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🔤 Project Overview

• Project Name: Enhancing Duolingo's User Experience

• Role: UX Designer (End-to-end process)

• Duration: 1 Week

• Tools Used: Figma, Marvel, Miro, Google Meet

• Screens Designed: 10+

• Design Process: Design Thinking (Empathize → Define → Ideate → Prototype → Test)

🚩 Problem Statement

Duolingo users face two critical experience issues:

1. They lose lesson progress when the app is closed mid-session due to interruptions or accidents.

2. The Weekly XP status is buried behind multiple clicks, which decreases motivation and tracking efficiency.

🎯 Goals

• Improve lesson continuity with auto-save and session recovery.

• Boost motivation by displaying Weekly XP prominently on the home or profile screen.

• Enhance user satisfaction, retention, and reduce frustration.

🔍 Research Insights

About Duolingo

• 575M+ Users

• 100+ courses in 38+ languages

• Gamified platform with streaks, XP, and rewards

• Majority users: 18–24 years

Challenges Discovered

• Progress loss from accidental app closure

• Time wasted restarting difficult lessons

• Inflexible pause options during learning

• Hard-to-access Weekly XP info (hidden in leaderboard)

These lead to:

• Disrupted learning flow

• Reduced motivation & engagement

• Potential drop in retention

👤 User Personas / Stories (featuring Duolingo Characters!)

• Bea – Goal-oriented learner frustrated by lost progress; wants auto-save to avoid setbacks.

• Eddy – Loves stats but finds the XP tracking process tedious; wants quick access to weekly progress.

• Lily – Easily distracted and introverted; desires the option to pause and resume lessons later without penalty.

💡 Ideation

"Crazy 8" Brainstorming

Sneha generated 8 rapid ideas to explore:

• Auto-save during lessons

• Prompt to “Save for later” when exiting

• XP widget on home/profile

• Clean confirmation modals

• Resume flow optimization

• Reduce navigation friction

• Minimize accidental restarts

• Simple, motivational visuals

🧪 Prototyping & Testing

🔁 Save Lesson Progress

Before: Users only saw "Quit" or "Continue" → loss of progress
After: Added a "Save for later" option with clear confirmation and a friendly message

📈 Weekly XP Display

Before: Buried in leaderboards
After: Prominently shown on user profile and dashboard for quick motivation check

👀 Usability Testing

• 5 users participated

• 3/5 were unsure if “Start” resumed or restarted a lesson

• 2/5 got confused by too many options during exit
  ✅ Changes made:

• Added “Resume Lesson” instead of generic "Start"

• Simplified buttons

• Clearer copy for save/quit actions

✅ Final Design Snapshots

(Insert visuals here with before/after comparisons or hover states)

• Resume screen with lesson info

• Save confirmation modal

• Profile with visible Weekly XP

• Clean layout with focus on clarity & motivation

🧠 Reflections & Learnings

• Small UX issues can create huge friction in daily use cases.

• Testing with real users exposes misunderstandings we may not anticipate.

• Writing clear, concise UI copy is just as important as visuals.

• Even successful apps need continuous optimization to keep users engaged.

💥 Impact

• More flexible lesson flow

• Motivated users with easier XP tracking

• Reduced frustration → better retention

• Improved overall learning experience

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