Global Search - MasterClass
Redesigning MasterClass Search to improve clarity, relevance, and cross-platform consistency—strengthening discovery across Web, iOS, and Android.
Making Search Searchable
Overview
At MasterClass, I led the end-to-end redesign of our Search experience across Web, iOS, and Android. This project followed the launch of the Library redesign I also led, and became the next strategic step in strengthening content discovery across the platform.
Search was one of the primary ways members navigated MasterClass’s catalog, yet the existing experience made it difficult to understand the breadth of content, recognize relevance, or meaningfully explore. My goal was to reimagine Search as a clear, intuitive, and expressive entry point to help users effectively browse and find the content they’re looking for.
As the lead designer, I collaborated closely with Product, Engineering, Data Science, UX Research, and Design Systems to define the vision, build scalable patterns, and deliver a cohesive cross-platform experience.
Background
Search had been intentionally deprioritized during the Library redesign due to scope, but post-launch data made the opportunity clear: a significant portion of users began their journey with Search, not with browsing. Additionally, Users lacked clarity about content types and relevance.
Goals
Make Search easier to find by placing it in the global nav
Improve comprehension of content types and relevance
Increase Search usage and downstream engagement & build scalable UI patterns for Web, iOS, and Android, and strengthen cross-platform cohesion and metadata clarity
Hypotheses
If we improved how Search is found, understood, and explored, users would have greater confidence in finding relevant content on MasterClass and consume more content that matched their intent.
Process
I first wrote a design brief outlining the problem space, data signals, constraints, risks, and milestones, which paired with my PM’s PRD as our alignment document. This allowed us to set clear expectations early and make principled tradeoffs later.
Throughout the project, I met with Engineering, Product, Data, Leadership, and Design Systems to pressure-test decisions, ensure technical viability, and define how Search needed to scale.
I also partnered with UX Research to develop test plans, build prototypes, and run iterative evaluations. Insights from these sessions shaped everything from information architecture to metadata representation.
Search V1
As the project continued, to test and learn iteratively to build towards a larger North Star re-design, we structured this project into V1 and V2 to accelerate delivery while exploring bigger changes in parallel.
V1 focused on:
Introducing Search into the global nav
Improving results patterns
Elevating relevance cues
Increasing entry-point discoverability
For our V1 release, I led and completed designs across Web, iOS, and Android. Search V1 launched in Q1 2023 and saw significant lifts in Search usage and engagement.
Search V2
Web
In our V2, we consolidated results into a single “All” view with content-type tabs. Each content type received its own display pattern, designed for recognition and clarity.
A standout element was the “Best Match” tile—an immersive hero result for exact instructor matches. It surfaced confidence signals quickly and celebrated the rich photography within the MasterClass catalog.
Mobile (iOS / Android)
On mobile, we introduced a tabbed model for content-type differentiation.
Large immersive tiles highlighted classes
Compact tiles represented shorter content (e.g., lessons)
This allowed users to immediately sense the depth and relevance of each result.
Overview
In our V2 designs, we wanted to further explore content display to encourage better wayfinding through content, and encourage relevant content browsing to help users find related content. To this end, in this stage of the project, I explored more substantial UX and IA improvements.
Final Designs
Design Delivery
For our final designs, I delivered web, iOS, and Android use case flows, high-fidelity prototypes across platforms, responsive variants, empty, error, and edge case states, and a comprehensive design spec.
Impact
Search V1 launched to 100% of users and drove meaningful lifts in content discovery and Search engagement.
Search V2 shipped as an A/B test and was prepared for rollout in Spring 2023, introducing scalable patterns and informing an updated global navigation system.
Results & Outcome
Redesigning Search redefined how MasterClass’s catalog was explored and understood, improving clarity, confidence, and consumption across platforms for both consumer and enterprise users.
This redesign also increased engagement with Search and overall engagement, and resulted in cross-platform systems cohesion and new scalable patterns that informed future catalog and navigation features.