Video SDK Design

OVERVIEW

Stream set out to expand its real-time platform by launching a new Video & Audio SDK, built from the ground up to match the developer-friendly ethos of its Chat product. As Staff Product Designer, I defined the user experience, component system, and theming architecture to ensure seamless integration with existing Chat infrastructure. This project unlocked upsell opportunities for hybrid messaging + video use cases, reduced customer churn, and positioned Stream to compete with incumbents like Twilio and Daily—without compromising on developer experience or visual consistency.

YEAR

2024 - 2025

ROLE

Staff Product Designer

SERVICES

PROBLEM

Prior to this launch, Stream offered best-in-class Chat infrastructure—but lacked support for real-time video and audio communication. Customers were forced to integrate third-party tools, fragmenting their UX and adding dev overhead. Internally, we lacked a unified design or component strategy for live calling. There were no patterns for ring states, device control, layout switching, or participant UIs. We needed a scalable SDK and interface architecture that could plug into our existing Chat SDK and reuse design system primitives.

Customer feedback:

“We want to offer video support in our app—but it feels disconnected when we bolt on a third-party tool.

SOLUTION

We launched a cross-platform Video & Audio SDK that tightly integrates with Stream’s existing Chat infrastructure and Sidecar design system. Key contributions included:


UI Kit for all call states: ringing, active, idle, error, reconnection

Modular component architecture with headless + prebuilt options

Cross-platform theming support using shared tokens (via Style Dictionary)

Interaction patterns for layout switching, device management, speaker views

Figma libraries with mapped variables, call flows, and reusable call surfaces

Demo apps and templates to showcase real-world usage across verticals

Component interoperability with Chat SDK (e.g., shared avatars, headers, channel context)

3x

increase in customer demos with chat + video enabled

3x

increase in customer demos with chat + video enabled

62%

faster average time to POC vs. using third-party video SDKs

+18%

boost in expansion revenue in first quarter after launch


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Video SDK Design

OVERVIEW

Stream set out to expand its real-time platform by launching a new Video & Audio SDK, built from the ground up to match the developer-friendly ethos of its Chat product. As Staff Product Designer, I defined the user experience, component system, and theming architecture to ensure seamless integration with existing Chat infrastructure. This project unlocked upsell opportunities for hybrid messaging + video use cases, reduced customer churn, and positioned Stream to compete with incumbents like Twilio and Daily—without compromising on developer experience or visual consistency.

YEAR

2024 - 2025

ROLE

Staff Product Designer

SERVICES

PROBLEM

Prior to this launch, Stream offered best-in-class Chat infrastructure—but lacked support for real-time video and audio communication. Customers were forced to integrate third-party tools, fragmenting their UX and adding dev overhead. Internally, we lacked a unified design or component strategy for live calling. There were no patterns for ring states, device control, layout switching, or participant UIs. We needed a scalable SDK and interface architecture that could plug into our existing Chat SDK and reuse design system primitives.

Customer feedback:

“We want to offer video support in our app—but it feels disconnected when we bolt on a third-party tool.

SOLUTION

We launched a cross-platform Video & Audio SDK that tightly integrates with Stream’s existing Chat infrastructure and Sidecar design system. Key contributions included:


UI Kit for all call states: ringing, active, idle, error, reconnection

Modular component architecture with headless + prebuilt options

Cross-platform theming support using shared tokens (via Style Dictionary)

Interaction patterns for layout switching, device management, speaker views

Figma libraries with mapped variables, call flows, and reusable call surfaces

Demo apps and templates to showcase real-world usage across verticals

Component interoperability with Chat SDK (e.g., shared avatars, headers, channel context)

3x

increase in customer demos with chat + video enabled

3x

increase in customer demos with chat + video enabled

62%

faster average time to POC vs. using third-party video SDKs

+18%

boost in expansion revenue in first quarter after launch


An image of a smartphone on top of an eletronic surface
image of a smartphone leaning on top of a record player
Smooth Scroll
This will hide itself!
Video SDK Design

OVERVIEW

Stream set out to expand its real-time platform by launching a new Video & Audio SDK, built from the ground up to match the developer-friendly ethos of its Chat product. As Staff Product Designer, I defined the user experience, component system, and theming architecture to ensure seamless integration with existing Chat infrastructure. This project unlocked upsell opportunities for hybrid messaging + video use cases, reduced customer churn, and positioned Stream to compete with incumbents like Twilio and Daily—without compromising on developer experience or visual consistency.

YEAR

2024 - 2025

ROLE

Staff Product Designer

SERVICES

PROBLEM

Prior to this launch, Stream offered best-in-class Chat infrastructure—but lacked support for real-time video and audio communication. Customers were forced to integrate third-party tools, fragmenting their UX and adding dev overhead. Internally, we lacked a unified design or component strategy for live calling. There were no patterns for ring states, device control, layout switching, or participant UIs. We needed a scalable SDK and interface architecture that could plug into our existing Chat SDK and reuse design system primitives.

Customer feedback:

“We want to offer video support in our app—but it feels disconnected when we bolt on a third-party tool.

SOLUTION

We launched a cross-platform Video & Audio SDK that tightly integrates with Stream’s existing Chat infrastructure and Sidecar design system. Key contributions included:


UI Kit for all call states: ringing, active, idle, error, reconnection

Modular component architecture with headless + prebuilt options

Cross-platform theming support using shared tokens (via Style Dictionary)

Interaction patterns for layout switching, device management, speaker views

Figma libraries with mapped variables, call flows, and reusable call surfaces

Demo apps and templates to showcase real-world usage across verticals

Component interoperability with Chat SDK (e.g., shared avatars, headers, channel context)

3x

increase in customer demos with chat + video enabled

3x

increase in customer demos with chat + video enabled

62%

faster average time to POC vs. using third-party video SDKs

+18%

boost in expansion revenue in first quarter after launch


An image of a smartphone on top of an eletronic surface
image of a smartphone leaning on top of a record player
Smooth Scroll
This will hide itself!