Table 4.

Illustrative interviewee responses.

Feedback category by respondent			Illustrative quote
Positive experiences using the app
	Male, 30 years, mySugr app	“I was curious and excited during the demonstration…good initial impression.”
	Female, 50 years, Glucose Buddy app	“Looked great when going through initially.”
	Male, 49 years, mySugr app	“Yes, certainly I would download such an app…Could be subsidized? I am willing to pay if it’s worthwhile.”
	Female, 50 years, mySugr app	“Keeping track of glucose testing, keeping track of medication.”
	Female, 29 years, mySugr app	“Liked the diabetes monster.”
Negative experiences using the app
	Female, 58 years, Glucose Buddy app	“Diet and calories is good and what I found most useful and necessary, but I don’t know how to calculate, for example, how many calories in a piece of meat or a bowl of rice?”
	Female, 29 years, mySugr app	“A bit confusing sometimes, don’t understand all of it. Carbs a bit confusing.”
	Male, 49 years, mySugr app	“Converting carbs challenging. Food descriptions take a lot of time.”
	Female, 50 years, Glucose Buddy app	“I wanted to use it and tried to use it a few times, but I kept getting stuck on the medication page. I often couldn’t navigate to other pages.”
	Male, 30 years, mySugr app	“Occasionally froze, a bit slow.”
	Female, 58 years, Glucose Buddy app	“So many features. Lots of things I need to know before I can use it. I have well-controlled diabetes, so only need simple monitoring functions.”
	Male, 49 years, mySugr app	“I want to do it quite quickly, but this app has too many things…too much information and too many questions. Could be simplified.”
	Male, 45 years, Glucose Buddy app	“Recording what I was already doing, so wasn’t super useful. Became too much of a chore. Not interesting enough. No motivation.”
	Male, 49 years, mySugr app	“Current app is too much like a log book and not engaging enough.”
Most frequently used functions
	Male, 30 years, mySugr app	“Blood glucose result most useful. Logging everything...Keeping track of numbers.”
	Female, 29 years, mySugr app	“I liked putting my blood glucose test in. Blood glucose test was the most useful feature.”
	Female 58 years, Glucose Buddy app	“Advice on diet—sample advice. You should be eating this sized bowl of carbs, this amount of fruit and vegetables, this much butter and fats. Videos. Suggestions of age-appropriate activities and how to do it safely.”
	Female, 29 years, mySugr app	“Tips on exercise and food and nutrition. Good meals, new workouts would help a lot. Things you can do at home if you don’t have time to go out.”
Suggestions for improvement
	Female, 58 years, Glucose Buddy app	“Measure food and activities more regularly. See pattern between things, like food and activity and how it affected my blood sugar.”
	Male, 49 years, mySugr app	“Should be able to set goals, for example, identify how many carbs you can eat per day and note down how much you’ve consumed at breakfast and how much you could still consume throughout the rest of the day. Same for activity—record steps taken so far and how many more to take to meet goals. Goals per day or per week.”
	Male, 45 years, Glucose Buddy app	“People that have had diabetes for two or three years, we know about eating and testing blood sugars, but you have so many things going on you forget, so it would be helpful to have regular reminders that are relevant.”
	Male, 49 years, mySugr app	“Something user-friendly and quick to enter. Simplify the current app and make it easier to navigate.”
	Male, 45 years, Glucose Buddy app	“Way that smartphone can talk directly to glucose meter. Glucose meter only remembers one month’s readings and then records over, so would like to have it send readings directly to smartphone. Communication between existing apps, for example this app and Google Fit.”