Become a UX Designer from Scratch
How This Course Will Help Your Career
What You’ll Learn
- An introduction to the main areas of user experience work, and why it matters
- The various UX roles in an organization
- How to create UX deliverables—with downloadable templates on creating personas, customer journey maps, prototypes, and many more
- How to go through the five stages of the design thinking process: empathize, define, ideate, prototype, and test
- How to start building a UX portfolio to land yourself a UX role
- The confidence to work with clients as a UX consultant
If you want to join one of the most rapidly growing fields in design, then look no further—this is the course for you. Through covering the ins and outs of the role, and throwing the doors wide open to the exciting world of UX design, “Become a UX Designer from Scratch” will take things right back to the beginning; it will offer a ‘hard reset’ in order to show you how to embark on a new career in UX design.
All products, whether digital or otherwise, must deliver a high-quality user experience (UX) or risk losing users to competitors—after all, a product is useless without its users! Products with good UX sell better; in fact, design-centric businesses have consistently outperformed the industry average by more than double, according to the Design Management Institute. Demand for UX designers is therefore higher than ever before; they are already prevalent in tech companies, and there is a growing need for them within other industries. UX impacts UI design, web design, and graphic design, and understanding the field of UX will improve your efforts within all of those areas.
Through this course, you will learn all the skills you need to assist companies in delivering the right UX for their products. All techniques included in the teaching are tried-and-tested industry standards, which will equip you with the very best knowledge to start you off on your new professional path. You will learn how to create various UX deliverables from the beginning of a UX project right to the end, ranging from customer journey maps to paper prototypes and even heuristic evaluations. You will also take your first steps towards creating a UX portfolio—something that will truly make an impact on your UX job applications.
You will also find a number of optional exercises and home assignments that build on one another and follow a design process—from the first idea, right through to the point where you can start testing your prototype. We highly recommend that you take up the challenge and complete all the exercises involved, because not only will you get hands-on experience with UX design but, by the end, you will also have a design case study that you can include in your portfolio.
In “Become a UX Designer from Scratch”, you will gain access to interviews with senior UX hirers and experts from companies such as SAP and Google. Through these interviews, you will understand what hirers and senior designers look out for when hiring a new member of the team—all so that you can gain an advantage over fellow candidates. We have also filmed a series of interviews with members who have successfully landed a UX job. These will provide you with inspiration for your own career prospects, as well as invaluable advice about how to transition into a career in UX and what daily life as a UX professional really looks like.
Wait no longer to begin your professional UX career!
Gain an Industry-Recognized UX Course Certificate
Use your industry-recognized Course Certificate on your resume, CV, LinkedIn profile or your website.
Our courses and Course Certificates are trusted by these industry leaders:
Is This Course Right for You?
This is a beginner-level course suitable for anyone who wants to embark on a career in UX design:
- UX designers, interaction designers, and UI designers looking to build effective portfolios and land their next UX job
- Students keen on becoming UX designers or UX consultants
- Entrepreneurs and business owners interested in conducting UX work on their own products or services
- Anyone aspiring to change into a career in the field of UX
Learn and Work with a Global Team of Designers
You’ll join a global community and work together to improve your skills and career opportunities. Connect with helpful peers and make friends with like-minded individuals as you push deeper into the exciting and booming industry of design.
Lessons in This Course
- Each week, one lesson becomes available.
- There’s no time limit to finish a course. Lessons have no deadlines.
- Estimated learning time: 17 hours 25 mins spread over 5 weeks.
Lesson 0: Welcome and Introduction
To be scheduled. Estimated time to complete: 1 hour 38 mins.
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0.1: Welcome and Introduction – Become a UX Designer from Scratch (5 mins)
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0.2: An introduction to courses from the Interaction Design Foundation (37 mins)
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0.3: Let our community help you (1 min)
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0.4: How to earn your Course Certificate (16 mins)
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0.5: Meet your peers online in our discussion forums (6 mins)
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0.6: Meet and learn from design professionals in your area (1 min)
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0.7: Gain Timeless Knowledge Through Courses From The Interaction Design Foundation (21 mins)
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0.8: Mandatory lessons vs. Optional lessons (8 mins)
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0.9: A mix between video-based and text-based lesson content (8 mins)
Lesson 1: Starting your UX career – What is UX and What do UX Designers do?
