Nurture pregnancy app

A companion for every stage

nurture+ is an iOS app for the months before, during and after pregnancy. It keeps a pregnancy’s logs and health records together, and turns them into a report for appointments.

I’ll start with the research and the moodboards, then get into the directions we tried and dropped before the final screens. Next to the weekly baby updates, the app keeps the parent’s own logs and health records together.

**nurture+ at week 24**The home screen leads with the week and a nutrition dial, and every food opens a card with what it adds.

nurture+ home screen at 24 weeks, with the week card and the Today’s nutrition balance dial scoring 65 — **nurture+ at week 24**The home screen leads with the week and a nutrition dial, and every food opens a card with what it adds.

Role and timeline

Product designer: research, user flows, design system and UI design
Four weeks, from App Store reviews to dev-ready handoff

nurture+ is an iOS app for the months before, during and after pregnancy. This is how its design came together.

Project

Client: nurture+
Platform: iOS
Category: Maternal health
Role: Product designer

What’s in it

Weekly updates
Food and photo logging
Supplements
Caffeine
Health records
Symptoms
Stage changes
Ask Nurture
Appointment reports
Privacy and export

My part

Research
User flows
Design system
UI design

About the projectWhat went into the app, and the parts I owned.

How the work went

Here’s roughly how the work went. Four steps, and most of the back and forth happened during iterations.

I started by reading what people say about pregnancy apps and pulling four of them apart screen by screen. Then came four moodboards, three home directions and a few rounds on the nutrient module.

Key screens from a competing pregnancy tracker — **Process**Competitor analysis, narrowing down features, design and iterations, then dev-ready assets.

A sage bowl of vitamin capsules from the nature moodboard — **Process**Competitor analysis, narrowing down features, design and iterations, then dev-ready assets.

Nine apps, side by side

Then I lined the apps up side by side. Nine of them, using Screensdesign as my primary research tool.

The pregnancy apps all do weekly baby updates. None of them log food against targets or keep health records, and MyFitnessPal, the one food tracker in the list, isn’t a pregnancy app at all.

App	Weekly baby updates	Kick counter or timer	Parent forum	Nutrient targets	Vitamins & meds	Symptom log	Health records	Visit report	Answers with sources	Postnatal support
Pregnancy apps
Pregnancy+
BabyCenter
What to Expect
Ovia
Flo
Sprout
amma
Nutrition apps
MyFitnessPal
Cronometer
nurture+

nurture+ doesn’t have a kick counter or a community.

Competitor matrixSeven pregnancy apps and two nutrition apps against ten features, with nurture+ in the last row.

What reviewers kept saying

I started with App Store reviews: the most recent ones for each pregnancy app in the competitor analysis.

About 1 in 7 praise the weekly baby updates, so I chose that feature to stay. The low ratings kept coming back to paywalls, onboarding that loses data and advice that feels generic.

1 in 7Baby updatesReviews that praise the week-by-week baby content.
28.0%Paywalls and adsThe most common complaint in 1 to 3 star reviews.
27.5%Logging and lost dataMany describe months or years of logs gone after an update.
21.8%Generic or wrongContent that didn’t fit their week, or was out of date.

What people wrote

Highly recommendI love how the app tells me what is happening week by week and I get to “see” my baby.Pregnancy+ · App Store
Everything is an upsellOr a subscription, or asking for more data. I immediately got emails from third party companies.What to Expect · App Store
Lost my data twiceTwice now it’s updated & my data is just gone.Ovia · App Store
Sorta helpfulI think some of the info is just basic, outdated, or even false. Can’t really trust it.Ovia · App Store

App Store reviewsFour findings, and what people wrote in their own words.

Forty weeks, forty illustrations

I researched every week of the pregnancy, and all 40 weeks have their own anatomical illustration.

They follow the anatomy week by week: the lining before conception, then implantation, the embryo, the fetus, and the turn head-down near the end. The sizes and development notes in the app come from the NHS and ACOG week-by-week guides. This was to help users connect with the growth of their baby throughout the pregnancy.

