People often get confused between UI and UX. You will find people using both terms interchangeably. Well, both are related, but not the same.
User interface (UI) design is about actual interfaces with which users engage, while user experience (UX) design is about the user’s journey when using the product or service. The UI designer focuses on the look of the app or web, while the UX designer focuses on functionality.
A website or product may have an appealing interface but serve a poor experience. In this case, UX needs improvement. Including too many beautiful visuals won’t improve user experience. For a UX designer, it’s imperative to understand the user’s journey. In this post, we will compare both and help you understand which one’s more important.
What is UI Design?
As the name suggests, user interface (UI) design is all about the web or app’s look, design, and feel. UI and UX are related. The UI designer works closely with the UX designer and creates an interface and design which satisfies the user experience.
UI designer focuses on making the product visually appealing and attractive. UI design focuses on three main aspects: the product’s interactivity, visual design, and information architecture.
- Interactivity - This includes how various user interface elements will function on a specific action. For example, what interface it will display when clicking a particular button.
- Visual design - Not so appealing user interface can make it boring for the users. It includes typography, color, graphics, logos, images, and other visual elements. Visual design improves user-friendliness and encourages users to spend more time on your product.
- Information architecture - Information architecture or IA includes how user interface content will be organized.
UI design isn’t just about adding appealing visuals. For the best results, the UI designer must focus on all UI design principles, such as consistency, efficiency, accessibility, flexibility, familiarity, and feedback.
Also Read: 7 Basic Principles of UI Design
What is UX Design?
User experience or UX design, on the other hand, is less about look and feel, and more about functionality. The main focus of a UX designer is to make sure the product provides the best experience to users.
UX design plays a crucial role. No matter how appealing visual elements you add to the product, if it fails to provide a quality user experience, it’s not worth it. The user designer has to consider the entire journey, starting from acquiring the user to the final buying.
Some of the crucial UX design principles are:
- User comes first
- Usability testing
- Accessibility testing
- Visual hierarchy
- Consistency
- Context
- Typography
UX designers think from the user’s perspective. They make sure users get meaningful and relevant experiences when using the product. Any issue in UX design can result in increased bounce rates, low average session duration, low conversions, etc.
Why UX is More Important Than UI?
First of all, UI is part of UX. No matter how much time, money, and resources you have spent on user interface design, without proper focus on UX, you will have dissatisfied customers.
UX is more important than UI because it keeps the user in the center. It ensures the user has no dissatisfaction throughout the journey. UX should be focused on every stage where the user interacts with the product.
Now, that doesn’t mean UI is not important at all and it can be neglected. Both UI and UX design go hand in hand. Neglecting user interface design means your product’s design and layout won’t be appealing and attractive. And, neglecting UX means your product lacks essential functionality.
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