What is UI Design? Our complete guide!

Find out everything you need to know about UI design (user interface)!

UI design or User Interface is the process of designing the look, feel and interactivity of a digital product. This could, for example, be a website, a mobile application or an online shop. We're talking here about all the graphic elements that will enable web users to interact on a website. Icons, colours, typography, navigation buttons - UI Design encompasses everything to do with the graphic design of an interface. It is important to note that UI design is not the same thing as UX design, although the two are absolutely complementary. User interface design is a broad field that requires the mastery of a wide range of technical skills. This guide is a good starting point for anyone interested in the subject!

What is UI design?

The user interface is the point of interaction between humans and computers. In other words, it's the process of designing the appearance of a website and the way in which people interact with it. Imagine you are using the Fyll for a home delivery of gasoline. The different screens you navigate, the buttons you click, and the forms you fill out are all part of the user interface.

A user interface is made up of the following elements:

• Input controls: These are interactive elements that allow a user to enter information. These can be check boxes, buttons, text fields, and drop-down lists.
• Navigation elements: They help the user navigate the interface in order to accomplish the desired task. This includes elements such as search boxes, sliders, and hamburger menus.
• Informational components: Anything that refers to useful information for visitors such as the appearance of notifications or progress bars.
• Containers: Containers are used to group content into meaningful sections. Itself contains various elements, while maintaining a reasonable maximum width depending on the user's screen size. For example, it could be an accordion menu that allows content to be hidden or not as needed.

UI design takes into account all of these elements and the way they work together to provide interfaces with a simple and visually pleasing navigation path.

The design of the user interface covers :

• Interactivity: How the user interface and its various elements behave and function? What happens when a user clicks on this particular button? 
• Visual design: the presentation of the interface with choices of elements such as color, typography, imagery and graphics, logos, icon design and spacing.
• Information architecture: how the user interface content was prioritized.

A well-designed user interface is essential to guarantee a good user experience, and therefore to meet the requirements of UX design. Now that we have defined UI design, let's analyze the difference with UX design and how these two techniques work together.

The 6 fundamental principles of UI design

There are certain principles that guide the user interface design process. These include:

Consistency

The most enjoyable and user-friendly interfaces are those that are consistent. Interface designers should strive for visual consistency by ensuring that fonts, colors, buttons, and icons are consistent throughout the product. This is simply a matter of following the graphic charter. But also functional consistency, by ensuring that certain elements represent the same function or action in all contexts. The more consistent the user interface, the easier it is for the user to get to grips with it.

A friendly user interface

This is how a user expects a particular interface to work. We all spend time on the web, and with experience, we associate certain actions with certain elements. For example, we automatically scroll up to find the navigation menu. So, to make an interface comfortable to use, it needs to be as familiar as possible.

Feedback

As the user moves through the interface, it is essential to provide feedback. Letting them know whether or not they have achieved their goal is a real sign that you care about them and that the interface is built specifically to help them. This can be provided visually, such as a checkmark appearing on the screen to let the user know that the desired action has been completed, or through a clear message. For example, if their shopping cart checkout didn’t work, a message could appear telling them to try again.

Flexibility

When designing an interface, it's important to allow for flexibility in how users can accomplish certain tasks. Ultimately, your user interface should be consistent while still allowing for some degree of customization based on the user.

Efficiency

While new users may need more guidance, more experienced users should have access to shortcuts that allow them to speed up actions they perform frequently.

Accessibility

User interface designers are responsible for creating interfaces that are accessible to all users. This includes ensuring sufficient contrast between text and the background on which it is placed, ensuring that interactive elements such as links and buttons are easy to identify, allowing enough space around buttons and touchpoints, and creating designs for windows of different sizes.

What is the difference between UX and UI design?

