UX/UI is a useless term

On this video Ran tries to convince you to stop using the term UX/UI. He believes it's confusing and it says nothing about the kind of work you do. Stick around to find out what are Ran's arguments.

⬇ Will you stop using the term UX/UI? Let us know in the comments ⬇

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Thanks for watching our video about UX/UI is a useless term and we'll see you on the next one.

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[kehindeadenaya]

I believe the job descriptions out there are what confuses a lot of designers, and designers are just trying to get attention from these companies, this is my opinion

[iamskoorb]

Product design isn’t the best either… nowadays it almost exclusively refers to digital products, even though industrial designers still design physical products

[cerebralvision]

I interview tons of people all the time and there are pretty strong differences between UX and UI when it comes to skillset. There is a bunch of overlap on both but I find people tend to lean one way or another. It's actually quite easy to distinguish. Although there are a few full stack designers out there, they are rare and most UX people aren't great at visual design while most Visual/UI Designers aren't great at UX. It's quite common. They say they do both, but they really don't. Also it doesn't help when the resourcing department's job descriptions don't do a great job understanding & identifying what's really needed. They're all like "We want someone that does everything!". That's an easy way to put out mediocre work. I do both product and web.

[Enigm-cg]

I don’t really get where is the issue if you work on a job where user experience and user interface are required. User experience as a set of methodologies inspired by design thinking to solve problems and user interface as designing the solution : a prototype, also involved in the design thinking approach.

[PaytonClarkSmith]

I used to think the terms UX/UI made me sound fancy. 🎩

Later on, when asked what I do for work I would just answer “I’m a web designer”.

Now, when people ask me I just answer “depends on the day!”

[imkeyi]

Big company still needs UI/UX designer, because they have professional front-end enginer to develop the UI/UX(for all kinds of digital products - whether is web or app or game) and make sure the code quality and they want separate design & front-end clearly in order to get a high quality product and benefit product management as well. But for start up usually UI/UX designer its the "Full stack designer" you need think as product designer and deliver designs this include all kinds of designs UI/UX, VI, Branding, marketing etc...

[orhashahar]

A friend ask me a few weeks ago: "so you do UX/UI?" And I was like: "No, this term is just confusing. Mostly if you are a freelancer trying to get cleints outside the design and tech world. I'm an old school web and brand designer"

[MrZxcvbnm]

I actually think the term UX Designer has nothing wrong with it. You understand the process of getting to know user's needs and you design based on that. And a UX designer should be able to design a website and an app in the same way. They are not different. They both help users achive their goals. And now that we are entering the metaverse era and Internet 3.0 UX designers would still be relevant. If you call yourself a "website designer", "app designer" r even "product designer" you are limiting yourself.

"What do you do?" "I DESIGN EXPERIENCES to help users use software with ease without them having to have technical skills". Sounds good to me...

[radekrozkiewicz]

I think UX/UI is fine for a job title. As designing high fidelity experiences after conducting user research, all by yourself is UX/UI. This is what I do in my day job

[MrKevfry]

I started in industrial design, so it felt weird that 'UX' was being used as an indicator of an exclusively digital design role, although 'Product Design' suffers from some of the same issues (My degree was in 'Product Design' even though it was 95% physical product focus)

[evandahsteadman]

Best advice - Ask what the end product is that you will actually be designing then work backwards. If its marketing /landing pages then you need to understand UX for marketing pages (e.g creative storytelling). If its web-apps / mobile or desktop apps then its product design and you will need to understand UX for product design. (e.g: app user flows, usability etc ). Both require visual design, but both have very different approaches to creating the user experience.

[BrandTechnica]

I think there is a lot of incorrect information out there about it. User Experience is a term created by Donald Norman in 1993. It's as simple as the words suggest, it's the study of how a user experiences anything from a product, service or system. It's sole purpose is to research and improve the experience of the user by improving the "interface."

It gained popularity in the game industry, as people who design the in game menus (aka interface) needed a name/title for the job. The last few years the term has become popular for anything that has a "user interface" or "user experience." In our digital world it's hard to neglect these things, and I think it's important to use those terms (correctly). As our digital world keeps growing even to a point where we're talking about a "metaverse" those terms are definitely here to stay.

