Keep text as short as possible. Avoid wordy, stilted text.
Consult the documentation that came with your phone for further instructions.
Read the instructions that came with your phone
Describe only what the user needs to know and don't provide unnecessary information.
Your phone needs to communicate with Google servers to sign in to your account. This may take up to five minutes.
Your phone is contacting Google. This can take up to 5 minutes.
Focus on the user's concern, not technical details
Manually control GPS to prevent other apps from using it.
To save power, switch Location mode to Battery saving
Put the most important thing first
77 other people +1’d this, including Larry Page
Larry Page and 76 others +1’d this
Put the user's goal first
Touch Next to complete setup using a Wi-Fi connection
To finish setup using Wi-Fi, touch Next
Avoid being confusing or annoying
Sorry! Activity MyAppActivity (in application MyApp) is not responding.
MyApp isn’t responding. Do you want to close it?
Words and terms examples
❌ Bad examples - Avoid
✅ Good examples - Use
cannot, could not, do not, did not will not, you will
Contractions: can’t, couldn’t, don’t, didn’t, won’t, you’ll, and so on
okay, ok
OK
please, sorry, thank you
Attempts at politeness can annoy the user, especially in messages that say something has gone wrong. Exception: In Japanese, “please” is mandatory and imperative verbs should be localized accordingly (turn on -> please turn on).
fail, failed, negative language
In general, use positive phrasing (for example, “do” rather than “don’t,” except in cases such as “Don’t show again,” “Can’t connect,” and so on.)
me, I, my, mine
you, your, yours
Are you sure? Warning!
Tell user the consequence instead, for example, "You’ll lose all photos and media"
