UI vs UX: What’s the difference?
UX and UI are two acronyms that are often mentioned by programmers and marketers. They are usually referred to as UI UX design, so it’s clear at a glance that they have something to do with design. However, many don’t know in detail what the term UI UX designer means, each of which is a separate profession. What exactly are the professions, what UX stands for and what UI means, and what is the difference between UX and UI?
In the article you will learn:
UX stands for user experience and most often refers to a profession dealing with user experience. It focuses on the user’s experience, feelings and overall first impression when interacting with any system, software, application or website. A UX designer tries to design all the functional elements in the right places so that the user goes through the whole process on the site as comfortably as possible and has the best feeling after leaving the site. The optimal goal is for the customer to return later to repeat the purchase and recommend the brand to friends and acquaintances.
UI is an abbreviation of user interface. UI design deals with the choice of colours, fonts, photos and their layout. It also determines the layout of important elements on the page and, of course, their appearance. These elements must be properly designed and positioned to make sense to the user.
UX and UI for web design
Although UX UI design are familiar terms, some people state them incorrectly or use them synonymously. You ask: What UX designer does? You definitely don’t need to look for UX in the UI, but simply put, UX is in charge of how the system works, and UI is in charge of how the system looks. Thus, UX and UI complement each other when creating websites or apps. Both are essentially about the same thing – meeting the needs and making the user experience more enjoyable.
The purpose is to create a web design that will ensure easy and at the same time maximally efficient use of the system. UX design and UI design are therefore interconnected. In general, a web designer is still a professional who specializes in creating visually appealing and functional websites. And this includes both of the above, for example, if it is a website design, including the preparation of a design manual.
The misconception that customer loyalty to a brand is largely linked to ease and convenience of use, that is with UX, has long been overcome. Today, we know that it creates loyalty along with UI. The quality of a software, website or application is directly proportional to the communication between UX and UI designers, their ability to coordinate and agree, and also to anticipate different situations in advance. UI UX design is full of challenges!
UX and UI differences
In practice, it is sometimes difficult to specify what work a UI and ux designer does and the difference between UI and UX design, as they are very closely related. That’s why a lot of jokes are made about them. For example, if the UI designer asks what size the questionnaire should be to get the customer’s attention, the UX designer will ask if we need the questionnaire at all.
If we wanted to show the difference between UX and UI design with a real-world example, just imagine a woman’s hair straightener. The UX displays its heating to different temperatures, teflon plates and a handle designed to hang when not in use. The UI includes the colour of the straightener and clearly labelled buttons. This is one example of the challenges UX and UI designers have to deal with.
It’s crucial to integrate UX web design early on.
Setting up the UX design of the website and apps should be done from the start with UX designers, the people responsible for UX design. Website owners often mistakenly think that a good UX setup will take a few hours or days and then they’ll never have to go back to it. Well the opposite is true. A UX designer may be a magician in a sense, but even his magic has its limits. Still not clear on what a UX designer does? Let’s take a closer look.
Any proposal for the creation of a website or a change of the existing state is based on data research and testing of options. Data analytics can show exactly how a user moves their mouse around the web, or it can show the web pages that a user has left. If a user isn’t clicking where we want them to click, or is leaving early, something needs to change.
What UX designer does
At the beginning, a survey is carried out to gather as much information as possible. It is easier to do such an overview when editing an existing page. However, if the making of a web starts from scratch, questionnaires, surveys and market analysis are used.
From the collected data, so-called personas are created for the page. They are fictitious persons, visitors to the site, who are supposed to encompass a certain group of people. Their age, occupation, financial security, hobbies, etc. are selected. There can be more than one persona, and the behaviour of users on the site is predicted by them. The UX designer then designs the architecture of the website. At this stage, the UX designer creates the entire logical structure of the future website, links, interconnections and paths through the site.
A wireframe design is created directly during or immediately after the creation of the architecture. The wireframe is the first sketch of the page. It contains only black-and-white areas without images and texts, indicating the different elements on the page. Usually the sections are just connected by crossed lines, so the whole drawing really looks like a wire-frame model or scaffolding.
Wireframing can be created with pencil on paper, which is often the most common first step. The best wireframes are then digitized. This design will help to understand better how the product will appear on computer, tablet and mobile screens. On paper, however, it’s harder to estimate how many elements can fit comfortably on a regular phone.
A UX web designer has three basic goals when creating wireframes:
- show basic content,
- draw the layout of the primary structural units,
- outline and describe the user interface.
The wireframe is then used to create a prototype of the website, which is a “clickable” version of the website without graphics. The prototype is always tested before the graphics are added. The role of any IT tester is to ensure that websites, software applications or systems are working properly and meet the set requirements and specifications. The aim is to see if the site is intuitive, easy to understand, manoeuvrable and functional. This is also a short definition of what is the UX meaning.
The task of a UI designer
A UI designer should have a strong aesthetic sense. They decide how the website will look like. A UI designer selects colours, combines them, chooses fonts, button shapes, animations of transitions or effects, in short, everything that is visible to the naked eye on the page. The user interface must have a uniform tone and colour matching, supervising the client’s corporate colours and logos so that the company’s branding is observed. In vain will be the UX designer convinced that the space on the top right is ideal for the cart icon, if according to the client’s rules the logo should be there.
The UI design makes sure that all elements are in the right place, in the right colour and size and that they look visually uniform, aesthetic and functional. If the UI designer is absent, it may show up as too many colours used on the page, poor contrast between the background and the font or an unfortunate font choice. These are all factors that strongly influence the user experience on the web. In a nutshell, what UX means and what UX design focuses on, is understanding the needs and preferences of users. It includes all interactions, impressions and reactions that a user experiences when using a product, service or system.
Problems and tasks of a UX designer
The problems that a UX designer regularly solves are many. Depending on the site from which the visitor leaves prematurely, it may turn out that the website has an annoying CAPTCHA control. The website may lack a filter or have a filter but it is insufficient or confusing. The site may have too many pop-ups or mandatory registration for purchase. All of this can cause customer loss and the goal of the UX designer is to prevent it.
Favourite creative job
UX designer is one of the most popular creative jobs. Their job may not be the easiest, but it’s fun and enjoyable if you like to design. A UX designer needs to be able to read data to design the best website structure that the user will immediately like. In the same way, the UI designer must create the right look for the website or application so that it looks appealing, uniform and meets the client’s requirements. Moreover, the two professions work closely together to jointly design the best possible web or other creation.
Our company is constantly looking for new talented people for these positions. When we find such colleagues, we take care of them properly. See for yourself and check out our great employee benefits. If you are interested to work for us, check out the current job offers in our company.
Current open offer: UX/UI Developer – Digital Solutions
We are currently offering you a home office or full remote job. If you have experience in frontend application development and knowledge of design standards, speak English or German, join our team. UX and UI design will become the main focus of your work.
You will design and develop innovative solutions and become part of an agile team. You will also implement digital services for the insurance industry. As part of your job, you will work closely with owners and developers.
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