App Information Architecture Research

Overview

Goal: Define the right layout and information architecture (IA) for our consumer app as we add insurance, banking, financial planning, and goal setting—by researching how peers structure their apps and turning that into actionable design direction.

Recommended IA (Option 2): Our preferred navigation is Home · Portfolio · Transact · Discover · Profile—five fixed tabs that work for any product mix. Content is filtered by advisor permissions and holdings; no conditional tab bar. See Recommendations for the full spec and Designs for concepts that reflect this structure.

Scope: Peers include Fidelity, Charles Schwab, Morgan Stanley, Merrill, Edward Jones, Ameriprise, Chase, Bank of America, Ally, American Express, E*Trade. Lines of business: investing (brokerage, retirement), banking, insurance, financial planning, goal setting.

How to read this site: Use the nav above to jump to Research (audit summary), Patterns (synthesis and typical IA), Recommendations (our proposed layout—Option 2 preferred), and Designs (app concepts based on Option 2).