UX Portfolio Case Study template (plus examples from successful hires)

Your portfolio is the most critical piece of the puzzle when it comes to selling your design skills to recruiters and clients. It’s the single most vital component of any design career move you will ever make.

A UX case study is a detailed but summarized presentation of a design project, its goals and objectives, the research methods used, the process to find a solution and the results achieved.

I hope to share with you a UX portfolio Case Study template for making your portfolio simpler and less overwhelming with the aim of getting you a job interview and potentially a higher paying job. I happen to have stumbled upon it through trial and error but it has resulted in me being headhunted for my last three Senior roles in UX at two agencies and a product company.

But first let’s start at the beginning.

When I was trying to design my portfolio, I used to spend countless hours digging up relevant work from past projects, downloading a ton of device mockups, and implementing every tactic from articles on portfolios that you can find.

The problem with that was it had been months and I was still not done. Every little inspiration I found, seemed to demand a new version. I also was not getting any interviews for the job I had applied for.

How long should a portfolio case study be? What should I include? I felt stuck and overwhelmed by every single detail.

The worst part was, I was not even sure if what I had was good enough to get an interview, let alone a job.

You know.

That queasy, gut-twisting anxiety in the pit of your stomach won’t go away no matter how much you tweak your portfolio.

By spending time studying other design portfolios of not just every designer but successful hires, I was finally able to come up with a system that covered what recruiters actually wanted to see.

Why the structure of a case study is important

Recruiters spend a short amount of time on each candidate’s portfolio, scanning for information in the case studies that relates to the role’s skills and responsibilities.

To stress how each important your case study detail and layout is, let’s look at how two recruiter personas who have different business needs might look at the information provided in a designer’s case study.

Recruiter 1

Peter

CEO
Works at small mobile app company, limited staff.
Results orientated, only has 5 minutes to look through a portfolio.
Looking for a freelancer/part-time designer.

A quick view of a candidate’s case study should answer:
– Is their work relevant to what we do?
– How much work did they do on a project
– Can they work unsupervised?
– Have they seen a project through to launch?

Recruiter 2

Dan

Creative Director
Looking for a full-time designer
Works for a large agency.
Leads and supervises the design team.
Process orientated, has time for a detailed case study.

A quick view of a candidate’s case study should answer
– Is their work relevant to what we do?
– Is this their most recent work and skills level
– Do they understand what problem they were solving (big-picture thinking)
-Did the solution solve the problem they sort out to address

These two recruiters require different forms of information and detail from your case study. It is up to you to make sure the case studies you create cover what they are looking for in order to land interviews.

Don’t just put a portfolio case study together and hope it will be good enough.

The secret to a portfolio case study that can get you an interview and explode your career opportunities lies in a creation process that is aligned with your audience’s needs.

That’s why I want to share with you this UX Portfolio Case Study template from UX Design Mastery. It is based on over 60 portfolios of successful design hires from Facebook, Amazon, Uber, Twitter, Apple, Google, LinkedIn, Dropbox and the insights of top design recruiters.

How do you write a UX case study

The secret sauce:
The core idea is to try to separate your case study creation process into a writing component and designing component so that you can tackle each one without getting stuck or overwhelmed.

This template is meant to help outline all the text that is going to be in your case study that recruiters/clients are looking for.

This ensures that your case study has a good narrative and understandable structure. This also allows you to plan more effectively what design artifacts you will need in your case study. It’s a system by which you can rapidly roll out multiple case studies without forgetting anything that’s relevant to a recruiter or client.

The UX Portfolio Case Study template has 8 critical sections that recruiters are looking for.

UX Portfolio Case Study template

1. Project Title & Subtitle	A headline and subtitle that indicates the name and goal of the project
2. Client/Company/Project type	Who was the project for
3. Project date	When did you work on the project
4. Your role	What you were responsible for on the project
5. Project Summary/About this Project	An overview that summarizes the project, goal and results
6. The challenge	What specific problem, user needs, business requirements and/or pain points that the project solves. Were there any technical constraints or business KPIs you had to keep in mind? Who are you users and what are their specific needs
7. Solution	What method/process were used to solve specific problem, user needs, business requirements and/or pain points? How did features address the objectives?
8. Results	Project success metrics, awards, reflections, project next steps and/or lessons learnt

Let’s look at these sections in detail, roughly how long each one should be and share some real life examples from successful hires.

1. Project Title & Subtitle

Length: Project Title (1 line) & Subtitle (1–2 lines)

A short concise headline that couples the name of the brand/application/client and goal of the project. A lot of designers tend to rush the naming of their project but it is crucial in capturing the attention of its reader. It is the first thing a recruiter is going to read to decide whether or not to carry on reading your UX case study. Make sure it is clear, understandable, and does not use technical jargon. The subtitle is optional but a great way to build more context around the Project title.

2. Client/Company/Project type

Length:1 line

Unless stated in the title, this helps build more background to who the project was for. If the project was not a commercial project for a client or brand, this is where you can state that it was a conceptual project, a design challenge, or a practice project.

3. Project date/duration

Length:1 line

When or how long the project was helps the recruiter establish whether this is your most recent work and most importantly, to gauge where your skill level is. Always try to put up work that is recent because it’s an accurate reflection of your skills.

4. Your role

Length:1–2 lines

This is a section to state everything you did and were responsible for. Recruiters are looking to accurately assess your skills in the context of the entire project’s execution. Did you work with a team, did you work unsupervised to create the project deliverables. Recruiters can make an informed decision about whether you will need help on the job or hit the ground running.

