Lightning Labs

Building the UX Layer for Bitcoin's Payment Network

Lightning Labs builds the infrastructure for the Lightning Network — a payment protocol that lets Bitcoin move at internet speed. When I joined, the products were built by engineers for engineers. My job was to make them usable by the rest of the world.

The Design Challenge

The Lightning Network is technically complex by nature. Channels, routing, liquidity, nodes — concepts that require real mental model shifts for anyone coming from traditional finance. The design challenge wasn't simplification for its own sake, but knowing which complexity to expose and which to abstract.

What I Built

Over four years, I worked across the full product suite:

• iOS Lightning Wallet — designed the first iOS wallet for the Lightning Network, translating a deeply technical protocol into a mobile experience everyday users could actually navigate. This was early days for Lightning — no established patterns, no user research to borrow from.
• Lightning Terminal — a desktop dashboard for node operators managing channel liquidity. Took a command-line-only workflow and turned it into something a non-technical operator could run.
• Brand system — evolved the Lightning Labs visual identity as the company grew from a small protocol team to a recognized infrastructure provider.

Results

• Shipped Lightning Terminal to thousands of node operators worldwide
• Brand refresh contributed to a significant increase in developer community engagement
• Design patterns established during this period have been adopted across the Lightning ecosystem