Two small quality-of-life fixes for Discord, built from daily use.
Discord is one of the products I use most, so it's where I notice the small interactions that interrupt simple tasks. Rather than redesigning the platform, I explored two targeted improvements built on Discord's existing patterns.
- Role
- Product Designer
- Timeline
- 2026
- Skills
- Interaction DesignUX ResearchPrototyping
Design principles
- Preserve familiar patterns: changes should feel native to Discord
- Reduce steps: common tasks in the fewest interactions
- Design around intent: support what users are trying to do
Finding friends shouldn't depend on their status
The Friends page defaults to Online, making it easy to browse who's available but less effective when searching for a specific person.
I grouped Online and All into a single Social view, allowing search to return both online and offline friends while still showing each person's current status.
Search by relationship, not availability
One Social view: search returns everyone, with status still visible.
Opening a conversation shouldn't require sending one
Opening a user's profile doesn't provide a direct way to access an existing conversation. If a DM isn't visible in the sidebar, users must send a message just to reopen the chat.
I added an Open Chat button beside the message composer: users enter the conversation without sending anything, and draft text is preserved.
Separated opening from sending
Open a DM from any profile without sending anything.
Where it landed
Both improvements exist as working prototypes that remove an everyday friction without introducing a new pattern.
- 2
- Friction points, found through daily use
- 0
- New interface patterns introduced
- 1 click
- From any profile to its conversation
What I took away
Built from Discord's own patterns
Both fixes reuse existing components and behaviors, so they read as something Discord could ship rather than a redesign.
Both frictions were intent mismatches
The interface answered a different question than users were asking: who's online instead of where's my friend, send a message instead of open the chat.