hello, and welcome

I am a product designer. Today I am thinking about product innovation.

Yidan Xu

Product & UX Designer — London
About

Research first. Then design.

I am a product designer and a researcher, based in London. I did a double master's in Innovation Design Engineering at Imperial College London and the Royal College of Art. I like problems that need science and people at the same time. Right now I am building Urify. It is a health product, and Imperial College London is incubating it.

A running thread across my work

How I think about AI & HMI.

Two of my projects ask the same question. How much should a system decide on its own? People also need to see where that line sits. If they cannot see it, they will not trust it. I wrote about this, from 1Soul to the Xiaomi Auto cockpit.

Read my thinking
Vibe coding

I build things too.

I also build software for myself. I use AI to help me write the code. These are not case studies. They are small tools I use every day. I will add more here as I make them.

mood_guard.py

MoodGuard

macOS desktop widget · Python + AppKit · built with Claude Code

I work alone on urgent things a lot. When I do, I get absorbed and forget the rest. I forget food. I forget sleep. I forget people. So I built MoodGuard. It is a widget, and it sits on the desktop next to the stock ones. It tracks the things that recharge me. You pick your own list. Each activity gets one pill, and you tap a pill to fill it in. A big number counts the days since the last one. Go 14 days with no real recharge and it warns you. Then you can do something before a low mood lands. It is free, and you can change all of it.

What it looks like
MoodGuard on the macOS desktop beside the stock Weather, Calendar and battery widgets, showing a 0-day counter and seven activity pills with three checked off in mint
It sits at desktop level and looks like the stock widgets. Tap a pill to check it off for today.
MoodGuard's customise sheet, a plain text box with one activity per line, being edited to add 'Walk my dog'
The list is yours. One activity per line, up to 12. Remove a line and it keeps the history.
Selected work

go on, give it a throw

Not sure where to start?

Click the dice. It will pick a project for you.

Or just scroll. Every project is below.

1Soul homepage — 'Be seriously matched, not just casually seen'
2026 · AI · Product · Website

1Soul

I was the sole designer on an AI matchmaking product: research-led repositioning, a full before/after redesign, and an AI-accelerated workflow grounded in real user interviews.

View case study
The Urify product, photographed for its James Dyson Award 2025 entry
2026 · Health Care · 0–1 · Startup

Urify

A 0–1 health-innovation product I founded solo, recognised as a UK James Dyson Award finalist and covered by Reuters.

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Xiaomi SU7 digital cockpit interior
2025 · HMI · Digital Cockpit

Xiaomi Auto

Contributed to the design and optimisation of in-vehicle interfaces, including central and rear displays, ensuring compliance with European standards and regulations.

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A minted NFT collectible shown on a phone mockup
2023 · Web3 · Startup

NFT

A Chinese NFT platform where users can autonomously craft personalised NFT profile pictures and both buy and sell NFTs.

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2025 · AI · Product · UI/UX

Innovate ADHD

Designed and built a remote ADHD assessment platform from 0–1, shaped around the cognitive and behavioural characteristics of ADHD users.

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Presenting research findings to the Huawei product team
2024 · UI/UX · Data-Driven

Huawei

Design improvements grounded in real user behaviour across three projects covering user identity, structural optimisation and cross-app consistency.

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A hand holding a phone showing the RES app's Breathe Easy welcome screen, with the RES sensor standing behind it
2025 · Health · Product · UI/UX System

RES

Precise pollen detection turned into actionable insight, helping people breathe easier and live better. DIA Award, and second prize at the Analytics for Society Award 2025.

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PulpaTronics website hero — hanging paper NFC tags
2024 · UI/UX · Branding · Startup

Pulpatronics

Brand building for a sustainable-tech startup during a London internship: colour system, promotional materials and workshop visual support.

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A playtester wearing a VR headset, controllers raised, in front of the flooded Westminster game world
2023 · VR · Unity · Gaming

Entropy

A VR game set fifty years from now in a flooded, waste-choked West Westminster, teaching recycling through play.

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The gesture-controlled lock device
2023 · AI · Machine Learning · Hardware

Gesture

A gesture-controlled lock I trained with machine learning. It opens only once every finger reaches its correct angle.

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Fantasy-style illustration of a character holding a small glowing white rabbit
2024 · Design · Illustration

Illustrator

Freelance illustration work from 2019–2025, adapting drawing method and style to each client's needs.

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Now

Mostly heads-down on weaving AI into everyday life: not chatbots bolted onto things, but small, specific tools that remove real friction. Some ship as client work, some are just for me, like the MoodGuard widget above. Also building Urify and designing at 1Soul.

Updated July 2026 · London
Contact

Let's work together.

Open to product design roles and collaborations in London and remotely.