A budgeting tool that meets stressed students where they are.

Students face real expenses and constant stress but rarely keep a strict budget — so a tool that demanded one would just get ignored.

The challenge was to make the link between earning and spending visible without friction.

Interviews confirmed the pattern: roughly half had no active income (relying on scholarships, loans, or savings), and most managed money informally.

That told me the tool had to be low-commitment from the very first screen.

20, general studies, on-campus custodian, high stress, little-to-no budget; frugal but unstructured, worried about money running low.

Ava became the gut-check for every decision: would this feel simple enough that she'd actually use it?

Four rounds — paper, two low-fi, then high-fi — each tested with 3–5 new participants. Testing reshaped three screens: the Expense Breakdown, the Results page (users misread it — I was showing the wrong information), and a Reports page users asked for to see their finances at a glance.

When the flow felt too complex, I cut steps. The prototype below is the result — try it.

Research and testing change the design, not just confirm it. The biggest wins came from watching real students misunderstand a screen and simplifying until they didn't.

And a process lesson: feeding users financial info up front to "help" actually biased them, so I stopped.