 3 out of 5]

Un poquito desactualizado, le falta cubrir resoluciones nuevas (obviamente iPhone 5 ni se diga) y cambios en iOS 5 y 6.
Es principalmente enfocado en diseño, por lo que no debes esperar una línea de código ni nada enfocado al desarrollo, pero sí muy buenos insights del proceso creativo de una app (y del proceso en general) y también detalles útiles para la estética.

[Dave Emmett · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great book on designing intuitive iPhone apps. Probably my favorite part was just getting all the correct terms for the core iPhone UI components (segmented controls, Navigation Bars, table cells, etc.), which is making it much easier to be specific when communicating with our developers.

[Jeff · Rating 4 out of 5]

Anyone interested in application design: this is your bible. Using it to teach a class this fall. Easy to read, full of information, and loaded with case studies that will hep you and your students understand the unique problems of app development.

[darío hereñú · Rating 2 out of 5]

Politically correct, nothing out of this world. With examples of current applications, clarify, pointing out the essential in the process of imaging, programming the app.
At the end of the day, can save a lot of time and pain.

A win/win relation!

[Kim · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book for the programming/designer dummy. I laughed (because Josh Clark is a funny guy); I cried (because I wish I had the skills to write my own app); it left me able to speak somewhat intelligently with the smart people who will be writing my app for an upcoming work project.

[Simon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Has many useful tips and insight for iPhone app developers; great examples of latest apps in the App store

[Rik Catlow · Rating 4 out of 5]

The best book i've read on iPhone app UX.

[Andrea · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is a delight. Was so easy to read, and so informative.....you just absorb it and can be confident that it's taught you something....that you'll actually remember.

[Harish · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great overview of iPhone (and mobile) design paradigms that's a must-read for anyone doing mobile app development.

[Craig Villamor · Rating 5 out of 5]

Must-have for anyone designing touch UI.

[Ana · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pretty good start to iphone app (and mobile apps in general) design with basics we should never forget (and we do forget so often).

[Jeremy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some parts are already outdated (e.g., no mention of retina display), but the overall philosophies for good app design are still applicable. A lot of app developers could stand to read this book.

[Alexander Debkaliuk · Rating 4 out of 5]

Solid book covering all the things you need to know before entering the world of iPhone apps design. Still makes a lot of sense today.

[Rohitashwa Jain · Rating 4 out of 5]

Loved it, especially when I was looking for some structured instructions on mobile designing. Wish it had a bit of Android coverage though.

[cosmic · Rating 4 out of 5]

Learned a lot about designing apps for touch devices.