A Guide to the Differences and Responsibilities of UX and UI Design

A Guide to the Differences and Responsibilities of UX and UI Design

UX UI Design - USER Experience Researchers

According to Steve Jobs, “Design is not just what it looks like & feels like. Design is how it works.” One of the common misconception user experience (UX) design is that it’s “all about how your website’s looks”. Where in fact, this is just a minimal feature of what it really represents. User experience is all about improving how people connect with technology and being able to recognize where these needs to happen.

Meanwhile, User interface (UI) design is the term that you would go with the visual and creative part of the design process whereas UX is the overall research and architecture of the content of a project. Some people assume this should be the responsibility of the developer, as they are the ones who build from the designs, but this wouldn’t be as effective without a UX and UI designers creating a functional and usable website or mobile application.

Both are things to consider when designing an application or website but each brings a different aspect to consider while creating the finished product.

User Interface:

How the user and a technology interact, the use of input devices and software.

 

User Experience:

The overall experience of a person using a product or services such as a website or mobile application, especially in terms of how easy or pleasing it is to use.

 

Design Process

UX Design is a process of creating and enhancing user satisfaction by improving the usability and accessibility between the user and the product. In short, customer satisfaction means everything is user experience.
While UI Design focuses on all the elements that make a website beautiful and fun to use: colors, button styling, graphics, animation, typography, diagrams, widgets, on click/tap behavior, etc. The UI elements on any given page all come together to create the overall aesthetic nature of any given app or website.

What do UX Designers do?

User Experience designers define the end-to-end experience users engage in when using an application or a website. What often goes unnoticed is that UX work is a science. The output – how the information is laid out on the screen and how people interact with it – is the result of working closely with internal participants to define and implement the business goals in a way that makes the most sense for the person who will end up using a specific feature.

 

What do UI Designers do?

UI designers take prototypes and sketches to the next level by ensuring that customers feel completely in their element when navigating your website. It’s not just nice-looking images, warm backgrounds, and flat or material design. It’s creating an emotional state for the user to feel 100% confident when using your website or mobile app.
To end all confusions, User Interfaces are the tools a person uses to accomplish a task or set of tasks, and User Experience is how a person feels when using those tools. Based on this definition and the story, we can see that anyone can design a trip (an interface and an experience) but only the design that accomplished the goals and considers all aspects, will let the user experience something magical.