5. Project Summary

Length: 1–2 paragraphs

This is a critical section for any reader who does not have a lot of time to read through the entire case study but wants a brief summary of the project, goals, and results. They may be going through a stack of applications and only have a few minutes to scan over one or two projects in your portfolio. Usually the first two. If nothing stands out or if the work is unclear then they will quickly move on.

That covers the introductory part of your case study. Now we get to the body of the case study.

6. The Challenge/Problem

Length: 2–3 paragraphs

This section specifically looks at the problems the project is trying to address. What are the business requirements, user needs, pain points that the project solves? Who are the end-users and core target market? What platforms was the project for and where there any technical constraints or business KPIs you had to keep in mind?

7. The Solution

Length: As long as needed

This section is going to be the longest as it showcases how the project goals where achieved. Firstly, outline the design process steps and methods followed during the project outlines the layout of this section. Show your overall project steps, why you chose the methods you used. Recruiters want to see all the relevant design artifacts that you produced from sketches to visual mockups to prototypes. Secondly, show how the project evolved through reviews and user feedback. I have put together a table that will hopefully guide your storytelling around each design deliverable. For each one speak on how the work evolved, was iterated on, or revised based on testing and stakeholder input.

Deliverable	Storytelling tips
Personas	Describe what data personas were based on, incorporating real quotes and behaviors to humanize user data
Sketches	Share the evolution of ideas through sketches, highlighting how initial concepts addressed specific user needs or problems.
Interview Notes	Present compelling user quotes and stories that reveal underlying needs or pain points, setting the stage for design decisions.
Usability Test Results	Tell the story of a user’s interaction, focusing on challenges faced and how design iterations improved their experience.
Whiteboards	Describe collaborative sessions, capturing the dynamic process of brainstorming and decision-making that led to design insights.
Wireframes	Explain how wireframes translated user needs into structured layouts, and how feedback informed subsequent iterations.
UI Designs	Discuss how visual elements align with user expectations and brand identity, enhancing usability and engagement.
Prototypes	Share scenarios where prototypes enabled user testing and feedback, leading to refinements that improved the final product.
Site Maps	Describe how the site map evolved to improve navigation and user flow, addressing specific usability challenges.
User Journeys	Walk through a user’s experience step-by-step, highlighting emotions and touchpoints that influenced design decisions.

Here are some examples for showing the overall process:

8. Results

Length: 1 paragraph

The critical last section concludes the case study by outlining any project success metrics that were achieved, awards that were won. Here are some example results that one commonly finds in a design portfolio and how you can phrase it.

Result Type	Example Impact
Improved Task Completion	Task success rate increased from 65% to 92% after redesign.
Reduced Drop-off	Checkout drop-off decreased by 30% after simplifying the form flow.
Increased Engagement	40% more users interacted with the feature after UI overhaul.
Faster Task Performance	Average time to complete task reduced from 3 min to 1.5 min.
User Satisfaction Boost	CSAT score increased from 3.2 to 4.5 post-launch.
Error Reduction	70% fewer user input errors after redesigning form validation.
Revenue Uplift	15% increase in conversions after improving product detail pages.
Support Load Decrease	25% drop in support tickets related to account setup after UX improvements.
Mobile Optimization Gains	Bounce rate on mobile dropped by 18% after responsive redesign.
Developer Handoff Speed	Reduced back-and-forth in dev handoff by 50% using component-based design.

In the case of a project that is not live, reflections and the project’s next steps are sufficient to round up the case study. Try to share any lessons that you learned to demonstrate you are invested in both the project’s life cycle and your career development.

What you can do next

If you would like to get down to work, download my UX Portfolio Case Study template for free. Its included with the Design Portfolio Layout Guide, which including 20 online case studies and example scripts for each case study section.

What to read next

UX Case Study Example #1 plus free template

How to fill in the UX Portfolio Case Study template from scratch and I will use an example UX case study from my portfolio.Read more

UX Case Study Example #2 plus free template

You may be wondering how should you organize a large amount of project information in a case study so that it isn’t overwhelming to recruiters? What information is vital to include in a portfolio case study? Or maybe you are just struggling to bringing together your wireframes, strategies and sections into a clean, attractive narrative…Read more

UX/UI portfolio projects for beginners #3: Travel App

This practice project/Client brief is the third one in this series from UX Design Mastery after the one for a Blog website and an eCommerce project.

Design Portfolio Projects

Blog website

Design Portfolio Projects

eCommerce

Design portfolio projects for UX and UI designers

Included in each design brief is the following:

Objectives (What is REQUIRED by the client. This part usually trips designers up as they go off designing what is not required)
Timeline (For this to be realistic each brief has a timeline that is as close to real-world work as possible)
Platform(Where your designs will live. Understanding these platforms will give a well-considered solution)
Target audience (Users always come first and the design must accommodate the target audience’s pain points)
References (If you are not sure where to start, clients normally give a set of examples or references they like. The closer the design solution is to the references, the fewer revisions a designer will have to do)
Deliverables (Most importantly how the solution should be delivered. These represent what a well-detailed portfolio case study looks like so hit it out of the park)
Recruiter advice (Portfolio advice from creative directors, CEOs and leading design creatives from the biggest companies)

A little about me

Creating a portfolio project is hard work.

I still remember when I did not have a single project in my portfolio that would really make me stand out and get noticed by recruiters.

I had just left my job as a Java Developer and was about to put all my effort into starting a design career.

One of the very first successful projects I created was a conceptual mobile app for a local airline. I had recently been on a trip which was frustratingly delayed and poorly communicated to passengers.

So I decided to creatively express my opinions through a conceptual project and it was responsible for me getting hired for my first design job.

Its also my most appreciated project .

I hope this travel app project you work on, provides you with as many opportunities as I have received.