Only the people that actually research user experience and/or design user interfaces, should be called UI/UX designers. Yes these people can also be product designers or web designers, game desginers/developers, graphic designers, ... Even special FX designers, yep movies with a user interface and experience exist.

So in my opinion it's not so useless as it seems. 😉

[aaronruiz]

This is a very helpful distinction. The importance of consensus on terminology is astounding. Thanks so much for this one, Ran 🙌🏼

[dankierson]

Separating UX from UI (expressed in simple language, of course) is enough for me !
I get your point about how different app and site UX/UIs are. But then the basic skill-set (graphical communication) is the same even though people usually focus on one or another of these.

[bogyayb]

💻 I think we are all just digital designers.

2️⃣ A digital product have 2 phases usually. First, concept, research, understanding what we and the users want. Second, the visual phase.

❌ Website, mobile app, tablet app, desktop app, web app on desktop, web app on mobile, web app on tablet, website on mobile, etc etc etc... It doesnt matter, all just INTERACTIVE PIXELS ON A SCREEN.

🌐 Yes, a website usually just too simple, you dont have to create a concept because you can find tons of concept for what you want. You can just focus on the second phase, the visuals.

📱 An App maybe need more time for concept creation, research and you can focus less on the visuals because there is a UI kit what you have to use.

❓Just ask the question, what if??
What if a website is unique and you have to create a concept and do a research?? A web designer cant do that?? What if an App dont have all types of visual components in the UI kit, you cant create a new one, beacuse you are just a ux designer?

💼 I think, at the end of the day, all of you are creating INTERACTIVE PIXELS what people can use on a screen, so basicaly all of you are a DIGITAL DESIGNER! So I think, a digital designer should be able to design a website, app, icon setts and do research and user tests! Of course, you can focus only just on 1 of them, and you can find a job where most of the tine you can just do what you wanted. But on the 10-40% of the time you have to do the others from the list, and you have to do it well, because you are a digital designer, everyone expecting you to create digital interactive pixels.

[QuackerJack]

In Germany, most Companies are looking for a "Eierlegende Wollmilchsau" :)

[teresagay]

wondering if there was a gloss-over when it came to UX design in the content of the video. I think that UX Design and UI/Visual Design are embedded within Product design. It is correct to separate UX and UI design, but wrong (I believe) to relegate UX design to product design.UX is a very technical role that requires specific skills most product designers don't apply when doing work. UX designers create technical artefacts and most often do a lottt of research in order to make design decisions. Not the EXACT same as product designers who do things on a larger scale as they need to take the business and other disciplinary functions into consideration as they design. The differences are slight, but actually very important.

[chestifie]

I've worked with companies that tried for force product designers to split into UI/UX teams, these where very senior Product Designers who focussed primarily on the companies apps. It did not go well for the company with the turn over rate exploding as a result. I have been a web designer, jnr to senior, then UI focused, and eventually evolved through job choice into the product design role, which I feel given my past is the most wholistic end to end version of a designer. I agree with your assesment.

[abgy]

I quit a job when a a new manager came in and wanted everyone to be a "product designer." It pissed me off no end. I was a UX Designer and UX Researcher, but I was "standing in" as a UI designer because the previous Senior person left before they were pushed out. I was outraged when someone new wanted to convert me to doing more UI design. I had no interest in doing this. Alas Product Design = UI design. Product design leans so much to UI Design it is untrue. If you're a product designer you will be doing UI end of. I keep away from those roles. I only go for UX Research and UX Design. The problem with Product design is that it will always lean to UI. A UX designer is expected to be that bridge with tech and business in a way that UI Design never will be.

[riaanamclean]

Thank you so much for this video. To me a product designer is a replacement to a business analyst almost. In my current situation I am a product specialist also a business analyst, also I studied psychology and I did ux/ui diploma . So I have 2 degrees and 1 diploma to have a job that pays well but is a mixture of all the skills. Also I must have a very strong domain knowledge which only comes with actually working in the area for at least 5 years.