Five taps a day.
The rest is on Fika.
Fika is an iOS app for remote workers. You start the day with a tap, declare how you're feeling, and the system reminds you of breaks, focus modes, and shutdown — so you don't have to think about it between taps.
The problem and the answer,
on one screen.
Working from home erases the natural limits of the day. Fika replaces those signals without asking you to be disciplined.
Home office
erased the day's signals.
No coffee with coworkers, no meeting that marks the end, no commute that closes the day — remote workers accumulate fatigue without noticing and never really disconnect.
- Same physical space · the schedule dissolves
- Office's natural breaks disappear
- Digital presenteeism replaces physical presenteeism
It doesn't add more work.
It takes the pressure off
organizing alone.
Fika runs quietly through the day with passive signals — timely breaks, intentional focus, clear shutdown. The user declares how they start, the system holds the rhythm.
- One tap starts the day · one ends it
- Suggested breaks every 90 min · no user action
- No-judgment summary · neutral data, not a ranking
It wasn't lack of discipline.
It was lack of signals.
46 survey responses + 6 interviews with remote workers. The strongest finding was a phrase different profiles repeated almost word for word.
Can't separate work from personal life. The office gave external boundaries that no longer exist.
"I finish the day without really knowing if I worked a lot or a little. I just know I'm tired."
Doubts whether their company trusts their performance. That anxiety drives digital presenteeism — working more to compensate for lost visibility.
Feel real isolation. The informal office breaks used to regulate the rhythm of the day — they're gone now.
Don't take formal breaks even though they know they'd help. Knowing isn't enough — they need something to remind them.
The problem wasn't lack of discipline.
It was lack of signals.
I designed for Marco.
The company benefits later.
A single primary persona — composite of the 6 interviews — to keep focus on the user, not the buyer.
Context
- Works from home 4 days a week
- Jumps from one meeting to the next with no transition
- Lives and works in the same physical space
- iPhone + MacBook · Apple ecosystem
Needs
- Structure without feeling controlled
- Breaks that don't depend on remembering to take them
- To end the day with a real sense of closure
- Data without judgment · just information
Frustrates him
- Productivity apps that demand setup before anything
- Gamification that rewards working more
- Notifications at the worst possible moment
- Apps that pretend to know things they can't
Triggers decision
- D1 · Declarative energy with manual correction
- D2 · Breaks by timer, not by detection
- D3 · Intentional friction instead of blocking
- D4 · Company only sees aggregate data
A typical Tuesday for Marco
How Marco's energy shifts through the day — and where Fika steps in without asking. The bar shows perceived energy, reconstructed from interviews.
Four decisions,
four real trade-offs.
Each decision resolves a tension between what Marco needs, what the platform allows, and what the research validated. Each one has a declared cost.
Declarative, correctable energy — not inferred from sensors
Marco declares his energy at start (High / Medium / Low). The system just keeps it visible and lets him correct it anytime. No sensors, no AI, no biometrics.
Breaks by simple timer — not by inactivity detection
After 90 min of active day (timer from "start the day"), Fika suggests a break. It doesn't detect if Marco stood up, went to the bathroom, or scrolled Twitter — it just knows 90 min passed on the clock.
Intentional friction, not app blocking
Focus mode activates Apple Focus + silences notifications, but does NOT block apps. If Marco wants out, he sees a modal with the time remaining in the block to decide consciously. The intention is to interrupt autopilot, not to take away control.
Company sees aggregated data, never individual
If the company sees individual data (breaks, energy, hours), the wellness app becomes a control tool. The company only sees aggregate metrics with at least 5 users — no names, no individual profiles.
Four mechanisms.
One single idea: minimal friction.
Energy Ring, breaks, intentional focus, and daily summary. Each one answers a pain point from the research and declares its own technical limit.
Your energy,
declared and editable.
Marco declares how he starts the day — High, Medium, or Low. The system reflects it all day and lets him correct anytime. No sensors, no biometrics.
Breaks come
to you.
