All about UX design and UI design
First of all it should be known that UX/UI are two different but complementary professions. Often, UX is assimilated to UI, as if the user experience was limited to creating a site with a pleasant design to access content and click on beautiful buttons.
The difference between UX Design and UI Design, so often questioned, can be formulated very simply: “an experience is not just an interface”. The UX Designer and UI Designer have different but complementary skills and roles. However, their tasks and occupations are often confused or misunderstood.
What is the difference between UX and UI?
Frequently, we hear about UX (user experience) and UI (user interface) in the field of web design. Often, however, these terms are confusing. Although they have the same objective (namely to optimize the conversion rate), these disciplines should not be assimilated to each other.
Figuratively, the UI is to the UX what the finger is to the hand. Let us take stock of this notion of complementarity and of the difference between these two expressions.
1- What is UX Design?
UX Design goes far beyond the digital environment and consists in designing an interface that fully meets the needs of each user.
The term UX comes from the English «User Experience» for user experience and is based on the emotional feeling of a user facing an interface.
The fields of study of UX design are very related to psychology, language and sociology. It was in 1990 that the American cognitive psychologist, Daniel Norman, began to talk about user experience. This concept refers to everything a user may perceive of a product.
For the web, the aim is to make it easier for users to find information on a website. The UX is based on the expectations and needs of the user identified during user tests to create the functionalities of a website.
The UX Design will be based on the analysis of users’ feelings when they use an interface. The goal is to provide the best possible user experience. This mission is entrusted to the UX designer.
It will worry about the emotions of users when it uses a website or app. It will improve the user experience through the collection of qualitative and quantitative data that will be used to create consistent user journeys relative to the target.
The UX designer answers a set of questions:
Who are the users?
What is the best user path?
How to make the experience simple and enjoyable? The UX designer will create the first functional models (wireframes) and the first structures, the UI designer is there to give life to the plans.
2- What is the Design UI?
The UI design is a term that concerns only the digital, the UI designer’s role is to design a pleasant and useful interface for users.
It reflects on the placement of graphic elements (colors, icons, buttons, typographies, etc.) and text on the web pages of a site.
The UI design thus focuses much more on the visual, aesthetics of a website. Its objective is to facilitate the navigation of users on a website by integrating intuitive and practical elements. The idea is to encourage them to stay on the page they are visiting and to foster their commitment.
A UX designer can be a UI designer
The UX designer is recognized as the architect or ergonomist of the digital solution project, he can design the final interface of a website, SaaS software or a mobile/web application. However the UI designer does not have the necessary skills to design the architecture of the project. Indeed, the User Interface is the visible part of the User Experience. The UI is the tangible product that the user can see and enjoy. However, the UX designer uses the UI designer’s strategies and tools. For a better user experience, the user interface and other elements must be taken into account.
How do they work together?
As we explained, a UX designer decides how the user interface works, while the UI designer decides the appearance of the user interface. This is a very collaborative process and both design teams tend to work closely together. As the UX team works on the application flow, how all the buttons guide you through your tasks and how the interface effectively meets users’ information needs, the UI team is working on how all these interface elements will appear on the screen. Let’s say that at some point in the design process it was decided to add additional buttons to a given screen. This will change the way the buttons need to be organized and may require changing their shape or size. The UX team would determine the best way to arrange the buttons while the UI teams adapt their designs to the new layout. Constant communication and collaboration between UI and UX designers ensures that the end user interface is as beautiful as possible, while operating efficiently and intuitively.
Two complementary business lines
For a successful project to create, operate and develop a digital solution, the UX designer and the UI designer are indispensable. These two businesses have a single purpose, the satisfaction of the end user of the solution. So it is very important not to neglect one profession at the expense of the other for a harmony.
The relationship between emotion and memory
It’s proven, emotional feelings influence our decisions. The UX designer must be concerned about the user’s emotions when using the product in question. Its objective is to put in place strategies to facilitate the use of the product, its simplicity, readability, usability, etc.
Conclusion
The UX does not go without the UI. In a development process, it is essential to link these two businesses in order to create a complete user experience.
The UX will encompass all the research, test, user path, wireframe. While the UI will deal with all aspects related to the visual, interaction, aesthetics and design of the interface.
It is important to understand the difference between these two terms, of course. But it is also necessary to train on these two professions because they are broad subjects that take into account different fragments of other fields: writing, data analysis, design, product design, test, UX research, etc.
