Redesigning the Onboarding Experience

Overview

The existing onboarding flow had a 62% drop-off rate at step three — users were overwhelmed by the number of decisions required before they could see any value. I led end-to-end redesign: starting with diary studies and exit interviews to understand where and why people left, then running card sorting sessions to restructure the information architecture.

Prototypes were tested in three rounds with 8 participants each. Key changes included deferring account configuration to post-activation, introducing a progress indicator, and replacing form-heavy screens with a single-question-per-screen pattern. The final design reduced drop-off by 40% and cut median time-to-first-action from 4.2 minutes to 1.8 minutes.