What is the role of a UX designer?
Last updated: April 2024
User experience (UX) designers think deeply about the interactions between people and products. You are involved in planning how websites and applications are designed and built — from the moment someone purchases a product to how they continue to use (and ideally love) it. The role can also include user research — you need to deeply understand customers before you can design for them.
Users who cannot find what they need may abandon online shopping carts and cancel product subscriptions. As a UX designer, your goal is to help eliminate points of friction. That means paying attention to the overall product experience as well as the fine details — from user flows to navigation to visual design. Your decisions and designs influence how users think, feel, and experience the product. So it is easy to understand why you are so essential to product development.
UX design is a rapidly growing field and UX designers are in high demand. Here is what you need to know if you are considering a career in UX.
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What does a UX designer do?
Your primary role as a UX designer is to advocate for the customer experience (CX). You obsess over customer pain points and continually push to make the CX more useful, enjoyable, and accessible.
Cross-functional collaboration is key to your work — you will sync with product managers on customer feedback and the product roadmap, then work with engineering to bring designs and solutions to life. Here are some of the areas you own:
Improving website and application usability
Providing clear design requirements for the development team
Testing concepts to validate before committing to code
Simplifying user experience across every customer touchpoint
UX designers typically have fast-paced and varied roles. You might dig into customer feedback, attend a sprint meeting, test a prototype of a new feature, and review product analytics — all in one day.
While the specifics will vary depending on your company, team, and priorities, here are some focus areas you can expect to contribute to:
Focus area | Description |
Information architecture (IA) | Organizing and structuring content so users can easily find the information they need to complete a task Think navigation menus, search systems, and how resources are organized. |
Interaction design | Making it as simple as possible for people to use your product This requires a UX designer to think carefully about everything from how user actions might trigger specific sounds in the app to how your product works with tools like styluses and touch screens. |
Prototyping | Drafting an experimental version of a product or feature — usually to share with stakeholders and get their feedback Prototypes help you explore ideas and design concepts before investing time and resources in development. |
Site mapping | Creating hierarchical diagrams that show how pages are prioritized, linked, and labeled on a website or application Sometimes these maps are visible to users who want to navigate your site — other times site maps are meant to help web crawlers index your site. |
Usability testing | Evaluating real-world user experiences with your product You can prepare a demo environment for users to test on their own or have them use the product in front of you. Either way, this is a great way to solicit feedback on their experience. |
User interface (UI) design | Creating the visual design of pages and views — taking into consideration everything from typography to color schemes and animations UI design considers how visual elements impact the psychology of a user's experience of your product. |
User research | Uncovering information about customer needs, problems, and preferences User research informs persona development and helps you frame design decisions based on real users. |
User story mapping | Visualizing the steps users take to navigate and complete tasks within your product In user story mapping, you plot user's interactions on a timeline or journey map to understand how a user experiences your product. This helps you focus on desired user outcomes, rather than just feature specifications. |
UI sketching | Visualizing the UI before any wireframing, prototyping, or development This informal sketching is key to brainstorming and iterating on new layouts and functionalities. |
Visual design | Considering how the text, colors, and images on your site or within your product enhance its design and user interactions Visual design incorporates both large and small design decisions such as imagery, typography, space, shadows, and more. |
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How do UX designers approach their work?
Let's take a step back from the detailed work and consider the larger context. Everything you do as a UX designer is meant to help and delight customers. To accomplish this, you need to center the user's experience in everything you do.
This is why many UX designers practice user-centered design — the iterative process of focusing on users and their needs in each phase of design. User-centered design is not a linear process. Rather, designers move in and out of five main stages: researching customer needs, ideating concepts to meet those needs, refining concepts into designs, developing optimal designs, and testing.
Some designers apply a related, but slightly different, lens to their work. Design thinking is a similarly iterative approach that focuses even more on brainstorming and creative innovation. This approach can be broken down into the following stages: empathize, define, ideate, prototype, and test.
In some organizations, design thinking is applied to problems and situations beyond UX design. While this might be done with the best of intentions (who does not want to infuse more innovation and creativity into their problem-solving?), not all problems require design thinking. When over-used, design thinking can end up slowing down innovation when teams spend too much time and energy on process versus delivering viable solutions.
