Redesigning MyFitnessPal Mobile App
Redesign concept for a health and fitness tracking application focused on streamlining navigation, minimizing interface clutter, and incorporating personalized features to better meet user demands and enhance market competitiveness.
Summary
Mobile App Redesign
Sole User Experience Designer
About the Product
Project
My Role
Year
Phase 1: Research
Business Goals
MyFitnessPal’s core mission is to empower people to make healthy choices by providing:
Community Support – A positive environment where users can connect and motivate each other.
Data-driven Approach – Accurate nutritional information for informed decision-making.
Personalization – Customized experiences based on individual goals.
Accessibility & Inclusivity – Tools that serve diverse users and fitness levels, with features like screen readers and high-contrast UI.
User Interviews & Surveys
Participants: 3 current MyFitnessPal users (varying demographics and fitness levels).
Insights: Logging a single meal feels too long; users crave deeper nutrient breakdowns and recipe suggestions tailored to dietary goals.
Competitive Analysis
Benchmark Apps: Cronometer, Lose It!, Fitbit, Noom.
Focus Areas: Onboarding, logging experience, social features, personalization.
Key Finding: Clear visual hierarchies and contextual guidance (e.g., “Learn More” prompts) make competing apps feel more intuitive.
Usability Testing (Heuristic Evaluation)
Logging Flow: Requires many taps; food database can be slow or inaccurate.
Navigation: Secondary features (Recipes, Insights, Community) are hard to locate.
Visual Hierarchy: Text-heavy layout lacking progressive disclosure.
Keeping these things in mind, I came up with the following goals:
MyFitnessPal (MFP) is a popular health and fitness tracking application that helps users log their food intake, track physical activity, and manage their overall wellness goals. Despite its popularity, many users find certain aspects of its interface confusing, its workflows cumbersome, and certain features underutilized or difficult to discover.
This case study outlines a complete redesign of MyFitnessPal’s core functionalities—food logging, nutrition insights, exercise tracking, and community features—to empower users with a seamless, engaging, and health-oriented experience.
I took on the end-to-end redesign of MyFitnessPal, which involved user research, competitive analysis, defining user journey, adding new features, creating wireframes and final UI, developing a prototype, and iterating the design based on usability test results.
Mission
My Role
Results
A successful UX Design is where both the business and users goals are met.
Before diving into the core problem statement, it is critical to clarify the business objectives and understand user expectations to ensure the redesign benefits both the company and its user base.
User Needs
Simple & Quick Meal Tracking – Users want a frictionless way to log meals, with reliable nutrition data and minimal manual entry.
Clear Progress Insights – Easy-to-digest charts and feedback linking daily habits to goals.
Seamless Integrations – Smooth syncing with wearables and health apps for a holistic view.
Personalization & Motivation – Tailored experiences for different fitness levels and dietary needs.
Accessibility & Inclusivity – Support for varying degrees of tech-savviness and assistive tools.
With these objectives defined, the groundwork is set for the redesign. Next step: start concept ideation and design!
Key Challenges
What needs are not being met?
Despite offering valuable services, over time, MyFitnessPal has introduced new features without fully reevaluating its overall user experience. As a result, users often describe the interface as cluttered and unintuitive, making meal logging more time-consuming than necessary. Key concerns include:
Overwhelming Interface – Cluttered screens, particularly Home and Diary.
Inefficient Food Logging – Too many steps, slow or inaccurate search results.
Weak Visual Hierarchy – Important features buried under less relevant information.
Complex Navigation – Difficult to switch smoothly between logging, exercise tracking, and insights.
Inconsistent Design – Jarring mix of buttons, color schemes, and layouts.
Limited Personalization – Generic recommendations that don’t align well with individual goals.
Research Methods & Findings
Setting New Goals
Improve Usability & Navigation
Simplify meal logging and reorganize core screens for intuitive browsing.Enhance Personalization
Provide tailored workouts, meal ideas, and insights based on user data.Elevate Engagement
Incorporate community elements smoothly to keep users motivated and connected.Drive Retention
Encourage habit-building with simplified daily tasks and clear progress tracking.
2024
Onboarding: Reduced steps and added skip options led to a 25% decrease in drop-off.
Meal Logging: Users appreciated the consolidated search/barcode field, cutting down logging time by ~30%.
Progress Tracking: Users wanted more personalized tips; we added microcopy beneath charts to provide actionable insights.
decrease in drop-off
less logging time
25%
30%
Added
microcopy beneath charts
User Personas
Phase 2: Synthesizing Insights
This will be achieved through these 3 goals: (These are the use cases that we are going to design for)
Help students find and engage tribes that align with their interests
Encourage interdisciplinary exposure by featuring tribes in the periphery of the student's interests
Develop leadership skills by creating a campaign model where students are able to recruit and advocate for their own tribes.
User Journey Mapping
Phase 3: Design
Information Architecture (IA) Overhaul
Ideation: Sketches & Wireframes
After completing the research phase, the features, actions, and the content required were readily apparent. I decided to make some quick sketches and map out the user flow.
Sketching is a great way to iterate quickly and generate ideas while synthesizing the insights from the research.
Prototyping
Ideation: Final Wireframe
After completing a couple of paper iterations I had the general user flow mapped out. It is time to transition to the digital world where I could further iterate in Sketch.