News.com.au mobile redesign
Role: Design Team Lead
The Brief : As Lead Designer, I was responsible for redesigning mobile.news.com.au to align with the refreshed News.com.au brand identity, incorporate UX insights and research, and integrate seamlessly with a new CMS, while ensuring editorial workflows remained uninterrupted.
CASE STUDY
The mobile site needed to reflect the new desktop visual language while maintaining the speed and flexibility of a live news environment. The goal was to improve user experience, readability, and navigation, while also enhancing performance, accessibility, and engagement, without adding complexity to the editorial workflow or disrupting the experience for millions of daily users.
I worked closely with Ella Lymbereas, Portia Hilton, Jesse Peereboom, Simon Wright, David Lewis and my Design Team. Together, we executed a complete redesign and successful migration plan, achieving remarkable results within weeks of launch.
Designing for a content-heavy site meant striking the right balance between form and function. I focused on creating a clear visual and information hierarchy, using structured grids, flexible typography, and white space to guide users intuitively. Navigation and search were streamlined to improve discoverability, while the design system and components were built to reduce editorial overhead and avoid duplication.
We took a human-centred design approach, using UX research, usability testing, and data insights to guide every decision. Starting with user research and analytics, we identified pain points and behaviours unique to mobile. Through iterative wireframing and prototyping, we explored structure and flow, then refined the UI into a clean, intuitive interface aligned with the new brand. Throughout, we focused on performance, readability, and accessibility, ensuring the site was fast and inclusive across devices. Regular testing and feedback loops with users and stakeholders helped validate our direction.
The result was a successful launch that quickly drove impact, within a month, the mobile site jumped from the fourth to the second most-visited news platform in Australia. It has since become the number one news website. A true team effort, this project proved the value of thoughtful, user-first design at scale.