Ladder is a subscription strength training app for iPhone. A certified coach designs a new plan each week, so users never have to decide what to lift. The app schedules the week, demonstrates each exercise on video, and logs reps and weight during the session. I’ve been using it for about .
The weekly plan (Feedback)
The home screen lays out seven days with today in bold. Each card carries the workout name, how long it takes, which muscle groups it hits, and a completion count. Tuesday has a yellow checkmark where its date should be. This is knowledge in the world, which Norman describes as putting information out in the environment instead of asking people to carry it in their heads. I couldn’t tell you what week of the series I’m on or what I lifted Tuesday, and I don’t have to, because it’s on the screen. The checkmark is clear feedback too, since I know the session registered without going anywhere to confirm it. The one thing I’d change is that the checkmark replaces the date entirely. Tuesday’s 8 disappears, so the row stops working as a calendar. Drawing the check as a ring around the number would confirm the session without hiding the date.
Logging weight (Constraints)
The plan calls for 7.5 pounds. The weight field is a plain text input with a keypad and a decimal point, and it takes whatever I give it. Miss the decimal and I’ve logged 75, which is more than four times my recorded max.
Norman’s argument about slips is that they happen regardless of how careful someone is, so the design has to catch them rather than trust the user not to make them. There is no constraint on this field at all, and I’m typing into it between sets with tired hands. A stepper in 2.5-pound increments would make the common case fast while keeping the keypad one tap away, and a sensibility check on anything more than double the recorded max could return “75 lbs? Your max is 17.5” with confirm and cancel. That’s an interlock rather than a lockout, so it slows me down without blocking a genuine personal record. Ladder already handles reversibility well elsewhere, since Undo Swap sits labeled in the control row rather than buried in a menu, and Norman consistently prefers that to a confirmation dialog.
The Effort column (Knowledge in the Head)
Every set shows an effort percentage. 60% comes up blue, 90% comes up orange. I’ve never found a legend for the colors anywhere in the app, and it never says what the percentage is a percentage of especially for beginners; overloading on weights seems difficult and unfamiliar. Ladder should tell you what the percentage means and the color associated with it. The color coding is knowledge in the head, since I’d have to learn what blue and orange mean and then remember it, except Ladder never taught me. The missing referent is a separate problem. Norman uses system image for everything an interface actually shows you, which is the only material anyone has for working out how the designer thinks the thing works, and here it leaves out the piece that would make the number mean something. Labeling the column “Effort (% of 1RM)” would supply the referent, and a small filled bar beside the number would carry the value without depending on color alone.
Conclusion
Ladder is at its best before a workout starts. The plan is made, the week is laid out, and nothing has to be remembered. The logging screen is where it declines, and that’s the screen I’m on when I’m tired and holding a dumbbell. Stronger constraints on the weight field, labels that distinguish repeated exercises, and a stated referent for the effort numbers would fix all three without changing anything about how the app looks.