Although consumer interest may be high when it comes to wearables, most designers and developers say that creating content for the devices is more challenging, according to a new study.
That study, conducted by Kony, found that the majority (69%) of designers said wearables are or will become a challenge for application design within the next year. The majority (65%) of developers also said the same.
More than half (51%) of designers said the challenge remains in designing for multiple devices and platforms.
The Next Frontier in Cross-Platform Mobile Development: Wearables and Connected Devices study comprised a global survey of more than 230 designers and mobile app developers about challenges encountered when developing for non-mobile applications.
Issues when designing for wearables, compared to smartphones and tablets, include unusual screen form factors and shorter consumer engagement timeframes, according to the study.
On the development side, a quarter of developers said they feel there is no clear vision when it comes to creating for wearables and more than a third (37%) said the top challenge is the complexity of omni-channel development and testing.
The top challenge for both designers and developers when dealing with the development lifecycle for wearables and mobile apps is lack of communication between departments, with almost half (40%) of both saying so.
Almost a third (31%) said receiving unclear objectives from internal stakeholders is a challenge and the third largest challenge stated is not being able to reuse assets across desktop, mobile and wearable apps, with almost a quarter (22%) of designers and developers saying so.
Top barriers faced in the development stage of wearables apps include lack of time and resources and overall complexity of developing and testing for omni-channel projects, according to the study
The majority (78%) of designers and developers said they are currently working on more than one application and even more (88%) said they will likely work on more than two within the next year.