Phantom Recent Activity & Notifications

Overview

As Phantom's user base grew, users needed better visibility into their on-chain activity. I led the design of the Recent Activity tab and the push notification system — two features that transformed Phantom from a transactional tool into a persistent companion for managing crypto.

Challenge

Blockchain transactions are inherently complex. Users interact with swaps, NFT purchases, staking, and DeFi protocols — each with different data structures. We needed a unified activity feed that made sense of all of it, plus real-time notifications so users never missed an important transaction.

Process

• Research — Analyzed transaction patterns across thousands of users to understand what activity types mattered most
• Information design — Created a taxonomy for transaction types with clear visual hierarchy and status indicators
• Notification framework — Designed a system for push notifications that balanced helpfulness with avoiding spam

Solution

The Recent Activity tab provides a chronological, human-readable feed of all on-chain activity. Each transaction type has a distinct visual treatment, with clear status indicators for pending, confirmed, and failed states. Push notifications alert users to completed transactions, incoming transfers, and important protocol updates.

Impact

The 10x performance improvement in loading activity data, combined with push notifications, significantly improved daily active usage and user retention.