DMRC | Sandeep Baskaran

A self-initiated redesign of the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation mobile app — fixing route-search friction, station swaps, and live platform visibility.

Overview

When I moved from South India to North India and set out to explore Delhi with friends, everyone gave me the same advice: take the Metro. On a cold winter morning I downloaded the official Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) app to look up the map and plan our route. The underlying network was world-class; the app experience wasn't. Around the same time I had started using CRED and was fascinated by tactile, neumorphic interfaces — so I took the DMRC app on as a self-initiated redesign to fix the usability gaps I'd hit first-hand.

Note: Because this was an independent redesign without access to DMRC's internal telemetry or operational constraints, it is scoped as a focused UX/UI exploration built around commuter pain points and public Play Store feedback.

Goals & motivation

Product goals:

Deliver an intuitive, uncluttered route-planning experience for both daily commuters and first-time visitors.
Make common commuter actions — swapping stations, re-running recent searches, comparing faster routes, and checking platform info — immediate.

Personal goals:

Own the full product design loop end to end: app audit, Play Store review synthesis, problem definition, UI redesign, and interactive prototyping in Figma.
Test how far a tactile visual language could go while keeping transit information legible for commuters of all ages.

App audit & user research

"Users are not always logical, at least not on the surface. To be a great designer you need to look a little deeper into how people think and act." — Paul Boag

Because I was already a user of the app, I began with a heuristic walkthrough of the existing information architecture and navigation flows, then cross-checked my notes against Google Play Store reviews from daily Delhi Metro riders and tourists.

Play Store reviews from Delhi Metro commuters highlighting navigation clutter, missing route options, and friction in station selection.

The problem — five pain points

Synthesising my own audit with commuter reviews surfaced five recurring failures:

No way to swap origin and destination. Planning a return trip meant re-entering both stations from scratch.
Cluttered, disorienting home UI. Essential route tools were buried alongside secondary informational links.
No recent searches. Daily riders had to type the same stations repeatedly.
No alternative or shorter route suggestions. The app returned a single path without surfacing faster or fewer-interchange options.
No live platform visibility. Commuters couldn't see live platform indicators when navigating busy interchanges.

Proposed solution — Then vs. Now

I redesigned the core screens in Figma, pairing a cleaner information hierarchy with soft, tactile surfaces and clear visual contrast between primary route actions and secondary utilities.

Then vs. Now (1): Home screen — replacing a dense grid of icons with a focused station search, one-tap origin/destination swap, and recent searches.

Then vs. Now (2): Route results — surfacing fare, duration, stops, line changes, platform numbers, and alternative route options clearly.

Then vs. Now (3): Station & route details — making line colours, interchange points, and live platform indicators readable at a glance.

Then vs. Now (4): Secondary utilities and navigation — decluttering recharge, metro map, and helpline access.

Prototype & learnings

Overview of the redesigned DMRC mobile screens and prototype flows.

Interactive DMRC mobile prototype in Figma · Open full screen

Key learnings

Small interaction fixes carry disproportionate weight in transit apps. A single origin/destination swap button and a recent-searches list save more commuter time than any visual polish.
Every layout decision lands on the user. Auditing real Play Store complaints alongside my own first-time-tourist friction grounded the redesign in problems riders actually hit on the platform.