Zalando

The future is calling. And it’s not a bot 👁️ https://zln.do/4rqZ5cB Design is moving at lightning speed. Cultural moments flare up and fade away overnight, and yesterday’s "best practices" are already old news. What’s queued up for 2026? We’ve gathered 11 design leaders from the Zalando community to lay out the map for the year ahead. We are moving past the "Help Bubble" and stepping into the era of agentic UX, where AI actively resolves logistics and guides every purchase. Here’s a preview of the 2026 Shortlist: 🔸 Agentic AI: Moving from the sidelines to driving core experiences 🔸 Hands-on Leadership: Why practical contributor skills are back in style 🔸 Experimental Engines: Designing smarter experiments, not just faster screens 🔸 True Craft: Why a trained eye is more valuable than ever in an algorithmic world Explore the full forecast from our team, including Kalliopi Papadopoulou (Calliope Papas), Yishi Yang, Oyindamola A., Sriram Venugopal, Inès Mir, Rafael Scovino, Çiğdem Demir, Andrea Brinkmeier, Simone Poli, Philip Appah and Thiago Hapner and see where we’re headed: https://zln.do/4rqZ5cB What’s on your radar for 2026? Drop a comment with your predictions 👁️

Snow wasn’t the only thing landing at our HQ this week. More than 90 guests joined us at our HQ for the K5 - Future Retail MEETup to discuss a pivotal shift in retail: The Future of E-commerce Content. Our VP Content Solutions, Matthias Haase, spoke about how we're moving beyond the "product on a white background" era. With 78% of Gen Z starting their journey with exploration rather than a specific product, the standard catalog is no longer enough. Matthias shared, "Personalization today is often just generic recommendations. AI gives us the chance to move toward true individualization – experiences shaped around a person’s unique body, style, and shopping context. Our goal with AI is to give customers better information and more confidence, across millions of products and many European markets." The Impact of AI-Enhanced Content: 🔸 Customer Confidence: Richer content (3D views, AI backgrounds, and virtual try-ons) has led to a 10% increase in engagement time and a reduction in returns. 🔸 Campaign Relevance: GenAI has led to a 17% increase in click-through rates (CTR) for our in-feed ads by making content more relevant at scale. 🔸 Operational Agility: By using GenAI in 80% of our editorial campaigns, we’ve reduced operational costs by 90% and cut reaction times from weeks to days. The takeaway? AI is the ultimate enabler, allowing us to deliver consistent, trustworthy, and inspiring content at a European scale. Thank you to the K5 team and everyone who joined us for these valuable insights. See you all in June at the K5 Conference 🚀

Meet Marwa Goda, a Senior Software Engineer on our ZEOS Portal team. She’s building the “front door” to our B2B ecosystem. By designing digital infrastructure for our Multi-Channel Fulfilment partners, she’s making our platform ready for the future. Marwa owns her work, from migrating access controls to adopting “policy-as-code” strategies. But life at ZEOS isn’t just about technical deep dives. We balance delivery with human connection – which means there’s always time for a team fika. ☕ Swipe through to see how Marwa drives impact at ZEOS. #PeopleOfZalando #ZalandoTech #ZEOS #ZalandoB2B #WomenInTech #InsideZalando #ZalandoStockholm

Welcome to Shenzhen! 🇨🇳 As the Lunar New Year starts, it’s a moment for fresh beginnings. We’re looking back at how far we’ve come and ahead at what’s next. If you’ve ever wondered what’s happening at our tech hub in China or if you’re curious about what our colleagues are building—or where they’re heading for a post-work bite— Xiaoxia Qiu has all the answers. Xiaoxia is the VP of Technology in Shenzhen, and he’s sharing a look into life at the hub. Listen in below.

How does partner communication sit at the heart of the fashion and lifestyle ecosystem? This week's episode features Katja Schmoekel, Team Lead in Partner Communication, who talks about how the brands and retailers can navigate the Zalando platform and how AI reshapes communication strategies. Listen to the episode on your favourite platform! Spotify: https://zln.do/3ztO1lS Apple Podcasts: https://zln.do/3NmR9FO #InsideZalando #ZalandoPiecesOfMe

