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Amazon Music is a global streaming platform redefining how people discover and engage with sound. For Design at Berkeley’s designathon in partnership with Amazon Music, my team and I designed an end-to-end mobile concept focused on contextual music discovery, earning 2nd place among 55 teams.
Role
Team
Timeline
01 PROBLEM
Music streaming platforms lack contextual intelligence, missing opportunities for personalized, moment-based engagement throughout the day, plus ignoring when and why users listen.
How might we help users explore global music and content through personalized, context-aware recommendations?
02 RESEARCH
We began by analyzing the state of the current music streaming landscape.
Understanding The Market
Projected global music streaming market by 2030 (Grand View Research)
Active Google Calendar and Apple Calendar users worldwide (Statista)
of Gen Z and Millennials say their surroundings inspire their music taste
We discovered that billions use calendar apps daily, but music platforms don't leverage this behavioral data to enhance discovery.
Calendar Integration
Location-Aware Recommendations
Social Listening/Parties
Smart Discovery
Amazon Music
Spotify
Apple Music
YouTube Music
Our Key Competitors
We mapped major platforms to understand how they approach contextual music discovery and where Amazon Music could differentiate.
Through Our User's Lens
We developed personas representing Amazon Music's core demographics to understand how contextual awareness could serve different listener needs.
03 SYNTHESIS
We synthesized our research findings into four core themes that would guide our design direction.
04 IDEATION
After research, we brainstormed potential features and mapped them in a matrix.
By integrating calendar data, Amazon Music can build contextual awareness — understanding not just what users like, but when they need it.
Ultimately, this is what stood out to us the most:
By merging calendar data, we saw an opportunity to create a syncing feature that uses intent, timing, and context to adapt to a user's daily rhythm.
05 THE SOLUTION
Calendar & Activity-Aware Playlists
Delivers timely, situational content that aligns with users’ routines.
Auto-creates playlists from calendar events like “Football Practice.”
Introducing calendar syncing in Amazon Music, driving engagement through smarter content discovery and stronger user retention.
The full mobile experience, from syncing to playing
06 REFLECTION
06 REFLECTION
As my first-ever designathon, this was an especially meaningful experience for me as a designer. I learned how to design under pressure and what it means to create solutions in real user needs and data-driven insights.
Getting 2nd place was a major achievement, and I'm so grateful to my team (Sarah Mou, Arshia Narula, and Akshat Parikh) for their resilience, collaboration, and strategic thinking throughout the competition.
I'm excited to take what I learned here into my future projects. Can't wait to participate in more designathons and keep growing as a designer!
Thank you!