Let’s get into it

Design Portfolio Project 3: Travel App

Client Brief

Client: Choose any travel brand of your liking

Timeline: 1–2 Weeks

Objectives

Create a mobile app design that can:
• Allow a user to book a flight, a hotel and car on a specific date for different destinations
• Find the best deals on flights, hotels and car hires
• Ability to select holiday activities
• Organize all travel plans into one itinerary
• Notifications

Platform

Please design a travel app for either iOS or Android. So we require mobile screens. Pay attention to

iOS guidelines
https://developer.apple.com/design/human-interface-guidelines/ios/visual-design/adaptivity-and-layout/
Android guidelines
https://material.io/design/usability/accessibility.html#hierarchy

Target Audience

References

Please conduct some research on the following travel apps that we love and get ideas for functionality and features to include

https://itunes.apple.com/za/app/kayak-flights-hotels-cars/id305204535?mt=8

https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/expedia-hotels-flights-car/id427916203?mt=8

Deliverables

• Research (refer to references provided)
• Highlight 3 enhancements or unique features you have included to make our app stand out and solve user pain points
• Sketches of initial ideas
• Wireframes
• Visual mockups screens of
⁃ App Onboarding
⁃ Home screen where a user can book a Hotel, a Flight, a Car or an activity in a popular city
⁃ Listing page of Hotels
⁃ Map view showing hotels location
⁃ Itinerary screen
⁃ Possible notifications

• Results section: Feedback from testing with 5 random people
• Fonts: Brand related
• Colors: Brand related
• Link to this project

Nice to have

Video walkthrough (Screen record using QuickTime an Invision prototype interacation)

Pro-tip

Go through an entire booking experience to understand how the app is design.

Advice from recruiters

I wish more portfolio websites included little descriptions of what the designer’s role was in a specific project, or even pointed out some specific problems or personal thoughts about aspects of their designs. Too many portfolios now are just vanity shots and client name-dropping without actually communicating what was done.

James Cabrera, Senior Product Designer, Refinery29

Going the extra mile and making sure it’s easy to consume, well-presented, and filled with helpful context about your projects tells us a lot about your communication skills. Ideally a portfolio should be more than just a collection of pretty thumbnails and mockups — it should speak to your problem solving skills.

Ryan Le Roux, Metalab

If you’re just starting out as a designer, a good alternative to unsolicited redesigns are personal projects. These self-initiated projects are a great way to build up your design and product skills, while also putting something out into the world for people to use. You’ll learn a ton from the experience of launching something and the feedback you’ll get from your users will definitely make you a better designer.

Elyse Viotto, Shopify

If you are interested in ting the PDF download of the travel app project and all my extra example case studies download below.

UX/UI portfolio projects for beginners #2: eCommerce site

One of the greatest challenges with transitioning into a UX/UI design role without any design work experience or educational background is proving your skills to a prospective recruiter or client.

This is the s project in the series after UX/UI portfolio projects for beginners #1 Blog Website

You may have already read up online on how to become a UX designer or a UI Designer but unfortunately you still have a vague or generic guide that comprises of:

Doing an internship
Mentorship
Reading books
Doing courses
Learning design tools
Going to meet-ups

The truth of matter is that you will need a portfolio with detailed design projects that effectively communicates to recruiters and clients that you are the right person to hire.

But such design projects are few and hard to come by unless you intern with a really good company that has cool projects.

Most unsolicited redesigns and Dribbble shots lack technical feasibility and real world constraints to be taken seriously.

So what can you do to address this problem?

A little about me

My own journey into design from being a Java Developer was a challenging one when it came to creating a portfolio recruiters would take notice of.

I did not know what projects to put into a portfolio. Mobile, Desktop or app designs?

What level of detail did recruiters want to see from my work?

And just generally were to begin.

I am going to share with you two things worked for me and helped me get started.

Looking at other designers work. I was a member of Behance community and would spend hours going through the most popular projects, most awarded projects and how they were structured.
Creating detailed design projects of problems I found on forums and in the news.

I did not get a massive following of designers on Behance but what I did have was a collection of about 6 well thought out projects that helped me sell my skills. Calvin Pedzai on Behance
I

These projects got me headhunted by a digital design company who were impressed by the types of projects and the level of detail.

Each design project related to what the design companies were looking for and hiring me was a no brainer despite the level of experience.

To help you get the same opportunities and create a well-rounded portfolio, I decided to create a series of detailed briefs or practice projects that you can use.

Design portfolio projects for UX and UI designers

Included in each design brief is the following:

Recruiter advice (Portfolio advice from creative directors, CEOs and leading design creatives from the biggest companies)
Timeline (For this to be realistic each brief has a timeline that is as close to real-world work as possible)
Objectives (What is REQUIRED by the client. This part usually trips designers up as they go off designing what is not required)
Platform(Where your designs will live. Understanding these platforms will give a well-considered solution)
Target audience (Users always come first and the design must accommodate the target audience’s pain points)
References (If you are not sure where to start, clients normally give a set of examples or references they like. The closer the design solution is to the references, the fewer revisions a designer will have to do)
Deliverables (Most importantly how the solution should be delivered. These represent what a well-detailed portfolio case study looks like so hit it out of the park)

This practice project/Client brief is the second one in this series after the one for a Blog website.

Lets get into it

This time we look at an eCommerce website project.

I decided to design a solution for this brief as well so you can check out what I produced in about a week and a half, after hours.

Design Portfolio Project 2: Ecommerce website

Client
Choose any clothing brand of your liking

Timeline
2–3 weeks

Objectives

Create a responsive eCommerce website that can:
• Tell the brand’s story alongside the products (VERY IMPORTANT)
• Showcase the latest products and bestsellers on Homepage
• Access to the cart throughout the site
• Show all category sections
• Allow readers to sign for an account
• Ability to Search through content
• Immerse the user into the ethos of the brand

Platform

Please design for responsive web. So we require desktop screens, tablet and mobile screens.

