Design Portfolio '26

Welcome to

A travel planning and discovery app

A travel planning & discovery app

My Role

Sr. Product Designer

Project Duration

Oct - Dec 2024

Tools

Figma, Firebase, Meta Analytics, Testflight

Project Overview

Eightydays.ai faced low user retention at just 1.5%. Through a complete UX redesign, I addressed friction points, restructured the journey and introduced intuitive interactions boosting retention to 9%. This case study explores the process, challenges, and outcomes.

Responsibilities

UX Strategy

Visual consistency

User retention

App redesign

Developer handoff

Mobile & web design

Design systems

User research & usability testing

Stakeholder alignment

Cross-functional collaboration

The Problem

The current experience on Eightydays.ai leads to poor user retention and low organic growth. Users often drop off due to unclear onboarding, lack of clarity around the app’s core value, and unintuitive navigation - resulting in a low number of shares and weak engagement across the platform.

The Goal

Redesign the application to increase the number of shares (North Star metric) and improve user retention (North Star metric) by:

Crafting a smoother, engaging onboarding that clearly communicates app purpose.
Designing intuitive, interactive interfaces for effortless navigation.
Enabling personalized list discovery based on user activity.
Boosting usability and delight to drive ongoing engagement and sharing.

Redesign the application to increase the number of shares (North Star metric) and improve user retention (North Star metric) by:

Crafting a smoother, engaging onboarding that clearly communicates app purpose.
Designing intuitive, interactive interfaces for effortless navigation.
Enabling personalized list discovery based on user activity.
Boosting usability and delight to drive ongoing engagement and sharing.

Design Process

Empathize

Define

Ideate

Prototype

Understand

Conducted user interviews and studied behavior to uncover travel planning frustrations.

Used qualitative insights and behavioral data to craft clear problem statements around user retention.

Brainstormed and mapped out solutions focused on simplifying the travel discovery experience.

Developed wireframes and interactive prototypes to validate user flow and content hierarchy.

Tested prototypes with users to refine the journey and boost engagement metrics.

Conducted user interviews and studied behavior to uncover travel planning frustrations.

Empathize

Used qualitative insights and behavioral data to craft clear problem statements around user retention.

Define

Brainstormed and mapped out solutions focused on simplifying the travel discovery experience.

Ideate

Developed wireframes and interactive prototypes to validate user flow and content hierarchy.

Prototype

Tested prototypes with users to refine the journey and boost engagement metrics.

Understand

User Research

Planning multi-city trips is overwhelming, with users juggling tools like Kayak, TripIt, and Google Flights. Through interviews, surveys, and usability tests with frequent solo travelers, couples, and digital nomads, I explored how they navigate this process—and how Eightydays.ai can better support their journey.

Highlights

Planning Fatigue

Users switched between 4–6 tools to plan a trip.

"It's exhausting hopping across platforms just to make a basic plan."

Planning Fatigue

Users switched between 4–6 tools to plan a trip.

"It's exhausting hopping across platforms just to make a basic plan."

Lack of Control

Auto-generated routes were exciting, but users wanted flexibility.

"I wish I could pick a few cities and let the AI fill in the rest."

Lack of Control

Auto-generated routes were exciting, but users wanted flexibility.

"I wish I could pick a few cities and let the AI fill in the rest."

Missing Context

Lack of visa/weather/logistics info created planning gaps.

"Cool route, but does it even make sense for the season?"

Missing Context

Lack of visa/weather/logistics info created planning gaps.

"Cool route, but does it even make sense for the season?"

User Personas

Rhea Kapoor: The Curious Explorer

Traveller

Photgrapher

Bengaluru, India

Tech Comfort Level: High

"I don’t want to end up in Paris every time,

I want the hidden stories no one talks about."

Goals:

Discover hidden gems and culturally rich destinations.
Travel on flexible schedules with spontaneous detours.
Share unique itineraries on social platforms.

Pain Points:

Has to manually research non-touristy spots.
Tools like Kayak/TripIt focus too much on mainstream cities.
Lack of flexibility in AI-generated itineraries.

