If you are considering digital product design as a career option, the question remains: Is UX design a good career choice? Will it be viable after 10, 20, or 30 years?
Well, if you have a keen interest in understanding user behavior, solving problems creatively, and shaping the digital world, a career in UX design will be a fulfilling professional journey for you.
Here we’ll explore the different aspects of UX design and delve into why it is considered a promising and rewarding career path.
What is UX Design?
User experience or UX design is all about making things easier and enjoyable for the users of a digital solution. Think about your favorite app or website. You enjoy using and spending time on it because the UX designers have made it an amazing experience for you.
They’ve added features and elements that are easy to find and navigate. So, next time you use that app or website, thank the UX designers for making it so much fun for you.
UX design is more like architecture but in a digital world. The designers are architects who plan, create layouts, and finally build the foundation for a functional app or website. They do all of this by keeping our needs in mind. That’s why it’s called user experience.
Is UX Design a Good Career?
In short, yes. But you don’t have to take our answer for granted. Look at your local job listings or LinkedIn feed. The increasing demand and popularity, job security and future growth, requirement of multidisciplinary soft skills instead of a hard-earned degree and a handsome salary package – all of this has made UX design one of the most lucrative career options over the past decade.
If you’re looking for an opportunity in the tech industry, you should either try your hand in web development or UX design. At least, that’s what most tech enthusiasts do nowadays. Even in 2023, UX design is an incredibly demandable and rewarding sector. So, if you want a competitive salary and just as fulfilling working experiences at the same time, UX design is for you.
Reasons You Should Pursue UX Design
Now, we’re going to break down some of the most compelling reasons you should become a professional UX designer.
1. Always in Demand
In July, 2022, Glassdoor placed UX design in 24th position in their top 50 list of best job openings of the year. And nothing changed in 2023 as well.
Since people prefer mobile-friendly websites/apps with quick loading speed, you can tell why companies will never run out of the need for UX designers.
Billions of websites are active today on the world wide web. All of them need maintenance and user-friendly applications that only UX designers can help with. The massive growth of tech industries indicates that this demand is not going down any time soon.
Even the non-tech industries like education, finance, government, non-profits, healthcare and media need UX expertise for their product design.
So, why shouldn’t you go for something that will always need your input?
2. Opportunity to Apply Creativity & Logic
You’ve got a creative juice flowing but don’t know how to channel it! How can you balance between logic and aesthetics in a real-life situation? Look no further because the UX role is just the right fit for you.
Contrary to popular belief, the minimal requirement to become a UX designer is not to have a deep knowledge of the design tools like Figma, Sketch or Adobe XD. For a design to come to life, you’ll have to focus on its practical aspect.
Think about your smartphone. The primary goal of the phone is to help you communicate easily. But is it the only feature you look at when you buy one? Don’t you think about how beautiful it would look in front of your friends or how smoothly your favorite gaming apps would run on it? Yes, you do. Everybody does.
The reason is that aesthetics matters. By aesthetics, we don’t mean the visuals of it only but the usability also. You’ll have to be logical to find out the users’ needs and insert the right features in the product so they feel comfortable navigating through your design.
At the same time, you’ll have to keep that creative juice flowing to give your brainchild a unique presence. This is how iPhones have outperformed other similar smartphone technologies for years in the market.
So, simply think out of the box but don’t forget to be reasonable as well!
3. Opportunity to Make an Impact
If you have the mindset of giving back to your community or the world as a whole, UX should be your choice.
Adding a simple button on a website may seem trivial from the outside but every action like this adds up to something significant at the end of the day. How?
Well, the secret lies in the name itself – User Experience. UX deals with the behavioral patterns of users and makes design decisions based on those patterns. How many businesses can you name that put their customers first like this? This is an engaging job where you get to collect data – sometimes personally from people of all ages and classes, know them and their preferences, and work hard to improve your product so they can have a soothing experience.