Limitations/Specifications
• Page performance (Loading time)
• Limited Screen size on mobile

Target audience

Young males and females 25 to 35

Blake, 31
PAIN POINT
Faster way of discovering products when searching.

Sarah, 26
PAIN POINT
Can I change the quantity of the products I add to cart?

Crystal, 28
PAIN POINT
How do I know these products are worth purchasing and reliable?

References

Please conduct some research on the following eCommerce websites that we love and get ideas for features to include

Deliverables

Research (refer to references provided)
Highlight 3 enhancements or unique features you have included to make our eCommerce site to stand out and solve user pain points
Sketches of initial ideas
Wireframes
Visual mockups on desktop and mobile of the

-Homepage
⁃ Category page with filters
⁃ Product detail page
⁃ Menu/Search
⁃ Cart

Results section: Feedback from testing with 5 random people
Fonts: Brand related
Colors: Brand related
Link to this project

Nice to haves

Video walk-through (Screen record an Invision prototype)

Additional message from client

Go through an entire shopping experience offline and online to understand how products are sold.

Advice from recruiters

Sketches, wireframes, unused design concepts, etc. That is the work. The final design is just the end of that entire design process. Getting to see that thinking and decision making is a big differentiating factor when deciding on who to hire.
Aaron Stump, VP, Creative Director Invision

Imagine us sitting in our weekly meeting room at 5 p.m., the last meeting before home time. We open up your portfolio and see several screenshots of mobile interfaces under a project name. The work seems relevant but there’s no description of what we’re looking at. We don’t know what you did, what the goal was or how you feel about it. We’re left with questions and move on to the next portfolio. Never forget your user.
Stanley Wood, Spotify

A more effective use of time would be explaining how a project solved a client’s problem, how designs were changed based on client feedback, and anything they wished they could have done but couldn’t, for whatever reason. Those stories are far more useful and interesting than someone trying to sell their talent.
Todd Dominey, Mailchimp

More Inspiration (Your cheat guide)

If you would you like a PDF of this design project you can download it below. Included are 2 additional eCommerce case studies and 5 online examples that you refer to from the best agencies and design companies in the world.

UX/UI portfolio projects for beginners #1 Blog Website

One of the hardest things to do when starting your design career is to create a design portfolio of impressive work.

But many have not had any substantial design work experience and the UX/UI projects they have done, are not worth putting up.

The Dribbble portfolio work they have is beautiful but often not technically feasible and has not enough real-world constraints for the work to be considered industry standard.

How do you start a design career without work experience or a college degree?

What level of detail is best to provide in a user experience designer portfolio?

How do you build a UI design portfolio?

Well, I’m glad you asked.

A good portfolio is made up of relevant, well considered detailed design projects.

At UX Design Mastery, we have created a simple and not overly complicated series of portfolio projects or practice projects, that will test your skills and help you create a well rounded UX/UI portfolio project that a recruiter will definitely take notice of.

Included in each portfolio project is a client brief that has the following:

Timeline (For this to be realistic each brief has a timeline that is as close to in work)

Objectives (What is REQUIRED by the client. This part usually trips designers up as they go off designing what is not required)

Platform(Where your designs will live. Understanding these platforms will give a well-considered solution)

Target audience (Users always come first and the design must accommodate the target audience’s pain points)

References (If you are not sure where to start, client normally give a set of examples or references they like. The closer the design solution is to the references, the fewer revisions a designer will have to do)

Deliverables (Most importantly how the solution should be delivered. These represent what a well-detailed portfolio case study looks like so hit it out of the park)

A little about me

(You can skip this part if you are ready to get down to some work)

When I started out in design, I had no portfolio projects or commercial experience because I had not been to a design school, let alone worked for a design company. I was coming from a technical background (software developer) but knew design was a passion because of a part time design job I did for a real estate company.

It was the most alive I had felt doing work.

You know what I mean.

When you get into the zone and can’t do anything else but DESIGN.

However I never fully considered it as a potential career at the time, until I left my developer job.

I decided to create a portfolio of conceptual work that would not only showcase my skills to potential recruiters but also help me track my growth.

In total I must have done 12 projects.

I would research on forums and help boards for reoccurring problems real people were complaining about and try to design an appropriate solution.

That gave each project, real world constraints and limitations that recruiters absolutely loved.

It was not long after I posted my portfolio that I got headhunted.

Repeatedly.

Without a degree or work experience. Woah.

But well thought out detailed portfolio projects.

I hope these portfolio projects do the same for you.

If you are ready to create some awesome work, let’s begin!!

Advice Quotes: (A few things to consider from recruiters)

We don’t want work that simply copies everything else. Our clients come to us to help them meaningfully resonate and differentiate. That means that we need to be on the bleeding edge of what is relevant, inspiring and thought-provoking.
Karin Soukup, Managing Partner, Collins

On a good/bad day I look at maybe 20–30 portfolios. Most of the time for maybe five seconds before I decide if it’s worth exploring further. So my first recommendation would be to make sure you grab the audience straight away. Show me something great and/or unexpected. Ideally both.
Haraldur Thorleifsson, CEO, Ueno

Show me how you’ve gone from insight, to concept, to solution, to impact with a real project example. That will help me understand how you work and think, and assure us you can do it again.
Katie Dill is Director of Experience Design at Airbnb

Client brief #1 Blog Website

Client:
Name: Vibz
Fonts: Use any you like
Colors: Use any you like

Timeline:

2 weeks to 4 weeks

Objectives

We would like a unique blog website that can:

Show featured articles on Homepage
Article page
Show all category sections
Allow readers to signup to a newsletter
Showcase our Instagram feed
Ability to Search through content
Guest authors
Social Sharing and liking of posts
Article ratings

Platform
Please design for responsive web. So we require desktop screens as well as mobile screens.

