How to Redesign an App — Complete Guide with Recommendations from Devlight

Victoria Sukharevskaya

Delivery Manager

Liubomyr Miller

Delivery Director

Do you wish to advance your mobile application? By implementing a well-planned mobile app redesign, you may improve user experience (UX) and increase engagement. 

Users expect mobile apps to have a high degree of functionality and usability because they have become a crucial part of our everyday lives. An app’s poor design can cause annoyance, unfavorable ratings, and ultimately user churn. A well-made app, on the other hand, can improve the user experience and foster loyalty. 

We’ll lead you through the process of a successful mobile app redesign in this tutorial. We tried to cover as many topics as possible, including user research, analysis, and testing, as well as design implementation. You can design a mobile app that is visually appealing, user-friendly and caters to the demands of your target market using the insights and techniques you learn in this guide. This can boost user interaction, boost retention rates, and eventually result in commercial success.

What’s an App Redesign?

Redesigning a mobile application involves making it look and feel better in order to make it more appealing and user-friendly. In other words, it entails assessing the app’s present design and determining areas that should be improved in light of user feedback. A redesigned software should offer a simple and intuitive user interface to entice repeat usage. To increase the performance, engagement, and retention of their software, product managers frequently start a makeover.

The redesign process might result in more functionality and a user-friendly design by bringing new ideas to the table based on user behavior analysis and unbiased feedback. Two equally significant steps are involved in the process of redesigning an app: 

• UI design 

User interface (UI) design is mostly concerned with the app’s visual elements. Layout, typography, color scheme, and other visual components fall under this category. The aim of a UI designer is to produce an interface that is aesthetically pleasing, user-friendly, and intuitive. 

• UX design 

When we talk about an app’s total user experience (UX), we mean it. In order to satisfy user needs, a UX designer attempts to create an intuitive, simple-to-use interface. To do this, UX designers carry out user research to comprehend the wants and objectives of the user. They build wireframes and prototypes to test and iterate on their design concepts after analyzing user behavior to determine how the app is utilized.

Benefits of Redesigning Your App

The process of redesigning an app is time-consuming and expensive. It will, however, earn back its cost and effort. Following an application redesign, product owners may benefit from the following:

• Creating a knowledgeable impression. Trend-following products appear to be enjoyable to use on a regular basis, which makes users admire the designers who created them;
• Becoming more visible on the market. Mobile apps that are updated regularly form a very compatible offer;
• Receiving higher conversion rates. Redesign affects not just the rates, but also other user experience (UX) changes, such as recommending the app to a broader audience, natural promotion, and loyalty;
• Increasing brand recognition. A mobile app’s brand awareness can help set it apart from competing products in stores and establish its credibility with users;
• Boosting the likelihood of additional investments. Your product makes a statement for you in front of investors. The regular release of new features and upgrades by a program is a strong argument;
• Becoming proud of your product. Any app makeover starts with swapping out old patterns and concepts for fresh ones. The software, which was released in a manner consistent with the newest design trends, will undoubtedly make you feel proud of the higher quality of services you now provide. And let’s not remember that a feeling of belonging to a bigger mission is what drives motivation.

6 Reasons for an App Redesign (With Solutions)

For a product to succeed, its functionality, intuitiveness, and stability are unquestionably crucial. However, when a user launches your app, the first thing they notice is how the design. The major part of first impressions is influenced by design. And in many circumstances, poor design can easily push a user away from your product. Now that you are aware of the design’s potential, let’s discuss some scenarios in which you might want to think about rebuilding your application:

Outdated Aesthetics

Modernization is a normal stage in the development of any brand because it enables a business to perform at a higher standard. In the context of rapidly evolving trends and user preferences, upgrades are unavoidable. Even the most effective UI will eventually seem old-fashioned despite originally appearing elegant and cutting-edge.

You don’t have to create an interface from scratch or adhere to every new UX/UI design trend, but it makes sense to update the product from time to time to keep up with the market standards. Apply modern design components and color schemes so that the app is both aesthetically pleasing and simple to use.

