UNiDAYS Native App
Native iOS and Android app
UNiDAYS is the world’s leading student discount network, connecting over 10 million students worldwide with brands like Apple, ASOS and Levi’s.
When I joined, the platform ran on a dynamic website. The brief was to replace it with a fully native iOS and Android app – lean, accessible, familiar to each platform’s users, and ready to launch in time for the new academic year.
Eight months later, the app launched and broke into the App Store top 25 and Google Play top 100.
My role
I was the UX/UI designer on the project from start to finish – research, site maps, focus groups, wireframes, A/B testing, UI design, animation and development liaison through to launch.
The scope covered both iOS and Android, each requiring their own native patterns and interaction models, designed in parallel without compromising either platform.
Key challenges:
Preserving the commercial ecosystem
Challenge
UNiDAYS’ business model relied on brands paying a premium for higher placement in the feed.
That hierarchy needed to carry over into the app without feeling forced or compromising the user experience.
Solution
I introduced a Featured section as the first thing users landed on when opening the app. This gave premium brands their visibility while feeling like a natural, curated editorial experience rather than an advert.
The rest of the app’s navigation was then built around this, keeping the commercial model intact without it getting in the way.
Key challenges:
One app, two very different platforms
Challenge
iOS and Android users have distinct expectations about how apps behave.
Designing a single product that felt native on both – without building two completely separate things – was a genuine challenge.
Solution
I researched the UX patterns, navigation conventions and interaction models for both platforms thoroughly, then designed platform-specific solutions where they differed.
Android used swipe-based tab navigation and a hamburger menu, while iOS used bottom navigation tabs – both familiar to their respective users, both serving the same underlying content.
Key challenges:
An inaccessible navigation banner
Challenge
The existing website had a top banner with buttons crammed too close together, failing WCAG accessibility standards.
Users regularly tapped the wrong button because the touch targets were too small with too little space between them.
Solution
I researched native solutions for both platforms and designed multiple options, reviewing them with the team before agreeing on an approach that solved the accessibility issue without alienating existing users.
The final solution met WCAG standards and felt immediately familiar on both iOS and Android.
Key challenges:
Keeping the experience lean
Challenge
The fewer steps between opening the app and redeeming a discount, the better.
Every unnecessary tap was a potential drop-off point for a student on their lunch break.
Solution
Every screen, flow and interaction was evaluated for whether it was strictly necessary.
Navigation was streamlined, content was grouped logically by category, and the overall architecture was kept as shallow as possible so users could find what they needed quickly.
Research:
Focus groups
We ran focus groups with students at UNiDAYS events and student lockdown events – getting real users testing real designs under realistic conditions.
Having multiple people testing simultaneously let us pinpoint pain points quickly and spot patterns in how students naturally navigated the app.
Research:
A/B testing
Where design decisions were genuinely uncertain, I set up A/B tests to let behaviour decide.
Specific sections of the app were tested against each other, with the winning design adopted and the alternative phased out entirely.
Research:
Site map
The first thing I tackled was the site map – mapping out every screen, hit point and navigation route across both the top navigation and footer. This gave the whole team a clear picture of the app’s structure before a single wireframe was drawn.
Final design:
Loading screen
The app opens with a loading animation I designed and built in After Effects – the UNiDAYS ‘iD’ highlights first, a nod to the student ID at the heart of the brand, while the app content loads in the background.
Final design:
Introduction screens
First-time users are walked through a short set of introduction screens explaining the benefits of joining and having a UNiDAYS account – setting expectations before they hit the main experience.
Wireframes:
Login and register
On logging in, users land directly on the homepage – where premium brand placements and limited-time offers live. The login flow was kept as short as possible to get students into the app quickly.
Wireframes:
Explore
Perks were grouped by category, with users swiping between them to browse.
This was one of the areas where iOS and Android diverged most noticeably – Android used swipe navigation with a hamburger menu, while iOS used bottom navigation tabs. Both felt right for their platform.