Limitations
Page performance (Loading time)
Limited Screen size on mobile

Target audience
Young males 25 to 35

Pain points
Searching for inspiration about lifestyle, health, news, music, movies and gadgets (Our category sections)
Get bored with uninspiring content
Hate having to return to websites to check for new articles

References

Please conduct some research on the following blogs we love and get ideas to include

GQ website

Men’s Health

Deliverables

Research section (refer to references provided and find features that should be added in order for our blog to be competitive)
Sketches of initial ideas
Sitemap/journey map
Wireframes

Visual mockups on desktop and mobile of
- Article page
- Homepage
- Category page
- Article page
- Menu

Highlight 3 enhancements or unique features you have included to make our blog stand out and solve pain points

Results section:Feedback from testing with 5 random people

Link to this project’s deliverables

Nice to have

Video walkthrough (Screen record an Invision prototype)

Additional message from client

Make it pop!!!

Inspiration (Life’s cheatsheet)

If you are still unsure about where to start I have a couple of very cool blogs done by the best agencies and design companies in the world.

Here are two case studies for you to analyze:

Here are other awesome example blogs:

The Awwwards site is great source of inspiration. Make sure to bookmark it and visit it often.

https://www.awwwards.com/sites/coda-story
https://www.awwwards.com/sites/oceanographic
https://www.awwwards.com/sites/the-official-squarespace-blog
https://www.awwwards.com/sites/vogue-arabia
https://www.awwwards.com/sites/sojournal
https://www.awwwards.com/sites/ubisoft-stories
https://www.awwwards.com/sites/caleo-magazine
https://www.awwwards.com/sites/disconnect

Go through them and find features you think will work for this brief.

Download the PDF version of this post so you can work through it.

UX portfolio teardown: Real portfolio example that secured internships at Google and Microsoft

You may have seen a number of UX portfolio examples online but you are still not sure what makes them work.

Is it the colors, the layout or the type of projects?

I am starting a series on UX and UI portfolio teardowns on the blog that you might benefit from in order to ultimately get a job. Will take guessing out of the way and focus in on what really works to land a job.

Today I look at Cedric Ith’s UX portfolio by quickly exploring his website, a single project and resume, to tease out the portfolio elements that helped him secure internships at Google and Microsoft. You might not be targeting these companies (You don’t really rate them ;)) but there is still alot you can learn from how his portfolio is structured and translate that to your portfolio.

UX Engineer and Interaction Prototyper. Exploring VR/AR/MR.

This is not a comprehensive teardown but structured in such a way as to simulate a recruiter, potential team lead or creative director who have to go through a 50 resumes a day.

Ready?

Let’s begin!!

Portfolio Website

http://cedricith.com/

Let’s dive into a project

Since the first one has a high likelihood of being selected. Will go for that one.

And lastly for the resume.

[ap_custom_testimonial type=’list-layout’ template=’template-3′ display_num=’1′ content_length=’full’ custom_layout=’disable’ title=’show’ comp_detail=’show’ email=’hide’ rating=’hide’ order_by=’random’ order_type=’ASC’ date=’hide’ image=’show’]

Takeaways

So what lessons should you take away from this UX portfolio example?

Recruiters don’t have a lot of time to read through your portfolio. Ensure your best and most relevant work is the first one listed.
Have a download link to your resume.
Use testimonials as powerful social proof.
Use language that is understandable for your headings.
2–3 really good portfolio projects are enough to get you an interview and possibly the job
Between you LinkedIn, portfolio website and resume, ensure you use a consistent and relevant job role throughout.
Identify job keywords and ensure your resume has them.
List your experience first as this is what is most relevant to a recruiter or employer.

If you really liked this post and want to see more of these, drop me a comment or just share this page.

Cheers!!

Freebie: UX Sketchbook, 15 Free printable browser screens

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Sketch out your concepts on a grid, write out your project feature notes and detail the scenario for that sketch. A variety of grid based browser screens are available for desktop and mobile views. This sketchbook is designed to make sketching and design communication easier with your team or client.

All the screens are completely customizable, as the source file is provided and exports can be resize how you want them.

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Was doing your degree a waste of time? UX-related degrees you might already have

Completing a degree can be so hard.

It’s been years of blood, sweat and tears in trying to finish your degree. Towards the end, you may have had a quarter mid-life crisis along with a few mental breakdowns since you never really had a passion for that degree. Having heard about UX design, it may seem like a pretty good career to pursue. However several questions inevitably crop up.

What would be the best degree to pursue if you want to do UX design? Do you really have to go back to school to start a whole new degree? Was your degree a waste of time?

Obviously, this can be seriously stressful if you do not have the time nor the money to go back to school.

In this post we will focus on UX-related Bachelor degrees that you might already have and how useful they could be in a UX role.

One of the best ways of figuring out what kind of education and training to pursue when going for a UX career, is looking at the UX professionals already in the industry.

The industry recognized Nielsen Norman Group surveyed a group of 963 UX professionals already working in the industry to find out the degrees that they studied at university.

Some background

The years of experience that participants held in the industry.

A large portion of the participants held a degree but some were already working in the industry despite not having a degree and being self taught.

What degrees do UX professionals have

The Bachelor degrees that the UX professionals held, broke down in the following way.

