In the past, we shared 10 UX design terms you need to know to communicate more effectively with your design team. In the spirit of expanding your UX EXP, we’ve curated a list of seven popular UX design tools that you should know.
While you won’t have to learn how to use these tools, understanding what they do, and how they fit into the design process, only strengthens a product's chance of success.
These bite-sized nuggets of software insight enable you to:
- Communicate more effectively with your UX designer
- Better understand the design process
- Feel more confident during creative reviews and meetings
- Be an incredible client to work with
Figma
What is it used for: UX prototyping
Why it’s awesome: Figma is one of THE industry-leading UX tools on the market. Beloved by most, it’s a UX wireframing tool that allows designers to create low, mid, and high-fidelity prototypes in a drag and drop—highly editable—whiteboard-style interface.
UX designers love Figma because it’s intuitive and easy to use. However, even if your UX designer doesn’t use Figma on a regular basis, it’s almost guaranteed that they’ll provide mock-ups to you in this format sometime or another.
Learn more about Figma on their YouTube channel
Adobe XD
What it’s used for: UX prototyping
Why it’s awesome: This wireframing tool comes from Adobe. It’s another excellent app for designers to get ideas down in one place and share them quickly. Similarly, since it’s Apple, it makes UX design very portable.
Designing mock-ups is fun and intuitive thanks to numerous features that allow the designer to create interactions, reuse style elements, and so much more.
Adobe has (unsurprisingly) an excellent product page, so go check it out! It won’t take very long, but you’ll get a ton of insight—heck, you can even download a free trial to experiment with it yourself!
By the way…
Wanna know where else you can get a free trial worth $2000?
By trying The Design Project today!
UserTesting
What it’s used for: User testing via real-time video recording
Why it’s awesome: A great way to describe UserTesting is by likening it to Loom. UserTesting allows you to watch precisely how users engage with your product. It enables them to provide clear feedback in real-time, allowing your designer to know exactly when and where to make adjustments and improve flows.
It works for digital and physical products, so your team can get invaluable insight into your customer’s mind and experience. Not only can you learn what they think by hearing their feedback, but you can monitor things like their body language and tone!
Check out a video of how it works in action!
UXCam
What it’s used for: User testing by screen-recording the user’s actions
Why it’s awesome: This tool is similar to UserTesting, except it is more about what you can learn from the screen than the actual human face and body. With features like heat-mapping, you can figure out exactly when and where users get stuck. UXCam literally allows you to see what users do when using your product.
Check out this brief product summary here.
OverFlow
What it’s used for: Mapping user flows
Why it’s awesome: This tool allows designers to simplify and optimize user flow by integrating with the most popular UX design apps. As a result, designers can quickly piece together entire user maps, allowing for a clearer understanding of the user’s journey and catching areas where confusion may occur.
Origami Studio
What it’s used for: Designing low to high-fidelity prototypes
Why it’s awesome: For an exciting all-in-one experience, Origami Studio is a fantastic tool. Not only can you copy and paste from Figma and Sketch, but it also offers the Canvas feature—allowing users to design layouts with drawing and text editing tools!
In addition, you can animate, edit dynamic layouts, and create quick interactions. All of which drive a more fluid and efficient design process.
Sketch
What it’s used for: All-in-one UX design tool
Why it’s awesome: A pioneer in the UX industry, Sketch holds rank alongside Figma and Adobe XD. Offering a deceptively simple user interface, it also provides intuitive features that allow minute-by-minute editing and polishing. It even gives you the flexibility to store reusable elements defined in your Design System.
The More You Know About Popular UX design tools…
The more you’ll grow…
Knowledge and determination are the superpowers that often make or break success. Now that you’re more familiar with these seven tools (but don’t get us wrong, there are a TON more out there—these are just our favorites), you’ll better be able to communicate and collaborate with your design team.
Whether you choose to work with a freelancer or UX design boutique agency (like us), it’s essential that you understand as much industry jargon as possible—and that includes the apps and software where your product comes to life.
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