You need to be critical here as well. One of the main goals of UX design is to create an all-inclusive platform for people from all walks of life. Digital product users can range from little children to senior citizens. You should make sure all of them receive equal attention when you create your designs for them.
For example, if your site is visited by or aimed at elderly people, you’ll have to design accordingly. You should use bigger fonts to help them see easily and keep the interface simple and easy to navigate.
The icons on the menu should be big enough to draw attention. The content should also be to the point. Older people don’t have a long attention span. Just give them the information they’re looking for.
The healthcare industry is getting digitized rapidly and UX designers can contribute here as well. As a designer, you can make it easy for patients to get appointments and prescriptions and help them get familiar with cutting-edge medical devices and updated treatment information.
UX design is not only about benefiting users either. Think of your company as a family and yourself as one of the members. Your contribution only improves your family conditions, right? In this case, your brand. Why wouldn’t you want that?
It’s not all about money after all. If you want a more fulfilling reward from your employment, know that UX will give you this wholesome opportunity.
4. Above-Average Pay Grade
Although the demand for UX designers is sky high, there is a shortage of skilled designers in the job market. As a result, employers are now offering some of the highest entry-level salaries for UX designers.
In fact, the average UX designer salary has already exceeded the national salary average in the USA ($53,490 per year) in 2023.
Of course, like any other performance-based system, you have to compete for your salary with time and contribution. Once you’re promoted to a senior UX designer, you’ll have a handsome amount in your pocket and a prestigious employment status to boast of.
The Glassdoor report above shows that the median salary for a UX designer in the USA is $97, 047. The salary scheme is satisfactory in other parts of the world as well. For example, in Australia, a UX designer earns A$90,422.
So, if you want to make good money and be creative at the same time, what better career can you think of other than UX design?
5. Low Barrier in Job Entry
For newcomers, UX design as a career provides a very welcoming and engaging environment. While a formal degree in design can help you land the job easily, it’s not essential at all. If your background doesn’t match with the job description, you will still have a great chance to nail the job with your skill and professionalism.
We all know that UX design does depend on creativity and analytical abilities but it requires far more than that to operate in the real world. You should have some basic knowledge of psychology to understand user experience better, sociology to predict a collective user behavior, and business and marketing to boost its sales.
It may sound odd but if you’ve been practicing as a psychologist for a long time, you can still make the switch to UX because you have already mastered communicating with people and understanding their needs.
This is the true definition of multidisciplinary. UX is not limited to tech expertise only. Even if you haven’t graduated from a tech-related discipline, you can still leave your legacy.
There’s a common misconception about UX designers that they have to be expert in using all the UX tools available.
First of all, these design tools are always evolving. You can’t possibly master all the tools in this sector and you shouldn’t invest too much time because some of the fundamental UX principles, such as usability testing and user interviews, don’t even require any use of tools.
As said before, your education background doesn’t matter much if you want to build a career in UX design. Yes, you’ll need a specific set of skills but your background won’t stand as a barrier in that case. Online resources out there are limitless too – paid or free courses, YouTube tutorials, and webinars – you name it! So, if you’re starting fresh, the door into UX design is wide open.
6. Easier to Switch Careers
Why become a UX designer? You can switch your career to UX design very easily because of the flexibility it offers. For example, if you have graphic designing skills, you’re definitely familiar with prototyping, wireframing. and stuff like that, right?
Guess what? In UX design, they’ll come handy alongside your creative input almost every step of the way.
Similarly, if you’re a decent web designer or a software developer, you already know a lot about the multidisciplinary aspects in a workplace and so you’ll fit right in with your problem-solving capabilities.
The same is true if you’re not from the tech industry as well. For instance, if you are a marketing professional or a business manager, you can engage in user experience by connecting with the audience, understanding their psychology, and making decisions based on their behaviors.
Sometimes, you need to fill in the big-picture roles in the design business. Of course, you’ll need to learn the basics first. Then you can have a team to perform according to the user needs, which is at the core of UX design.