Needs:

A platform that suggests unusual routes and hidden gems, not just popular cities.
Travel alerts (visa/weather/safety) to plan better.

Arjun Mehta: Hassle-Free Dreamer

Tech Consultant

Traveller

Mumbai, India

Tech Comfort Level: Moderate

"I want to explore more places but I don’t want to become a travel agent just to get there."

Goals:

Go on well-planned vacations without investing too much time.
Maximize value from limited leaves and budget.
Travel with partner or friends with minimal planning stress

Pain Points:

Gets overwhelmed with planning multi-city trips from scratch.
Hates switching between planning sites.
Struggles to consolidate information from scattered blogs, YouTube videos, and travel forums.

Needs:

Quickly save or import places from reels/blogs/videos.
Curate mood-based travel lists (“Hidden Cafes in Paris”, “Solo Spots in Kyoto”).
Minimal manual planning - AI should help complete the gaps.

Previous Screens

List View - 1

List View - 2

Map View

List Collections

User Profile (self)

Saved Lists

Frictions Identified

No Context

Pins and lists lacked nearby or related suggestions, making discovery feel random.

Disconnected Pages

Profile, lists, and saved places felt isolated instead of working together.

Inconsistent Design Language

Visual styles, iconography, and layout patterns varied across screens - breaking user flow.

Low Interactivity

Users couldn’t engage meaningfully - no reactions, saves, or feedback options.

No Visibility

Users had no clue who viewed or engaged with their content - reducing incentive to contribute.

Final Screens

Check out the application on App/Playstore

User Login/Sign-up Screens

Refined the experience by addressing edge cases and providing clear navigation paths to help users handle them smoothly.

Landing

Sign-up

Forgot Password

Reset Password

Explore, Profile + Updates

Redesigned the Explore page for a more chic and breathable aesthetic, enhanced the Profile and Edit Profile sections (e.g., countries visited), and improved the Update Application pop-ups for better clarity and usability.

Explore Page

Profile Page

Edit Profile(self)

Countries Visited

Update App Pop-up

Create List Flow / Screens

Optimized visibility, UI, overall user experience, and backend AI performance to ensure smooth functioning of one of the most used features. The flow begins with pasting a list, article, blog, or vlog. Followed by the map view of the locations Pinned down by AI. Users can then add details to the list as needed and publish it seamlessly.

Create List with AI

Paste text/link/blog

Map view

Published List

Published Map view

States, edge cases and more…

Customize the image of a location from your local gallery, learn better on "who follows & who comments" more comfortably and edge case screens for when the internet or search results feel under the weather :D

Change Image

Wi-fi not working

Under Maintenance

Notifications

Chatbox

Impact Summary

Through a series of focused design interventions, we addressed key user frictions and significantly enhanced the overall experience:

Boosted Daily Active Users (DAU) from 1.5% to 9% by fixing core usability and engagement gaps.

Boosted Daily Active Users (DAU) from 1.5% to 9% by fixing core usability and engagement gaps.

Shares increased as users found content easier to discover, interact with and distribute.

Shares increased as users found content easier to discover, interact with and distribute.

Time spent per user rose considerably, with higher engagement observed both on a daily and weekly basis.

Time spent per user rose considerably, with higher engagement observed both on a daily and weekly basis.

Redesigned onboarding flow encouraged new user adoption via the web app, creating a smoother transition to mobile.

Redesigned onboarding flow encouraged new user adoption via the web app, creating a smoother transition to mobile.

Successfully launched mobile-responsive versions for both iOS and Android, ensuring cross-platform consistency and accessibility.

Successfully launched mobile-responsive versions for both iOS and Android, ensuring cross-platform consistency and accessibility.

Conducted rigorous usability testing before and after rollout to validate design decisions and continuously refine based on feedback.

Conducted rigorous usability testing before and after rollout to validate design decisions and continuously refine based on feedback.

Maintained tight collaboration with developers, ensuring that design intent translated accurately in the final product while also flagging bugs and identifying edge cases early.

Maintained tight collaboration with developers, ensuring that design intent translated accurately in the final product while also flagging bugs and identifying edge cases early.

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