Designing for Decentralization: User Interfaces in the Web3 Design Era

The new era of the internet is upon us. Web3, its new iteration, is meant to be a decentralized, blockchain-powered space built on the ideas of distributed networks, permissionless and trustless processes, and an open ledger.

However, Web3 products’ adoption hinges on how intuitive their design is. That’s why you need to pay extra attention to your user flows and interfaces if you plan to launch a Web3 product.

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4 Web3 Design Trends to Be Aware Of

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Dark Mode

The dark mode seems to be the default choice for Web3 designers. Many products go even further than the dark mode and adopt a whole 80s sci-fi vibe in their style. While this trend is worth keeping in mind, it doesn’t mean you should automatically copy what other products are doing. If you do, how would your product manage to stand out?

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Interactive Visuals

Like the dark mode, interactive visuals are the it of Web 3 design. Those can include animations in the hero section of a website, parallax scrolling, and hover effects, among others. Why are interactive elements so beloved by Web3 products? They allow products to set themselves apart from their corporate counterparts with more serious static designs. This goes straight to the heart of their brand identity.

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Gamification

Creating gamified user flows helps drive engagement and conversion, incentivizes participation, and fosters loyalty. From tokenized rewards to RPG elements, gamification is gaining traction in Web3 beyond blockchain games. Gamification doesn’t have to serve only the engagement goals, however. It can also motivate users to educate themselves on the core Web3 concepts or help you build a community around your business.

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Less Is More

Minimalism isn’t an exclusive among the Web3 design trends: it’s an established best practice in Web2, as well. However, it’s still worth reminding that, while Web3 products have their unique design challenges, they still remain digital products at their base. So, remember that maximizing the UI’s convenience and usability means minimizing the clutter and embracing white space.

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How Fivecube Approaches Web3 Design

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Discovery, Strategy & Planning

Before our Web3 designer team can get to crafting user personas and user flows, we at Fivecube need to get a full grasp of your business, product, brand identity, and users. Once we understand your needs and objectives perfectly, we set out to outline the strategy and map out the project’s timeline. Heavily investing time and resources into this stage allows us to deliver designs that are aligned with every client’s unique needs and offer tangible value.

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Ideation & Visualization

Armed with the full grasp of your product, brand, and users, we let the creative juices flow. Our brainstorming is then followed by selecting the most viable Web 3 design ideas and turning them into wireframes. With your green light, we transform the wireframes into high-fidelity prototypes to bring the product’s vision to life. We collaborate closely with your team to ensure the resulting design meets your expectations – and exceeds them.

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Refinement & Support

We adhere to the iterative approach to design. So, we don’t expect to hit the mark impeccably on the first try by simply following Web3 design trends. Instead, we take our first design, test it thoroughly, and improve it based on real-life users’ feedback. This is how we zero in on the ideal user flows and visuals every time. With the design finalized, we remain by your side to make sure your product remains on top.

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Web3 Design: Fivecube’s Experience

Web3 design finds its application across a variety of blockchain-powered products, from cryptocurrency exchanges and NFT marketplaces to video games. However, decentralized finance (DeFi) remains the leading use case for Web3.

Just take one of our clients, a France-based company behind Lyber. This client turned to Fivecube with an idea for a new product that would facilitate managing multiple cryptocurrency trading accounts. We helped the client set it up for success with an intuitive, easy-to-use interface for its powerful tools. If you’d like to learn more about our experience in designing products that make the complex simple, check out our works.

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5 Web3 Design Best Practices to Guide You

Designing a Web3 product comes with its own set of challenges, such as:

• Lack of profound user research. Web3 users tend to value their privacy. That’s why understanding their preferences and behavior requires a longer and more thorough user research phase.
• Proliferation of scams and bad press. From Sam Bankman-Fried’s trial to Bitconnect’s implosion, Web3 products can’t boast great coverage in the media. That’s why you need to work extra hard to foster trust among the user base.
• A (somewhat) high barrier to entry for new users. First-time Web3 product users may struggle with understanding the jargon and transactions’ implications. So, Web3 products have to add an educative component to the interface.

Here are the five best practices every Web3 designer should follow to counter these and other challenges.

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Be Clear at Every Point

When in doubt, assume your users don’t have prior experience with any Web3 products similar to yours. Once you do, you’ll easily identify the key points where you have to communicate the implications of certain actions. Besides having warnings about potential financial losses pop up, you need to ensure your copy is jargon-free whenever possible. It’s also a good idea to add learning materials for those who want to learn more.

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Leverage the Familiar

Users that are new to Web3 need a point of reference to quickly wrap their head around, for example, exchange rates. As they fluctuate, it may prove difficult to understand how drastic the change was. This is where thoughtful Web 3 design can save the day, too. You can provide a point of reference for your users by comparing the cryptocurrency value to the user’s native currency.

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Make Hashes Less Overwhelming

Crypto wallet hashes can be up to 42 characters long. One typo in the hash can lead to the user mistakenly sending the money to the wrong recipient. And since the blockchain ledger is immutable, neither the company nor the user can reverse the transaction. To avoid such a scenario, require users to double-check hashes before confirming the transaction. You can also enable users to create a list of beneficiaries and display the nicknames of each.

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Communicate the Transaction Status

While real-time payments aren’t a reality everywhere in the traditional banking system, users are getting more and more used to transactions being carried out instantaneously. However, on blockchain, transactions can take minutes or hours to be completed. That can be a nerve-racking experience. To avoid stressing out your users, display an estimated waiting time for the transaction before they confirm it. You can also allow them to track its status.

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Ensure Users Understand Gas Fees

Gas fees can be an unpleasant surprise for users new to the concept of gas in general. So, make sure you communicate what gas is and why they have to pay this fee. It’s also a good idea to add the gas fee to the overall transaction amount on a separate line before asking the user to confirm it.

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Final Thoughts

While Web 3 design shares some best practices with any other product design, it also requires extra attention to detail. You need to ensure it clearly communicates gas fees and provides a point of reference for exchange rates. You also need to design user flows in a way that closely guides new users and breaks down complex concepts in easy-to-grasp cues and copy.

Want to learn more about design best practices? Make sure to check out Fivecube's blog for more insights on MVP, SaaS, and product design.