Case study · Toptal Global Hackathon · 2022
First place, 79 teams, 50 hours.
Lead UX/UI Designer on Topverse — a gamified work-life-balance mobile app for remote freelancers and Toptal members. Won the Toptal Global Hackathon against 79 teams and 298 participants worldwide.
- Role
- Lead UX / UI Designer
- Client
- Toptal Global Hackathon
- Year
- 2022
- Status
- 1st place · 79 teams
Overview
A play-during-free-time app — that became a wellness platform.
Toptal’s brief was deceptively simple: build a mini-app for Toptalers and other remote professionals to play during their free time. Fun, engaging, ideally with social and competitive elements.
The real problem underneath: remote work — at the scale of 1.56B people worldwide — has eaten into work-life balance. People can’t escape work mode. So instead of building yet another casual game, the team reframed the problem and built a wellness platform disguised as a game.
The brief
Build something that helps people unwind.
An online mini-app for Toptalers and remote professionals to play during free time — engaging, ideally with social and competitive layers. The brief stopped there. The work started.
Problem & opportunity
Remote work, at population scale.
15K Toptal freelancers. 59M remote workers in the US. 1.56B worldwide. The opportunity wasn’t entertainment — it was the way work-life balance, work-mode escape, and connection-outside-of-work have quietly become an unsolved problem at planetary scale.
User research
100 responses, eight hours.
Quick survey to Toptal members and external freelancers. Returned 100+ responses in 8 hours — fast enough to inform every design decision that came after.
No time for games during work — wellness has to fit between meetings.
Play for stress relief, not competition. Calming over chasing.
Want strategy / puzzle games that keep the mind busy.
Prefer mobile over desktop for personal time — phone-first design.
Personas
Two people, two problems, one app.
A Toptaler inside the company’s ecosystem, and a Remote Freelancer outside it. Both validated by primary and secondary research — neither built on assumptions.
Approach
Four moves, fifty hours.
- 01
Frame the real problem
Remote work has scaled to 1.56B people worldwide and Toptal alone has 15K freelancers. The brief asked for a play-during-free-time mini-app — the real problem was work-life balance, isolation, and never quite escaping work mode. Solved that, not the surface ask.
- 02
Validate with users in hours
Ran a quick survey across Toptal members and external freelancers — 100+ responses came back in 8 hours. 74% had no time for games during work, 56% wanted strategy puzzles, 60% played for stress relief. Two personas emerged from the data and shaped every subsequent decision.
- 03
Compete on concept, not features
Competitive analysis showed the category is crowded with bland wellness apps. The differentiator: gamify well-being itself — every hour you invest in mentorship, health challenges, or community service grows a personal 'Verse' space. Recognition and self-satisfaction loop, not points-for-points-sake.
- 04
Ship a full pitch in 50 hours
Led UX and UI end-to-end while teammates handled illustrations and business analysis. Information architecture, sketches, style guide, 40+ mobile screens, interactive prototype, and a full pitch deck — built in 50 hours flat against a global field of 79 teams.
Concept
Gamify the well-being itself.
Instead of points-for-points-sake, every hour a user invests in health challenges, mentorship, or community service grows their personal “Verse” — a visual, evolving space they can be proud of. The loop is recognition and self-satisfaction, not vanity metrics. Optional competition layered on top for those who want it.
Information architecture
Structure first, screens second.
Mapped the IA before any high-fidelity work — clear navigation hierarchy, user flow paths, and entry points for each persona’s primary goal.
Sketches & style guide
A team-shared visual system.
Built a lightweight style guide alongside the UI work — colours, components, interaction patterns — so the illustrator’s artwork and the prototype screens stayed consistent across the pitch deck and the live demo.
My Verse · the payoff
A space you can be proud of.
As wellness habits accumulate, the user’s Verse grows from a stark work-only landscape into a thriving garden — with achievements like a community-funded hospital and a flourishing wellness park. Three visual states tell the entire story of the gamification loop at a glance.
Deliverables & outcome
Eight deliverables. First place.
Unique gamified work-life-balance concept
User & market research (100+ responses)
Information architecture & user flows
Sketches, wireframes & supporting research files
Two validated user personas
40+ mobile-app screens
Interactive prototype
Pitch presentation & live demo
Reflection
“The brief asked for a game. We delivered a wellness platform — and won against 79 teams because we earned the right to reframe the problem before we drew a screen.”