Yandex Alice

Yandex Alice

An AI assistant that lives on the lock screen, not in a chat

The brief was a dream: imagine an AI product with no technical limits, built around the phone. The Yandex Alice team ran it as a design battle, a concept contest between studios and in-house teams, at the Kaiference conference.

Our studio team of five took 2nd place, one point behind the winner, an in-house product team.

Role
Senior designer
Team
Studio team of five, with an art director
Timeline
July 2025
Outcome
2nd place, one point behind the winner

I worked on the idea, the scenario and the screens. The team presented it live at the conference while I worked remotely.

Alice opened from the home screen: the day’s greeting, the cards for the day, and breakfast ordered in one tap
The morning: the day laid out, breakfast in one tap

Pick one idea out of many

We started with a brainstorm, and the ideas got wild: a tutor for anything, last night’s dreams turned into a series, a guard against phone scams, whole worlds built from a prompt.

We picked the broadest idea, and the hardest: an assistant that works across all your apps and does things for you, not only answers.

The brainstorm’s ideas stuck on a board one by one, then the one we chose, an assistant across all your apps, turns green
The ideas we had, and the one we chose

Then we listed what people would use it for, from a social media detox to a summary after every call. Each one became a card Alice shows at the right moment.

When…

I want to…

So Alice…

I scroll social media too much

Take a break from it

Turns off notifications, switches on Sleep, locks the apps

I barely walk

Get out more

A walk nearby, a trip or a place to go

The doctor gave me pills

Not miss a dose

Reminders that fit around the day

I have work calls

Not miss anything said

The key points, the next steps and the recording

I can’t pick what to watch tonight

Have a good evening

A film picked from Kinopoisk, dinner from Yandex Eda

The jobs people would hire Alice for

Turn several concepts into one

Each of us made a concept, then we laid all five side by side and kept the strongest parts: cards instead of a chat, a greeting that knows your day, and Alice’s purple.

Five early concepts side by side draw together into the home screen we built
Five concepts into one

Take Alice out of the chat

A chat works like a queue of requests. You have to know what to ask and remember to open the app.

Most moments when help is useful don’t look like that. You slept badly. A call starts in six minutes. You can’t decide what to do tonight. Nobody opens a chat then.

So we moved Alice to the lock screen. She shows a card when something is about to happen. The usual tools you call up yourself stayed in a second tab, Studio.

The lock screen through a day: a warm-up after a short night at 8:03, the weekend planned at 18:36, ideas for the evening at 19:56, each card opening into Alice’s sheet
Cards on the lock screen

Stay with you all day

We planned a whole day, hour by hour: what Alice can notice at each point, from sleep, the calendar, steps and screen time, and what she brings.

08:00 Morning

  • You wake upHow you slept, and a short warm-upPhone
  • Breakfast timeA menu from your usual orders, here in 15 minutesPhone
  • Standup soonYesterday in short, and a countdown to joinPhone

14:00 Work

  • A mockup to reviewFeedback on a Figma frame, in the notchMac
  • A call in six minutesEverything for it on one cardPhone
  • Hours at the deskA break, and a timer for itMac

19:00 Evening

  • A tiring weekA weekend away: a route, tickets, a hotelPhone
  • A free eveningA film, and dinner to go with itPhone
  • Before bedHow was your day?Phone
What Alice does through the day

She doesn’t stop at suggestions. She orders, books and writes drafts, and you confirm with one tap. That tap is the rule: Alice never spends your money or speaks for you without it.

Before a call she gathers what you need. After it she sums it up: the key points, the next steps and the materials.

Before a 1:1, Alice’s card on the lock screen with questions to ask; after it, the summary and the next steps
Before a call and after it

Before bed she asks how the day went, and the little face on the card takes on your mood.

The mood check-in before bed: the slider goes from Irritated to Good and the little face changes color
How was your day?

Be there at the desk too

On a Mac, Alice sits in the notch. Paste a link to a Figma frame, say what you need, and she writes the feedback while the orb thinks.

A link to a Figma frame pasted into Alice in the notch, the orb thinking, and feedback for the designer opening out of the notch
Feedback on a mockup, from the notch

When a call ends, Alice writes it up right there in the notch.

After a call, Alice writes it up in the notch, and the summary with the recording opens out of it
The summary of a call

Set Alice up once

You sign in with Yandex ID, pick an avatar and a character for Alice, and connect services: Yandex apps, work tools, messengers, food delivery. The more she can see, the more useful her cards get.

Onboarding: signing in with Yandex ID, Alice’s avatar coming to life, the services connected
Setting Alice up

Where it landed

  • 2nd place

    The jury scored five things: idea, visuals, storytelling, interaction and impact on the future. The maximum was 75 points. We finished one point behind the winner, an in-house product team, and ahead of the other in-house teams.

If we did it again

We’d spend less of the pitch on the perfect day and more on the first week: how Alice earns enough trust to be allowed to order your breakfast.