Negative Customer Reviews

What problems do users of your mobile app bring up? You need to update the design of your apps if you have low app ratings, poor customer evaluations, or reviews from clients who have issues. Even negative feedback brings about benefits. Having any user comments and real-life experience makes it simpler to identify the parts of your app needing fixing and improvement. 

Find the parts of the software that are frustrating consumers, such as the cluttered UI or the confusing navigation. To make it more logical and user-friendly, streamline the design and user experience. To fully understand the “why“ behind how users interact with your app, use session replays and analytic tools. They will help you obtain insights into unique user behavior patterns and identify chances for UX enhancement with the use of touch heatmaps, funnel analytics, crash logs, and event analytics.

Complex Interface

Applications frequently grow overly complex with time, especially when new features are added and the interface gets cluttered. It is particularly relatable for SaaS apps because they are often highly sophisticated and fulfill many different roles.

When Uber added new service options, it seemed that the screen was too small to show all the options at once, leading users to select the incorrect item. The answer to this problem was to ask them where they were going in the first place (include a “Where to?“ area) and only after that to display the price, the route, and other pop-ups. 

Rebranding

Sometimes, it makes no sense to hang onto an outdated perception because the design may not be the only thing that has to be updated; a new look and an effective marketing strategy might give a brand-new vitality. It piques the curiosity of current clients and aids in attracting new ones.

Despite being a popular platform, Airbnb’s brand over time didn’t align with its new product goal. In order for consumers to grasp its essential beliefs and guiding principles, Airbnb chose to develop its distinct brand identity in 2014. They updated the typeface, the logo and even added a new color they named Rausch during the overhaul. As a result, they positioned their product as being clear, approachable, and engaging to their customers with the help of design.

Platform Updates

Keeping your app updated is crucial as mobile platforms and technology develop. A redesign will help ensure that your app is compatible with the newest gadgets and cutting-edge frameworks for developing mobile apps. The solution will be to keep up with the most recent developments in mobile technology and make sure the app is optimized for these platforms. Enhance compatibility and app performance, this may entail altering the design or user experience.

Your Conversion Rate Is Not What It Could Be

Do you follow your drop-off rate? Visitors can easily become irritated by a poor UX design. Whether a visitor becomes a devoted customer depends on the experience they have with the app. The majority of people link poor design to poor service. The halo effect refers to this phenomenon. New trends in user experience develop over time, making even the most fashionable designs appear old. 

When the Redesign Is Not a Solution

Redesigning your application’s UI/UX might be useful if you, as the product owner, know what issues you want to address and what user behavior you want to modify. If you’d like to simply “add amazing animations to make it pop“ and “make the application cool“ rather than turning it into a work of art or transform the design into something truly exceptional, it is preferable to take extra time to investigate and consider exactly what you want to accomplish.

Don’t redesign merely for the sake of redesigning. It is unquestionably not worthwhile to change the appearance and feel of a program if it does not provide the end user with anything novel or beneficial. The redesign is also not a solution if:

• the cost of redesigning your app is higher than the revenue generated from that investment;
• most of the functionality will be changed in the near future anyway;
• there is no configured analytics for key metrics (adjust and collect indicators for 2-3 months and only then proceed to redesign in case there is a need).

And finally, redesign is not a designer’s job, despite how strange that statement may sound. Instead, it is far from just their job. A comprehensive team of experts, including a designer, marketer, business analyst, etc., is needed to rebuild an application or create an interface from scratch completely. Changing some parts of the app’s aesthetics or color design alone probably won’t help you for this reason.

Top 3 Factors to Consider Before Redesigning Your App

It’s important to remember that designing a mobile app for your company has the potential to revolutionize the way you do business completely. A well-executed redesign can raise engagement, enhance user experience, and even generate revenue. 

Prior to starting a mobile app redesign, it’s crucial to examine user behavior and feedback, identify problem areas and opportunities for growth, and develop a comprehensive plan that takes these issues into account. Here are some considerations to make:

• What objectives does the redesign have? Do you want to update the app’s appearance and feel, boost revenue, or improve user engagement?
• Who are your intended customers? What are their wants, actions, and objectives? Are there any issues with the present app that need to be fixed?
• What are the existing app’s advantages and disadvantages? What functions well, and what requires development? What kind of user feedback have you received?