The chart above shows how diverse education is at the undergraduate level for UX pros. Several things are particularly interesting about the top bachelor’s degrees:

Design topics represent only 11% of the total degrees. Psychology, Communication, and English commanded only 9% each. The specialty degrees for Interaction Design and HCI barely made it onto the list (most likely because they are relatively recent programs available at only a few universities so far).

The Masters degrees that the UX professionals held, broke down in the following way.

We see more specialization at the master’s level, as expected; but half of the master’s degrees were apparently unrelated to HCI and UX directly. Even so, most represent very marketable skills aimed at communications, design, technology, business, and understanding people and information.

How useful were these subjects

More importantly how useful were these degrees in day to day work?

Top takeaways

It’s important to realize that UX professionals come from so many varied educational backgrounds and not strictly traditional UX streams.
You almost certainly need at least one university degree, but it doesn’t have to be in HCI if you have some coursework or training in HCI topics too
Respondents recommended that students going into UX take a wide variety of classes. It’s difficult to know in advance which knowledge may turn out to be useful in your work, because the world of UX work is so broad.
It takes a combination of formal and informal education as well as on-the-job experience in order for most people in UX to become well-rounded professionals.

Some quotes

How to sell your ideas to executives to make them understand why they are important for the business. “Become a strong writer and everything else will fall into place.”

“Take something that can prepare you to work with engineers and developers.”

“Sciences are very useful in that they carry an innate sense of organization—alot of usability has to do with making order out of chaos, just as a lot of sciences seek to achieve the same thing.” Learn about data analysis.

Looking to break into UX? Top 8 UX Design courses UX pros wish they had taken

Transitioning into the UX design industry from a different field can seem like a daunting task considering the amount of varied information one finds on the Internet.

What should you know, what should you be able to do and should you go back to school to start a new degree/course?

Obviously, getting some training is a good start in any field.

In this post we will focus on what UX design courses UX professionals wish they had taken before starting their job.

This will serve as a great point to start from if you are considering User Experience Design as a field to work in.

In order to give you the most reliable information, this is not just my opinion but from a survey study conducted by the recognized Nielson Norman Group of 963 UX professionals already working in the industry.

Background of participants

To begin with here is a breakdown of the UX professionals that participated in the study.
Survey Participants’ years of experience in user experience (UX)

Now to the more interesting part.

Participants were asked what UX design courses did they wish they had taken that would have prepared them for a UX position. The results were as follows

Understanding the responses

Many said their education had served them well, but many also indicated there were subjects/courses in which they wished for more education. All of these courses represent topics useful to UX (HCI, social sciences, design) and / or very competitive job skills (Computer Science, marketing, JavaScript, drawing).

Some respondents said that many of the wished-for ux courses they mentioned had been unavailable at the time, unavailable at the university, unavailable in their country, or unavailable in the degree
programs they pursued.
Others said they had taken some courses in the topic, but now they want to take more-advanced UX design courses.
Many people mentioned that business, organizational behavior, and persuasive techniques courses were not included in their design training, and in retrospect it would be a huge practical advantage to have those in the workplace.
Several people said the courses they want to take would help them be more competitive in the job market now or would help them be much more effective in their current roles.

Action items for you:

Identify what you maybe be missing from your skillset

Find short UX courses or general courses online that cover some if not most of these subjects and do them

Alternatively find books around these topics

How to become a designer and get hired: Issue #1 Fantasy Interactive

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How to become a designer and get hired. Issue 1: Interview with Fantasy Interactive CEO David Martin

I sat down with David Martin, the CEO and Founder of Fantasy Interactive, an independently owned human-centered design agency with a mission to impact the user experience in every-day products through bold design. They have an impressive client roster including Facebook, Spotify, HP, USAToday.com, Wacom and Google to mention a few. With over 200+ industry awards, David has managed to build a globally recognized brand. So when I thought of creating a design series that would help designers improve their craft and get hired, there was no better place to start than Fantasy Interactive.

What you will learn

How David started and got into design
Influences and inspiration
Advice for those with no design experience
How to craft your portfolio
Standing out and getting hired

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Youtube full interview.

Thank you so much David for joining us. David if you could take us back to when you were still a student and tell us a little bit about where you grew up. What did you study?

I started a long way from here. I started in Dublin, Ireland. When I went to school I could say I was not a good student. I communicated very visually and I was not so good at the academic side of things. I did not believe in certain subjects like history and even math which I knew I would not use so I kinda tuned out and daydreamed which ultimately put me in a position where I could not get into universities that I wanted to. I had to repeat exams and eventually ended up getting into college. I ended up getting into a communications course in Germany. I went to Sweden to look for jobs. Any type of jobs, on cruise ships, cleaning toilets, whatever it would take to get over to the States.

While this was going on I started exploring the Internet and found it very unattractive, very ones and zeros and as I was doing that I just found a passion for organizing it by redesigning it. My expectation of the Internet was that of the movie ‘Minority Report’ but then it wasn’t, so I started designing in my free time and that’s how I started.

What tools were you using?

I started off using something like a Squarespace, a website builder. Because I’d never designed in my life I picked it up listening to music and I found that I had a talent for designing things with the computer like reorganizing things on a page even though I cannot draw to save my life. But using a computer I can somehow design little details of effort into anything. No matter what profession you are in this does pay dividends down the road.

Were there any influences or inspirations along the way like friends or mentors?

No, nothing like that but inspiration came from living in Ireland and growing up on Knight Rider. I love things that are well organized, things that were well taken care of. I just had an affection for it. I was always blown away by game UI, playing games like Nintendo but I always felt they could have been more finessed, refined and that I could bring a little bit of color into things.

How then did you enter the industry?