**Baby through 40 weeks**Weeks 1 to 4 are magnified. The milestones mark the blastocyst, implantation, embryo, fetus and head-down.

Four moodboards

I started with four moodboards. Every one of them tried a different but cohesive feeling for the app.

The nature board won with Terry. One of my notes on it says “Everything in nature was once a baby”, and its greens and overhead food shots are still all over the app.

Women resting together on a lawn — **Moodboards**Soft, Nature, Playful shapes and Lighthearted. Nature was kept.

Vitamin capsules in a sage bowl, shot from above — **Moodboards**Soft, Nature, Playful shapes and Lighthearted. Nature was kept.

Three home directions

The home screen went through three directions. I tried to make all of them prioritise the baby and nutrition.

I usually start with the key screens instead of onboarding, to understand which tonality to set for the rest of the app. This way we settle on a direction sooner and go through fewer iterations at the end. The goal is to get to the rejected ideas faster.

A led with a big week card, B squeezed the week into one row, and C went big on the baby illustration. After review calls the client picked a fourth direction, which combines elements of all three with a completely new petal dial for nutrition.

Direction A: a large 24 weeks card, then four nutrient capsules in percent — **Explorations**Three directions, then a final home that kept A’s week card and turned four capsules into one dial.

Direction B: the week in one row, then four nutrient bars with targets — **Explorations**Three directions, then a final home that kept A’s week card and turned four capsules into one dial.

Four rounds on nutrition

The nutrition module itself took four rounds. We wanted a unique and easy way for moms to scan their deficiencies.

It started as progress rows, one per nutrient, but that was too predictable. Then I tried a ring with a carousel of all nutrients, a ladder with eight bars split between food and prenatal, and finally the petal dial on the home screen, with one balance score in the middle.

Round 1: Today’s intake as four progress rows with amounts — **Iterations**Progress rows, a balance ring, a nutrient ladder and the final petal dial.

Round 2: a balance ring scoring 65 with a row of nutrients — **Iterations**Progress rows, a balance ring, a nutrient ladder and the final petal dial.

Onboarding

The setup screens give a glimpse of why nurture+ is more than just a pregnancy tracking app.

The idea was to make the app nutrition and baby-focused: align the growth of the baby with helping mothers and mothers-to-be nourish their bodies, and feel a sense of connection with the baby each passing week.

Welcome screen: nutrition for you, through every chapter, with a Get started button — **Setup**The stage comes first, then the weeks ahead and the foods that help.

Setup screen: the best nutrition for your baby, with everyday foods — **Setup**The stage comes first, then the weeks ahead and the foods that help.

A page for every week

Every week has its own page. It shows the baby’s size and development, and cites ACOG or the NHS.

I also added three short fact cards that open each week from Home. They can be reopened later from “This week”, so nothing is lost on a skipped day.

Today’s deck, card 1 of 3: iron helps carry oxygen — **Every week**Week 24 is 30 cm, about the size of an ear of corn. The deck opens with iron.

Your baby at 24 weeks: 30 cm, about the size of an ear of corn, with development notes — **Every week**Week 24 is 30 cm, about the size of an ear of corn. The deck opens with iron.

Layered logging

I layered the logging: food, caffeine, supplements and health records, to give an overall picture of nourishing the body and the baby.

Food can also start from a photo. The app finds what’s on the plate, like the kidney beans and broccoli here, and asks you to check each item and its portion before saving.

Log nausea screen with a severity slider — **Logging**Symptoms with severity, a photo of a meal, and the supplements you usually take.

Choose supplement screen with your usual supplements — **Logging**Symptoms with severity, a photo of a meal, and the supplements you usually take.

History and reports

Logs can be viewed on a calendar: every log and record from that day, in time order.

Before an appointment, the app turns a date range into a report. You choose what goes in, medicines stay out unless you tick them, and it’s shared as a PDF.

Your day, Monday 7 September: food, supplement and symptom entries in time order — **History and reports**A day in time order, what to include, and the report ready to share.

Include in your report: medicines and conditions unticked — **History and reports**A day in time order, what to include, and the report ready to share.

