UX/UI Case Study
remmba iOS App
Always forgetting which cookies your kids love? Can’t remember that cozy park you visited? Then this app is for you.
Role
Concept, Research, Visuals
Duration
Mar - May 2022

Tools Used

Figma, Whimsical, Affinity Designer
remmba is an app for saving — and easily finding again — the things that matter in a world full of information and impressions. Products, dishes, places: a catalog of all your favorites in one place. Here I’ll briefly walk through the concept work and show what came out of it.

According to Tomer Sharon, 86% of startup ideas come from their founders’ personal pain. This case study is no exception. I’m tired of digging through my photo album and chats with my wife and friends for products or places I liked or they recommended. Tired of standing in the grocery store trying to remember which yogurt was so good, or which pudding my kids liked last time. Tired of scrolling through old photos to find that place with the great breakfast from my last trip. This is my personal pain — and, as it turned out, not only mine.

To see whether I had company in my misery, I did a little research. Here’s some of what I found:
How often do you save discoveries?
How convenient do you find the way(s) you use to save the discoveries?
How convenient are the way(s) you use to find your saved discoveries (trying to recall, photo search, note search, etc.)?
As you can see, a significant share of people save things and places and would like a better way to do it — and to get back to them quickly. Great news! Let’s get down to business.

On top of the survey, I interviewed a few friends. Some insights:
  • I was surprised to learn that several friends use Google Maps to save locations and keep lists of favorite items
  • Some use albums on Facebook and even Instagram to save and share their discoveries
  • Hashtags came up several times as a convenient way to search and sort
  • People want to save not only what they liked but also what they didn’t — I plan to handle this with a rating
Next stop: user personas. Based on the data, I came up with these two:
  • Kate

    Kate is a 42-year-old mother of two living in London. She works as a programmer at a web studio, is tech-savvy, and uses smartphone apps a lot.


    To keep track of favorite brands and products for herself and the family, she uses the built-in Notes app and takes lots of photos, which she shares in chats with her partner and friends.


    I buy a lot of different things for the family, and it’s impossible to keep everything in mind. I’d like to store everything in one place and quickly find it, especially when I’m in the process of shopping.


    She finds this less than convenient, especially when she needs to find something quickly, and would like a faster, easier way. Sharing her finds and favorite places with people close to her matters; photos and purchase location are must-haves.

  • Joshua

    Joshua is 24. Lives in Montreal. Not married. No kids. Carefree. Works as a photographer and travels a lot.


    He tries to keep track of interesting places he comes across, but has little need to remember store products. He takes photos and pins places on Google Maps.


    The biggest hassle is searching through thousands of photos for the one that reminds me of a spot with a great city view or a cool beach. It’s doable, but it takes longer than I’d like.


    Joshua would happily use a more convenient way to save places. He’s especially interested in personal ratings — because nothing is just black and white.

Did I mention I found an iOS app that does something similar? It’s called Sense. I compared its features with what I planned for my version. But first, some research data on the features potential users want:
What details of the discovery do you consider the most important to save?
And a bit more on how much people want to share things and places:
How important is it for you to share your discoveries with others?
The comparative analysis itself:
Sense
remmba
Multiple Photos
＋
＋
Location
＋
＋
Price
＋
＋
Sharing Option
＋
＋
Albums
＋
＋
Description
－
＋
Rating
－
＋
Video
－
＋
Map View
－
＋
Something to aim for, right?

Based on all this, I defined the core functionality:
  • Saving things and places as fast as possible — and getting back to them just as fast
  • Albums for cataloging items
  • Details: name, description, photos, location, rating, price
  • Map view of saved items
  • Sharing items with friends
Now for the crooked drawings and boring wireframes.

First I sketched some wireframes by hand to picture what the app might look like. In my defense, my daughter had stolen the ruler and hidden it somewhere.
After this creative dive, I structured the data a bit — pinning it down as an information architecture so it wouldn’t just float around in my head.
The user flow was supposed to go here, but I decided to show it on the finished screens below instead. For now, just note that the app has two main functions: create a new item (I called it a "Card") and find an existing one. I tried to make both as quick and straightforward as possible.

Then, with a rough idea of how the app should look, I made a dozen hi-fi wireframes. (Frankly, this step could have been skipped — the app is quite simple. But it’s a case study, so here you go.)
So the skeleton is ready and its purpose is clear. Time for the flesh: a neat visual layer and good old icons. By the way, in between all of the above, I designed the app’s logo (and came up with the name, of course). Here it is:
And finally, meet remmba — beautiful and occasionally coming to life:
Remember the User Flow?
5 STEPS
Adding a Card
3 STEPS
Finding a Card
3 STEPS
Finding a Card
The app’s widgets could look like this.
Time for some guerrilla testing. In theory I should have tested earlier too, but the functionality is very simple, so I trusted my experience and tested the near-final prototype.

I asked a few friends to try the Figma prototype. They had no complaints at all — except that they couldn’t install it on their iPhones. Alas, it’s just a case study. But maybe one day…