Senior Product Designer (Connected Products)

We’re looking for a Senior Product Designer with Connected Products experience to join our Product Design team, helping shape how families discover, set up, and enjoy Yoto everyday across software and hardware experiences.

About Yoto

Yoto is a screen‑free interactive audio platform for kids. We make carefully connected audio players that kids control, with no microphones, cameras or ads. We have a catalogue of audio that inspires creative play and learning with 1,000+ titles in our card store from top creators, publishers and labels – including Disney, Marvel, Roald Dahl and Universal Music. We also create Yoto Originals such as BrainBots. We’re on a mission to be the soundtrack of childhood, helping families discover and grow through inspiring audio experiences. Our products combine beautifully designed hardware with thoughtfully crafted digital experiences to create moments of independence, imagination and joy.

Yoto's Product Design Team

The Product Design team at Yoto shapes how families experience our audio players and the ecosystem around them. As a Senior Product Designer (Connected Products), you’ll help define how Yoto products come to life in families' homes. We’re particularly interested in designers who think holistically about products, people who understand how industrial design, hardware, packaging, firmware and software work together to create one seamless experience. This role sits at the intersection of physical and digital design. You’ll help shape everything from unboxing and setup to everyday interactions between our players and companion app. You’ll partner closely with Product, Engineering, Hardware, Firmware and Brand teams to turn complex challenges into intuitive, delightful experiences. Our work spans some of the most important moments in a family's journey with Yoto, from first‑time setup and early engagement to daily listening, content discovery and long‑term product adoption. Your work will help ensure these experiences feel simple, magical and deeply considered.

What you'll be doing

• Own and champion the end‑to‑end connected product experience, helping ensure hardware, firmware, packaging and app experiences feel like one coherent product.
• Shape the first‑time journey from unboxing through setup and activation, designing experiences that help families get started quickly and confidently.
• Work closely with Hardware, Firmware and Engineering teams to design products that balance customer needs with technical and manufacturing realities.
• Design on‑device interactions and feedback, from button behaviours and physical controls to audio and visual responses – creating experiences that feel intuitive and complete without requiring a phone or app.
• Design and refine both physical and digital touchpoints that contribute to the overall customer experience.
• Own complex, high‑impact areas of the connected product experience from discovery through to shipped outcomes.
• Translate customer insights, research findings and real‑world observations into meaningful product improvements.
• Bring systems thinking to product challenges, knowing when the right answer lives in the app, on the device or in the moments between them.
• Align stakeholders across Product, Hardware, Engineering, Marketing and Brand, helping teams make informed decisions and move forward together.
• Communicate concepts, rationale and design decisions clearly through prototypes, storytelling and design artefacts.
• Contribute to design critiques, team discussions and ways of working that continue to raise the quality of our products and design practice.

What you'll bring

• Significant experience in Industrial Design, Product Design, Connected Product Design or a related discipline.
• A portfolio demonstrating how you've shaped physical products and the experiences around them, with clear examples of products that blend hardware and software.
• Experience designing connected products, consumer technology, audio products, wearables, smart home devices or other hardware‑led experiences.
• Strong understanding of how physical and digital touchpoints work together to create seamless customer experiences.
• Experience working closely with Hardware, Mechanical, Firmware and Engineering teams throughout the product development lifecycle.
• Demonstrable experience designing onboarding, setup, activation, pairing or first‑time‑use journeys where clarity and ease of use are critical.
• Experience designing on‑device interactions for physical products including input models, feedback systems and edge cases – where the hardware itself is the primary interface.
• Strong systems‑thinking skills, with the ability to consider the entire customer journey across physical and digital touchpoints.
• Experience working in ambiguous environments and helping teams move from problem definition through to delivery.
• Excellent communication and stakeholder management skills.
• A collaborative approach and desire to contribute positively to the wider design team.

• Experience designing native mobile app experiences for iOS and Android.
• Experience working on products used by families, children or in‑home consumer environments.
• Familiarity with user research methods across both physical and digital products.
• Experience prototyping and testing physical‑digital experiences.
• Experience working in subscription, media, entertainment or consumer technology businesses.

If you’re excited by creating products where hardware and software work together seamlessly, we’d love to hear from you.

Salary £75,000 – £85,000 based on experience. We never want to miss out on great candidates, so don’t let our banding put you off reaching out – there’s sometimes flexibility for the right fit!

What you can expect from Yoto

• Flexibility: Hybrid working – expectation of one day a week in our London office, with the option to work from anywhere for up to six weeks a year. Summer Hours policy to use between June and August.
• Financial: Income Protection covering long‑term sickness for up to two years, company sick pay that increases with length of service, life assurance cover from day one, workplace pension with up to three percent employer contributions after probation and a generous employee referral bonus scheme.
• Health & Wellness: Private medical insurance via Aviva, a wellbeing allowance for memberships or therapy, 24/7 employee assistance programme, unlimited access to dental advice and a bike‑to‑work scheme.
• Time Off: 25 days of holiday per year plus bank holidays, a birthday off, one extra day after every two years worked up to five extra days, and, after four years of service, eligibility for a sabbatical of up to three months unpaid.
• Helping Families: Family‑friendly leave including enhanced maternity, paternity, adoption, fertility, pregnancy loss and carer leave, plus a workplace nursery scheme for parents of preschool‑aged children.
• People & Planet: Up to two volunteer days a year and a book allowance of up to £50 a year for professional development.
• Fun Perks: Your very own Yoto player and starter pack of cards, regular company socials and celebrations including our annual YotoFest.

Equity and Diversity

At Yoto, we love creating a world where childhood is rich with discovery and joy. We’re also passionate about building a workplace where everyone can thrive – both professionally and personally. We value flexibility and give our team the freedom to balance life and work in ways that suit them. We're committed to fostering a safe, diverse, and inclusive environment where all individuals, regardless of their background, feel valued and supported. Our Diversity, Equity and Inclusion group holds bi‑monthly forums to elevate diverse voices and perspectives, ensuring everyone at Yoto feels heard, respected and appreciated. We invite candidates from all walks of life to explore opportunities with us and join a company that champions flexibility, equity, and inclusion.