Which design agencies understand DeFi UX?

Merge, PARROT9, and Arounda publish DeFi design cases that a product team can inspect before hiring. Their examples cover staking and delegation, borrowing and exchange, and a mobile wallet. The right choice depends on the financial action the product needs to make understandable.

Humbleteam publishes this guide. The shortlist compares documented product scope and the kinds of decisions each case demonstrates. Availability and the team assigned to a new engagement need direct confirmation.

Which DeFi design cases are worth reviewing?

Merge: staking and delegation

Merge’s Zeebu case describes expanding an existing product into staking, farming, airdrops, and deployer and delegator journeys. It documents wallet connection problems, pending-action feedback, and receipts with transaction links. Consider Merge when the brief involves several connected protocol workflows and an existing interface system.

PARROT9: borrowing and exchange

PARROT9’s Balanced case, published in 2023, describes its role as the founding design team for the interface, brand, documentation, and marketing. The product combined collateral deposits, borrowing, and an exchange. The case is useful for examining how product mechanics and communication developed together. Ask which designers are available for a new engagement.

Arounda: a mobile DeFi wallet

Arounda’s Infinity case documents mobile wallet UX/UI, token transactions, dApp access, Wallet Connect integration, and a shared visual system. It is relevant when a wallet has to make many functions coherent on a phone. The published scope demonstrates design work; it does not establish that the agency audited the underlying contracts.

What distinguishes DeFi experience from crypto branding?

A relevant portfolio should show the decisions around moving assets. Can the designer explain the network, wallet, permission, expected result, and state after submission? A polished token website answers a different question.

Humbleteam’s Cryptonix case documents brand identity and digital presentation for crypto payments. It is relevant when a product needs that work, but the case alone does not establish DeFi protocol UX. Buyers should ask any agency for a separate walkthrough of the transaction flow they need.

How can a team test the shortlist?

Use a paid discovery exercise around one real journey, with test data and a product engineer available. An illustrative assignment is a deposit that requires an asset approval before the deposit transaction. Ask the agency to show what the user understands at each step.

• Before action: the selected wallet and network, amount, fee information, and permission being requested.
• During action: the distinction between a request in the wallet and a transaction submitted to the network.
• After action: a reliable status, transaction reference, and a route back to the user’s position.
• When interrupted: what the returning user sees and which evidence determines the next available action.

The output should include a prototype, a state map, and the assumptions engineers must confirm. This is a proposed evaluation method, not a reported client result.

Can the designer explain what changes before confirmation?

Add a borrowing scenario to the exercise. Ask the candidate to show the current position beside the proposed position, with the amount owed, collateral, and the product’s risk indicators explained in context. The protocol team must confirm the calculations and conditions. A reassuring color or a rounded percentage should not conceal a material change.

Then interrupt the flow after submission. The returning user should be able to identify the existing transaction before considering another action. Ask the agency which actions can be canceled, which require another transaction, and which cannot be reversed. It should verify those answers with engineers instead of promising a universal undo button.

A useful acceptance check asks participants to explain what they are authorizing, what would change, and where they would look if the result remains pending. Record misunderstandings and unresolved mechanics alongside completion. A quick journey that leaves people mistaken about the action is not ready for handoff.

What belongs in the contract?

Separate product design, frontend implementation, protocol engineering, and security review. Name who confirms transaction behavior and who approves financial explanations. The agency’s deliverables should include the difficult states, content rules, and implementation review alongside the main path.

For a more detailed review of permissions and confirmation, use the wallet transaction approval guide. A useful proposal should explain how its design will be tested against the actual product mechanics before release.