Kat Li — Boarding Pass Reimagined at the Gate

Frontier's original Apple Wallet boarding pass, leg 1 of 2 — Before

After

Frontier's original in-app boarding pass, leg 1 of 2 — Before

Boarding Pass

Katherine LiSFO – DEN (1/2)

After

Swipe either pass or tap the dots to move from before to after.

Context

During my layover, which turned from 1 hour into 7, I found my boarding pass poorly designed and unhelpful, and decided to redesign it.

A boarding pass has to be the single reliable source of truth for a passenger in a very chaotic, transitory state. A passenger looks for different information at very different moments, so they need to locate any one piece of it instantly and to know that what they are looking at is current.

Observations

Too much redundant information (e.g., service codes that mean nothing to passengers), yet critical info like departure and arrival times are nowhere to be found.: What I didstripped down to most relevant info and grouped them (metadata, flight, seating and boarding, boarding times).
Two different layouts for the same ticket (Wallet card vs. in-app pass) means the passenger can't build a stable mental model of where to look.: What I didMaintained similar designs for in-app and apple wallet, with apple wallet stripped down for feasibility (2 primary fields and 5 auxiliary fields).
Absolute times with no urgency signal. “Door closes 6:44 PM” reads the same whether it's 5 hours away or 5 minutes away.: What I didAdded dynamic indicators like “On time” and a countdown that would activate past a certain threshold (e.g., 30 min left to go).