BitGo Verify
For institutional teams, approving critical crypto transactions was often slow, fragmented, and tied to desktops i.e. a risky bottleneck in a fast-moving market.
I led the design of BitGo Verify, a mobile-first solution that enables institutional teams to approve high-value crypto actions anytime, anywhere—faster, safer, and with complete confidence.
Security had outpaced mobility.
As BitGo scaled to serve the world’s largest institutions, approvals remained locked to desktops. Teams couldn’t always be at their desks when critical transactions needed action, creating bottlenecks in a market that moves 24/7.
Bring Speed and Confidence to Institutional Approvals
THE CHALLENGE
Institutional teams handle high-value crypto transactions that demand both speed and precision. Yet approvals were still bound to traditional desktop systems, creating friction in moments where timing and clarity were critical.
But this wasn’t about simply moving approvals to mobile. The ambition was bigger, designing a secure, mobile-first foundation for how institutions confidently move assets, stake funds, and manage policies at scale.
Our high-level goals were to:
Faster approvals: Significantly reduced time-to-approve for high-value transactions.
Faster approvals: Significantly reduced time-to-approve for high-value transactions.
Lower friction: Simplified batch approvals with smart password handling, reducing cognitive load for admins.
Greater trust: Advanced fraud detection and live identity verification increased confidence in every approval.
Positive adoption: Institutional clients reported improved efficiency and peace of mind when managing digital assets on the go.
My Role
I led the end-to-end design of BitGo Verify, from discovery through delivery. This included:
Conducting research and mapping institutional approval workflows.
Designing wireframes, interactive prototypes, and user flows.
Running usability tests and iterating on core features like batch approvals and password handling.
Delivering polished designs aligned with BitGo’s design system.
I collaborated closely with a Product Manager, Engineers, and Security experts, and partnered with institutional clients during testing to ensure the experience was both usable and trustworthy.
Untangling Institutional Approvals
KICKOFF
At the start, the challenge wasn’t framed as “design a mobile app.” Instead, we were faced with a broader problem: institutional approval workflows were fragmented, complex, and bound to desktop systems.
I partnered with our PM and security experts to map how institutional client admins were approving transactions, uncovering friction points and opportunities for a mobile-first solution.
Early Insights
Talking with client admins revealed:
Desktop dependency: Approvals couldn’t happen on the go.
Need for clarity: Full transaction context was essential for trust.
Client Expectations Had Shifted
DISCOVERY
Through iterative testing, it became clear admins expected approvals to be seamless, secure, and mobile-first. These insights shaped the foundation for the mobile-first solution.
Customer Insights
DISCOVERY
We conducted research with institutional client admins to guide our initial planning phase.
These are the key insights that shaped the design direction of BitGo Verify:
Approvals Don’t Wait for Desks
Admins needed the ability to review and approve critical actions on the go, whether traveling, commuting, or outside office hours.
Trust Must Be Visible
Security checks like liveness and fraud detection weren’t just safeguards, they were signals that reassured admins.
Clarity Builds Confidence
Admins required full context, initiator, amount, policies, before approving. Without it, they hesitated.
Mobility Without Compromise
Admins wanted the convenience of mobile approvals, but only if security standards matched those of desktop workflows. Speed couldn’t come at the expense of safety.
Business Insights
Speed is the New Trust
In digital asset markets, every delay risks missed opportunities. Faster approvals weren’t just about convenience—they directly reinforced client confidence.
Compliance Can’t Be Compromised
Institutions needed the flexibility of mobile, but only if it preserved audit trails and regulatory standards already in place.
Collaborating at Scale Without Losing Focus
DESIGN PROCESS & PRINCIPLES
One of the biggest challenges of this project was balancing collaboration with speed. BitGo Verify touched multiple areas: security, compliance, backend systems, and client workflows. I needed to coordinate with Product, Engineering, Security, Compliance, and institutional client stakeholders, some co-located, some distributed, while keeping the design moving forward.
Managing feedback was tricky: different teams had strong opinions, and debates sometimes slowed decisions. At the same time, our primary focus had to remain the institutional admins, ensuring their approvals were fast, clear, and secure.
Getting buy-in from multiple teams while staying focused on the user was a constant balancing act.
To tackle this, I implemented a transparent design rationale process and shared visual frameworks early. This made design decisions visible, helped the team understand trade-offs, and allowed us to maintain momentum without losing alignment.
Designing Mobile from the Ground Up
THE EXECUTION
Before this project, BitGo had no mobile designs for institutional workflows. I created the first mobile design system, building a foundation for consistent, scalable, and secure experiences across all mobile screens.
This included:
Visual components and interaction patterns optimized for mobile touch interactions.
Design tokens for colors, typography, spacing, and states, ensuring clarity and compliance with security standards.
Core screens and flows: login, approval queues, transaction details, and notifications.
The result was a cohesive mobile experience that reduced iteration time, improved consistency, and gave engineering a clear foundation for building secure, efficient mobile workflows.
Bringing It All To Life
THE EXECUTION
The gallery below shows some key screens for the BitGo Verify app.
You can also check out the clickable prototype by clicking on the button below
Early Assumptions That Iteration Tested
ASSUMPTIONS
Users will read every transaction detail before approving
Reality: In high-volume contexts, admins scan for key signals; presenting the right info upfront matters more than showing everything.
Mobile approvals can be identical to desktop flows
Reality: Mobile constraints required rethinking workflows, touch interactions, and prioritization of info.
All security measures are intuitive to users
Reality: Even experienced admins needed guidance and clear feedback for steps like liveness verification.
Admins will act immediately on notifications
Reality: Context matters, users may be traveling or in meetings; push alerts and batching had to accommodate real-world behavior.
Internal stakeholders know what “friction” really feels like
Reality: Testing with actual client admins revealed pain points that weren’t obvious to internal teams, like password overload or unclear transaction metadata.
ITERATIONS
Batch Approvals Exposed Hidden Friction
EXPECTATION: Admins will remember wallet-password mappings in batch approvals.
Initially, the design assumed admins could remember which passwords belonged to which wallets in a batch.
FRICTION: Through usability testing and iteration, we discovered this cognitive load significantly slowed approvals and increased errors.
SOLUTION: Designing a system that automatically matched passwords to the correct wallets not only reduced mental overhead but also substantially improved approval speed, highlighting a major factor that the original proposal had overlooked.
What was proposed
Users were expected to remember which wallets had what passwords to approve certain requests.
What users needed
Smart matching of password for any wallet in the batch for speed and reduced cognitive overload.
THE IMPACT
Faster Approvals, Stronger Trust…And Counting
What I learned
REFLECTIONS
I learned that designing for institutional clients isn’t just about usability—it’s about making complex workflows feel seamless while meeting strict security and compliance requirements. Iteration showed me how small design choices, like batch password handling, could have outsized impact on efficiency and trust.
Learning to Navigate Trade-Offs
I learned that in highly regulated, security-critical environments, early assumptions about user behavior can be misleading. Iterating with client admins revealed subtle pain points, like batch password handling, that weren’t apparent in discovery, teaching me to test rigorously and design for real-world usage, not just theory.