Niyo's Payment eco-system scaling and App redesign

I led the design of Niyo's in-house UPI payment experience from scratch. It increased retention of users in the app for domestic payments, fund transfers to-and-fro from their Niyo accounts & bill payments — one of the most impactful projects I worked on.

The goal was to embed Niyo's travel spirit within the new UPI experience and offer users functionalities missing in other UPI apps they use. This project served as a base for design system and app re-design initiatives.

Our key focus was on making the UPI experience more human and natural for everyday life scenarios. Which is why we included features like "Mark a contact as favorite" for frequent payments, and "Add Nicknames" for easily remembering a contact irrespective of their contact or registered name.

1. Within 3 months of the launch the UPI crossed 15cr transaction volume.
2. 22% of users started paying their credit card bills with the new in-house UPI.
3. This was also the first feature release with a launch video — a practice that became common thereafter in the design team.

I led design for one of the most important revenue sources of Niyo Global — International Payments. With multiple eco-system constraints, the key focus was on designing a stress-free, clear & intuitive experience for sending money globally to family & friends.

The main challenge was to design for multiple complex approval states within the overall transfer journey, which led to different drop-off scenarios. The home page was designed to allow users to get back in from the last step.

Post-successful launch and adoption on the mobile app, the forex-transfer was brought to Niyo's website as well. Along with junior designer Tushar Prakash, I led this initiative, making the first web-based service experience for Niyo.

The components, home page structure, error & drop-off handling, and other patterns created in the Remittance project served as a base for the Forex-cash service, which started a quarter after the Remittance launch. This saved major time for both designers and developers since the UI framework was already available — the team was able to focus more on content, logistics, and experience improvements.

A yearly subscription plan to grow customer lifetime value, by offering increased rewards on spends, free international lounge access, and savings on services like flight/hotel booking and forex transfers.

Key areas:

• Activation page that supports single to multiple plan selection
• A system for entry points across the app
• Plan offerings and business details with the product team
• Visual identity for the subscription plans

Despite the limited marketing of the plans, within the first month of release 28,381 Premium plans were activated. For new users, 8.2% of them opted for a Premium plan post card order.

With more contextual discovery points and stronger benefits in the future, this conversion rate can be improved.

More details are captured by my team member who worked on the project under my lead — Pragya Goenka in her case study.

Niyo's design system was limiting the company's goal of experience and expansion of offerings. A 5-year-old system — outdated visually, with accessibility issues around colors and tap areas, and not built to cover the growing use-cases that came with the company's rapidly expanding services portfolio.

Designers across different pods were making UI decisions independently of a centralized system. Most features/flows ended up looking like a standalone app or experience — more time spent in reviews, more headaches for developers maintaining different code for barely different components.

Key areas:

• A scalable design system that supports both app & web development across Niyo's 15+ offerings
• Ensuring all key experiences adopted the new design system
• Visual identity for the subscription plans
• Leading the entire design team, coordinating with engineering and leadership for a consistent experience

• Brand equity: unified visual system across marketing, web, and mobile boosted brand recall.
• WCAG compliance: 100% AA compliance on web and mobile.
• Faster cycles: component-release times down by 50%; dev handoff issues dropped 70%.
• Rapid migration: all 40+ products fully migrated within two months, zero rollbacks.

This project demonstrates how a strategic, scalability-first design system can transform brand perception and product efficiency. By combining rigorous research, accessible design principles, and cross-platform collaboration, Niyo now delivers a cohesive experience across mobile and web, prepared for future growth and innovation.