Apple iOS5 Lock Screen Interaction

From the early design days of Macintosh and Jef Raskin, Apple has always led the way in OS interaction and visual design. However, today Apple announced the new iOS5 and for the first time I had doubts about couple of screens shown at WWDC 2011 (especially the Home Lock Screen).

Old Screen                                       New Screen

Here are my thoughts on why the old Lock screen was better than the new Lock screen:

1. Speed – ‘Slide to unlock’ is an action where  a user swipes his finger from left to right. On the old screen, users do not have to worry about missing the target. But on the new screen, there is a continuation from the first ‘slide to unlock’ object to second ‘Camera Icon’ object. To avoid misclick on Camera icon, users need to be cautious that they do not slide past the first object. This makes the unlock action much slower.

2. Error Prevention – This follows the first point. Users cannot make an error on old screen.

Bottom Line: Camera Icon on the Lock screen does add value, but placing it right of the unlock slider might be a bad idea.