OVR Technology
2026
Designing a companion app for a personal scent display
Omara is a personal scent display that allows you to smell your video games. Omara Scent Studio (OSS) is the companion software that allows users to customize, maintain, and troubleshoot the Omara. I took full design ownership of the companion app, scaling it to be launch ready in both Pre-Beta, Beta, and Full Launch phases.
Overview
Managing a brand new piece of gaming tech made easy
OVR Technology created a meaningful step forward in allowing users to smell their digital worlds with Omara, a personal scent display no larger than an AirPod Pro case. Naturally, with new, unique tech comes understandable curiosity on how to manage it and to know what is possible with it. To address this anticipated user need, Omara comes with a companion app, Omara Scent Studio (OSS), similar to other devices that connect via Bluetooth or Cable (i.e. Logitech headphones, NVIDIA GPU). Because OSS exists, users are provided with support and control of their Omara, so that they can spend less time figuring out functions, and more time playing their scent enabled games.
My Impact
I assumed design ownership of agency Figma files, eliminating $4k/hr out-of-scope fees as an in-house designer that can iterate quickly on the design based on pivoting hardware constraints and holistic understanding of Omara in its product ecosystem. In preparation for major milestones in 2026, I scaled OSS to be demo and launch ready in Pre-Beta, Beta, and Full Launch phases. My design strategy and scoping of key features required for user success afforded a 4 month development buffer window for focused QA, polish, and trust optimization before Full Launch. QA rounds consistently demonstrated that ease of use is maintained, time to complete primary user goals is kept at a minimum (<1-3 min), and key notifications are presented clearly, promptly, with dedicated CTA.
Design MVPs:
Onboarding flow
Notifications
Device Settings / App Preferences
Game Catalog
Project NDA
Due to NDA, various visuals are omitted from this case study.
Challenge
Understanding how to operate a cool, new piece of tech
During my time at OVR, these product questions helped calibrate my approach to problem solving:
Omara's major payoff is that it scent enables both new, upcoming game titles, and currently existing, highly popular ones. Users are purchasing Omara for this perk, and typically want to get into the content right away. How can this user flow be streamlined with minimal friction and risk of error?
Omara does not have a screen to display information, which requires the information to live in OSS. What information and functions are useful to the user?
While Omara is simple in industrial design, novelty led to varying levels of interaction ambiguity amongst users seeing it for the first time. This led to some users getting stuck on how to proceed forward. How do we setup the user for success at the beginning and during their user journey with Omara?
Research
Identifying key user goals
With a Full Launch scheduled in Q4 2026, and early Kickstarter backers receiving their devices in August 2026, I advocated for focused design strategy and proper scoping to ensure that I was designing for the right needs.
Based on market validation findings and a deep dive on how Omara works, I identified the following key questions:
How does the user know that Omara has connected correctly?
How does the user know when their Cassette is running low?
How does the user know that Omara is correctly connected to game mods?
How does the user troubleshoot Omara?
How does the user adjust scent intensity levels?
What if a user does not like a certain scent?
How do users discover scent enabled games?
What I learned
The questions above required solutions that prioritized accuracy and speed of goal completion. Modular design was used to achieve this design strategy: grouping related functions to their respective screens, with several helper modules (such as notifications, toasts, and Omara connection status) present on every screen.
I identified that a carefully designed onboarding flow is going to be imperative to user success in OSS (and with Omara in general), as it would establish the companion app's value and educate the user on Omara's core functions before diving into their first session.
Clear, helpful notification and toast messages were going to be key in troubleshooting and maintaining Omara with OSS. I made the design choice to also include in the alert messaging clear CTA to solve various pings. This ensures that users are handed the solution rather than trying to find it themselves, leading to an intentional and premium experience.
Strategy
A/B testing for onboarding flow
Taking what I've observed and learned from live demos and content creator video footage, a major risk was user confusion on how to interact, assemble, and setup Omara correctly. Omara's industrial design is elegantly simple and applied Jakob's law, but due to the novelty factor, users did not necessarily have intuitive handling of the device. Live demos demonstrated that users could accidentally break their Cassette or insert it in Omara incorrectly on first unboxing.
A/B testing was utilized to determine which method of assembly guidance was preferred within OSS:
Slideshow with gifs with copy
Video
Test results pointed to Version A as the preferred method. This confirmed the following:
Users value controlling the pace of a tutorial
Allowing users to control the pace of a tutorial holds their attention longer
Holding the user's attention longer during the tutorial increases user success in the future
Excitement is a user emotion that influences behavior
I designated excitement as an important user emotion to consider. In their excitement, users may rush past, entirely skip, or proceed out of order during onboarding, which can impede correct assembly and education on how to enjoy Omara. I proposed that onboarding doesn't start when the user starts the app, it starts when the user first unboxes Omara.
Users already revealed that they want to control the pace in getting started, however a baseline pace needed to be set to mitigate chances of error.
I ideated and proposed solutions to physically slow down the user during the unboxing experience, while maintaining the hype, and ensuring that new users get plugged into OVR's community:
Physical pacing methods: Cassettes will have sticker cover over the chip read by Omara for data, this sticker also demonstrates graphically how to correctly insert the Cassette into Omara, and is required to remove before inserting
Accessible content: allowing users to see the video assembly guide tutorial from Version B in A/B testing if they have not downloaded OSS
Access to Discord: presented as a QR code on the packaging, and readily clickable on OVR's website
Designs
One stop shop to see all scent enabled content
A common question from users is what games are scent enabled. I designed a simple game catalog living within OSS to allow users to quickly browse and access Omara compatible content.
This design is intentionally made simple so that it can scale exponentially as OVR's content catalog grows, covering analog forms of gaming such as tabletop and non-gaming verticals such as relaxation/meditation.
Top navigation bar features core modules such as Connected Omara, Omara Battery, Connection Type/Status, and Game Link Status (Web Socket Connection), and notifications.
Aroma Atrium screen viewing all available, scent enabled games
Scent enabled game info modal
Lessons
Designing for clarity, confidence, and fun
This project validated that I am able to anticipate, scope, and execute design strategy correctly with informed foresight. As is the nature of startups, reactionary pivots can easily distract and cause a design timeline that addresses a noise rather than a signal. By diligently protecting the design scope and focusing on what users will truly need at baseline when Omara is in their hands, I was able to ensure the software team builds (and I design) based on response, not reaction, leading to a design is intentional with thoughtful details.
Ultimately, seeing users delighted by how easy OSS was to use in parity with Omara and its gaming content was my biggest motivator. Ensuring that the baseline, foundational functionality for OSS was intentional, thoughtful, and focused was my way of respecting Omara's innovation.
I attended my first PAX back in 2017 as an attendee in Seattle. Almost a decade later, I attended PAX East as an exhibitor with OVR, showcasing Omara, OSS, and its gaming content. The aura farming we did as a team, being called "the only new tech on the floor," is one of my fondest memories.