The design of theuser experience (UX) and user interface (UI) design are complementary, but equally distinct. Take this example: Perle-rare.ch is an online fair trade fashion boutique for all women. The company wanted to open a physical shop and, for its overall structure, first called in an architect. The architect will start by asking the questions of who, what and what needs to be built. The architect then organises the structure of the shop, taking into account the layout of the different rooms and how the employees will move around. Once the plans have been drawn up, the interior designer takes charge of all the visual aspects of the offices. This includes furnishings, lighting, choice of materials, etc. When designing a website or application, UX designers are the architects and UI designers are the interior designers. UX design takes into account the whole user experience, focusing on the needs, goals and pain points of target users. The aim of UX design is to create products and experiences that are easy, effective and enjoyable for the web user. And that will also enable the site owner to achieve their objectives quickly. Put simply, UI focuses on the visual and interactive elements that a person uses to interact with a digital product, while UX deals with the overall user experience. What do users see when they use a digital product and what are the touch points they encounter? How does the visual aspect of the interface help them to navigate and carry out certain tasks? Which elements need to go where? Does the design reflect the brand? You'll soon realise that without a quality user interface, the user experience will be severely impacted. Although UI and UX design don't go without each other, one of the main differences between UX and UI is that UI design is only concerned with digital interfaces, whereas UX design can ultimately be applied to anything, not just websites and applications. Anything that can be experienced can be designed, whether it's opening an account at your local bank or ordering something online. Because UX design is all about satisfying the web user by offering them a unique experience that meets their needs. UX and UI call on different skills, tools and processes, but both are concerned with accessibility and creating a pleasant experience for the user.

The user interface design process

Like interior designers, user interface designers come into play after the product has been designed. Here are some key stages in the user interface creation process:

1 - Understanding the context

It is imperative to study the target audience for whom we are designing the interface. Thus, it is a question of studying the project specifications in detail to understand its objective and the way in which the target acts.

2 - Analysing the competition

Observing the competition is necessary to understand what your target expects when interacting with an interface. This makes it possible to design a product that will be familiar to them and therefore easier to use.

3 - Designing the graphical elements of the user interface

Of course, a significant part of UI design is focused on graphic design. UI designers will design all of the individual screens that make up the user journey as well as the various elements that appear on those screens. This includes creating icons and buttons, selecting or creating images, making decisions about colors and typography, and designing animations and interactions.

4 - Creation of models and prototypes

At first, the mockups remain basic to determine the position of the various elements on the pages. Then, the designer moves on to developing prototypes in order to model the product in a real way. This makes it possible to make the elements clickable and thus to communicate not only the appearance of the product's user interface, but also its behavior when the user interacts with it.

5 - Now it's the web developers' turn!

Once the product UI is finalized, it’s up to the developers to turn the UI designer’s prototypes into a working product. It’s important to know that moving from prototypes to development isn’t always easy, as developers and other stakeholders may have feedback, requiring you to modify your designs.

Introduction to user interface design tools and software

UI designers use tools and software to help them create interfaces that are easy to use and interactive. At Geekworkers, we mainly work with: Adobe Suite : a complete vector-based user interface tool, the Adobe suite is used for basic mockups, up to animations and quality interactive prototypes. In the Adobe suite we find: Illustrator, InDesign, Photoshop or After Effect. figma Figma is a web-based interface creation tool designed for rapid, collaborative design. Like the Adobe suite, Figma is a vector graphics editor that will take you from idea to interactive prototype.

What skills are required to become a UI designer?

Are you interested in the profession of UI designer or are you looking for a qualified professional for your digital interface? Take a look at the skills required of a professional user interface designer. The most important skills in user interface design are as follows:

• Know how to design web pages and prototypes
• Knowledge of design principles such as typography and color theory.
• Master tools such as the Adobe suite or Figma
• Understanding UX design and its usefulness
• Knowledge of the principles of interaction design
• Knowledge and understanding of information prioritization

In addition to these skills, UI designers will also need to demonstrate:

• Creativity and attention to detail
• Of interest in creating accessible and inclusive design
• With a team spirit
• Ease in solving problems.

These are all skills that our experts possess! Geekworkers works with experienced UI designers who strive every day to refine their knowledge in the field to offer you a quality service! Want a guarantee? Take a look at our portfolio !