Electric Vehicle Charging Station Finder App
A mobile app that simplifies finding charging stations and enhances the overall charging experience.
Date
2023
Role
Solo Product Designer
About The Project
Electric vehicles (EVs) are becoming increasingly popular due to their energy efficiency and environmental friendliness. However, EVs have a shorter range, longer refueling time, and a battery life of 10-20 years which is a major drawback.
To gain a place in the growing market, the company I freelanced for a company that wanted to create a mobile app to helps EV drivers find charging stations.
Problem Definition
Problem Context
EV drivers face unique challenges when it comes to refueling their vehicles compared to Internal Combustion Engine (ICE) vehicles. Like longer refueling times, range anxiety, finding their way through different charging standards, and the difficulty of locating available charging stations.
Problem
“EV drivers encounter difficulties in locating public charging stations that are both accessible and compatible with their specific requirements.”
Research
To gain a comprehensive understanding of the target users and their pain points I have conducted desk research and collaborated with the business analyst to find out business needs and opportunities. While primary research was not feasible due to constraints, I have gained valuable insights regarding electric vehicle users and the industry.
Domain Research
Before diving deep, I wanted to learn some fundamental information about EVs and what sets them apart from ICEs (Internal Combustion Engine, a usual car).
Understanding EV Users
In order to gain a deeper understanding of the experiences and obstacles faced by electric vehicle users, I have gathered information from recent studies.
Competitor Audit
I have tested approximately 25 competing products that are on the market, aiming to pinpoint common pitfalls and identify areas of improvement.
Visually Cluttered Maps
Some competitors have visually cluttered maps, making it difficult to locate charging station pins. While it is a good idea to display various points of interest to help with wayfinding, they should be kept to a minimum to not to overwhelm users.
Use of Bottom Sheets
All the competitors use bottom sheets to display summary information to let the user decide whether they want to invest more attention and see details. While some apps do a good job of providing the necessary information in a tight space, some lack useful information.
Filtering Options
Filters are crucial to users, particularly when they are in close proximity to numerous charging stations and want to avoid wasting time and mental energy checking each individual pin to see if the station fits their needs. Some competitors doesn’t offer enough filtering options.
Reviews
I have also researched competitor reviews on iOS and Android app stores to identify common pain points and opportunities for our app. While many mentioned general functionality issues like app crashes, others specifically mentioned concerns with reservations, payments, lack of information during charging, and app discoverability.
Insights
We’ve uncovered some insights through our research and derived assumptions based on the expertise of the business analyst to make sure everyone is aligned to work from these findings as a common foundation.
EV drivers give importance to environment and cost savings most.
EV drivers have issues with battery range & capacity and availability of public EV charging stations.
EV drivers prefer convenient payment methods like Plug&Charge.
EV drivers complain about non-functional/broken, blocked stations.
EV batteries degrade over time.
Personas
I have developed two proto-personas based on the research and our assumptions about the potential users. By concentration on two user types (experienced and novice EV driver), we aimed to ensure the app addressed both of their challenges and expectations.
Ideation
We have collaborated as a team to find out how we can solve problems we identified, what to prioritize and what are the technical constraints.
How Might We
After identifying key issues, we have formulated a How Might We question to generate ideas for potential solutions.
Feature Prioritization
We brainstormed about potential issues without limitations but we had to consider their feasibility and prioritize potential solutions.
Solutions
Simplifying the Payment Process
While having a Plug&Charge (just plug in the charger and payments are done automatically) like capability was way out of our scope, we wanted to simplify the payment process as much as possible.
Like most of our competitors, we placed a start charging button on our navigation and visually highlighted it. We offered options for QR code scanning, manual code entry, and NFC capability.
Improving the Reliability of Charging Stations
To help with issues like broken or slow chargers, we've added social features such as comments and ratings for users to provide feedback and guide other EV drivers on the quality of stations.
We’ve also included “Report Error” buttons on many pages including the station pages to allow users to inform us of any issues or problems they encounter.
Highlighting Amenities
As refueling an EV can take hours, amenities near charging stations can be a decisive factor for EV drivers when choosing a charging station.
With this in mind, we wanted users to be able to easily view amenities near a charging station right in our app, and even be able to filter charging stations based on amenities nearby.
Highlighting Frequently Visited Stations
While this is mainly an app to find nearby charging stations, it is safe to assume that some users would search for or check the availability of the same stations over and over. To make it easier to find frequently visited and previously searched stations, we introduced the ability to bookmark stations and used empty state of the search screen to highlight last visited stations alongside the last search queries.
Helping Users Prevent Battery Degradation
As EVs have degradable batteries, it is recommended not to charge more than 80% to preserve battery life.
Initially, we considered implementing a feature to automatically stop charging at 80% and prompt the user to continue if desired. However, we realized this could potentially cause more issues. Instead, we opted to send a notification at 80% charge, allowing users to enjoy their time without the stress of constantly monitoring their battery percentage.
Reservations
In order to address the frustration and stress of not finding an available charging spot, we implemented a reservation system.
While reservation functionality is nothing new, it introduced some new challenges for us: What if someone else starts using the charging device minutes before the appointment time?If they use the app to start charging, we can display a warning message. However, the app is not the only way to start charging; it is also common to use RFID cards among other methods.
The interim solution we found was to display a message on the charging device itself as well (if supported). But the question “when should we start warning the users about upcoming reservations” (and the fact that their session will end by that time) requires further research and thinking.
Design
After the ideation phase, I developed flowcharts to visually outline the user's journey and interactions within the app.
I have then proceeded to create a sitemap to showcase the app's basic information architecture.
Wireframes
We continuously refined and perfected the design direction through iterations on the wireframes until we were satisfied with nearly every aspect. We utilized Figma to gather and exchange ideas for discussion.
UI Design
I focused on creating a visually appealing and unique style that sets our app apart from similar products on the market, while maintaining a clean look. Drawing inspiration from the client's logo, I incorporated two vibrant green gradients with a touch of blue as the primary colors for both light and dark modes.
I used a systematic approach by utilizing scalable and reusable Figma components, implemented text and color styles in a token-like manner to improve maintainability and scalability. This approach also greatly reduced the time needed to create both dark and light mode themes (this was before Figma introduced variables).
Usability Testing
Conclusion
Despite the project's demanding deadline, I enjoyed collaborating with the team to develop an app for electric vehicle drivers. However, from a user-centric perspective, I believe the project would have greatly benefited from more extensive user research and user testing.
You can find a version of this app on App Store here.
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