Following our discussion of some important factors, let’s delve further into the main approaches you may choose to conduct redesign. 

Revolutionary vs. Evolutionary Redesign

Regardless of the choice of strategy, you need to address user behavior. Apps can be redesigned using either comprehensive changes or incremental interface improvements. Each of these strategies shows its efficacy in various scenarios:

• A revolutionary redesign involves rewriting an application from scratch. This strategy is frequently applied when an application’s original design is out-of-date or does not adequately address user needs;
• Evolutionary redesign involves a number of little adjustments that improve the usability of the program. Instead of creating a whole new interface, it involves making minor changes to an existing one. With this strategy, you can gradually roll out incremental updates without overwhelming people.

Your redesign goals will determine which of these two solutions you choose. The greatest alternative for you may be revolutionary if you’re seeking for a new beginning and want to develop something completely original for your audience. However, evolution may be more successful if you wish to keep things the same while still making improvements along the way.

The 4-Component Process for a Successful App Redesign

When we engage in this kind of cooperation, the redesign process is essentially split into the UX audit and the redesign process itself. Between them is the data analysis that interlinks two parts. Each of those stages is then broken down into smaller levels. They are depicted in the diagram above. After that, go testing and iterating changes logical before launching any kind of app update.

The first and perhaps most crucial pre-stage for you as a product owner would be to establish the purpose for a redesign, even though we just indicated that there are two key steps in the redesign process when improving the UI/UX of the application.

Set the objective. We’ve already spoken about one scenario in which you could want to make changes to the product. However, keep in mind the following elements in order to define the purpose correctly: 

• Do you have any definite knowledge of UI or UX issues to be fixed? Remember that “I don’t like the look of my product“ is not a sufficient response. 
• Have you looked at the attrition rate? You may better understand the moment of truth in CJMs — crucial moments when users either become frustrated and quit interacting with your application or choose your brand — by creating a user journey map.
• Are you aware of what consumers think of your product? Keep an eye on the reviews that users leave for it, solicit feedback, and speak with your users.

Always gather proof to back up each of your decisions throughout this phase. Once you’ve established the objective, keep it in mind and proceed to further auditing.

Step 1: UX Audit

Any application’s primary goal is to address a concern of its intended user base. An app must be functional, with a consistent and intuitive layout and appealing design, in order to rapidly and efficiently achieve this goal. Gather all the data you need to uncover the flaws in your current design by conducting a UX audit.

In plain English, a UX audit helps us to:

• Determine UX issues based on human factors principles, comprehend how users interact with various product aspects, and determine which features of rival goods they find most beneficial;
• Identify the target audience’s preferences, needs, and behavior patterns;
• Set the essential needs that your target market has for your product;
• Learn about the advantages and disadvantages of your product and gather suggestions for enhancing the design.

The audit’s findings are typically delivered in the form of a report that includes a thorough explanation of the issues within the app. It could be a customer journey map, an empathy map, or report visualizing approaches/methods that suit best the type of audit or query context, as well as results that need to be visualized to serve the base for further discussions. A pre-made manual for enhancing the user experience is the UX audit following, which requires the next steps:

Carry out market analysis 

Market research is the first step in any app design process, including comprehensive makeovers. Your mobile app needs to offer a unique value since you are undoubtedly aiming for the top places of the store charts. Market research helps in focusing and discovering what products or services rivals are offering and how to outperform them.

Heuristic analysis

Ignoring the current interface is quite a big mistake. Instead, analyze the present app design while paying close attention to the user experience. A heuristic analysis is used to pinpoint a product’s typical usability problems so that they may be fixed, hence enhancing user pleasure and experience and enhancing the likelihood of a digital product’s overall success.

In a broad sense, heuristic analysis, which focuses on usability, is an evaluation technique where one or more specialists assess a digital product’s design against a set of predetermined design principles (often referred to as heuristics) and pinpoint any instances in which the product deviates from those principles. Check out our Instagram to see how we conducted the heuristic design analysis of the Sahseh app.

Analyze consumer comments  

Evaluation of user feedback is the third foundational element of app redesign research. This involves compiling reviews across social media, the App Store, and Google Play. Additionally, business owners frequently conduct customer surveys.