That being said, let's look at design thinking from the point of view of a UX designer:
Stage of design thinking | What UX designers do |
Empathize | Approach empathy like an investigator. It is all about setting aside your personal assumptions and deeply understanding what your customers need, want, and experience. During this stage, designers:
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Define | Begin to establish the core problem you are trying to solve. The clearer you get now, the more fruitful the rest of your design process will be. During this stage, designers:
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Ideate | Time to get creative. Now that you better understand your users and have pinpointed a problem, you can start brainstorming solutions. During this stage, designers:
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Prototype | Before fully investing in one solution, it helps to create several scaled down versions of the feature set or functionality. These prototypes are then shared cross-functionally for review and feedback. During this stage, designers:
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Test | Prototype testing requires taking your product to real users for feedback. This is not the end of the design thinking process. Rather, you will use the results of the tests to revisit, ideate, create new prototypes, and test again. During this stage, designers:
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What other skills does a UX designer need?
While it is critical for UX designers to build role-specific skills like user research and prototyping, your career growth also depends on developing "soft skills." After all, UX designers often work at the intersection of several key functions — you are often seen as a leader on your team and the design expert within the larger organization.
Find opportunities for mentorship and growth in the following areas:
Empathy: UX designers are problem solvers who care deeply about what customers need. It is not enough to research customers from a distance. You need to become skilled at immersing yourself in their experiences.
Curiosity: Empathy requires curiosity. You must be able to move beyond your own personal biases and ask the questions that will help you see things from a different perspective. Curiosity is your biggest asset during user testing — every bit of feedback and user action is an opportunity to gain valuable insights that will help you improve your product.
Leadership: Your customer knowledge is critical to the product — and to the business as a whole. Get comfortable with answering questions from executives, presenting in front of teams, and communicating how the value of your designs.
How to become a UX designer
As consumer expectations for products continue to rise, so does the need for excellent UX designers. And there is good news — the majority of UX designers enjoy their jobs. Glassdoor ranked UX designer in their top 50 best jobs in America based on salary, job openings, and job satisfaction.
While UX designers are often part of the product team, larger organizations generally have dedicated UX departments. The field is evolving and you may encounter different types of UX designer titles as you skim through job listings — including director of user experience, UX manager, senior UX designer, and product designer.
You might find enjoy a role in UX design if you are excited about the potential of impacting a product's success by improving the customer experience. UX design might also be a good career choice if you enjoy a variety of tasks — everything from research and testing to prototyping and visual design.
There are lots of different ways to prepare yourself for a UX role. You can pursue an advanced degree, internship, or certificate in UX design — including courses from the Interaction Design Foundation or Google's UX Design Certificate. Create a portfolio showcasing your UX projects and work on building your UX network. Each of these steps gets you closer to working alongside a product team to build lovable products.
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FAQs about UX design
How do I become a UX manager?
The blend of strategic, tactical, and managerial work makes the role of UX manager appealing to many. If you are currently working in UX design, talk to current UX managers. Express interest in the role and ask about their experience and skills. Take initiative with new projects and tasks to showcase your leadership approach, remaining open to feedback. Help others on the team grow their skills in areas where you are strongest. And if possible, manage a UX intern. This can help you begin to understand what it is like to lead.
What is the difference between UX design and product design?
UX design focuses on creating a user-centered experience within the product. UX designers specialize in conducting user research, creating wireframes, and developing user flows. They design the user interface (UI), making sure it is intuitive and user-friendly.
Product design encompasses the entire process of creating a product — from the overall strategy and vision of an offering to concept development and market launch. Product designers make strategic decisions about what functionalities the product should have in order to meet the user's needs and deliver value.
What is the difference between UX and UI design?
UX (user experience) and UI (user interface) design are interrelated and collaborate closely. UX design deals with the broader aspects of user satisfaction and experience, while UI design focuses on the aesthetics and visual elements that enhance that experience. Both are essential for creating a well-rounded and accessible product.