Style confidence, directed by Lily Collins. Award-winning actress, producer and author Lily Collins is joining the Zalando team as our first-ever global brand ambassador 🌟 As a star with a strong connection to Europe and a celebrated eye for style, Lily is the perfect partner to help us answer that universal daily question: “What Do I Wear?” This year-long partnership is all about empowering our customers to find confidence in their style, featuring two major brand campaigns throughout 2026. “We’re thrilled to welcome Lily to Zalando”, says James Rothwell, SVP Marketing. “She embodies confidence and creativity with a natural and instinctive connection to fashion.” We’re kicking things off on 9 March 2026 with our Spring/Summer campaign, where Lily gives her own take on her daily style dilemmas. Stay tuned as we redefine style inspiration together: https://zln.do/3MI1bFI

How do you measure success when the user can’t see the change? At the recent React Universe meetup hosted at Zalando, Mohit Karekar, a Principal Engineer in our Client Foundations team, shared how we navigate performance measurement during technical migrations. With over 200 tech enthusiasts in attendance, the conversation centred on the evolution of the React Native space and the necessity of a performance-first mindset. Watch Mohit’s takeaways on engineering metrics and why people at Zalando make the technical challenges even more rewarding 🚀 Sending a thanks to Callstack for the collaboration. #InsideZalando #ZalandoTech #ReactNative

Safer Internet Day 2026: Making the web a fairer stage 🌐 We participated in conversations at two key industry events in Berlin around this occasion. Hosted by the Federal Ministry of Justice and Consumer Protection (Bundesministerium der Justiz und für Verbraucherschutz) and Bitkom, our very own Ena Salihovic joined the stage to dive into a big question: “Games, Gamification, and Influencers – Hidden Consumption in Everyday Digital Life?”. We highlighted how making the internet safer should not just focus on creating new laws, but also on consistently enforcing the ones already in place. When we back up the existing legal framework, we build real trust and a level playing field for European consumers and companies. It was a privilege to share the stage with Stefanie Hubig, Ralf Wintergerst, pérignon isabelle, Frank Schwabe, Ramona Pop, and Benedikt Morschheuser. Secondly, we hosted the Deutschland sicher im Netz e.V. (DsiN) talk ‘Media Competence in Schools” in our headquarters, engaging in a vital exchange on how we can collectively (parents, schools, politics, society, and companies) foster a digital world that's safe for future generations. Thanks to Martin Meingast, Martin Drechsler, Christoph von Massow, Gregory Kuc and Isabelle Rosière, as well as Freiwillige Selbstkontrolle Multimedia-Diensteanbieter (FSM), who joined us on stage. Ensuring fairness and safety in digital spaces is a shared responsibility for all actors in Europe. Thank you to the organizers and everyone who joined this inspiring discussion. Let's keep building a digital Europe that’s as innovative as it is consumer-friendly.

Who needs a warm night in when you have hot takes on cross-platform development? Despite a slippery sidewalk day in January, over 200 enthusiasts filled our Berlin auditorium to talk all things React Native. It was inspiring to see such a bold turnout. Our host Katia Bezzina kept the energy up while we dove into the details that matter: 🔸 Eugene Verichev (Zalando) shared lessons from early adoption in video.   🔸 Mohit Karekar (Zalando) broke down performance in brownfield projects.   🔸 Artur Morys - Magiera (Callstack) got practical with on-device LLM inference. 🔸 Tejas Kumar (IBM) showed us how to optimize health through code. A huge thanks to everyone who braved the Berlin winter to join the conversation. And a shout-out to Callstack for the collaboration to bring the React Universe Meetup to our stage. Networking, learning, and zero judgment—just how we like it 🧡 We've got more exciting content coming your way. On our Engineering Blog Mohit will be diving deeper into his talk. Stay tuned for that: https://zln.do/4rLJHqM Want to be part of our innovative team? Have a look at the React Native role on our job page: https://zln.do/46GOnpJ

Where AI meets style: Shaping the future in Zurich At the heart of Switzerland’s tech scene, our Zurich Tech Hub is where we are actively shaping the future of fashion. From our Prime Tower office, our teams are deep-diving into Data Science, AI, and Machine Learning to revolutionise how customers discover the styles they love. By building sophisticated tools like the Zalando Assistant, we are moving beyond the traditional search bar to create a truly personalised, conversational experience. We are not just solving technical problems; we are pushing the boundaries of what is possible in fashion technology. 💻 If you're looking to tackle complex challenges with a brilliant, high-performing team, we would love to meet you. Explore our open roles in Zurich: https://zln.do/3Zm3KjD #ZalandoTech #InsideZalando #ZalandoZurich