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Interaction design doesn’t have to be hard. The new Insert Menu gives you easy access to all the building blocks for rapid prototyping. Click the + icon to find and insert device frames, interactions, buttons, video players, and more—everything comes preloaded with customizable interactions. Joanne Mac is a UX/UI designer with a background in graphic design who strives to empower those creating positive change by helping them create meaningful and easy-to-use experiences for people.
Following is a curated list of my favorite user experience apps and productivity tools, from UI design to cloud storage software. https://renewkiosk.weebly.com/blog/change-mac-app-icons. The tools are categorized in the major categories of UI design, code, collaboration, prototyping, user research, video editing, web hosting / portfolio and general productivity tools.
Ios app mac id. Helpful if you sort by cost and category https://renewkiosk.weebly.com/blog/unwanted-app-opens-back-up-after-closing-mac. to find something you want.
![Mac Mac](/uploads/1/3/4/0/134071729/402887944.gif)
Apps For Mac
Tool | Why It's Good | Cost | Category |
---|---|---|---|
Webflow | As close as it gets to design-to-code: Webflow is an entire product that includes WYSIWYG page design, web hosting, all able to be exported at production-ready code. Perfect for designers with some frontend (HTML/CSS/JS) knowledge. | $0 (Freemium) | Code |
Brackets | Adobe's full-featured code editor | $0 | Code |
Zeplin | Automatically generate styleguides and code snippets based off of Sketch / PSD files in a format usable by front-end developers. Wonderful collaboration & design handoff tool. | $0 (Freemium) | Collaboration |
Avocode | Design handoff tool; the enterprise version of Zeplin | $6.75/mo+ | Collaboration |
Lingo App | Collect and organize design inspiration (images, UI, etc) in one beautiful, drag and drop interface. Amazing for competitive analysis and quick moodboard creation. | $0 (Freemium) | Collaboration |
Macbook Pro | For the simple virtue that most design programs are on the Mac and sometimes on Windows, get a Macbook If you hope to do any serious design. And skip the Macbook Air and get the Macbook Pro. The MBP is often necessary for large documents and video/photo editing, which Oz knows all too well is a pain in this ass with the svelte-but-underpowered Macbook Air. Make sure to get a machine with 16gb of RAM - which makes the biggest difference in speed for all designer workflows. | $1999+ | Equipment |
Mailchimp | Best and most advanced email management system that's FREE for up to 2000 subscribers. What Oz uses for all his emails. Great UX, intuitive campaign management & automation features. | $0 (Freemium) | Marketing & Freelance |
Bonsai | All-in-one freelancing platform to generate beautiful contracts, invoices, and even time tracking. | $0 (Freemium) | Marketing & Freelance |
ImageOptim | Incredible free Mac app that dramatically reduces image file sizes, just drag & drop and automatically compress! | $0 | Productivity |
GIFBrewery | Modify & compress GIFs, like ImageOptim but for GIFs. Mac only. | $0 | Productivity |
TimeOut by Dejal | Mac app that saves your eyes, ability to set screen 'time outs' to remind yourself to take a break, stretch, look away from the screen. | $0 | Productivity |
Principle | Easy to use Mac app to build animations in a familiar Sketch-like interface. | $129 | Prototyping |
Framer | Originally an animation-focused tool, Framer is now a full-blown, browser-based prototyping tool that enables you to create designs that export cleanly to code. | $15/mo+ | Prototyping |
Origami | Free design & prototyping tool from Facebook's design team | $0 | Prototyping |
InVIsion | Popular prototyping tool that imports. Invision has also developed its own browser-based prototyping tool | $0 (Freemium) | Prototyping |
Dropbox | Super fast file hosting and sharing, Dropbox now offers some integrated collaboration apps like Dropbox Paper. | $0 (Freemium) | Storage |
Sync | 5GB free, great alternative to Dropbox because it offers password protection (think portfolio items & PDFs) for FREE. Stable company that's been around for a long time, on all platforms. | $0 (Freemium) | Storage |
Figma | Browser-based UI design tool with an awesome 'forever free' plan. Quickly becoming dominant for not just UI design, but also seamless same-document collaboration. | $0 (Freemium) | UI Design |
UX Pin | Popular browser-based design tool with deep collaboration & prototyping features. | $29/mo+ | UI Design |
Axure | Higher learning curve, but ability to execute amazingly detailed interactions and flows. Available on both Mac & Windows, important tool to know if you're working in enterprise UX design. Free for users with a student email: www.axure.com/edu. | $29/mo+ | UI Design |
Sketch App | The de-facto user interface design tool that's easy to learn and wildly extensible. Mac only. | $99/year | UI Design |
Adobe XD | Adobe's heavyweight UI design + animation tool in one. Benefit of being on Mac and Windows. | $9.99/mo+ | UI Design |
UserTesting | The 800 lb gorilla in User Testing offers extensive options to get users to test your product, including the free user-testing on peek.usertesting.com. | $0 (Freemium) | UX Research |
HotJar | Top all-in-one analytics tool that offers heatmaps, click tracking, user behavior recording, surveys and tons more. | $0 (Freemium) | UX Research |
Optimal Sort | The best online cardsorting software; validate your content & information architecture with remote open & closed cart sorts. | $0 (Freemium) | UX Research |
Fullstory | Literally watch your users use your website, with in-depth analytics. Awesome research tool. | $0 (Freemium) | UX Research |
Screenflow | Mac only video editing software that Oz uses to make tutorials & lectures. If you're on a Mac, Screenflow performs leaps & bounds better than Camtasia. | $129 | Video |
Camtasia | Popular Windows and Mac video editing software Oz used in the past for making tutorial videos and quick animations. | $200 | Video |
Handbrake | Drastically compress video sizes; like ImageOptim but for video. Mac only. | $0 | Video |
Hostgator | Easiest & cheapest cloud hosting to build your custom site (including Wordpress) | $4.99/mo and up | Web hosting & portfolio |
Elementor | Extends Wordpress into a powerful drag & drop builder tool. Regular version is free, Elementor Pro is only $49 for 1 site. Oz uses Elementor Pro for his personal website, OzChen.com | $0 (Freemium) | Web hosting & portfolio |
X Theme | Great for customizing Wordpress sites, X is a popular theme + drag & drop builder. UXBeginner.com is built on X Theme. | $45 | Web hosting & portfolio |
Wordpress | The de-facto blogging platform. If you plan to write, build a brand or market your own product, Wordpress is wildly extensible (themes, plugins) but can take some time to learn how to configure. Wordpress.org is the free open-source version that can be easily installed on web hosts like Hostgator (what I do for UXBeginner.com), while Wordpress.com is freemium web hosting + blogging platform in one. | $0 (Freemium) | Web hosting & portfolio |
Squarespace | Ideal for designing small, beautiful websites & landing pages. A bit lacking in blogging & content management features, but makes it for it with easy aesthetics & drag & drop designs. | $12/mo+ | Web hosting & portfolio |
Namecheap | Domain name registrar with the best UX and competitive pricing. | $0.99 and up per domain | Web hosting & portfolio |
Ulysses | Oz's favorite writing tool, it's a minimalist (but full-featured) Markdown editor that has the best library view & workflow out of most text editors. Great for writers and content strategists. | $4.99/mo+ | Writing |
Copy Paste 'Em | Nobody uses clipboard managers; everyone should use clipboard managers. And Copy Paste 'Em is the best-in-class option that makes you 10x more productive by making your copy & paste history accessible, replete with shortcuts. It's the tool that Oz can't live without. | $9.99 | Productivity |