Overview

Sabi is a cross-platform mobile app designed to help Nigerian professionals understand their spending across multiple bank accounts.

This project explores a gap in the Nigerian fintech ecosystem: while users can access their financial data, they lack the tools to interpret it meaningfully.

I designed the product end-to-end, focusing on how financial information can be presented in a way that is clear, non-judgmental, and actionable.

Role: Product Designer (solo)
Scope: UX, UI, Product Thinking, Design System
Platform: iOS (primary), Android (secondary)

Problem

There is a recurring pattern among Nigerian professionals:

They earn consistently, yet struggle to explain where their money goes.

Most banking apps provide:

• Transaction logs

• Debit alerts

• Basic account balances

But they fail to provide:

• Context

• Patterns

• Insight

Users are left to manually piece together their financial behavior across multiple apps.

Through early conversations, one pattern became clear:

Users are not irresponsible with money. They are operating without visibility.

This distinction reframed the problem entirely.

Opportunity

The Nigerian fintech space has strong players in:

• Payments (Moniepoint, Flutterwave)

• Savings and investments (PiggyVest, Cowrywise)

However, there is no dominant product focused on:

Helping users understand their spending behavior

This presents an opportunity to build a product that sits between banking and financial planning—a clarity layer.

Research

I conducted qualitative interviews with Nigerian professionals aged 24–33, earning between ₦250k–₦600k monthly.

To test financial awareness:

• Participants estimated their monthly spending

• Then compared it with actual transaction history

Key Findings

• Most users underestimated spending by 2× or more

• Spending was fragmented across multiple accounts

• Users frequently checked balances due to uncertainty

• Budgeting tools were abandoned due to friction and poor localization

The most important insight:

I’m not bad with money. I’m just blind to it.

Defining the Product

Initially, I explored common fintech directions:

• Budgeting tools

• Spending scores

• Alerts and notifications

These approaches introduced friction or felt overly controlling.

I shifted toward a different framing:

Sabi should not tell users what to do. It should help them see clearly.

Design Principle — The Mirror Principle

The product is built on a single guiding idea:

Reflect, don’t judge

Most financial apps:

• Score behavior

• Highlight “bad” spending

• Push corrective actions

Sabi:

• Shows patterns

• Provides context

• Leaves decisions to the user

This principle influenced:

• Copywriting

• Visual system

• Data representation

• Feature prioritization

Information Architecture

The app is structured into five core areas:

• Home → Current financial state

• Transactions → Full activity log and details

• Insights → Behavioral patterns

• Budget → Optional spending limits

• Profile → Account and settings

This structure separates:

• Daily awareness

• Deep analysis

• Optional control

Information Architecture

The app is structured into five core areas:

• Home → Current financial state

• Transactions → Full activity log and details

• Insights → Behavioral patterns

• Budget → Optional spending limits

• Profile → Account and settings

This structure separates:

• Daily awareness

• Deep analysis

• Optional control

Key Design Decisions

1. Remove Judgment from the System

• No red for overspending unless user sets a budget

• No scoring or grading

• No prescriptive language

2. Design for Multi-Account Reality

Users operate across multiple banks.
The product aggregates all accounts into a single view.

3. Prioritize Single-Glance Clarity

The Home screen answers:

Where do I stand right now?

Without requiring navigation.

4. Make Insights Passive, Not Pushy

Insights are discoverable, not forced.
Users explore patterns at their own pace.

Design System

The visual system reinforces clarity and neutrality.

Typography

• Plus Jakarta Sans → financial emphasis

• Inter → interface readability

Color Logic

• Green → lower spending

• Amber → higher spending

• Red → only for true errors or exceeded limits

Key rule:
Color never implies judgment unless the user defines a limit.

Key Screens

Onboarding & Bank Connection

The onboarding flow focuses on trust

Home Dashboard

The Home screen is the core experience

Transactions

Insights

The Insights tab surfaces patterns such as:

• Spending frequency changes

• Category dominance

• Behavioral trends

Each insight is purely observational.

Budget

The Budget tab introduces optional control

Outcomes (Projected)

Although this is a concept project, expected outcomes include:

User Impact

• Increased awareness of spending patterns

• Reduced financial uncertainty

• More confident decision-making

Product Metrics (Hypothetical)

• High daily engagement with Home

• Strong interaction with Insights

• Increased retention through habit formation

Challenges

• Limited research sample size

• No real banking API validation

• Insight generation not fully engineered

These would require deeper validation in a production environment.

Key Learnings

• Financial products are emotional systems

• Metrics influence user perception

• Neutral design builds trust

• Simplicity requires deliberate restraint

What I Would Do Next

• Conduct usability testing with real users

• Validate Spend Pulse effectiveness

• Explore AI-driven insight generation

• Expand to users with irregular income patterns

Final Reflection

Sabi is not a budgeting tool.
It is not a financial advisor.

It is a product designed to solve a simpler, more fundamental problem:

Helping people finally understand their own money