So basically, I started designing in Flash 3, the very early days and I started to see that this platform had motion capabilities and I wanted to bring UI to life. That was a huge driver for me to combine those things. So I started making Flash sites and they started getting noticed because no one was really working with Flash except maybe banners. So I started building websites and brought some user interaction to them. It was just mind blowing. Very similar to how on Dribbble, people use the GIF to take designs to the next level. It’s always looking at how you can take something to the next level. The first job that we got was around US$20k with a game studio and from there we started hiring people.

We basically sacrificed everything to create a portfolio because I knew the portfolio would create credibility and start attracting clients. In our second year, there was a phone call from Time Warner and they came in to hire us to redo their portal.

For me, you have to be able to take those opportunities and make the most of them. Time Warner came in, then Xbox came in a week after so it was all happening at the same time.There was never any room for snowflake mentality in our business. We are not going to push people too hard or bend over backwards for our clients because our business is built on people. When there are lows, our team comes together and figures out how to make it work. It’s knowing your principles, your DNA and when it’s time, to drive hard. When you surround yourself with good people is easier to deal with those situations.

How did you grow the business – through marketing or referral?

Fantasy has never had a sales team since day one so all our work is a hundred percent referral. From 2001/2002 it has not changed. It’s basically making work that is respected by other designers and those designers will spread the word. The key is to constantly push. A lot of people over the years will do something good and then two years will go by and their work is still at the same level as a few years ago and the key for any designer is to constantly push the bar. Your attitude should always be about pushing yourself to the next level every 6 months to a year.

Even today, when you compare your work with the top 20 Dribbble shots over the past month and put your work beside them, honestly ask yourself “Does your work fit in there?”. If it doesn’t, look at the details of the other 20 shots and figure out what about those details makes them better. Start implementing that same finesse in your work and put more time into it.

As a designer, you have to find the time, the ethic, the consistency, the love, the passion to focus on the details because details are something that this world lacks immensely and we are crying out for it.

What advice would you have for someone with no experience?

Do what I did. Cheat. Copy. No one ever taught me how to design. I just liked it and I just started designing. Even though my first pieces were absolute crap and terrible, when I looked at Awwwards I just wanted to copy the work. So what I did was I took their work and I put it in Photoshop and I tried to copy pixel for pixel the work that I saw and when I was able to do that, it made me feel like I was able to reproduce the amazing work that I saw. As I was doing that I would try to make it even better by a bit. Test yourself then stand back to see how you learnt to be as good as that person.

So if you are starting off today as a designer, go to Dribbble look at the Top 100 shots, try to replicate your favourite ones and if you can replicate them you are in business. As you improve the work, try to do just a little bit better. Do something slightly different, change the color or change the font.

See if you can make it better than the original and that will sharpen your skills in a way no university can teach you.

How about soft skills and technical skills?

As far as skills go, you can go on YouTube and watch videos all day long. That’s what you have to do by yourself at home. Use the Internet. If you happen to work at an agency, there is opportunity to better yourself by working with other designers and you learn pretty quickly that way. In general, I am the least technical person especially when it comes to design. I have an eye for detail. I think the soft skills are more important. How you are able to critique yourself. How you are able to take criticism from others and not flake out about it. It’s how you position and brand yourself.

If you have 3 good projects in your portfolio and the rest are crap, leave out the rest. If you include everything, we look at that designer and we say they made a poor decision in representing themselves.

I don’t care about your last 10 projects I care about your best project. If you can do a project to that level then I know you can do everything else with us. But don’t turn me off by showing me the other stuff that you probably didn’t have enough time to do or enough inspiration to do. Quality over quantity.

Does your portfolio have to line up with what you want to eventually do in a job?

No, not at all. As long as I can see that you can compose with the right colors, fonts and the design is nice and tight. I advise people to take sites like Google or Apple iOS and say here is what there is currently and here is the improved version that I made. That is the stuff that is gonna get you jobs. The best work that you can do is work that you make without a client telling you to do it. That is what we do. We have this case study called ‘what if’. What if “Tinder and travel”, “What if airline”. We put that out because we had a week to spare and put something together that is without limits. So I would say to you designers, if you want to go out there and redesign CNN, make a better version of that without it being fluffy; use big imagery, visual aesthetics but think of the User Experience. Your design cannot just be beautiful, it has to be smart.

Smart Design is beautiful design combined with design that a user can actually use. Also focus on the mobile space, operating systems, Artificial Intelligence and try to come up with a cool shot to put up on your Dribbble or Behance.

And don’t spend all day on your portfolio. Nobody cares at the end of the day. When people review your portfolio, the last thing that people want to do is to figure out how to use your site.

They want to use Dribbble or Behance which they already know how to use quickly. All they’re looking for is one or two shots of gorgeous work. That’s all that we’re looking for. When I look at a portfolio I have about 15 seconds and sometimes 5 seconds to quickly scan, close the tab or keep it open. We just don’t have the time to go through something intricately put together.

Where do you see most portfolios hosted?

Behance and Dribbble have one consistent template for presenting your work. That’s all we need to see. Behance and Dribbble give you the opportunity to tell your story through screenshots and more of a flow of how you came up with something. Absolutely go and do that if you can. We just really want to see your work.

Any stories of great portfolios or instant hires?

There are three levels to getting hired. Level one is clearly a person that is not at the level that we need so we skip. Level 2 is someone who has some good work with great typography which is always a good sign. Level 3 is that person who is very, very rare. They have 20 – 30 shots but they are all immaculately done. The details are just there and they’ve added some UI motion.

I do not need you to be at level 3. We can get you to 3. We need you to be a 2. We look for the that level of finesse. If your Dribbble shots look like they could be on our Dribbble page, then you are hired.

