UX/UI Project
Project Type
Student Project for UX Academy - Designlab
Role
Solo UX/UI Designer
Tools
Figma, Typeform, Google Meet, Notion
Timeline
4 weeks
Overview
WhatsApp connects billions of people all over the world - but it completely overlooks something so basic about global communication: time.
Let's start with the simple thought that inspired the whole project.
WhatsApp connects billions of people all over the world - but it completely overlooks something so basic about global communication: time.
When we message someone abroad, we’re usually just guessing if they’re awake, at work, or asleep and we usually end up doing mental math or switching to world clock apps just to avoid disturbing someone at the wrong hour.
For my Designlab Capstone, I set out to solve this by introducing time-zone awareness directly into WhatsApp - in a way that feels natural and seamlessly integrates with the app's existing design language.
The problem
People who frequently communicate across time zones often lack clear awareness of their contacts’ local time. This leads to mis-timed messages or calls, creating confusion, frustration, and unnecessary disruptions in both personal and professional interactions.
The solution
Two seamlessly integrated features that bring time-zone awareness to WhatsApp, making global communication more thoughtful and effortless.
Research
Grounding the Concept in Research and Market Insights
To really understand the challenge, I started with the empathize phase - doing research and talking to people about their real experiences communicating across time zones. This helped me see their main frustrations, habits, and needs before defining the problem.
Secondary Research Insights
There’s a clear opportunity for WhatsApp to improve the experience by introducing time-zone awareness features.
WhatsApp has 3+ billion users worldwide.
Over 300 million people live abroad and rely on WhatsApp to stay connected.
Users often feel frustrated by mistimed messages or the need to use external tools to manage time differences.
Many users coordinate work, family, and friendships across time zones.
Competitive Landscape
No major personal messaging app shows a contact’s local time directly in chat.
Consumer Apps
iMessage, Telegram, Viber
Don't address this need at all. No major personal messaging app shows a contact's local time directly in chat.
Work Apps
Slack & Teams
Account for cross-time-zone messaging in work settings with time-zone scheduling and local time in profiles.
The opportunity
→ No major personal messaging app shows a contact’s local time directly in chat. This gap positions WhatsApp to become the first truly time-aware messaging platform.
User interviews and survey
Listening to Real Experiences Across Time Zones
User Interviews
Qualitative Research
7 participants
Typform Survey
Quantitative Research
24 responses
Key insight
I validated a clear user need for awareness and considerate timing tools that help people stay connected without causing disruption. Together, the interviews and survey data proved that users want simple ways to be more mindful of others' schedules.
Define
Identifying core problems and opportunities
After collecting all this data, I moved into the define phase to organize and analyze what I found.This step helped me spot common patterns in people’s experiences and understand the main problems I needed to solve before moving into ideas and solutions.
Affinity Mapping - From Research to Core Themes
Time-zone friction is universal - users already find workarounds, but none feel seamless inside WhatsApp.
Persona
Sophia, the Global Connector, a 28-year-old flight attendant who constantly shifts between time zones
To keep the findings human and relatable, I brought the research to life through Sophia who represented users trying to maintain close relationships while juggling unpredictable schedules across timezones.
Goals
Shaping the Design Direction from User Insights
Shared Goal
Make global communication effortless, respectful, and intuitive.
Design Considerations
Detect time zones automatically with manual override.
Respect privacy and make local-time visibility opt-in.
Keep the feature lightweight and fully integrated with WhatsApp’s current experience.
Problems & HMW
Turning broad pain points into design opportunities
To guide ideation, I framed the challenge through actionable POV and HMW statements, turning broad pain points into design opportunities. These statements helped narrow focus toward awareness, clarity, and respect in global communication—principles that shaped the features I chose to prioritize.
Ideate
Exploring Solutions - From ideas to structure
I started brainstorming ideas to make cross–time-zone communication easier and more considerate.
This phase was mainly about exploring possibilities, generating concepts, and starting to shape how the solution could take form within WhatsApp’s experience.
Feature Roadmap - Prioritizing for Impact
Local time Display & Message Scheduling
Local Time Display
P1 - Must Have
Shows a contact’s current local time directly in the chat.
Message Scheduling
P1 - Must Have
Lets users compose a message now and schedule it to send automatically at a later time.
