Save & Travel - Goal based savings app
Save with purpose. Travel with freedom.
Save with purpose. Travel with freedom.
Many young professionals want to save for vacations but struggle with tracking deposits and staying motivated. Existing budgeting apps are too complex or focus only on expenses, not on visualizing travel goals.
Why this matters.?
# Users forget to set aside weekly deposits.
# Apps feel like accounting work, not motivation.
# No clear way to see if savings will cover trip costs.
After identifying the problem, I wanted to hear directly from travelers. Through interviews, surveys, and competitor reviews, I dug deeper into how people actually save, what holds them back, and what could keep them motivated.
Users often find it difficult to manage travel savings alongside daily expenses. Existing tools are either too generic or too complex, and they don’t offer a simple way to set travel-specific goals, collaborate with friends, or track progress visually. This leads to abandoned plans, financial stress, and missed travel opportunities.
After setting clear goals, I moved into the research phase to uncover saving behaviors and validate assumptions. I used a combination of interviews, surveys, and competitor analysis to gain both qualitative and quantitative insights. This mix helped me capture not just what users do, but also why they behave that way.
User Interviews: I conducted 5 in-depth interviews with young professionals (ages 22–35) who were planning trips. These conversations helped me understand their motivations, frustrations, and saving strategies.
Surveys: A short Google Form survey gathered 20 responses, providing supporting data around app usage, savings consistency, and drop-off patterns.
Competitor Analysis: I reviewed Goodbudget, Mint, and YNAB to see what features worked and where gaps existed, especially around travel-specific saving goals.
Day-1🎤 5 Interviews --> Day-3 📊 20 Surveys--> Day-5 🔍 Competitor Analysis
From the research , goal statements several clear patterns emerged:
Most participants admitted:
They struggle to stay consistent beyond 1–2 months of saving.
Apps felt like accounting homework, which discouraged them.
A majority wanted visual progress indicators and simple reminders to feel motivated.
I created personas to represent key user behaviors and pain points. The primary persona, Eswar, is a young professional who loves to travel but struggles with saving for his marriage and planning trips with friends.
Design choices—like goal creation and progress visibility—were directly influenced by Eswar’s needs.
Eswar's journey revealed the frustration of saving without structure. His goals—and his need for clarity, control, and motivation—inspired key elements of Save & Travel.
I created personas to represent key user behaviors and pain points. The Secondary persona:
Srikar is a Hodophile person who spends and travel a lot.
Design choices—like goal creation and progress visibility—were directly influenced by Srikar's needs.
Motivation →Visual progress (bars, circles, goal meters).
Simplicity → Less “finance-heavy,” more “goal-oriented.
Consistency → Gentle reminders to stay on track.
Flexibility → Weekly/monthly deposit toggles, adaptable to income.
Start saving with enthusiasm but drop off after 1–2 months.
Use multiple apps but abandon them due to complexity.
Want saving to feel connected to real-life goals (travel, events).
Start saving for multiple trips with different amount.
Adding blog part will encourage to save more.
After identifying user needs, I mapped out the app's information architecture to ensure intuitive navigation and content organization.
Sketching paper wireframes helped me explore multiple ideas quickly, allowing room for experimentation without getting caught up in visual details.
The homepage wireframe was designed to make savings feel visual and motivating from the first glance. Early testers easily recognized their goal progress but suggested adding a total savings summary for better context.
Using Figma, I built a low-fidelity prototype that allowed me to define the core structure of the app, including navigation, user flows, and key interactions. This phase helped validate the overall logic of the design and made it easier to gather early feedback from users and stakeholders before investing time in high-fidelity visuals.
I transformed the low-fidelity wireframes into high-fidelity UI designs using Figma, applying the visual style, iconography, and typography system that aligns with the brand’s tone. The goal was to create an interface that feels friendly, modern, and motivating for users saving toward their next adventure.
I have tested the Hi fidelity prototype in two types :
# Moderated usability:
I conducted moderated usability testing with 5 participants to validate the Save & Travel prototype. Sitting with each user, I observed how they navigated the savings flow, asked clarifying questions, and noted areas of confusion. This approach allowed me to gather both behavioral insights (where users struggled) and direct feedback (how they felt about reminders and progress tracking).
