You’ll need a great online user interface design in order to make a top new site or app. These projects should follow a range of key design rules if you want the results you’re looking for. In this guide, the Page Flows team looks at online UIs and the tools that make them work.
How Online User Interface Design Helps Your Project
Whether it’s a site or a phone app, great UI design may be the path to success. This will help you guide users from one part of it to the next. Too many people still judge books by their covers. This means you need to make a great impression.
When you look at online UI design, the changing nature of the web is a big factor. These platforms and products cover a wide range of tech, for example. Each one you build will have to fit many screen sizes and specs.
There are some trends you can jump on to help your site thrive. You can make sure it has a dark mode for people browsing at night! A full phone version can help with this even more.
Functionality is still key. As is the case with any UI plan. The end goal of designers here is to make a product that works. A site must load, be easy to read, and get people to the right web page.
Online UI Design That Fits Your Audience
The “user” in “user interface” is at the heart of a design team’s plans. Digital products of all kinds must keep their users in mind at every stage, or their app/site will be hard to use and have a high bounce rate.
For sites that are already live, use Google Analytics to learn more about your viewers. This goes a lot deeper than just seeing who reads your posts. You’ll be able to see their full journey. And view a full range of great UX stats.
You can also see where users put their mouse via a mouse heatmap. This alone serves as great feedback for your design. It shows you and your team if viewers use your site how you want them to use it. If they don’t even go near a CTA, you have work to do.
What Tools and Software Are Commonly Used for Online User Interface Design?
Online and offline tools use many of the same apps in the design stage. Figma is popular for both sites and apps. Here are the tools you can use to build online UIs.
1. Figma
This is one of the biggest UI design platforms. Figma lets you make great layouts on any platform. It also has a big teamwork focus. Real-time edits in shared files make it easier for teams to stay on the same page.
2. Zeplin
Zeplin can help each designer and dev check the final site layouts. Some teams choose between this and Figma. Others find ways to blend the two. This helps you work with precise “frames” of a site near the end of a project.
3. Adobe Photoshop
Graphics are a key part of most web products. Your team will need a space to make vectors or other visual elements. Photoshop can help you out here. For example, it lets you turn photos into “slices” fit for a web page.
4. Hotjar
When it comes to testing the UI, Hotjar is a great choice. It shows you maps and records of each user journey. This helps you find pain points. The funnel feature also makes it easy to see where people fall off of this journey.
5. Miro
In any design phase, your team could find its best ideas. Miro can even help remote teams spread all over the world plan out their next sprint. If your firm or team is using Agile, it’ll have a lot to gain from Miro.
Online UI Design Courses
If you’re not part of a team working with UIs, it’s not too late to learn. There are a lot of courses you could join to start your UI journey. You can even sign up for full tutorials for any of the above apps. You’ll learn answers to all your questions, such as “How does responsive design impact online user interface design?”
Google has a range of UI and UX design programs. A credential from them is sure to help get your design career off the ground. You can find these on Udemy, Coursera, and other big e-learning sites.
Few courses focus on online UIs. This is because the key themes are broadly the same as offline UIs. You’ll still need to make a usable and intuitive interface. You can also take web dev courses alongside a UI one. This gives you a taste of the practical side and lets you see these UIs in context.
How Does Responsive Design Impact Online User Interface Design?
GoodFirms says 73% of web devs name responsiveness as a big issue. If your page lags or doesn’t look right on a phone, users might even close it. When your site wants to sell them something, this can be a huge dent in your earnings. The less they struggle with the web UI, the more likely they are to stay. Hence, users have to “respond” to your design.
Many users browse the web with their phones each day. You can’t leave them behind. You have to test your site on many phones and screen sizes. Fluid grid layouts can help you scale a photo or page to match many UI needs. Without this, your images may end up as eyesores on phone screens.
This is a good reason to keep your site simple. You’ll want it to load just as well on top PCs and new phones. Keeping phone users in mind can, in a way, stop designers from going too far. This helps your team avoid “big” effects that might just slow down the UI on any platform.
Nielsen and Molich’s 10 UI Rules
Knowing what tools and software people commonly use for online user interface design is only the start of your journey. You also must learn the 10 key rules of UI. These are for both online and offline projects.
Jakob Nielsen and Rolf Molich made these rules in the 1990s. And today’s apps still use them. Their tips are as follows:
- Visibility of system status: A user’s actions must change what they see. A web feature must alter the site’s UI in some way.
- Consistency: Your site’s graphics and terms should be clear. The same icon can’t stand for two features, for example.
- Recognition, not recall: Keep vital task info on-screen to help mental load. This makes the site much simpler for the user.
- Stopping errors: Your site should be usable. Test this before you launch it. Or your users might have problems with it.
- User control: Let users undo their actions on a whim. Make sure the site can’t lock them out of its main functions.
- General look: Build a great design but keep it functional. The UI should be able to guide people to other pages with ease.
- Help: Add buttons that come in handy when someone struggles with the site. This could be a prompt to open live chat.
- Clear errors: Your error alerts should set out the issue. This gives the user a chance to fix it themselves.
- Flexibility: Add hotkeys and other ways of using the site. This then lets the user enjoy a much better time browsing.
- Matching the real world: Your design should show pages and tools in an order that makes sense for the user.
The Differences Between Online and Offline Design
User interface design online and offline are similar. Good design is good design, after all. No matter the context. But online design is more likely to run into different devices and screen sizes. Few PC apps differ much from one Windows device to another. But you’ll still need a MacOS version.
Offline apps rely more on tech to load their UI. Online ones also need a good connection and a strong server. But you need to optimize both in their own ways so they run well. An online dev team could also change their UI more easily. Site users won’t need to download the update.
All kinds of apps take data from users. This help devs make them better. But it’s easier to get (and act on) this data when it all takes place on your site. If someone uses an app offline, it’s not as easy to send its stats to the devs.
Online UIs: Building a Web-Ready Design
You can’t neglect your site, even (and especially) if it’s mainly to sell your products. You’ll only get great results if you focus on your online user interface design.
Page Flows can help you find all the great site and app UI inspiration you’ll ever need. Take a look at our full user flows to find your site’s next feature.