Ask Nurture

All answers show their sources. Each one lists the logs and the NIH fact sheet it drew on.

The iron answer starts from the 12 mg logged that day, which adds to the personalised layer of the app. For bleeding, it tells you to contact your care team and puts the steps and a call button right there. The idea is to allow maximum access to care, information and tools.

Ask Nurture: should I take more iron? The answer starts from 12 mg logged today — **Ask Nurture**Answers start from your own logs, then show the sources behind them.

Sources behind this answer: your context, then the NIH iron fact sheet — **Ask Nurture**Answers start from your own logs, then show the sources behind them.

When a pregnancy ends

Edge cases were handled even when tough. The stage screen says “My pregnancy has ended” and “You don’t need to tell us why.”

Weekly updates stop and nothing is deleted. The home switches to nutrition only, and the pregnancy’s photos, milestones and weekly updates move to a private folder in the journal.

Your stage: what’s changed? Options include my pregnancy has ended, you don’t need to tell us why — **Stage changes**From what’s changed, to what nurture+ updates, to the home afterwards.

We’ll update nurture+ for you: what changes and what stays — **Stage changes**From what’s changed, to what nurture+ updates, to the home afterwards.

Food versus prenatal

I added another layer to the analytics: food and prenatal nutrition are kept distinct.

The week view averages the days you logged and splits each bar between food and the prenatal. The idea is for the user to know clearly how much nutrition comes from whole foods and how much from supplements, so they can adjust their diet.

**Nutrition**The week’s averages, where the iron came from, and a food to try next.

Design system

The system uses Geom for display and Plus Jakarta Sans for titles, subtitles and body. The dial and cards follow a 4 point corner radius system.

Two of my notes on the nature board were “Nature + numerics” and “Organic rounded shapes”. You can see them in the balance dial, which puts eight nutrients on petals around one score, and in the pill buttons and circular food photos. This was my attempt at bringing nature into nurture.

Lentils food card with a circular photo — **Design system**Components, two typefaces, twelve text styles and an eleven-colour palette.

Circular food photos: dairy, mushrooms, eggs — **Design system**Components, two typefaces, twelve text styles and an eleven-colour palette.

Geom
24	Display	Medium	88/90
65	Score	Medium	40/40
80 mg	Metric	Medium	28/36
nurture+	Wordmark	Medium	23/28
Plus Jakarta Sans
Check your inbox	Question	Medium	32/40
24 weeks pregnant	Title	SemiBold	26/34
Today’s deck	Section	SemiBold	21/28
Create account	Body strong	SemiBold	15/23
Estimated due date	Body	Regular	15/23
Welcome	Label	SemiBold	13/20
Lentils	Caption	Regular	12/18
Your baby	Micro	SemiBold	10/14

Food imagery

I kept the food photos to one style. Each shot is angled from above on the same pale backdrop.

That style comes from my nature moodboard, where a bowl of capsules is shot from above. The idea is to focus on one item, and one item only.

**Imagery**Soft light from the left, shot from above, on the same pale backdrop.

Culture and food preferences

And culture and food preferences weren’t forgotten. All suggestions respect the user’s cultural inclination.

How do you usually eat? A list of dietary patterns — **Food preferences**How you eat, which food traditions you enjoy, and what to leave out.

Any foods you want to avoid? A search for ingredients — **Food preferences**How you eat, which food traditions you enjoy, and what to leave out.

Wrapping up

The project wrapped up after four weeks, and it was one of the most exciting app projects I’ve worked on. Terry had something to say about it:

Raksha was just a pleasure to work with. She is professional, articulate, and is clear about her deliverables and her timeline and sticks to it. She is creative and manages her time well, and communicates everything. As someone who is not well versed in user workflow, she helped guide me through and is knowledgeable about the whole process and provides recommendations after doing diligent research. I can’t wait to work with her again.
Terry PerenichClient, nurture+September 2026

Client testimonialTerry Perenich, nurture+, September 2026.

See the app at nurtureplus.app, or visit raksha.design to see more of my work.

Raksha Tated