Ever wondered about UX and UI design and how they're different? You're not alone. Many people use these terms like they're the same, but they actually mean different things.
UX design is all about making sure your experience with a product is good. It involves understanding what you need, doing some research, and making interfaces easy to use. UI design, on the other hand, is about how the product looks and feels. It focuses on making things pretty and easy to interact with.
Keep reading to learn more about how UX and UI are different, how they work together, what each role involves, the pay, and much more.
UX design stands for “user experience design,” while UI is “user interface design.” Both are really important for a product and they work closely together. But, they are actually different. UX design is about the overall process of creating a product, and UI design is about how the product looks and feels.
A List of Differences Between UX and UI Design. Let’s break down what each term means.
User experience design is about designing products with the user in mind. Don Norman, a big name in this field, came up with the term “user experience” in the late 1990s.
He says it's about everything a user goes through when interacting with a company and its products or services.
Even though UX design started in digital stuff, it can be used for anything like street lights, cars, or even shelves from Ikea. But, it’s mostly used in digital areas now, especially since technology has grown so much since the term was first used.
You can learn more about UX design history in this article.
In short, UX is about any experience you can have, whether it's a website, a coffee machine, or a trip to the store. UX design thinks about all the things that shape this experience.
A UX designer focuses on how the experience feels and how easy it is for you to do what you want to do. They watch and analyze how people really use things.
For instance, they think about questions like: Is it easy to buy something online? Can you hold that vegetable peeler comfortably? Does your banking app help you manage your money well?
The main goal of UX design is to make things easy, efficient, and enjoyable for you.
Here’s a quick summary of UX design:
So, what does a UX designer actually do? Here's a quick look at their typical tasks:
User interface design is about the visual aspects of a product and how you interact with it. It's a term used only for digital stuff.
A user interface is where you interact with a digital device or product, like the screen on your phone or the touchpad on a coffee machine.
For websites and apps, UI design is about how they look and feel. It’s about making the user interface easy and intuitive. A UI designer thinks about things like icons, colors, spacing, and how the product adjusts to different screen sizes.
UI design is about turning a product's research, content, and layout into something that looks good and is easy to use.
To sum up UI design:
If you’re more into visuals, UI design might interest you. Here’s what UI designers usually do:
UX and UI are often confused, but they’re very different. UX is about the overall feel of the experience, while UI is about how the product’s interfaces look and function.
A UX designer looks at the whole journey a user takes to solve a problem. They find out what issues users face and how a product can solve them. They research who the users are and what they need. Then, they map out the user’s journey, thinking about things like how information is organized and what features are needed.
Then the UI designer steps in to make it look good. They focus on the visuals of the user’s journey, like the screens and touchpoints you encounter, such as tapping a button or swiping through photos.
While UX sets the path, UI adds the details that make the journey possible.
UX and UI are both super important and work together. Good UX needs good UI to be effective. They complement each other, and getting both right is key in today’s world.
Think of UI as the icing on the UX cake. A great app idea needs good UX to figure out the features and user journey. But if the app looks bad or is hard to use (like having hard-to-read text or buttons too close together), that’s bad UI, and it ruins the good UX.
Good UI can’t fix bad UX either. A pretty website that’s hard to use is like a pretty cake that tastes bad.
Choosing between UX and UI depends on what you like and what you’re good at. UX needs empathy, problem-solving, creativity, and some business skills. UI is more about visuals and making technology look good and work well.
If you like both, you could do a bit of each!
Whether you want to be a UI or UX designer, you’ll need to:
There are lots of free courses and content online to help you start. If you’re thinking of changing careers, free online training in UX/UI design is a great place to begin.
For more details, check out guides on becoming a UX designer and a UI designer. Remember, education is a great first step, and formal training can really boost your chances of success in this field.