Determining design concepts

Practically nothing has changed with the strategy. Wireframing. Prototyping. Make sure the redesign concept accurately captures the new identity if your organization undergoes rebranding.

Step 2: Data Gathering and Analysis

Businesses naturally involve data analysts in redesigning to understand consumer behavior better and produce user-friendly and effective digital experiences. 

Let’s dispel a frequent misunderstanding before we examine how data analysts and UX/UI designers collaborate: data analysts can play a role at the beginning of a product life cycle. You may be wondering how a data analyst may be beneficial before there is a product for which to collect data, but data analysts are also charged with making sure that organizations are in accordance with the legislation regarding the collection of data. 

Creating a user experience that is both legal and data-rich can benefit from the assistance of data analysts. They can also be beneficial by providing information gleaned from comparable goods or experiences. In the end, every position on a development team can be helpful at any stage of the product life cycle.

User Research

To produce something that users would love, designers must first comprehend precisely what people want from their products. Data analysts can close the user-designer gap by researching what features users value and why. It’s crucial that designers understand what users like, dislike, and wish they could have.

Product Design

With knowledge of the users’ priorities, designers can develop, iterate, and enhance products while giving priority to the most pressing problems already in existence. Designers can build user-centric designs that are optimized for usability, engagement, and general satisfaction by using a data-driven approach.

Usability Testing

This process, which takes place after a product or feature is delivered, is comparable to user research. The main goal of usability testing is to gather information on user interactions and behaviors so that it is possible to evaluate a design’s effectiveness and efficiency. Usability testing is one of the numerous methods that designers employ, similar to the scientific approach, to be able to adapt products to satisfy the unique needs of their consumers. 

Step 3: Redesign Itself

After successfully passing all the previous stages, you may proceed to the redesign process itself to organize all the insights into the efficient design solution. Typography, colors, icons, illustrations, element style, and the relationships between them are all included in this. In other cases, it could also include completely redesigning entire screens or even sections of the product, which might mean removing some elements, renaming, or rewriting entire pages, among other things.

Visualizations for all product screens

When redesigning a product, a designer will:

• Build a dynamic prototype of the application to thoroughly assess the appearance of the application and the logic of interaction between elements;
• Test the prototype to find flaws and areas for improvement before the application is finally sent to developers;
• Create a wireframe that presents all the most crucial interface elements and describes how they should interact with one another.

UI Kit

A UI Kit is a collection of all the UI elements that make up the user interface of your product. UI Kit implementation helps to visualize the user’s interaction with the interface.

The use of UI Kits can streamline, unify, and integrate large projects. It is the primary design document of the project, utilized by designers and developers at every step of work on a project, and it enables you to rapidly and effectively produce each subsequent app component based on the sample of the preceding ones.

Step 4: Final Testing and Iterating Changes

The final stage is to extensively test the app before making it available to the public once you’ve made the necessary alterations in light of the findings of the usability testing. Product owners distribute the software to a few users in order to get feedback and spot any problems that still need to be fixed.

It’s crucial to include software developers in this phase’s testing and launch procedures. They can collaborate with the design team to make sure the app is created in accordance with high-fidelity prototypes and satisfies all necessary criteria. This entails performing technical tests to make sure the software is compatible with various hardware and coding frameworks and optimizing it for performance, security, and dependability. 

The effort doesn’t end once the app has launched. Through ongoing testing and user input, it’s critical to keep track of and enhance its performance. Make sure that the software satisfies user needs and offers a satisfying user experience by thoroughly testing and continuously enhancing it. Users may become more engaged and devoted as a result, which will ultimately help the app succeed.

Top Mistakes of App Redesign Process

Here we have created a list of the most important mistakes to avoid during the app redesign process based on our expertise:

No Budget for Development

The ability to more easily adapt design thinking to financial restrictions is made possible by learning the typical expenses associated with creating particular concepts. Budgets shouldn’t be seen as a source of aggravation but rather as a beneficial design restriction.

Slowly, Then Suddenly

Your team needs a lot of time to complete the task successfully. Setting a strict deadline may lead to unneeded pressure and subpar performance. Being realistic and persistent is crucial, even if your website relaunch date is just used for internal planning. Your team needs a lot of time to complete the task successfully. Setting a strict deadline may lead to unneeded pressure and subpar performance.