To be scheduled. Estimated time to complete: 4 hours 35 mins.
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1.1: Welcome and Introduction (8 mins)
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1.2: What is UX Design? (45 mins)
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1.3: Why is UX Design so Important (16 mins)
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1.4: 7 Key Factors of UX (22 mins)
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1.5: Basics of Interaction Design (26 mins)
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1.6: An Introduction to Usability (20 mins)
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1.7: What is a UX Portfolio? (24 mins)
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1.8: 7 UX Deliverables: What will I be making as a UX designer? (39 mins)
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1.9: How to adopt the right attitude towards your UX work (19 mins)
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1.10: What Skills do UX Hirers Look for in an Applicant. Interview with UX lead at Google, Stephen Gay (41 mins)
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1.11: Discussion forum (6 mins)
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1.12: Learning More About UX Design (8 mins)
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1.13: Congratulations and Recap (6 mins)
Lesson 2: Top strategies to help you tackle UX design projects
To be scheduled. Estimated time to complete: 3 hours 3 mins.
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2.1: Welcome and Introduction (8 mins)
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2.2: Human Centered Design (25 mins)
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2.3: What is Design Thinking and Why Is It So Popular? (31 mins)
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2.4: Activity-Centred Design: Interaction Design Approaches (37 mins)
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2.5: How to do a Google Design Sprint (30 mins)
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2.6: Understanding users through their activities (7 mins)
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2.7: Why You Should Analyze Your Competition to Design Better Solutions and How to Do It (24 mins)
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2.8: Learning More about UX Design Strategies (17 mins)
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2.9: Home Assignment for the Next Lesson (4 mins)
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2.10: Congratulations and Recap (6 mins)
Lesson 3: How to build your first UX design from start to finish, part 1: Empathize and Define
To be scheduled. Estimated time to complete: 4 hours 28 mins.
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3.1: Welcome and Introduction (7 mins)
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3.2: 5 Stages in the Interaction Design Process (32 mins)
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3.3: Learn to Prioritize in Your Interaction Design Process (22 mins)
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3.4: Stage 1 in the Design Thinking Process: Empathise with Your Users (28 mins)
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3.5: Pros and Cons of Conducting User Interviews (1 hour 17 mins)
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3.6: Personas (45 mins)
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3.7: Using Personas to Build User Empathy (7 mins)
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3.8: Customer Journey Maps - Walking a Mile in Your Customer’s Shoes (15 mins)
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3.9: Exercise: Building customer journey maps (7 mins)
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3.10: Discussion Forum (6 mins)
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3.11: Congratulations and Recap (27 mins)
Lesson 4: How to build your first UX design from start to finish, part 2: Ideate, Prototype, and Test
To be scheduled. Estimated time to complete: 3 hours 0 mins.
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4.1: Welcome and Introduction (6 mins)
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4.2: Learn How to Use the Best Ideation Methods: SCAMPER (22 mins)
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4.3: Learn How to Use the Best Ideation Methods: Analogies (15 mins)
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4.4: Exercise - SCAMPER (7 mins)
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4.5: Why You Need to Prototype and How to Start off Right (21 mins)
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4.6: Paper Prototyping (12 mins)
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4.7: Exercise – Building a low-fidelity paper prototype (8 mins)
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4.8: 4 Types of Evaluation (30 mins)
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4.9: Expert Evaluation (24 mins)
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4.10: Discussion forum (7 mins)
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4.11: Home Assignment – User Evaluation (15 mins)
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4.12: Learning More About Designing a Website or an App (15 mins)
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4.13: Congratulations and Recap (6 mins)
Lesson 5: Create your first UX portfolio and wrap up
To be scheduled. Estimated time to complete: 41 mins.
