Member-only story
Process: industrial design vs. UX design
I have a degree in Industrial Design (ID) but I switched my focus a year and a half ago to User Experience Design (UX). Now that I have a better understanding of UX and still have ID fresh on my mind I wanted to break down how the design processes compare.
While both design processes are very similar, there is a clear distinction between the way companies design physical products vs. digital products. Both processes have influenced the way I design today and I hope that when compared, it will influence your work as well.
🚨Warning: These are my opinions from my experiences and are not defined processes. There are overlaps in these fields which I won’t get into in this article.
Overview
Whether you’re an Industrial Design or UX Designer there are 4 high-level steps you’re going to take when you want to design something. Those 4 steps are Research, Sketching, Prototyping, and Development.
Each specialty comes with a variety of processes depending on the project at hand, but for this article, I’m going to take a high-level approach to compare each discipline during each one of these 4 phases.
🔎 Research
Competitive Research
ID & UX: Competitive research is done before starting a project to make sure you are doing something that is either done in a better way than your competitors or unique to the market. This can give you a base knowledge of the market, as well as a list of features you will be competing against.
Market Research
ID & UX: Market research should be done before starting to design because you need to learn if there is room in the market for your product to fit. If, for example, you made a fidget spinner last year you’re less likely to make money because the market was flooded with other companies doing the same thing.
User Research
ID & UX: This initial research should be done to learn about the pain points of your users. If you’re designing a yoga mat or a yoga app, you need to talk to people who do yoga to learn what they would want in an improved version of what’s on the market.
