Deutsche Bahn
Design update of timetables in Deutsche Bahn lounges and travel centers
Hero Image showing a cut out of the new Deutsche Bahn departure boards.
A visual design update and structural overhaul of Deutsche Bahn timetables for train station lounges and travel centers, with a focus on making information accessible to a broad user group.
Team
zigzag GmbH
Florian Dusch & Sina Zorn

Year
2024
Accessible Signage
We followed WCAG 2.2 standards to ensure clear visuals, readable typography, and intuitive information hierarchy with the goal of designing  effortless wayfinding for every traveler, regardless of age, ability, language, or familiarity with past or current DB design systems.
A picture of the new portrait format DB Departure Board as seen at Düsseldorf main station.A cut out of the top right of a departure board, focusing on the train station Stuttgart main station.
Challenge
The evolution of the Deutsche Bahn brand over recent years has rendered some of its technology visually and structurally outdated, creating a noticeable gap between its modern identity and user-interface systems. Our collaboration focused on redesigning DB timetables to align with their new design language. This included refreshing the landscape format with a modern aesthetic and introducing an entirely new portrait format. The key challenge was ensuring both formats remained visually cohesive while being accessible to the diverse user group frequenting train stations across Germany.
A wireframe of a landscape format screen.A wireframe of a portrait format screen.
Solution
To achieve a streamlined visual appearance, the landscape format was divided into two sections that reflect a similar aspect ratio to the traditional 9:16 portrait format. Both versions display a high number of departures while maintaining accessibility through clear typography, balanced colors, and well-considered spacing.
Deutsche Bahn portrait format departure board displaying 12 upcoming departures..Deutsche Bahn landscape format departure board displaying 12 upcoming departures..
Two Approaches
While the portrait format retained its predecessors approach for adding and removing departures, creating an intuitive animation flow for the landscape format proved a difficult challenge. Ultimately, its two sections were designed to work separately from each other: the left side displays the nearest upcoming departures, while the right side features a pagination, enabling the display of a much larger volume of information seamlessly.
Design System
The backbone of the collaboration is the robust design system, which ensures visual consistency not only with other Deutsche Bahn products but also between the two formats. Existing elements, such as iconography, were expanded to cover all potential use cases, reinforcing a cohesive and scalable design approach.
Deutsche Bahn train chips, showcasing what type of departure it is.New caution icon in vibrant orange, based on DB design language
Layout of single departure. The component highlights the time of departure, type of train, destination, platform, stops on the journey and trip information such as cancellation.
A cut out of a departure that shows a train, which splits during the journey. This results in a layout that is double the normal height.
Further Projects