Every 90 minutes of active day, Fika suggests a break on the Lock Screen. The notification is actionable: "Done, I paused" or "Later". No opening the app, no extra tap.
Focus that doesn't
lock you in.
Focus mode activates Apple Focus + silences notifs for 25 min. Does NOT block apps. If Marco tries to leave, he sees a modal with time remaining to decide consciously — it interrupts autopilot without removing control.
Data without ranking,
without gamification.
When the day closes, Fika shows active hours, breaks, average energy. No streaks, no "good vs bad days", no notifs saying "your performance is dropping". One actionable recommendation based on simple patterns.
What happens when
something falls outside the ideal flow.
Empty state as motivation, dark mode following the system, edge cases with predictable responses. The "weird" states are where a product stops inspiring trust if they aren't designed.
The full day, interactive.
Start it, live it, end it.
Declare your energy, watch the break countdown, enter focus mode, and see your daily summary with real session data. Every decision from the case study is demonstrable here.
From interview to pixel.
Four stages, one decision per stage.
I didn't jump from research to the pretty screen. Every stage produced decisions that survived to the final version.
Project log
Design system + accessibility,
together.
Tokens, scale, components, and A11y as one piece. The system isn't decoration — it's what keeps screens looking like each other six months from now.
Semantic palette · blue + states
Brand blue as the through-line. Green / orange / red only when they mean something (High / Medium / Low, or product states).
Manrope · one family used well
A single typeface with 5 weights, modular 1.2 scale. Manrope reads well at small sizes and feels friendly without being childish.
4px base · seven steps
Multiples of 4. Each step has a purpose: inline gap, card padding, block separation.
Applied core
What I actually used in the mockups, not a wishlist:
Verified minimums
What was actually checked in the case. What's missing is declared, not hidden.
Uncovered space.
Model that separates roles.
Competitive analysis of 5 comparable apps — only apps that really compete on the same problem. The B2B2C model separates who pays from who uses.
Structure + energy · nobody combines them
| App | Structure | Energy | Auto breaks | Focus | B2B2C |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fika | ● | ● | ◐ | ● | ● |
| Structured | ● | ○ | ○ | ○ | ○ |
| Tiimo | ● | ◐ | ◐ | ○ | ○ |
| RescueTime | ◐ | ○ | ◐ | ○ | ● |
| Reclaim.ai | ◐ | ○ | ○ | ◐ | ● |
| One Sec | ○ | ○ | ○ | ● | ○ |
Structured and Tiimo give structure but ignore energy. RescueTime measures time but doesn't structure the day. One Sec interrupts distractions but doesn't organize anything. Fika combines structure + energy + focus + B2B2C — its breaks have the real limit of depending on a manual day start (◐), a deliberate decision that prioritizes user control over invisible detection.
The company buys,
Marco uses.
The company never sees individual data. Minimum 5 users to activate the aggregate view — protects Marco and sustains trust.
How we'll know
Fika is working.
North star + leading metrics that predict it + lagging metrics that sustain it. Targets are aspirational — they get tuned with real data from the first month.
A behavior funnel.
Each drop-off is a hypothesis.
Instead of a flat KPI list, I view the user journey as a funnel — each step depends on the previous one. If end-of-day shutdown drops, it isn't because "Marco doesn't want to close"; it's because one of the earlier steps broke.
Who designed Fika,
and what I'm looking for now.
Fika was my final project for the UX/UI bootcamp at Nuclio Barcelona. I refined it later so I could defend it in interviews. If it caught your eye, let's talk.
Tools and practices
Research & strategy
Product
Design
Languages
What I'm looking for
D4 · Aggregate data only, never individual
The B2B2C model had an obvious tension: the company pays, the company wants data. But if Fika exposes individual breaks or energy, it stops being wellness and becomes surveillance. I decided the company only sees aggregated metrics, minimum 5 users. That makes upsell harder but protects Marco's trust — without it, the product doesn't work. If we talk, this is the call I'll defend hardest.
Working well
starts with ending well.
If you'd like to see the Figma file, dig into the research, or discuss any decision in the case — write me. The best part of a case is a real conversation about it.