Xapo
Making high-stakes money movement clear across mobile and web.
- Scope
- Product design and UX systems
- Platforms
- iOS, Android and web
- Focus
- Payments, onboarding and KYC
- Period
- 2018–2019
Context
Simple actions, complicated consequences.
Xapo combined Bitcoin custody with everyday money movement. A person could hold different balances, exchange currencies, move money between accounts, withdraw funds and pass identity checks—all inside products spanning iOS, Android and web.
These were short interactions with little room for ambiguity. Before confirming, people needed to know which balance money was leaving, where it was going, the amount and rate involved, and what would happen next.
Product architecture
Map the whole system before repairing individual flows.
The existing iOS architecture was documented alongside proposed and longer-term target states. That exposed where navigation, account structure and product terminology were working against one another—and gave the team a common model for deciding what belonged where.
Detailed flows then applied that model to exchange, moving and retrieving funds, PIN access, onboarding and KYC. The work connected the product strategy to the interface states customers would actually encounter.
- Existing-state sitemap
- Target-state architecture
- Exchange and fund movement
- Onboarding and KYC
- iOS, Android and web
- Product strategy
Key decisions
Make the consequence visible before the commitment.
Name the source and destination
Show which account money leaves and where it arrives. “Move” only becomes clear when both sides of the transaction are explicit.
Separate review from confirmation
Give people a deliberate point to check the amount, currencies and exchange rate before committing, followed by an unmistakable final state.
Design the states between
Pending, confirmed, failed and recoverable states matter as much as the happy path when real money is moving.
Ask for compliance in context
Connect identity requirements to the action they enable, rather than presenting KYC as an unexplained block at the front of the experience.
Team system
Give product and engineering the same language.
A shared design system turned repeated interaction patterns into reusable components across three platforms. The Xapo Engineering Framework documented how product, design, prototyping and platform teams worked together, while workshop kits helped teams move from open questions to testable decisions.
Facilitation and mentoring were part of the engagement because the system needed to survive beyond a single project or designer.
What changed
From disconnected screens to a product model the team could extend.
The engagement produced current- and target-state architecture, detailed transaction and onboarding flows, reusable interface patterns and an operating playbook for the teams building them. Together, they made complex financial actions easier to reason about—for customers and for the people shipping the product.
First-party archive reviewed: product strategy, iOS architecture, exchange and fund-movement flows, onboarding work, design-system material and the Xapo Engineering Framework.
Trust starts with knowing what will happen before you tap.