Wireframes:
Search
On Android, search was triggered via a floating action button at the bottom right of the screen, opening a dedicated search page with previous results shown for quick access.
The results
The app launched in time for the start of the new academic year – the most important window for a student platform. Within the launch period it broke into the App Store top 25 and the Google Play top 100. Not a bad result for eight months’ work.
iOS and Android apps
UNiDAYS is a popular student discount platform with a native mobile app available on iOS and Android. The app’s design emphasises simplicity, speed, and accessibility, targeting Gen-Z and millennial students who need quick access to deals from brands like Apple, ASOS, and Levi’s.
My role
The challenge was to create a native iOS and Android application to replace the current dynamic website that was being used.
The outcome had to use the latest native UX best practices and expected user behavioural patterns as to not alienate users. As well as this, the app needed to be as lean as possible.
Key challenges:
Slick functionality without compromising premium screen estate
Challenge
The way the UNiDAYS website worked was that businesses would pay a premium fee to have their card placed higher up the website than the other businesses.
This new app, needed to feel familiar yet not compromise the current ecosystem that had been set up previously.
Solution
I researched fully into each opperating systems ‘style’ of how UNiDAYS could integrate the ecosystem that we have created.
Android used tabbing (swiping) to navigate through the categories of perks, whilst iOS used a different tab style component and behaviour, along with a mixture of utilising the bottom navigation to help users explore perks.
I also looked at creating a ‘featured’ page which users landed on when opening up the app – this allowed us to keep our premium ecosystem.
Key challenges:
Inaccessible navigation banner
Challenge
A lot of work needed to be considered around the top banner of the site and hittable areas between buttons as these would fail WCAG standards.
They were small buttons with not a lot of room for error, users would often click one button, and realise that they’d accidentally pressed the other button directly next to it.
Solution
By researching extensively into behavioural patterns; Android and iOS both have methods in which can easily solve the inaccessible top banner problem we currently had.
I created multiple options to and got these reviewed by the team, we all agreed on a preferred approach that we thought felt familiar so we didn’t alienate our users.
Goals
Create a lean experience for users
Creating a lean experience can only be a good thing when making an app intuitive and easy to use. The less steps to potentially cause confusion then better.
Make the app familiar to what they would expect to see
If a user uses an Apple device and uses their device a specific way, they would expect the same behavioural patterns when using the iOS UNiDAYS app, the same for Android – we want to make the app feel familiar and not alienate users by adding functionality into the app that they might not recognise based on their opperating system.
Research:
Site map
The very first area I worked on was the site map for the app, creating all the hit points and areas that users will be able to navigate to and use.
This covered the top navigation and the footer for the app.
Creating a site map helped me to get an overview of the key user routes that would need to be taken by the user whilst navigating the app.
Research:
Focus groups
We thought it would be a great idea to organise a focus group between staff across other departments of the company to try and get extra ideas that we could put towards the creation of the app, as well as to see if there was any consistent issues that we needed to avoid or improve with the current dynamic website that we had.
Having lots of people testing the app at the same time, allowed us to pin point any pain areas during the set tasks we set for the users.
Research:
A/B testing
This allowed us to test specific sections of the app and keep an eye on the behavioural patterns of our users when they landed on the relevant pages.
Doing this gave clear results for which design we should use as one would work better than the other. If that was the case, we then phased out ‘Design B’ completely.
Wireframes:
Login screen
Upon logging in, users are taken to the homepage.
This is where the main brands pay for exposure, as well as limited-time offers
Wireframes:
Explore
Perks were in groups of type, so users could swipe between the pages to see the other areas.
This area was one of the main differences in native UX between Android and iOS. Android interface uses swiping and the Hamburger navigation to get between pages, whereas the iOS interface uses main sections along the bottom navigation.
Wireframes:
Search
Searching within the Android app was done by hitting the floating action button at the bottom right of the screen. Doing this opened up a new page where it showed previous search results.