The task

To design a comprehensive app where users can discover guides tailored to their interests, access structured and up-to-date information, get authentic tips from real creators, and seamlessly navigate to their destinations—all within a single platform.

User pain points

The process

Desk research and social listening

To understand how users currently approach buying travel guides and tours, we analyzed data across multiple platforms:

User behavior and pain points

To understand how users plan their travels today, we analyzed their current workflows: how they tackle the task, what features they value, where they focus their attention, and the friction points they encounter with existing tools.

Competitive landscape

We evaluated 7 key market players, ranging from global giants and traditional guidebooks (Tripadvisor, Lonely Planet, Fodor’s, Frommer’s) to regional booking platforms (Yandex Travel, Ozon) and niche travel forums.
Market Gaps:

• The "Tourist Trap" Default: Recommended locations are heavily skewed toward overcrowded, mainstream attractions.
• Fragmented Research: Users are forced to piece together tips, locations, and accommodations from multiple disjointed sites.
• Poor Customization: A lack of robust filters makes it impossible to tailor the experience to specific needs.
• Lack of Curation: A noticeable absence of boutique, exquisite, or off-the-beaten-path recommendations.
• Opaque Pricing: It is incredibly difficult to gauge whether a location or itinerary fits a specific budget.

UI audit and benchmarking

To see how the market currently addresses user needs, we conducted a comprehensive visual audit of key players. We dissected their navigation structures, content hierarchy, location cards, and filtering systems to identify successful design patterns and uncover critical UX gaps.
Key Takeaways:

• What Works: Competitors do a great job using emotive, high-quality imagery to capture the vibe and atmosphere of a destination.
• The Missing Link: There is a severe lack of trip-specific personalization. It’s incredibly hard to grasp the actual narrative of the trip, what the core highlights are, or what the real on-the-ground experience will look like.

The Product Hypothesis

Based on our research and analysis, we formulated the following hypothesis:
If we provide independent travelers with an all-in-one platform featuring authentic creator-led guides, verified tips, an interactive map, and trip-style filtering, then they will drastically reduce their planning time. They will feel confident that they aren’t missing out on key experiences, ensuring a comfortable and engaging trip.
Validating the Hypothesis. To validate this, we will track the Time on Task metric—measuring the time users spend completing core flows within the app. These flows include:

• Discovering and selecting a guide.
• Exploring the guide’s content and verifying it meets their needs.
• The decision-making process.
• Proceeding to checkout and completing the purchase.
• Actual in-trip usage and navigation.

User Journey Mapping

Screens wireframing

My deep dive into user behavior dictated exactly what tools the product needed to succeed:

• Trip-Style Filtering: Intuitive tagging based on the user’s format (e.g., Budget-conscious, Local Secrets, or Popular Highlights).
• Creator Transparency: Detailed author profiles in every guide to build trust.
• Integrated Navigation: Built-in maps with seamless routing capabilities.
• Verified Relevance: Up-to-date location tracking to prevent "closed doors."
• Offline Mode: Internet-free access ensuring reliability anywhere on the go.

Creating moodboard and design concept

To establish the product’s visual direction, we curated a moodboard centered around the core emotions of travel: joy, freedom, movement, and energy. The resulting design concept relies on vibrant accent colors for CTAs, highly emotive photography, and an overall dynamic aesthetic that inspires exploration.

Creating UI Kit

Building upon the moodboard and core visual concept, we developed a comprehensive UI Kit. The library is organized into 6 key component groups: Cards, Buttons, Typography, Icons, Core Elements, and Tab Bars.

Hero screen

The Home Screen is built on a powerful core philosophy: seamlessly guiding the user from inspiration to action.
I designed the layout to cater to different user states: a robust search bar with advanced filters serves high-intent users who already know their destination, while the Popular Destinations block inspires those still in the discovery phase. To create a highly personalized experience, returning users are greeted with a Recently Viewed module to pick up exactly where they left off, alongside a Traveler’s Choice section that leverages social proof to highlight the platform’s top-rated guides.

Guide List

The guide list screen is the first place where the user makes a purchasing decision. Therefore, for convenience, the search feature and the guide list are displayed immediately. Each card is designed to be as informative and atmospheric as possible.

Inside the Guide

Checkout Screens

The checkout screen is one of the most critical stages in the user journey—and the point where users most frequently experience hesitation. Our friction analysis made one thing perfectly clear: the user needs to know exactly what they are buying and what they are going to receive. That is why the checkout screen reiterates the guide’s value proposition, includes an email input for sending a backup copy, and integrates familiar, trusted payment methods.

Purchased Guide

A purchased guide is a practical working tool. From the friction analysis, it became obvious: the user must instantly understand the guide’s current relevance and the specific scenario they purchased it for. This is addressed by the "up-to-date" badge and the tags right below the title. The creator block resolves the issue of trust. Finally, two navigation modes—by day and by category—make it easy to conveniently plan out the trip.

The detailed location screen helps the user ensure that a place is actually worth visiting, which is why we added the "Locals' recommendation" badge. The Overview and Reviews tabs separate the general description from the experiences of other users. A built-in mini-map with a "See on Map" button helps the user instantly build a route to the desired location.

Saved Places

The Saved Places (My Guides) screen addresses one of the primary pain points identified in the research: people constantly lose track of their saved locations because they are scattered across multiple sources. The "Saved in the cloud" badge alleviates the anxiety of losing data. The saved section features intuitive navigation, organizing places by country, and allows users to easily get directions to a location or remove it entirely from their list.