Everything you need to know about becoming a UX designer

Anyone who has ever navigated a website, bought something online or downloaded an app has reaped the benefits of user experience, or UX, design work. A UX designer’s job is to curate a user experience within a digital space that is functional, meaningful, and desirable.

What does a UX designer do?

UX is the experience that a user has when interacting with a product. For example, is a website confusing to navigate or easy to use? Do prompts within an app make sense for the user? 

The job of a UX designer is to answer these questions and create an experience for users that is as seamless and makes as most sense as possible. They walk a fine line between meeting the needs of consumers and helping a business flourish and grow. 

Much like a web designer’s work is centered around the nuts and bolts of graphic design work to create the look of a digital site, a UX designer is responsible for establishing the processes to curate the feel of a site or app. Their goal is typically to improve user satisfaction by creating the most desirable interaction possible.

The job of a UX designer focuses on product development, overall functionality, and ease of use to maintain a meaningful experience for users. They also seek opportunities for business growth and implement branding and marketing strategies such as market research, design, and functionality tests to help a site or app’s business succeed and grow. 

Each UX designer does their job differently depending on the needs of their company. Here are just a few examples of tasks that a UX designer may encounter in a day’s work:

• Conduct product research by testing their products with focus groups.
• Complete surveys or interviews with users.
• Collect and analyze data pertaining to a particular part of the UX.
• Create personas (fictitious user profiles) to demonstrate key user groups and their needs.
• Map the information architecture of a website, app, or product experience.
• Create design deliverables called wireframes to represent each step a user might take during app or website interaction.

How do you become a UX designer?

Many UX designers get their start in UX boot camps, online training, and certification programs instead of with a traditional undergraduate degree. In fact, there are very few degree programs specifically tailored to train UX designers. 

UX designers often start out in related fields with degrees in graphic design, digital marketing, or software development before making a career change into the UX design space.

While a college degree is helpful when it comes to landing a job in UX design (and the college itself is certainly a great networking tool) it isn’t always necessary.

Once a person has learned the fundamentals of UX design and how to use the appropriate design and research tools — whether through a university or otherwise — they can begin to seek work independently and start working on projects to build a portfolio of work. 

With an established portfolio to present to prospective employers, a UX designer can showcase their hard skills and potentially land an interview for a UX design job even without a degree. They leverage their experience and work their way up instead of leaning on a degree to land a role in UX design.

What skills do you need to become a UX designer?

Because user experience focuses on how people interact with digital media such as apps, websites, and other digital products, the majority of a UX designer’s work is done on a computer, making computer skills essential. Especially in the phases of the design process that involve wireframing and prototyping, UX designers will need to know how to use software like Sketch, Adobe XD, and Illustrator. 

UX designers should be able to think creatively and have a keen eye, but also understand the elements of UX design on a technical level. Research, data collection, and analytical skills are also a necessary part of a UX designer’s job. Additionally, project management skills, as well as team management strategies are often helpful for UX designers.

UX designers typically work in teams at some point in the design process, and at a minimum they will need to be able to interact with users during the research phase and with business owners/operators to implement their design. This means that UX designers should possess collaboration skills and the ability to communicate effectively.

What is the average salary for a UX designer?

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) includes UX designers in their salary data for web developers and digital interface designers, who made an average annual salary of $85,490 in 2020. However, a UX designer can make much more depending on their level of experience and where they choose to work. 

The average salary for a UX designer in 2021 ranges from $77,203 to $106,989, according to research from Salary.com. The highest-paid UX designers reside in states with higher costs of living like California and New Jersey. 

What is the typical career path for a UX designer?

Any business, company, or entity with a website or an app can benefit from the expertise of a UX designer. However, businesses with a product or service to sell will find that hiring a UX designer is essential to success. 

A UX designer can choose to specialize in one specific type of industry or field. For example, where one UX designer may work solely for beauty brands to design apps that sell makeup and hair care products, another might choose to work on websites where industrial maintenance workers place orders for specialized machinery parts. 

Some UX designers choose to work for small start-up companies, which means they may be tasked with handling every aspect of the user experience themselves. This is also often the case for UX designers who choose to work on a freelance basis as an independent contractor rather than as an employee.

When working for a larger corporation, the job of UX design is often broken down into smaller specialty tasks. People looking for UX designer jobs may see listings for things like “UX research specialist” or “information architect” that just focus on one phase of UX design.

To advance in a UX design career, it is important for a UX designer to continue to keep up with the latest technologies. This might mean learning new skills like animation or coding to help set their work apart from less experienced designers. 

Where to find UX designer jobs?

The BLS predicts that the job market for UX designers will grow faster than the average for all other occupations at a rate of approximately 8% over the next decade. This is great news for future UX designers looking to get into a growing field. 

Find current job postings for UX designers on Ladders now.