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5.1: Welcome and Introduction (2 mins)
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5.2: 3 Reasons Why You Should Have a UX Design Portfolio (15 mins)
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5.3: Learn How to Create Your First UX Portfolio (2 mins)
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5.4: Wrap-Up and Where to Go From Here (10 mins)
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5.5: Make Use of Our Local Groups to Build Your Professional Network (5 mins)
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5.6: Congratulations and Recap (9 mins)
Lesson 6: Course Certificate and Final Networking
To be scheduled.
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6.1: Get Your Course Certificate (1 min)
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6.2: Course Evaluation (1 min)
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6.3: Continue Your Professional Growth (1 min)
Learning Paths
This course is part of 2 learning paths:
How Others Have Benefited
Seth Lemon, United States
“The lessons are clear and easy to understand. The content in the lessons are thoroughly explained, and there's a good balance between video content vs. text content. This really is a intro or UX 101 course, which I really appreciated.”
Prudhvi Raj Midasala, India
“The strength of this course is its content and the way all the lessons are organized. The experience the instructors possess is also a huge advantage to the course and its members in understanding the design methods effectively.”
Barbara-Anne Tane, Australia
“The course has given me a great overview of the foundation of UX design, the processes, players and understanding of the expectations of / on designers.”
How It Works
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Take lessons by industry experts
Lessons are self-paced so you’ll never be late for class or miss a deadline.
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Get a Course Certificate
Your answers are graded by experts, not machines. Get an industry-recognized Course Certificate to prove your skills.
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Advance your career
Use your new skills in your existing job or to get a new job in UX design. Tap into our community to help you.
Frequently Asked Questions
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I missed the enrollment date and now the course is closed. Will I have any opportunity to take the course in the future?
Don't worry if you missed the course. We will re-run it shortly. One of the reasons we continually open and close courses is to be able to control the classroom size.
Networking is a large part of our value proposition, so we want just the right number of people inside the courses. That is also why we display the "XX % percent booked" on our course icons.
We’ll re-schedule the course and make it available for sign-up on https://www.interaction-design.org/courses in only about a week (or perhaps a little bit longer). The actual start date of the course will be a few weeks after sign-ups begin too. We’ve found that this is the best way to maximize flexibility and convenience for everyone, especially you as you put your course program together.
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Can I take more than one course at a time?Yes, you can take as many courses as you would like. For example, if there are 30 active courses, you can enroll in all 30 courses at the same time and move from one to the other as you please.There are no further charges once you have paid for your membership.
Please note: If you have a student membership, you can take a maximum of two courses at the same time. As a student, you can thus still take as many courses as you would like – free of extra charges – just as long as you finish them (or drop them) so that you don’t have more than three ongoing courses at the same time. Please note that if you drop a course, progress is not transferable between cycles. So, you'll have to redo the lessons and answers you already completed in the current cycle. -
Do I have to be online at an exact time to study?
No. You can set your own study schedule. There are no "live sessions" or "webinars" since our members are from all timezones around the world. We are a truly global community – with members in every single corner of the world.
Thus, once you are enrolled, you can take all the time you want to complete a given course. Every "classroom" in each course will never close, so you’ll have permanent access to your classmates and your course material (as well as your own answers).
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Will I receive a Course Certificate?
Yes. Every time you complete a course, you get an industry-recognized Course Certificate. There is no limit to how many Course Certificates you can earn during your membership. You will also receive a 3-step guide on how to include your Course Certificate on LinkedIn and in your résumé/CV.
You can see an example of a Course Certificate at the bottom of the Course Catalogue.
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I have answered questions in a lesson; when will they be marked/graded?We do the marking/grading in so-called "sprints" – where we sit down and do all the marking/grading in one go. Your answers will be graded approximately two weeks after you submit your work.We do this because it is much more efficient than doing one little step every day. It's part of our lean/agile work philosophy, and that approach to efficiency is one of the factors that keeps our membership prices so incredibly low.We are doing it to save you money and as part of our mission to lower the cost of high-quality design education.
