These are the 397 most inspiring, innovative designs of 2018

Winner:Apps and Games

Seeing AI--talking camera app

Microsoft

See Credits

Ran Zhao (Designer); Samantha Neufeld (User Researcher); Jeanne Parson (Audio designer); Rob Frye (Interaction Designer); Anirudh Koul (Founder and Researcher); Saqib Shaikh (Tech Lead); Eugene Seleznev (Software Engineer); Meher Kasam (Software Engineer); Harrison Wray (Software Engineer)

Finalist:Design Company of the Year

Microsoft

Finalist:Graphic Design and Data Visualization

Microsoft Learning Tools

Microsoft

See Credits

Mike Tholfsen, Principal Product Manager, Education and OneNote

Finalist:Health

Seeing AI--talking camera app

Microsoft

See Credits

Finalist:Social Good

Seeing AI--talking camera app

Microsoft

See Credits

Honorable Mention:Experimental

Project Zanzibar

Microsoft

See Credits

Haiyan Zhang - Team Lead Nicolas Villar - Team Lead Dan - Hardware Engineering Greg - Industrial Design, Prototyping Christian Holz - Software, Research Tim Regan - Software Development Oscar Saladin - Industrial Design

Honorable Mention:Experimental

Windows Mixed Reality

Microsoft

See Credits

The Mixed Reality Team at Microsoft

Honorable Mention:Social Good

AI for Earth

Microsoft

See Credits

Lucas Joppa, Chief Environmental Scientist at Microsoft (Leads AI for Earth); Ranveer Chandra, Principle Researcher at Microsoft (Leads FarmBeats)

Honorable Mention:Timeless Design

How Microsoft uses the cloud to adapt the Office suite

Microsoft

See Credits

Microsoft Office Engineering Teams

Honorable Mention:User Experience

Project Personality Chat

Microsoft

See Credits

Jonathan Foster – Designer; Deborah Harrison – Designer; Ron Owens – Designer; Tulasi Menon – Product manager; Sai Neppali – Product manager; Somi Reddy Satti - Developer; Radhakrishnan Srikanth – Product manager; Bill Dolan – Microsoft Research AI and Cortana Editorial team AI and R India team Microsoft Research- NLP team

See past winners: 2017 | 2016 | 2015 | 2014 | 2013 | 2012

All Stories In Innovation By Design

Co.Design

Design will kill marketing, says Ikea’s former design chief

Marcus Engman is leaving Ikea to run a consultancy that convinces companies to spend their marketing budget on what matters: design.

Co.Design

Dyson’s latest product is a $550 hair curler

After six years and $31 million in development, Dyson is launching the Airwrap, a device that creates ringlets using a bit of aerospace-inspired physics.

Innovation By Design

Meet Krewe, the eyewear brand that New Orleans (and Beyoncé) built

The five-year-old brand’s founder is focused on giving back to his native New Orleans and putting it on the map of fashion-forward cities.

Innovation By Design

There’s even a Warby Parker of towels now

Weezie wants to shake up a mundane industry with design.

Innovation By Design

What the healthcare industry could learn from Lyft and Airbnb

The sharing economy is built upon service and interaction designs that engender interpersonal trust. Healthcare organizations could learn from it.

Innovation By Design

The future of web design is less, not more

Low-Tech Magazine’s new website is solar-powered, which means it goes offline in cloudy weather.

Innovation By Design

This building’s giant sundial shows how much energy it’s making

It’s one of the most efficient buildings in the country–but its most unique design feature might be the 40-foot-tall installation in the atrium.

Innovation By Design

Dieter Rams wants Silicon Valley to stop

In Gary Hustwit’s highly anticipated new documentary “Rams,” the legendary industrial designer indicts the world he helped create.

Innovation By Design

This long-lost Eames design is being produced for the first time

In the 1940s, radio companies rejected the Eameses’ designs as being “too modern.” Not anymore.

Innovation By Design

Winner:Apps and Games

Finalist:Design Company of the Year

Finalist:Graphic Design and Data Visualization

Finalist:Health

Finalist:Social Good

Honorable Mention:Experimental

Honorable Mention:Experimental

Honorable Mention:Social Good

Honorable Mention:Timeless Design

Honorable Mention:User Experience

Design will kill marketing, says Ikea’s former design chief

Marcus Engman is leaving Ikea to run a consultancy that convinces companies to spend their marketing budget on what matters: design.

Dyson’s latest product is a $550 hair curler

After six years and $31 million in development, Dyson is launching the Airwrap, a device that creates ringlets using a bit of aerospace-inspired physics.

Meet Krewe, the eyewear brand that New Orleans (and Beyoncé) built

The five-year-old brand’s founder is focused on giving back to his native New Orleans and putting it on the map of fashion-forward cities.

There’s even a Warby Parker of towels now

Weezie wants to shake up a mundane industry with design.

What the healthcare industry could learn from Lyft and Airbnb

The sharing economy is built upon service and interaction designs that engender interpersonal trust. Healthcare organizations could learn from it.

The future of web design is less, not more

Low-Tech Magazine’s new website is solar-powered, which means it goes offline in cloudy weather.

This building’s giant sundial shows how much energy it’s making

It’s one of the most efficient buildings in the country–but its most unique design feature might be the 40-foot-tall installation in the atrium.

Dieter Rams wants Silicon Valley to stop

In Gary Hustwit’s highly anticipated new documentary “Rams,” the legendary industrial designer indicts the world he helped create.

This long-lost Eames design is being produced for the first time

In the 1940s, radio companies rejected the Eameses’ designs as being “too modern.” Not anymore.

Sick of midcentury modern? Here’s where to buy today’s best design

Skip the spindly leg sofas and knockoff Eames chairs, and try these shopping destinations instead.

Why haven’t we evolved a solution to aging?

To fix the climate, we have to fix our soil

High CO2 levels will wreck plants’ nutritional value, so don’t plan on surviving on vegetables

“The day innocence died”: How the media covered Columbine 20 years ago

That tone-deaf Ancestry ad was playing on Canadian emotions about Americans

Netflix is opening a production hub in NYC

The story behind the redesigned Game of Thrones title sequence

An ex-Apple designer explains why Cupertino didn’t address screen addiction earlier

The real reason why luxury fashion brands love the art world

Why transparency is much more than just disclosing information

You should take “you have too much time on your hands” as a compliment

Running a business helped me recover from burnout. Here’s how