THE PROBLEM

Planning group trips is often a frustrating and time-consuming experience.

Coordinating preferences, aligning schedules, deciding on destinations, and managing logistics like accommodations or shared expenses can quickly become overwhelming, especially when done across multiple messaging platforms and booking sites. Groups often struggle to reach consensus, leading to indecision, missed opportunities, or plans that don’t satisfy everyone.

A platform that streamlines the group travel planning process by utilizing decision-making tools (voting, polling, and scheduling), offering shared itineraries, and facilitating collaborative trip organization in one place. The goal is to make group trip planning more inclusive, efficient, and enjoyable for everyone involved.

What gaps or opportunities exist in current travel planning tools?

To better understand the landscape of group travel planning tools, I analyzed three key competitors and evaluated their strengths and limitations. This helped me identify common pain points across platforms and find opportunities for TripSync to deliver a more cohesive experience.

Where does communication or coordination most often break down during trip planning?

Through user interviews and surveys, I aimed to uncover the specific moments where planning breaks down, whether it’s agreeing on dates, tracking expenses, or simply keeping everyone on the same page.

Before conducting interviews and surveys, I identified key target audiences to ensure that my research would address the needs, behaviors, and frustrations of the most relevant traveler types for TripSync.

To synthesize my findings from user interviews, I created an affinity diagram in Miro and grouped related observations into categories based on common themes.

This helped me identify core pain points and opportunities that would guide TripSync’s design direction. From this process, I uncovered four key insights that reflect the most important needs and behaviors of group travelers.

Exploring key features that solve disorganized planning, unclear communication, and group coordination.

Noting key pain points, I created task flows for both the onboarding process and key in-app actions to visualize how users would navigate the app and interact with core features.

I then created low fidelity sketches to explore layout ideas and visualize how key features could come together. This step helped translate user needs into tangible interface concepts before moving into higher-fidelity design.

Building on the sketches, I developed mid-fidelity wireframes in Figma to establish structure, layout, and functionality. These wireframes served as the first detailed version of the interface prior to gathering user and peer feedback.

Evaluating usability and gathering feedback to inform design improvements.

Initial user testing and peer feedback provided valuable insights into areas of confusion and opportunities for improvement. Based on this input, iterations were made to several mid-fidelity designs to enhance clarity and usability. Here are some of the pages I iterated on.

Start a New Trip - Destinations

When setting up a trip, users have the option to generate destination recommendations based on preferences they select using tags. The initial wireframe lacked functionality due to the size and horizontal scroll of the tags, which limited the visibility of tag options and made it hard for users to see what they’ve already selected. The page was iterated on to maximize visibility of the tags, and I designed a second page for users to view their selection and recommendations.

After multiple rounds of wire framing, feedback, and refinement, I present the final design of TripSync, a solution for collaborative group travel planning.

Follow Onboarding Steps to Start a Trip

Whether you’re planning a new trip from scratch, adding existing trip plans, or joining someone's trip, TripSync’s onboarding flow makes it easy to set key details like dates, destination, budget, and group members, so everyone starts on the same page.

View the Figma file with all the wireframes and the full prototype of TripSync.

Designing TripSync from the ground up was a rewarding challenge that pushed me to think holistically about both functionality and user experience. Each iteration deepened my understanding of how thoughtful design can simplify and enhance group travel. Additionally, this project reaffirmed the importance of staying grounded in user feedback. From the way people wanted to vote on trip decisions to how they preferred to communicate with friends, every design decision was shaped by real needs.

Moving forward…

If time permits, I would love to further my user research and expand beyond college-aged students for feedback on TripSync. I would like to focus on a larger range of adults, as there may be features that TripSync could benefit from to appeal to more types of travelers. Some of the features I currently have in mind include

Calendar Integration

Syncing with Google Calendar or Apple Calendar to automatically add already planned events, reservations, flights, and bookings will make the itinerary less of a hassle to set up.

Local Discovery

Upgrade the Discover feature by including "Trending Now" or “Locals Love” sections and tags to surface popular or hidden gem spots.

AI-Powered Suggestions

Use AI to suggest itineraries, polls, or saved spots based on group preferences or past trips, as well as generate daily schedules based on distance, hours of operation, and weather.