Silent / Do-Not-Disturb Send
P2 - Nice to Have
Allows users to send a message silently so the recipient won’t be notified immediately.
Silence Hours
P3 - Can come later
Lets users set specific quiet hours inside WhatsApp when notifications are muted.
User Flows
Mapping intuitive user flows for discovery, activation, and interaction
To visualize these concepts, I mapped intuitive user flows for discovery, activation, and interaction, ensuring the experience would feel natural within WhatsApp’s familiar structure. Mapping early also clarified where each feature would live in the interface and how users would encounter it during everyday use.
Low fidelity
Exploring multiple placement and interaction patterns
At the low-fidelity stage, I explored multiple placement and interaction patterns for the Local Time and Message Scheduling features, grounding each concept in a close analysis of WhatsApp’s existing UI behaviors. I studied how the app currently introduces new features, surfaces secondary actions, and balances discoverability with minimalism, then tested variations that aligned with those patterns.
This exploration allowed me to compare alternatives side by side and identify the most promising directions to bring into mid-fidelity testing.
Mid-fidelity
Validating and Refining Through Early Testing
After defining the features and flows, I moved into the prototype and test phase — turning ideas into interactive designs, testing them with users, and refining the experience through iteration.
I built interactive mid-fidelity prototypes in Figma and recruited 4 global WhatsApp users (ages 24-30) for 15-minute usability sessions. Rather than asking for preferences, I designed task-based scenarios to observe actual behavior and uncover friction points before investing in high-fidelity design.
Flow 1: Local Time Discovery & Settings
This prototype focused exclusively on the local time feature. Users encountered the alternating header label (contact name ⇄ "Local time: 9:00 AM") in an open chat, with a bottom sheet education flow explaining the feature on first use. The settings flow was placed under Settings → Privacy, using WhatsApp's standard audience controls (Everyone, My Contacts, My Contacts Except..., Only Share With..., Nobody) to manage time-sharing visibility.
Flow 2: Long-Press Send + Notification Icon List View
This prototype tested the hold-to-send entry point for message scheduling—users long-pressed the Send button to reveal an action sheet with "Send Now / Send Later." After scheduling via the dual-time picker bottom sheet, scheduled messages appeared in a dedicated "Scheduled" section accessed via a notification icon near the typing bar (next to stickers). This kept the chat timeline clean while centralizing scheduled message management.
Flow 3: + Menu Send Later + Inline Message Bubble
This prototype tested the "+" attachment menu entry point, where "Send Later" appeared alongside other optional actions like polls and location. After scheduling through the same dual-time picker, a lightweight inline message bubbleappeared in the chat timeline ("Scheduled for tomorrow 9:00 AM"), directly integrated into the conversation flow. Users could tap or long-press the bubble to edit, reschedule, send now, or delete.
High fidelity
Bringing the Concept to Life Through High-Fidelity Prototyping
After completing mid-fidelity usability testing, I moved into high-fidelity with a clear understanding of what was working, what needed refinement, and which flows were strong enough to carry forward.
I refined the UI —updating copy, layout, and component behavior so the experience felt native and believable. The goal was to remove abstraction and ensure that the next round of usability testing reflected how these features would function in a real product environment.
In this phase, I also explored how these features would behave in group chats. During mid-fidelity testing, it became clear that group conversations introduce additional timing and coordination considerations, making them an important scenario to address in the final prototype.
Testing & Iterations
High-Fidelity Usability Testing
To validate the refined design, I conducted usability testing on the high-fidelity prototype to assess clarity, confidence, and real-world readiness of the finalized flows.
Iterations
Final Outcome
Seamless cross-time-zone comunication
I delivered a refined, high-fidelity solution that makes cross-time-zone messaging feel seamless. Through local time awareness and flexible scheduling, this project transforms “Is it too late to text?” into confident, respectful connection.
Testing early and often made a huge difference. Small moments of confusion kept showing up, and fixing them one by one is what ultimately made the experience feel simple and trustworthy.
Designing inside an established product like WhatsApp pushed me to be more thoughtful. I couldn’t rely on new UI patterns, so I had to solve problems through placement, hierarchy, and language.
I saw firsthand how powerful microcopy can be. A few well-placed words clarified complex logic and helped users feel confident instead of second-guessing themselves.
Most importantly, this project helped me connect research insights to real product behavior — turning abstract findings into concrete, usable design decisions.