“I Just Need a Talented Designer“

A collaborative effort creates a remarkable product. Although developers may be the first role that comes to mind, the product team and the finished product can greatly benefit from graphic designers, UX designers, and UX researchers. Important customer insights regarding the intended users can be obtained through UX research. Usability testing is also important to remember. Prototyping and design workshops can enhance team collaboration and foster an agile atmosphere. They are excellent for settling issues as well.

Not Organizing Design Assets Into a Design System

A design system is a set of guidelines for managing design at scale by minimizing duplication and establishing a common visual language and simple style across many pages and channels. Great UX places a strong emphasis on simplicity. Many make the mistaken assumption that people desire all-inclusive, feature-rich apps that can perform any task. However, having too many options can cause indecision. 

Don’t Break What Already Works

Don’t assume that everything needs to be entirely rebuilt right away. Most of the time, you simply need to modify the application’s components that get in the way of reaching the desired results. Users want to feel safe and at ease while navigating, free from the fear of unintentionally performing undesirable actions.

Release for a Limited Audience

An excellent strategy is to personalize the app by limiting the features that are shown to a user to those that are relevant, hence limiting the options. However, don’t assume you know your TA well (that is without assumption basis and subjective experience and expertise, instead define findings/reasons/data to transform them into important actions), conduct research, and you may discover new findings about the people interested in your app you would never guess blindfolded.

Choosing the Wrong Strategy

A strategy’s lack of or improper construction raises questions about the outcome. Laying a foundation is similar to planning. Spend some time creating a detailed plan. An app needs to be designed with your business plan in mind in order to be profitable. Choosing the wrong redesign strategy that does not correlate with the available resources (for instance, revolutionary when you have many features) will make your redesign go wrong from the very beginning.

How Much Does It Cost to Redesign a Mobile App?

In addition to the technology stack you choose, which is one of the most important factors in determining the price of redesigning a mobile app, there are other elements that you must take into account. The numerous variables involved in an app’s complexity, which naturally affect the redesign, involve:

• the complexity of the UI kit (the kit size, the complexity of construction and interactivity of elements, animations);
• the chosen strategy;
• the skill level of the designer;
• the uniqueness of the mobile application (competitor research or best cases).

Another element is the redesign strategy, whether you choose an evolutionary or revolutionary approach. Selecting the composition of your development and design team also matters. Will you be working with an internal team, independent contractors, a consulting firm, a larger team, or a combination of these? A mobile app’s redesign price is influenced by who works on it and how they work, in addition to the app itself. Even the project participants’ locations must be taken into account.

Additionally, when giving you a cost estimate, software development, design, or mobile consulting companies may choose between two methods: time and material or fixed price. You must also take into consideration this option. The time and material method rarely produces a precise cost; instead, it is based on hourly wages and the length of time needed to rebuild your mobile app. On the other hand, a fixed price proposal will provide you with a cost estimate for the entire project based on the specified scope.

Final Tips for Conducting Redesign

The user experience should be fluid, and they shouldn’t have to struggle to figure out how the product functions. Know your target audience before you begin designing a mobile application. Developing lean personas and customer journey maps and doing user research can help you understand the target market when product redesign. The ideal experience can be made for your audience the better you understand them. Now here are more tips:

• Before you start designing, you need to form a true vision and desire for your final product. This will help the designer with the relevant options and accordingly optimize costs;
• Establish clear objectives and KPIs, conduct user research to obtain audience insights, and keep an eye on the market to ensure a seamless and professional redesign;
• Before launching a major overhaul, do some preparation. Consider the budget and timeframes, consult with stakeholders on the plans, and choose someone to bear the brunt of the process management on your behalf;
• Carry out analysis of client reviews, coding, testing, and release. Following the rollout, collect user feedback to determine whether you are heading in the correct direction;
• DON’T hard reset your current design. Many businesses view a makeover as a complete restart. If you intend to radically redesign its appearance, rearrange its structure, or add new screens. You can apply a lot of the lessons you learn from your consumers’ actions and interactions with your current app’s language as you design a new one.