Findings from moderated usability:
Round 1 (Before Iterations)
4/6 users missed the weekly/monthly deposit toggle.
2/6 users struggled to set reminders.
Users described the app as “a bit unclear at first.”
Round 2 (After Iterations)
6/6 users successfully completed saving setup.
Deposit toggle was immediately recognized.
Users described the reminders as “helpful, not annoying.”
# Unmoderated usability:
In addition to moderated sessions, I ran unmoderated usability testing by sharing the prototype with 8 participants remotely. They completed predefined tasks (creating a savings goal, adding a deposit, setting a reminder) without my guidance. This allowed me to capture authentic behavior and measure how intuitive the flow was in a real-world context.
Findings from Unmoderated Testing
Key Struggles:
3/8 users hesitated when finding the reminder settings.
2/8 users expected a confirmation message after adding a deposit.
Positive Outcomes:
8/8 users successfully created a savings goal on their first attempt.
6/8 users described the progress bar as "motivating and simple to understand".
Average task completion time was under 1 minute.
Based on Usability feedback,
# I refined the color palette and icons to make the interface feel more engaging and aligned with a travel theme.
# I introduced a clear “Add New Goal” action on the home screen so users could start saving without confusion.
# The typography was updated from a generic sans-serif to a cleaner, more legible style that improves readability on mobile devices.
# These iterations enhanced both visual appeal and usability, ensuring users could quickly understand actions while feeling motivated by the design.
# Task success rate improved from 67% in Round 1 to 100% in Round 2 after iterations.
# All participants were able to add a savings goal and set reminders without guidance.
# 80% of testers said the visual progress bar made saving feel achievable and motivating.
# Setup time was reduced, with most users completing their first goal in under 1 minute.
Eshwar:"Now I know exactly how close I am to my trip.”
“The reminders feel supportive instead of annoying.”
Srikar :“It doesn’t feel like budgeting anymore — it feels like planning my vacation.”
What Worked:
Research directly shaped key design choices — from the visual savings bar to the reminder system.
Iterations based on user testing significantly improved clarity and motivation.
Combining moderated and unmoderated usability testing gave a well-rounded view of user behavior.
What Didn’t Work (Challenges):
Early wireframes didn’t highlight the deposit toggle clearly, causing confusion.
Reminder settings were initially hidden and overlooked by most users.
Needed multiple iterations before users felt saving was intuitive.
What I’d Do Next:
Test the design with a larger, more diverse user group to confirm scalability.
Explore social saving features (friends pooling for group trips).
Add gamification elements (milestones, rewards) to further boost engagement.
Designing Save & Travel taught me that great UX isn’t just about polished visuals — it’s about making saving feel achievable, motivating, and fun.”
The final design helped simplify the savings journey for users, combining personal finance and travel planning into one intuitive experience. Users appreciated the clean UI, visual goal tracking, and flexible deposit scheduling.
This project strengthened my end-to-end UX process—from early user research and empathy mapping to designing responsive interfaces. I gained confidence in balancing functionality with user motivation, especially in financial products.
✅ What I Learned:
"The importance of emotionally engaging visuals in financial tools".
"How to break down travel saving into small, motivating interactions".
"The value of structuring the UX process even for conceptual projects"
🧠 Skills Demonstrated:
UX Research · Wireframing · Prototyping · Visual Design · Webflow Development
Save & Travel is more than just a personal finance app — it’s a solution designed to help people turn travel dreams into reality through disciplined, visual, and collaborative saving.
This case study reflects my ability to lead the full design process: from uncovering user pain points to crafting user flows, wireframes, high-fidelity UIs, and validating solutions through feedback.
Through this project, I learned how to balance clarity, motivation, and functionality — three pillars that make a financial tool both practical and emotionally engaging.
Most importantly, it showed me the power of designing for real users, with real challenges — and how good design can create positive habits that last.
Users appreciated the clean and minimal UI, saying it felt calming and easy to navigate.
The progress visuals and savings goal cards were described as “motivating” and “visually clear.”
