Geography
India
Domain
Banking
Platform
Mobile App
Services
Research, Strategy, Design
An intuitive, accessible & future-ready redesign.
Despite its legacy & massive user base, HDFC Bank’s mobile app struggled to match the simplicity & intuitiveness of modern digital experiences. Traditional banking workflows felt tedious & impersonal, deterring younger users while overwhelming existing ones. The interface lacked the warmth, accessibility & speed users had come to expect from new-age neobanks.
This led to fragmented journeys, low engagement & declining user trust. The redesign set out to change that — by making banking feel effortless, inclusive & emotionally resonant across generations.
Challenge
With over 60 million users relying on its mobile banking app, HDFC Bank faced mounting usability challenges — from a cluttered interface & disjointed navigation to inconsistent payment experiences. Basic financial transactions felt cumbersome & users often turned to third-party apps to perform everyday tasks.
The goal was clear: simplify complexity, unify experiences & make traditional banking feel effortless for every demographic — from Gen Z to senior citizens.
Solution
NetBramha partnered with HDFC Bank to completely reimagine their native apps — creating a modern, inclusive & intuitive interface that bridges the gap between user expectations & actual experience. By aligning stakeholder expectations, streamlining information architecture & integrating accessibility-first design, the redesigned experience delivered emotional resonance & functional clarity.
Research
A multi-layered research process combined stakeholder workshops, competitor benchmarking & proxy user interviews to map out the complete user ecosystem. Since direct user access wasn’t feasible, the team collaborated with customer support teams & product heads to surface recurring user frustrations & unmet expectations.
By benchmarking against leading neobanks & fintech disruptors, the team identified key UX gaps & strategic opportunities to enhance trust, speed & discoverability — while maintaining HDFC’s legacy of reliability.
Pain points discovered
Complex
Navigation
Users struggled to find & complete essential transactions quickly
Fragmented
Payment Journeys
Multiple methods (UPI, transfer, self-transfer) created redundant user paths
Visual
Inconsistency
Legacy UI patterns made the app feel outdated & difficult to trust
Lack of
Feedback
Absence of micro-interactions led to uncertainty during transactions
Strategy
Rooted in research insights, our UX strategy prioritized accessibility, personalization & performance. We mapped complete user flows for all major banking tasks, ensuring that both first-time & power users could navigate intuitively.
The information architecture was restructured to reduce cognitive load – grouping related financial actions under simple, meaningful categories.
To humanize the experience, we built personas representing India’s multigenerational banking audience, from digitally native users to those transitioning from offline banking.
A new design system was established to ensure scalability – enabling HDFC’s in-house team to roll out new features consistently & rapidly.
Simplified User Journeys
Streamlined key flows like payments & transfers, reducing drop-offs & confusion
Enhanced Accessibility
Improved visual hierarchy & interaction cues, ensuring inclusivity across user groups
Boosted Engagement
Improved overall app satisfaction & repeat usage through intuitive, personalized design
Design
We crafted a cohesive design language centered on clarity & confidence. The new bottom navigation bar improved discoverability, while smart shortcuts gave users one-tap access to frequent actions like payments & bills.
Micro-interactions & subtle animations made feedback instantaneous, reducing anxiety during high-stakes actions like money transfers.
The exhaustive Design System — built on atomic principles — standardized every element, from typography to interactive states, enabling a future-proof, unified design rollout.
Information Architecture
The Information Architecture for HDFC was built by combining user insights, stakeholder needs & competitor benchmarks to create a structure that’s intuitive, scalable & user-centric.
Rooted in key user behaviours & pain points, the IA organizes core banking tasks into a clear, low-friction hierarchy that reduces cognitive load. It defines a content strategy for each page, ensuring essential actions like transfers, payments & account management are always easy to find.
This foundation supports smoother user flows today while enabling the app to scale consistently across both NetBanking & Mobile Banking.
Wireframes
To translate insights into structure, we created detailed wireframes that formed the foundation of HDFC Bank’s new mobile experience. Every key user journey — from registration and login to the dashboard and money transfers — was mapped for clarity, efficiency, and accessibility. These low-fidelity prototypes helped us test and refine task flows early, reducing complexity and ensuring intuitive navigation across devices. By visualizing interactions, we aligned stakeholders on layout logic, information hierarchy, and functional priorities. The wireframes became the blueprint for a banking app that feels faster, lighter, and smarter — shaping a design system rooted in usability and trust.
Visual design
Building on the validated wireframes, our visual design phase brought HDFC Bank’s new digital identity to life – one that feels “modern, trustworthy & human”. We crafted a cohesive design language rooted in clarity & accessibility, balancing the bank’s legacy of reliability with the freshness of a neobank aesthetic.
Each screen, from registration & login to the dashboard & payment flows – was designed to reduce cognitive load & build user confidence through clean layouts, intuitive hierarchy & meaningful use of color. Micro-interactions & motion were thoughtfully integrated to provide feedback, guide focus & enhance engagement.
The result was a visually unified experience that made everyday banking not only functional but delightful, ensuring consistency & scalability across Android & iOS platforms.
Design system
A comprehensive Design System, built on the atomic design model of Atoms, Molecules, and Organisms, was created to serve as HDFC’s single source of truth for all future design needs. This system standardizes visual and functional elements, ensuring consistency across the mobile app while empowering in-house teams to scale rapidly and maintain quality. With components like tabs, date pickers, calendars, cards, and alert patterns, the system acts as a long-term framework that keeps the experience cohesive, accessible, and easy to build upon as new features and flows are added.
Outcome
Simplified Transactions: Drastically reduced steps for key financial actions
Improved retention: A more engaging, reliable experience for all user segments
Empowered teams: Scalable design system for faster internal rollouts
Reduced Support Queries: Clearer user journeys & self-resolving UX flows
The redesigned HDFC Mobile Banking app now impacts over 6 crore Indian users, setting a new benchmark for fintech UX in India – merging trust, technology & human empathy into a single seamless experience.