Don’t forget about the plenty of online resources available e.g. courses and tutorials that will allow you to master UX on your own at your own pace. After you’ve gotten the basics right, there’s always a chance to learn on the job. Your practical experience from conducting personal and collective projects or even from volunteer work, can help you go a long way in this industry.
You should also invest time in networking with other professionals in the field, gaining soft skills, and staying updated with the latest developments and trends in the industry. In UX design, your willpower and persistence matters the most for progress.
7. Impressive Career Growth
You know why UX design is a good career – the field of UX design is always expanding. With expansion comes varied specialized roles. If you are experienced enough, you’ll be able to leverage your skills and eventually branch off to more specific roles.
Here are some of the most common UX job titles you’ll find:
- UX Designer
- UX Researcher
- UX Architect
- Information Architect
- Usability Tester
- UX Analyst
- Content Strategist
- User Researcher
- Interaction Designer
- UX Engineer
- Product Designer
- UX Product Manager
- Experience Designer
- Visual Designer
- Service Designer
- UX Strategist
UX designers themselves have opportunities to get promoted to more senior roles like Senior UX designer up to the C-suite level jobs like UX Director and Vice President of User Experience.
To sum up, whether you choose to work for a promotion to higher positions or switch to other specialized UX roles depending on your skills and interests, the possibilities are endless.
8. Flexibility to Work Remotely
After the pandemic (COVID-19) hit, businesses began focusing on saving their precious time and resources by shifting to virtual workspaces. Since then, many companies have been facilitating remote and hybrid working options to draw in more candidates who feel comfortable that way.
If you think about it, UX design doesn’t have to take place in an office setting. All you need is a computer with the design tools installed, a stable internet connection, pen and paper for sketching ideas, and a communication medium to exchange instructions and information.
So, it’s entirely possible to work from home if you’re a UX designer, especially if you’re a freelancer or an independent worker.
9. Guaranteed Job Security
Is ux design a good career? Well, there’s a rumor going on that UX design is dying with time. Don’t listen to that because without UX, web design or digital product design will fail miserably.
To understand what we mean, take smartphones again as an example. 20 years ago, we didn’t have them. But the interaction design was always there for the computer users.
Once smartphones came onto the scene, UX design became a prominent discipline and it still is. Can you see that the principle stayed the same even 20 years later, which is ensuring the users continue to have a wonderful experience with their devices?
In fact, user experience or UX is a concept that will stay with us as long as the tech industries keep growing. Maybe, we won’t have the name of UX anymore, but the idea and its necessity will always be there.
10. Access to Available Resources
We’ve talked about the availability of resources for you to learn UX online. We should add that they are also easily accessible.
There are both free and certificate courses online. Some of them even offer practical lessons to help with your learning. YouTube can be a great free source as well.
Since there’s no academic course on UX/UI design, it would be more effective if you can attend different seminars and sessions and learn directly from the design experts themselves.
How do I Decide if UX Design is Right for Me?
We’ve shown you the sunny side of UX design so far to let you know that you have a potential to do well in this field. But none of this matters if you aren’t that thrilled about it. The resources will always be there, so will be the lucrative salary. But unless you enjoy your job yourself, everything will feel forced and out-of-place.
You have to ask yourself the right questions. It’s a career you’re talking about. So, calm down and give yourself enough time to figure out what you really want.
Do you want recognition for your creativity? Are you looking for ways to improve people’s lives with your skillset? Are you good at problem-solving? Can you read people’s minds well enough to adjust your tactics accordingly? Do you have a keen eye for design and design thinking? Can you push yourself through continuous learning?
If most of these answers are yes, you can definitely make a name for yourself in UX design.
Look into your options and find out which UX role aligns with your career goals. Salary is definitely an incentive but your mindset going into the job is the most important.
