Volta
A seamless end-to-end experience for an EV charging network across 8 cities.
Mobility · Experience Design · 2023
Volta is an EV charging network operating across 8 cities. When they approached me, they had excellent hardware and a terrible app — a product that made a smooth, inevitable future feel clunky and provisional. The goal: redesign the end-to-end charging experience, from finding a charger to leaving one.
The challenge
EV charging has a unique anxiety signature: range anxiety. Users approaching a charger are already stressed — they have been watching their battery percentage for the last hour. The app they land in needs to immediately communicate competence and calm. The previous app did neither.
The approach
We identified three critical moments in the charging journey: finding a charger, initiating a session, and ending one. Each had its own failure modes and anxiety patterns. We designed around those moments, not around feature lists or app sections.
Journey mapping
Shadowed 24 EV drivers over four weeks. Documented every friction point, every moment of confusion, every workaround they had developed to cope with the existing product.
Calm design principles
Developed a set of design principles specifically for high-anxiety contexts: lead with status, reduce choices at decision points, and never make users do math.
Maps and real-time data
Rebuilt the map interface entirely, with live charger status, queue length estimates, and routing that accounts for charge level and time pressure.
Simplified session flow
Reduced the steps to start charging from 7 to 2. Eliminated all account-related friction at the point of charging. Made payment invisible.
App Store rating moved from 2.9 to 4.6 within 90 days of launch. Support tickets relating to 'how do I start charging' dropped 58%. More importantly, the language users used to describe the product changed — from 'frustrating' to 'just works'.
