ISO 9241-115:2024

Overview

ISO 9241-115:2024 - part of the ISO 9241 series on ergonomics of human‑system interaction - provides guidance on conceptual design, user‑system interaction design, user interface design and navigation design for interactive systems. The standard applies across development approaches (human‑centred design, agile, waterfall, HFI, object‑oriented, rapid development) and is intended to inform designers, developers, evaluators, tool builders and project managers involved in user interface and interaction design.

Key topics and technical guidance

ISO 9241-115 organizes practical guidance into clearly defined topics, including:

• Conceptual design: defining system purpose, user needs, mental models and high‑level interaction concepts to guide consistent interface behaviour.
• User‑system interaction design: specifying interaction types, designing interaction scenarios, user actions and compatibility across scenarios.
• User interface design: structure of interfaces, UI instances and UI elements; information architecture and information design to support findability and comprehension.
• Navigation design: design of navigation sequences and techniques for linear, tree, network, hybrid and dynamic structures; support for exploration, alternative paths and minimizing user effort.
• Links and navigation semantics: guidance on system‑activated vs user‑activated links, permanent/temporal/computed/user‑defined links, discriminability and avoiding temporal link errors.
• Session and state management: saving/restoring state, returning to saved or previous states, and clean exit behaviour.
• Cross‑cutting concerns: accessibility, overall consistency, aesthetics, device support, and constraints on design.
• Human‑centred design integration: how to incorporate HCD activities, mental models and evaluative checkpoints throughout development.

The standard emphasizes practical design recommendations rather than prescriptive technical specifications.

Practical applications and who uses ISO 9241-115

ISO 9241-115 is useful for:

• User interface designers creating UI specifications, wireframes and interaction flows.
• Developers implementing interaction logic and navigation behaviour.
• Evaluators and usability specialists producing checklists and conducting conformance assessments.
• Designers of UI toolkits and style guides who need to encode good interaction patterns.
• Project managers ensuring design quality across development lifecycles.

Typical applications include web and mobile app UX, enterprise software, embedded interactive systems, and any product where navigation, information architecture and interaction scenarios affect usability and accessibility.

Related standards

ISO 9241-115 complements other parts of the ISO 9241 ergonomics series (usability, accessibility and human‑centred design guidance). Use ISO 9241-115 alongside organization‑specific style guides and accessibility regulations to create consistent, usable and accessible interactive systems.

Keywords: ISO 9241-115, ergonomics of human-system interaction, user interface design, navigation design, conceptual design, human-centred design, information architecture, accessibility.