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I have updated my name, but my course certificate is not updated — how can I change it?Once you update your name, the certificate will be updated automatically in the next 48 hours.
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I have started the course/lesson later than the specified date, are my answers still going to be marked?
We will be marking answers for as long as there are active members. Therefore, even if you are the only person taking a lesson at that particular time, your answers will still be marked.
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How are courses graded?Open-ended questions are graded by our experts and course instructors – not by machines.That's one of the reasons that our Course Certificates are credible and recognized by industry leaders.
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I started a course after the official start date; for how long will I have access to the course materials?
Regardless of when you have enrolled on a course, you will have access to the course materials for the entire duration of your membership. So, if you pay for a one-year membership, you will have access for one year, renewing your membership for a second year means you will have access for two years, and so on.
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New lessons are starting before I have had the chance to complete all aspects of the previous lesson(s); am I going to be locked out of these unfinished lessons?
No, you will not be locked out of any lesson or course. You will have access to all course materials throughout your membership, so there is no pressure to keep at the same pace as the specified lesson release dates.
All we recommend is that you try to stick to the same schedule as other participants. The reason is they may have moved on to other lessons, thereby meaning you could miss out on the social aspects of the course(s). However, we anticipate that there will be a constant flow of participants working through different lessons and courses, so overall you are unlikely to miss out. We will also be running all courses again — so there really is no rush.
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Are course certificates awarded on a specific date?
No; you can generate your certificate as soon as you attain at least 70% of the total course points.
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When will I receive my Course Certificate?
Course certificates will be given to participants when they have scored more than 70% or more of the total course points. For example, if a course contains ten lessons each with ten questions, you will receive a course certificate when the instructor has awarded you at least 70 points (70% of the total course points).
There is no specified time that certificates will be awarded — instead, they are given to participants as and when they have answered all questions, even if this is long after the official end date.
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How do I add my Course Certificate to my LinkedIn profile?Below is a step-by-step guide on how to add your Interaction Design Foundation course(s) to your LinkedIn profile:
- Log in to your LinkedIn account, then go to your profile.
- On the right, in the Add profile section dropdown, choose Background and then select the + next to Licenses & Certifications.
3. In the following fields add:- Name – Course name
- Issuing organization – The Interaction Design Foundation
- Check the field “This credential does not expire”
- Issue date - Input the date written on your certificate (e.g., May 2019)
- Credential ID – Your membership ID number (it's written on your certificate)
- Credential URL: Input the certificate URL provided on your course page
4. Click on the save button.
Congratulate yourself!
You’ve made a great accomplishment by earning your course certificate, and now the world knows about it! -
How do I add the Interaction Design Foundation Membership Certificate to my LinkedIn Profile?Below is a step-by-step guide on how to add your Interaction Design Foundation course(s) to your LinkedIn profile:
- Log in to your LinkedIn account, then go to your profile.
- On the right, in the Add profile section dropdown, choose Background and then select the + next to Licenses & Certifications.
3. In the following fields add:- Name – Membership Certificate
- Issuing organization – The Interaction Design Foundation
- Check the field “This credential does not expire”
- Issue date - Input the date when you joined our community (e.g., May 2019)
- Credential ID – Your membership ID number (it's written on your certificate)
- Credential URL: Input the certificate URL provided on your profile page
4. Click on the save button.
It is as simple as that. Now, anyone who visits your profile can see your certificate! -
How much will I have to pay for the courses?
As a member, you can take as many courses as you want with no additional costs. This means you only have to pay our membership fee to take an unlimited number of courses. There will be no further charges on top of the membership fee, no matter how many courses you decide to take.
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Do you provide mostly beginners' or more advanced courses?We provide courses for all levels of mastery and across the full spectrum. If you’re new to design, you can start from our beginner courses and progress all the way up to our advanced ones. If you’re an established designer, on the other hand, you will find some of our lower-level courses provide a good refresher—and the advanced ones, a bit of a challenge.
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How long does it take to complete a course?
Once enrolled in a course, you will gain access to a new lesson each week, which you are free to complete without any deadlines and no end date, either.