The Opal focus app across several screens, showing planning, blocking, and break suggestions

Opal · Product Design

Making focus feel a little easier

Students don’t need another app telling them to focus. With two teammates, I designed a focus app around planning, motivation, and breaks worth taking, built from a 30-student survey and tested with 23 more.

Role: Product Designer
Team: 3 designers
Timeline: 10 weeks, 2025
Recognition: Indigo Design Award

Overview

Students didn’t want stricter blocking.

We surveyed 30 college students. They weren’t asking for stricter blocking. They wanted help staying motivated, planning their time, and taking breaks without falling straight back into scrolling.

27/30: struggled with procrastination
21/30: were distracted by their phones
61%: had never used a focus app

Insight

Focus apps were each solving one piece of the problem.

ForestBlocks distractions.
FinchMakes self-care rewarding.
Focus FriendAdds accountability.

Students wanted pieces of all three. That became the foundation for Opal.

Design

One app for the whole cycle: plan, focus, step away.

The Opal calendar screen, showing a day view with classes and meetings alongside a to-do list — **Know what’s next**Tasks, focus sessions, and breaks live in one plan, so deciding what to do and starting it happen in the same place.

A hand holding a phone showing a Sticker Found screen, with a physical focus sticker beside it — **Make progress feel good**Tap Stickers turn steady focus into gems and rewards. Not a game, just a reason to come back.

A phone showing a break suggestion to pick up a book, with other suggestions floating beside it — **Put the phone down**Instead of only blocking apps, Opal suggests what to do on a break: a walk, water, a stretch.

Testing

23 people showed us where it still wasn’t clear.

“Event” didn’t make senseWe switched to familiar words like Task and Activity, with icons.
Scanning needed guidanceWe added alignment guides and clearer onboarding for Tap Stickers.
New users got lostWe added help the first time someone meets a feature.

What I took away

Make the better choice the easier one.

The real question wasn’t how to stop distraction. It was how to make putting the phone down feel better than picking it back up.

Save for Me

Sarah Chen 9:41 AM

Final specs for the onboarding flow are in Figma. Can everyone review before Thursday?

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Sarah Chen 9:41 AM

Final specs for the onboarding flow are in Figma.

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