12 UX Design Tools to know about

No designer is expected to understand how to use all these tools. We recommend new designers to think about the type of design work they are doing and allocate some time to explore each tool. Become familiar with each of their strengths and weaknesses and decide on 1-2 tools to focus on. At the end of the day, the tool does not make the designer! Design is a process and a way of thinking/feeling, first and foremost. Tools are there to make certain parts of the process more efficient and professional.

UXPin
UXPin allows designers to smoothly transition between each and every stage in the design process, all in the same document. Paper sketches, wireframes, mockups, prototypes and any unique combination of these you can think of. Mac/Windows. Free Trial (29$/mo for 25 projects | 49$/mo for 50 projects). NB: Students who enroll in one of our projects will receive 3-months free subscription to UXPin.

Sketch
Sketch Is a professional design tool for Mac that utilizes a fully vector-based workflow which helps you design interfaces quickly and intuitively. Mac. Free 30 days trial, buy for $ 99.

Adobe XD
Adobe XD is focused around two tabs: Design, and Prototype. The Design tab features simple vector and text tools, and is used for creating your design. The Prototype tab is for previewing, and sharing your design. With Adobe, you can build high-fidelity prototypes — also on a pc. Mac/Windows.  Free.

Invision
This is a Webby product that gives designers the freedom to design, review, test and share the results with developers and other team members. Invision integrates with Sketch, also project collaboration features, which allow all users to give feedback, take notes and see the product changes in real time. Mac/Windows . Free for 1 project (15$/mo for 3 projects).

Axure RP
The web and user experience designers use it to make click-through wireframes, user flows and sitemaps as well as interactive prototypes. It allows you to add interactions, create Master Pages and use ready-made components from Widget libraries. Mac/Windows Users.  Free Trial (29$/mo for 1 user | 49$/mo for teams).

Invision studio
This tool is going to help us designer create better Team communication, better Wireframes and high end designs, rapid prototypes with micro interactions, and super efficient design hands off to development. FREE.

Zeplin
Working with Sketch becomes really great when using it with plugins. This plugin is one of the most useful ones. It helps developers easily check the sizes, fonts, colors and dimensions of your interface. Only for Mac. Free for 1 project (17$/mo for 3 projects | 26$/mo for 12 projects).

Balsamiq
Balsamiq is a graphical tool created to draw user interfaces, web sites, desktop and mobile applications. It makes it easy to drag and position elements. Mac/Windows.  89$ for single license.

Flinto
Flinto allows designers to create interactive prototypes for the mobile, desktop or any other web application. Enables us to create complex micro-interactions on top of your layers exported from sketch. Mac/Windows. Buy for 99$. Free Trail (20$/mo for unlimited projects).

RapidUI
This new platform transforms Photoshop files into live sites without the need to write code. Drag and drop your PSD file into its dashboard and within minutes the psd transforms into HTML and CSS. Within the platform, you can make your designs fully interactive — bringing to life sliders, videos, maps, buttons, and whatever else you could want with just a few clicks. Mac/Windows.   Free.

Principle
With Principle you can easily design interactive user interfaces. Whether you’re designing the flow of a multi-screen app, or new interactions and animations, this allows you to create designs that look and feel amazing. Only for Mac. Free Trial (buy for 129$).

Proto.io
Proto.io is a surprisingly powerful web app; it has many functions. But because everything works by drag-and-drop, clicking buttons and selecting values from lists, it can be a bit overwhelming sometimes to find the setting you need. Mac/Windows. Free trial.