Design inspirations

Awwwards

Dribbble

Behance

Last piece of advice

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Passion. Attention to detail. The small details make a massive difference.

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Links and resources

Dribbble
Behance
Fantasy Interactive Website: fantasy.co
LinkedIn profile
Fantasy Dribbble page
Fantasy twitter page
Fantasy Career page

Where to work: Design agencies Ep1

Focus Lab are a close team of creative professionals based out of Savannah, Georgia. They are passionate about partnering with good people and organizations to provide exceptional custom solutions.

Our skills are specific and fine-tuned. We are specialists, not generalists. We build identities and experiences to elevate and empower organizations.

Awesome office setup at design studio @focuslabllc Tag a friend 👇 comment and follow @focuslabllc for more👆. #workspace #digital #interface #mobile #design #application #ui #ux #webdesign #app #userinterface #photoshop #userexperience #inspiration #materialdesign #uxdesignmastery #creative #dribbble #time #behance #appdesign #sketch #designer #website #programming #art #work #concept #amazing #uxdesigning

A post shared by UX Design Mastery (@uxdesignmastery) on Aug 12, 2016 at 4:49am PDT

Last minute changes and polishing touches on a stressful deadline day at @focuslabllc Tag a friend 👇 comment and follow @focuslabllc for more👆. #deadline #digital #interface #mobile #design #application #ui #ux #webdesign #app #userinterface #photoshop #userexperience #inspiration #materialdesign #uxdesignmastery #creative #dribbble #time #behance #appdesign #sketch #designer #website #programming #art #work #concept #amazing #uxdesigning

A post shared by UX Design Mastery (@uxdesignmastery) on Aug 31, 2016 at 3:07pm PDT

Awkward is a digital design and development agency operating from Rotterdam. It’s been 5 years since they started building quality products together with established companies and great startups. Since then, they have developed a variety of disciplines and interests, which let us transform ideas into first class experiences.

We help our clients realize ideas from the first sketch, to launch day and beyond. It’s in this process where we create innovative software for mobile and web. A process where strategy, design and development is key. We also launch our own ideas, sometimes resulting in separate ventures.

Beautiful office space from design agency @madeawkward Tag a friend 👇 comment and follow @madeawkward for more👆. #office #digital #interface #mobile #design #application #ui #ux #webdesign #app #userinterface #photoshop #userexperience #inspiration #materialdesign #uxdesignmastery #creative #dribbble #time #behance #appdesign #sketch #designer #website #programming #art #work #concept #amazing #uxdesigning

A post shared by UX Design Mastery (@uxdesignmastery) on Sep 12, 2016 at 6:04am PDT

We love developers too. Great shot from @madeawkward Should designers learn some coding in your opinion? Tag a friend 👇 comment and follow @madeawkward for more👆. #workspace #digital #interface #mobile #design #application #ui #ux #webdesign #app #userinterface #photoshop #userexperience #inspiration #materialdesign #uxdesignmastery #creative #dribbble #time #behance #appdesign #sketch #designer #website #programming #art #work #concept #amazing #uxdesigning

A post shared by UX Design Mastery (@uxdesignmastery) on Jul 27, 2016 at 2:42pm PDT

We’re a digital design studio specializing in product design and development.

Office setup at @underbelly Tag a friend 👇 comment and follow @underbelly for more👆. #workspace #digital #interface #mobile #design #application #ui #ux #webdesign #app #userinterface #photoshop #userexperience #inspiration #materialdesign #uxdesignmastery #creative #dribbble #time #behance #appdesign #sketch #designer #website #programming #art #work #concept #amazing #uxdesigning

A post shared by UX Design Mastery (@uxdesignmastery) on Dec 27, 2016 at 6:12am PST

Multi-disciplinary collaboration in a brainstorm session at @underbelly Tag a friend 👇 comment and follow @underbelly for more👆. #brainstorm #digital #interface #mobile #design #application #ui #ux #webdesign #app #userinterface #photoshop #userexperience #inspiration #materialdesign #uxdesignmastery #creative #dribbble #time #behance #appdesign #sketch #designer #website #programming #art #work #concept #amazing #uxdesigning

A post shared by UX Design Mastery (@uxdesignmastery) on Jul 27, 2016 at 6:10am PDT

The worst part was, I was not even sure if what I had was good enough to get an interview, let alone a job.

Why the structure of a case study is important

Peter

Dan

How do you write a UX case study

UX Portfolio Case Study template

Let’s look at these sections in detail, roughly how long each one should be and share some real life examples from successful hires.

1. Project Title & Subtitle

2. Client/Company/Project type

3. Project date/duration

4. Your role

5. Project Summary

6. The Challenge/Problem

7. The Solution

8. Results

What you can do next

What to read next

UX Case Study Example #1 plus free template

UX Case Study Example #2 plus free template

Design portfolio projects for UX and UI designers

A little about me

Let’s get into it

Design Portfolio Project 3: Travel App

Client Brief

A little about me

Design portfolio projects for UX and UI designers

Lets get into it

Design Portfolio Project 2: Ecommerce website

Objectives

Platform

Target audience

References

Deliverables

Nice to haves

Additional message from client

Advice from recruiters

More Inspiration (Your cheat guide)

A good portfolio is made up of relevant, well considered detailed design projects.

A little about me

(You can skip this part if you are ready to get down to some work)

Client brief #1 Blog Website

Timeline:

Objectives

﻿References

Deliverables

Inspiration (Life’s cheatsheet)

UX Engineer and Interaction Prototyper. Exploring VR/AR/MR.

Portfolio Website

Let’s dive into a project

And lastly for the resume.

Takeaways

References