When You Shouldn’t Pursue UX Design
We listed many reasons why you should go for UX design as your career. But there are just as many reasons not to take it as well. Let’s talk about them for a while-
Many job candidates want to try UX design just because it’s in the trend now. You can show off, make good money, and get a social standing among your peers but if you’re not into UX 100%, then this shouldn’t be your choice.
Your employer expects total dedication from you when he hires you for the job. If you’re not genuinely captivated by the beauty of UX design, you won’t be able to give it your best shot. As a result, the whole team will suffer from your lack of respect for the design process.
If you think UX is nothing more than web design, you shouldn’t think about choosing UX design as a career at all. You need to be able to differentiate between the two before pursuing any of them as a career.
Simply put, website design is about how a site looks whereas UX design is about how that website works. Web designers add colors and other stuff to the website and UX designers ensure that the site is user-friendly and easy to navigate.
Besides, web design is a part of marketing design while UX actually belongs to product design.
Similarly, graphics design skills don’t automatically make you eligible to be a UX designer. Without a command over user engagement, you can’t expect to do anything meaningful in your job. So, don’t go applying for a UX design job thinking it’s graphics design. Make sense of the differences between the two.
Money drives a lot of people into a lot of businesses that they probably don’t even want to be in. It’s true and there isn’t anything wrong with that necessarily. After all, jobs are there to put food on our table.
However, UX design is a creative job and ideally, creative people have to work incredibly hard before they make ends meet. Take a garage band or an indie actor for an example. But UX is paying you one of the most sizable salaries in the world today for your creativity in front of a computer screen. If you don’t at least respect that, then your heart won’t be in your work. Consequently, you’ll produce some sloppy results benefitting nobody and possibly depriving someone who could’ve done far better in your position.
Some people think UX is exclusive to product design. But that’s not the case. While product design may be its primary application, UX is widely practiced in marketing industries as well.
This misconception leads you to make some wrong choices. For example, you’ll choose UX design thinking it’s a design industry but maybe it’s marketing. Another case may be that you’ll choose product design just for the sake of it; not understanding the rewarding aspects of the business.
So, try to eliminate such wrong ideas and get to know product design as a whole before choosing your career there.
All in all, the point is getting to feel UX as a career you’ll probably spend the rest of your life on. UX gives you the chance to impact lives and help humanity in this world of digitalization. Acknowledge all of these before making the final decision.
The Future of UX Design in the Face of AI
Is UX design a good career? Yes for now. But with Artificial Intelligence making waves in the different industries around the world, this is a matter of concern for this discipline as well. As a UX designer, will you have to face the threat of losing your job because of automation?
We may not be able to predict the future but with how things are going, we can safely say that UX can’t be automated for a long time to come.
Think of AI generated images and layouts. They can be clean and attractive but they miss the accuracy by a long margin. AI can’t produce a descriptive design that doesn’t have any flaws at all.
However, with more research and improvements, it’ll probably create something with minimal errors. But the timeframe for that seems eternal.
In fact, even if it does generate some flawless design, it still can’t take over UX simply because UX is more than the visuals. It’s about user research and ensuring the overall quality experience that the site can offer to its users. It invokes a feeling in the human mind- particularly the users, that can’t be replicated by machines.
The manual and custom labors that go into a UX design such as research, thinking, design, interviews, constant updates and changes- are unreal! AI can bring an idea to life, but to generate that idea, it’ll always be dependent on a UX designer.
All of these are not to say that AI is useless here. If AI can manage the design aspect of UX at least, it will free up the UX designers to get more creative and productive with an increased focus on user research.
Key Takeaways & Getting Started
We hope that by now, you’ve figured out whether you’re the right man for the UX job or not. If not, don’t worry. Take your time and research more. See if the idea of creativity, meaning and growth, all of which are packaged into one job, makes sense for you as a career.
If you’ve finally chosen the UX designer career path, it’s time for you to work on the basics of UX at first. Read a book on design thinking, attend seminars or enroll in courses offered online. After you’re confident about what you’re doing, you can start applying for UX positions and hopefully score a job! Good luck!
