Design Love: Ovo Timer

The last year or two has seen a sea of change when it comes to the design of Android apps. Unless the developer has provided exceptional functionality, he can no longer expect success if the app doesn’t look good. In the Design Love series, I’ll share some of the best examples of the growth the platform has seen. Last week, I wrote about Camera Zoom FX.

The first thing you notice when you launch Ovo Timer

Android developers are often guilty of losing focus from the core functionality of their app by adding features by the dozen. For this reason, I’m often quite excited to try out a new app which offers a very small set of capabilities, particularly if those capabilities are wrapped in some gorgeous design.

One such app is Ovo Timer. Ovo is just a countdown timer, with a maximum possible time of 60 minutes. The only additional feature that it adds over the stock countdown timer is that of setting timers via voice recognition. What does stand out about Ovo, however, is the manner in which you set the timer.

Instead of the typical tapping in of an HH:MM:SS for your timer, Ovo requires you to draw circles around the red-and-white-arc shown in the screenshot as if you were winding up your timer. The moment your finger leaves the screen, the timer starts and the red-and-white-arc starts to reduce in size to indicate the time left (which is also written in the middle, where you can tap to pause).

That is, quite honestly, all that Ovo offers, but that is a good thing. And I certainly was addicted to playing with it, winding it up again and again, and sometimes winding it down enjoying the UI. It reminded me Shush, another one of my favorite apps that I wrote about late last year as part of Uniquely Android. Ovo does offer some small preferences, such as choice of sound, vibration, whether to continue playing until a user dismisses an alarm and whether to keep the screen awake.

Possible Improvements

I love the look and feel of Ovo, and although I must admit that the stock Jelly Bean app also looks pretty neat, I would gladly switch over to Ovo for every moment I need a timer. Where it does lack, however, is the 60-minute limit. While it is good enough for most cases, I do wish I could set longer timers and use Ovo as my alarm app at times (when I’m confident that I wouldn’t need Puzzle Alarm Clock). I wouldn’t mind seeing the addition of a stopwatch, too.

However, I do understand, from what I’ve seen, that the developer simply doesn’t want to pack too many apps into it, and that is fair enough. Ovo is gorgeous, and if the developer is with his work, then that is all that matters.

To download Ovo, visit this link. Do let us know what you think in the comments, and you can also nominate other apps for future Design Love posts.