Webtoon
Webtoon is one of the most popular comic reading apps — but finding your next great comic is harder than it should be. This self-initiated project redesigns the experience to make discovery easier without overwhelming readers.
🌿In a nutshell…
Problem: Webtoon has a discoverability problem, where it is hard to navigate and find comics due to its overwhelming amount of choices
Impact: I created an Explore section — a dedicated space to find comics by popularity, genres, and Webtoon Originals — reducing the number of comics shown at once by 30%.
Project description
Webtoon is one of the most popular comic reading apps, but the experience of finding something new to read is harder than it should be. The app surfaces hundreds of comics across multiple pages, with no single place to explore by genre, popularity, or mood. This self-initiated redesign focuses on two things: reducing the noise on existing pages, and creating a dedicated discovery path that doesn't exist in the current app.
Here are some user app ratings from the App Store and Reddit:
"It's hard to sort through canvas comics… there are thousands of comics on the app. There isn't a way to see completed comics. It also made trying to find comics to read harder" — ⭐⭐⭐
"I just think that Webtoon and other Webtoon/Webcomic platforms have a terrible tagging system and a search function that makes it extremely difficult to find what you're looking for" — Reddit user
"… flooding the home page with a random assortment of stories that I haven't read and have no interest in reading" — ⭐⭐
How might we redesign Webtoon's interface so readers can easily discover their next comic — without feeling overwhelmed the moment they open the app?
Results
Reduced number of comics per page by 30%
Created 4 main pages that are intuitive to readers and easier to access types of comics, increasing discoverability
Developed new 'Explore section' to create one spot on the app to find new comic reads
More personalization + reduced sections on 'For You'
Process
This is how I tackled making comic discovery easier — without overwhelming readers the moment they open the app.
Old Webtoon app
I looked through the original Webtoon app to see how the comics were structured and where they appeared on the app. I wanted to have a better sense of the design system, the overall look and feel and improvements that I could potentially make.
UX Research
I created a survey asking questions regarding app usage, what users intended purpose of using the app is, the most frequented sections of the app, their consensus on the amount of comics on the app, and opinions on redesign suggestions. I posted the survey on several Webtoon subreddits to gather data.
Design &
Prototype
After gathering user insights into the app and having my own preliminary thoughts, I created sketches to then transform them into lo-fi and hi-fi wireframes. I made use of the existing pages to give a familiar feel while tackling the reduction of comics on the app.
Understanding the existing experience
These are the 5 pages in the original Webtoon app for context
For You
First page when user opens up app. Contains My Series, Ranking with trending webtoons, Webtoon Originals, Top Picks, and more sections (15 in total)
Originals
Webtoon originals separated by "Daily" (which day an original webtoon is updated) and by "Genres"
Canvas
Webtoon recommended series, Weekly HOT and trending webtoons based in genres. Has two sections, "Spotlight" and "Genres"
My
Contains series you have read, separated by "Recent", "Subscribed", "Downloads", "Unlocked", "Creators", "Comments" and "Super Like"
More
Has number of coins (purchasing money), Webtoon Shop, Search, Settings, etc.
User Research
To reach the most amount of Webtoon users, I posted my survey to 3 subreddits related to Webtoons: r/webtoons, r/WebtoonCanvas, r/webtoon and survey subreddits called r/SampleSize, r/SurveyExchange and r/takemysurvey.
The survey received 20 responses. This is a self-initiated project with a small sample — findings were directional, not statistically significant
Primary use: reading series
Most important features in Webtoon
This graph clearly says that the subscribed series, recommended series, like and comment history and trending series are the most important ones
"For You" is overwhelming
A good majority find the amount of comics too much right as you open up the app — this data corroborates with the use of a specific number "For You" sections and not using other sections
"I feel there is way too much going on the For You page. I rarely use it because it's just overwhelming to look at"
"The Webtoon app is more polished than it used to be, but it definitely needs to be reorganized for clarity."
"I don't like being advertised generic romance comics every time I open the app"
Overall User Insights
Design Decisions
Based on the user data provided from the survey, I made the following choices to address the discoverability issue.
4 pages in menu bar
The original one, as mentioned before, had 5 different sections on the app (For You, Canvas, Originals, My, More). I condensed this into 4 sections instead — For You, Explore, My and Settings. For You became more personalized while Explore was the one particular section that allows you to find new reads. My and Settings are kept the same (I just renamed More with Settings)
Reduced number of sections in "My"
The original app has "Recent", "Subscribed", "Download", "Unlocked", "Creators", "Comments", and "Super Like." Based on user data, much of these tabs were not commented by any of the respondents as components they used/needed in the app. I reduced this to just 4 sections — "Recent", "Subscribed", "Download" and "Comments" based on user data.
Explore Section
I created "Explore" to provide a singular dedicated section for users to explore pages and not infiltrate the user's For You section that is personalized to them.
I broke "Explore" into 3 different sections — Spotlight, Genres and Originals to have all the ways of how Webtoon displays comics. My idea for the Explore section was to initially have three separate pages that contain recommended/trending (Spotlight — already pre-existing in the original app), genres (separated into two different pages) and Webtoon Originals
Lo-fi Wireframes
Hi-Fi Wireframes
The centerpiece of the redesign is Explore — a dedicated discovery section that didn't exist in the original app 🌿
Solution
The redesigned flow separates discovery from personal content for the first time — Explore exists purely to help readers find something new, without cluttering the personalized For You experience 🌿
User Feedback
I went over this new redesign with 3 users of Webtoon who answered my survey, and this is what they had to say. These would be used to improve the design in future iterations of the Webtoon app. I walked them through the redesign via a Figma prototype, asking them to complete two tasks: find a new comic to read, and navigate back to a series they'd previously read. This mirrored the two core pain points from the original research.
For You page was aligned with user's personalization
All 3 users said that they liked the reduced amount of sections on the "For You" redesign, showing only subscribed, recommendations and trending
Explore page useful, but can still be improved
2 users independently flagged the same gap: there was no way to filter by keyword or author within a genre, which would be something to address in the next iteration.
Comics can be improved with tagging
1 user also suggested tagging comics visually as Canvas vs. Original, which aligned with feedback I'd already seen in the Reddit survey data — that pattern showing up twice across different research methods made me feel confident it's a real priority
Project Takeaways
Discoverability is about structure, not just content
Webtoon has plenty of great comics to choose from, but the setup of the app makes it hard to discover those great comics. This project taught me that how the organization of information directly determines whether users can find what they're looking for, and that reducing noise and creating dedicated discovery paths are two distinct but complementary design moves
Working within an existing design system
Because this was a redesign rather than a blank canvas, I had to make decisions about what to preserve to keep the app feeling familiar to existing Webtoon users. I did have to redesign and even make new screens, but I still wanted to keep existing design elements to not make the app feel foreign