Grab Re-design Case Study
Don’t be afraid of doing product re-designs. If you have good reasons and an understanding of the usability issues, start planning and execute!

Process
Research:
I am aiming at surveying the frequent Cab booking users and understanding the current problems of the app and solving those through design with affordance and less cognitive load.
Persona:
James
Age: 25
Occupation: Designer
Location: Singapore
Job Story:
James is a busy man who is a designer by profession. He is not a frequent traveller, He has a plan to go for a movie with his girlfriend, by this time of the day, he is already worn out. So he planned to book a cab to make it to the movie, on time.
Critiques
A design critique represents an enormous opportunity to learn from a diverse set of experiences and perspectives of those in the room. It is not just a learning experience but also aids in navigating the design onto the right direction.
- It would be great if the navbar title is contextual to the screen instead of showing the branding, since there are many placeholders otherwise, to show branding(Splash screen, Appicon).
2. As the app suggests the current location, showing the “From” location(as text field) in top of the screen, it is dominating the “To” location which is most important in this context. It can thus be shown as a secondary information.
2. Actions placed both at the top and the bottom of the screen, make it harder to use because your fingers have to run back and forth every time you need to perform an action.
3. Asking the user whether it is a Business or Personal purpose, in the booking screen is a little too much information!(Too much information will lead us to clutter), I would suggest scrapping that question from the booking screen and show in a separate sliding pane.
4. Grab Rewards can be listed separately as a menu in the sliding pane, again, less information = clutter free booking screen. For the user who haven’t ridden at all, we should hide the “Grab Rewards” menu, which is irrelevant in that scenario.
5. “Notes to the driver” is a show stopper in booking screen, it can be given once you receive the driver details after the booking is complete. So the user knows, whom he’s sending the message to.
6. Selecting the cab-type screen looks like a full page pop-up. This will suffocate the user and he will end up in quitting our cab app, which is the worst part! We should apply some intelligence rather than plainly listing all the cab types to the user.
7. “Waiting for driver approval” screen can be done better, without giving a feel of navigating to a separate screen.
8. Driver details is scattered in “Driver on the way” screen. Action listing can be revisited to give more Accessibility and visually appeal. Assume, the driver will be in driving and thus not advisable to read messages then. I would rather suggest to remove the message feature. Driver arrived status can be shown once he is at the location.
Design Solution
- Once the user Signs-in/Signs up, the app should be in a ready state to book the cab.
- The only text field shown in the screen is “Where do you want to go?” which is more contextual and the user wouldn’t miss anything here. This basically servers the purpose of the app.
- Category is listed on the top of the screen as a tab in a subtle way, with less cognitive load.
4. For a user who is planning a trip later, the calendar icon helps him to book later. Here we are clearly conveying the booking is for immediate travel, else tapping the calendar icon, will help add a booking for future use.

- One stop solution for enter the “Drop point” & “Pickup Point”(If user intend to change).
- For the first time user, we are not showing the “Recent location”
3. Showing the kilometer range from the current location will give transparency and information to the user.
4. Indicating “From” as circle and “To” as Square, I have used two different colours to differentiate.

- Showing the selection location in the map rather than showing in text field will give a more natural look and feel and Affordance is assured. Tapping on the location will take you to change location. I have given Accessibility of changing the location here.
- Showing the members out will help app to suggest better.
- Showing the payment mode will maintain transparency with the user.
- I have used green color for the “Book Now” option for the positive approach to the user.
- And I am Indicating “From” as circle and “To” as Square and have used two different colours to differentiate and I used gradient in the track to give the visual relation.

- Car type will be shown based on the passenger count. If the number of passengers is more the 5, we will not be showing cars that do not fit the range.
- I have differentiated the price tag with colour, If it is highly priced at the moment the amount will be in red BG and the Low Price will be in green BG
- Double tapping on the cab will show the info of cab type.
- Based on the payment type user can pay conveniently.
- User can add the Credit/Debit card on the card selection.

- I have show the “Pickup Point” and “Drop Point” location and other details, giving the user a clear report of information.
- User can cancel the cab at anytime he wants to.
- If no one accepts the request, the user can retry and find a cab again.

- App will show the driver status.
- Driver Name, Car number & Rating are given in-app as an important information
- Required action will be listed at the bottom of the screen.
- User can cancel the ride even at this point, but he should give a proper reason for the cancellation.
- On Ride screen will be similar but without the information bar.
- Once the ride is completed, we will record the the feedback and rating from the user to serve better.

Conclusion
- Organizing and structuring design principles is just as important as creating them in the first place. I’ll continue finding ways to better structure the design principles we created at work, and visualize them so that everyone can get a good understanding of it across the organization.
- Grab re-design case study helped me understand how to solve simple case in design. It gives me confidence that if we apply similar principles, and keep doing what we are doing on UX research,UI, Visual design in our product team can help me achieve much more success in the near future.
Thanks for reading!
