Why Sports Services Are Becoming More Convenient For Users In Iran

Sports applications in Iran used to have a cumbersome user interface. Registration forms spanned several screens. Payments were not seamlessly integrated. User interfaces in Persian would be a hurried translation from English templates. Notifications would come at the wrong time. Most of the issues mentioned above have been addressed by 2024 on most Iranian sports websites such as club sites, live score providers, video streaming websites, and foreign websites that have reached Iranian users through their localized interfaces such as (Farsi: بهترین سایت شرط بندی فوتبال). This has been done in gradual stages rather than through one major overhaul, but the end result has had a major impact.

The Friction That Used To Define Iranian Sport Apps

A few years ago, when an Iranian football fan downloaded a sports application for the first time, he would face numerous challenges. He needed to verify his identity using a complex signup process. Payment transactions were conducted using gateways that often broke down in the middle. Persian language had issues with its display on various applications. The notifications on these applications used UTC but not Tehran local time.

Such challenges did not solely affect sports applications in Iran. They stemmed from the overall situation in Iranian mobile application development, with little exposure to foreign technologies and payment systems. Sports applications were affected by the same problems as banking applications, ride-sharing, and e-commerce applications.

Consequences of the problem were noticeable. Major sports applications in Iran were unable to convert sign-ups into full account creation due to a significant number of people abandoning registration. Another problem that occurred frequently was unsuccessful subscription renewal due to a broken payment gateway. The issues mentioned above often appeared in app store reviews of the period.

What Specifically Has Become Easier

Between 2021 and 2024, some fixes were made that helped resolve the major pain points. Some of these fixes happened because of bug fixes provided by the developers of the applications. Other fixes were done at the platform level via Cafe Bazaar and Myket. Finally, there were fixes from the side of the Iranian providers of payment solutions for their products.

The changes by category look like this:

Overall, it has affected the way Iranian users access sports apps. The new user accessing the football app in 2024 will get to use an operational account in a few minutes. In comparison, five years ago, such a process could take too much time, sometimes even more than one sitting.

Mobile Payments And Sign-Up Flows

Payments were the greatest source of friction and also saw the largest amount of improvement. Payment gateways from Iran such as Saderat Pay, Mellat, and Pasargad have renewed their mobile SDKs from the year 2022 to provide improved in-app purchasing capabilities. In comparison to those in the year 2020, sports applications that used the new SDKs have seen significantly improved subscription completion rates.

The sign-up process has become simpler at the same time. Most major sports applications in Iran now have users enter their phone number for sign-up, followed by an SMS verification as opposed to national ID at the first stage of the process. National ID verification still takes place through the application but only upon making the first purchase or claiming a prize.

Three changes that delivered the largest convenience gains:

• Onboarding through single-screen interface instead of multi-screen forms;

• Login through biometrics such as fingerprint and face unlock on compatible devices;

• Payment methods saved with single-click renewals of subscriptions.

This particular layer is significant as it eliminates the necessity of typing passwords or PIN codes in Persian-language boxes, where the mixed-language inputs historically used to lead to errors.

Persian-Language UX And Notifications

The second area of significant development relates to the experience of the Persian-speaking community. The Iranian developers have made investments in Persian right-to-left font display, Persian language-specific icons, and Persian voice command. Applications with English translations of their interface no longer do that but create the Persian interface from scratch, with the English option serving only as the second one.

The format of notifications has changed. Match notifications are provided in Tehran local time zone. Notifications themselves are written in Persian using their own language conventions and not just translated directly from English. Customization of push notifications can be done individually for every club, match type, and competition; thus, the issue of too many notifications leading to muting of notifications has been addressed.

An additional layer of convenience has emerged in the form of international sites that have reached Iranian audiences through foreign social media. MelBet Instagram Iran is a case in point; it is an Instagram account that features match previews, betting analysis, and predictions, all with captions in Persian, Tehran time schedule for matches, and tailored content formats to appeal to Iranian audiences. It utilizes a network system based outside Iran, but it follows the same convenience formula as the big sports apps used in Iran.

Common convenience features now expected by Iranian sport app users:

• Persian-first interface with proper right-to-left rendering;

• Notifications for games using Tehran local time;

• One-page setup with delayed identity check;

• Biometric login and stored payment options;

• In-app messaging support with prompt replies;

• Offline game mode in low connectivity areas.

These days, users see these capabilities as the basic requirements, not the additional capabilities. Applications that do not have these capabilities fail fast, despite having a rich content offering.

How Convenience Translates Into Audience Growth

These improvements in terms of convenience manifest themselves through changes in the audience numbers. Since 2022, the apps dedicated to sport in Iran have gained more users compared to other mobile applications. Footballi attracted four million active users. In two years, the user base of Stadio almost doubled. Also, the number of Aparat's sports section users increased from four million to six million.

This increase cannot be related to the development of new content but to the improvements in the user experience instead. Mobile applications that failed to introduce any UX improvements demonstrated much lower user growth despite their equally rich content library. It is now clear that the audience appreciates the convenience more than the abundance of new content.

Also, the apps created by sports clubs followed the same trend. For example, the redesigned Persepolis application attracted many users within one year after the launch in 2023. Similarly, Esteghlal increased its user base thanks to the redesign carried out in 2024.

What Still Needs Work

The friction areas should also be highlighted. The payments that come internationally from Iran remain restricted due to sanctions; thus, the efficiency of these applications relying on international payment services is lower than applications that rely on local services. The App Store provided by Apple does not permit payments directly to Iran; therefore, enterprise certificates are used for the iOS applications. It becomes a problem when users need data portability since there are no standard mechanisms for linking various user accounts provided by local applications.

The second kind of friction can arise from outside the applications in terms of the supporting infrastructure. Video streaming quality may vary depending on the speed of the Internet connection, particularly in Iranian cities. Latency becomes a problem in the case of using a Virtual Private Network (VPN) to access some websites abroad.

Not one of them will vanish anytime soon. The sports apps of Iran have managed to solve all the problems that could be solved on their own. However, some of the issues need something more to happen before they can be sorted out, and that something is beyond the scope of the app makers. It should be noted, though, that up until recently, the trend had been looking positive for about three years, and access to sports applications had never been so easy in Iran.