A few debates are well-known in the world of design, but they are never quite settled. One of them is between UI vs UX and what is the difference between UX and UI design. Despite countless analogies explaining how these two design concepts interact, pinpointing a definitive answer has proven extremely difficult.
In general, however, if you are new to the industry—and especially if you are interviewing for positions in design—learning these terms and understanding what is UI vs UX is extremely important.
UX and UI Difference: An Outline
User Interface (UI) relates to aesthetics and User Experience (UX) to the experience a user has with a product. UI is characterized by aesthetic elements, and UX is characterized by the experience a user has with a product. Thus, UI is concerned with visual interface elements like typography, color schemes, menu bars, etc., while UX is concerned with the experience of the user. Though most of the time we get curious about finding which is the better among UI vs UX, it is essential to understand that both of these are irreplaceable when it comes to designing.
The logical flow of actions and basic components are established first, followed by the definition of visual details. It also showcases how collaboration works, where UX designers pass over their work to the UI team once the core concept has been tested and proven to work.
What is the UI Design and Why is UI Important?
UI design is all about transforming an interface into something digestible and usable by selecting appropriate typography, images, and other elements.”
Wireframes are transformed into polished graphical user interfaces through UI design. By doing so, you both enhance a product’s usability and create an emotional connection with the end-user. The user experience (UX) is therefore composed of a number of user interfaces (UI), which flow together (hopefully) smoothly to create a product.
The limits of UI are more tangible than those of UX, since it focuses on what it is named for: interfaces. In the term UI, I mean the design of individual screens or interfaces on a user’s journey while the user experience is the sum total of all the intangibles on a product’s journey.
UX designers’ jobs end at prototyping, where UI designers begin. Wireframes are converted into visually appealing designs that are both usable and visually appealing, and are optimized for different screen sizes based on their visual characteristics. Also, Read: Top 10 Effective Landing Page Design Tips
We will now examine the typical responsibilities of a UI designer.
Product Design and Feel
- A design research study provides insights into users and competitors and provides information about the latest trends in design. This is one of the most crucial elements of UI vs UX as it allows the designer to find ideas and create user interfaces that match the user expectations.
- The design of the user interface, including color schemes, font styles, icons, and buttons, is the responsibility of the UI designers.
- The brand positioning of the overall product and the graphic design of the user interface are closely linked. And that is why we say UI is closely related to graphic designing.
- A UI designer creates style guides, pattern libraries, and components that describe how each element (color, font, etc.) should look so that products and brands look consistent.)
Interactivity and Responsiveness
- An interface should be responsive to all devices, platforms, and screen sizes, both in terms of form and functionality.
- Designers can design the interactivity of an interface by using animations, transitions, or other interactive elements.
- A UI prototype displays all elements of the UI in real time. Users test them to get a feel for how the product will work and to get a feel for how the designers intend it to work.
What is UX Design and Why is UX Important?
The goal of UX design is to understand your users’ overall journey so that you can turn it into a product.” UX design refers to the entire interaction a user has with your product. In UI vs UX, UX tries to answer the question: What is the most simple, frictionless way to help people achieve their goals?
Basically, UX design deals with making a customer’s entire journey easier. It is the job of a user experience designer to define user flows, interview customers, and test products to understand the customers’ journey. Also, Read: Card Sorting in UX for Better Web Design
Take a look at what a UX designer typically does.
Strategy and Research
- Design a strategic plan to ensure stakeholders are aligned and working toward common goals at the beginning of the UX design process.
- UX designers are mainly problem solvers based on user research and data. We tend to think of design as something visual, but most of their work is conceptual problem-solving.
- A website, an app, or a product’s information architecture describes how its content is organized and labelled. An information architecture should assist users in finding and accomplishing information.
Prototyping and Wireframing
- A UX designer speaks with users to identify their needs, then creates the best user flow that will help them complete their tasks. Since UX designers are conceptually focused on the user journey, they have very limited influence on how the final product looks.
- An interface wireframe is like a skeleton that illustrates how the design will work at a fundamental level -the bare minimum needed for understanding how the design will work. These wireframes are digital or even hand-drawn.
- A UX designer should always test to find out if they are doing their job right or not. Testing with actual users. Using a rough prototype or even a simple paper mockup early in the design process, UX designers collect data from the users in order to validate their assumptions.
- Product managers and researchers work together closely with UX designers to analyze the test results and determine the next steps.
Why is UI/UX Important?
Your entire experience of a product is shaped by the combination of UX and UI. Two similar products may provide the same result, but their UX/UI differs in how they present it. Let’s assume there are two sets of UI vs UX designs for two different products, the one that will perform better will definitely be the user’s favorite in this UI vs UX design comparison as it will have a better overall experience.
Hope this comparison on UI vs UX helped you understand the basic differences and importance’s of both. UI/UX design services are quintessential for the design and user experience. And at the end of the day, what matters is the hands-on experience of the user.
