What is user experience, where do we find it in real life, and how do we recognize it every day? Here is UX explained through the world around you.
User experience (UX) is the sum of a person’s perceptions and responses when they use, or anticipate using, a product, service or system. It goes far beyond screens: a restaurant, a sidewalk, a water fountain and a website are all designed (or undesigned) experiences. UX is not the same as UI. The interface is just one small part of it.
Key takeaways
- UX is a person's perceptions and responses to a product, service or system, before, during and after use.
- UX is not UI. The interface and usability are small parts of the whole.
- Accessibility and inclusive design (Universal UX) are what separate real UX from plain design.
- Disabilities can be permanent, temporary or situational, and good UX accounts for all three.
- UX is everywhere: restaurants, streets, urinals, water fountains and towns without winter sun.
What is user experience? Some examples
A common example is a bar or restaurant. The experience is the menu, the music, the plates, the tablecloths, the lighting, the service, the brand image and the status it confers. In an ordinary bar none of this is planned; it rests on habit, taste, budget and intuition. In places of a certain status, every detail is designed by UX professionals to maximize the experience, and with it the benefits.
Urban UX is another example. When a city rebuilds transport and sidewalks at the same time in dense, high-traffic areas, the pedestrian space becomes too small. People spill onto the road, drivers slow to a crawl, and the blockage spreads street by street in a domino effect. Doing both works at once looked faster, but ignoring the experience made everything slower. Any experiencer can predict that before the work even starts.
Accessibility and inclusive design: UX at its best
One of the most important parts of UX is accessibility and inclusion. Inclusive UX design, also called Universal UX, is what sets UX design apart from plain design.
When we say disability we often picture wheelchair users or blind people, which is correct, but there are also psychological, neurological, hearing and educational disabilities, and conditions like dyslexia, autism and deafness. Disabilities can be permanent (a missing arm), temporary (an arm in a cast) or situational (hands full of grocery bags). Designing solutions across all of these, using ergonomics, psychology, product design and interface design, is some of the most rewarding work there is.
And what about inclusive UX?
Inclusive UX means users can live the experiences we design fluidly, regardless of race, gender or religion. It does not deny individuality, it recognizes and exalts it. An experience that speaks to you honestly and represents you is one you will want to repeat; one that discriminates, implicitly or explicitly, is one you will avoid. In good UX, inclusivity harbors accessibility, though the reverse is not always true.
More real-life UX examples
Product design: the multi-purpose water dispenser
A Global Tap dispenser at the California Academy of Sciences lets you drink or fill a bottle, and some models add a lower tap for dogs. A small design decision that quietly serves several needs at once.
Psychology in UX: the fly in the urinal
In the early 1990s, Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport etched small photorealistic flies near the drain of each urinal so users had something to aim at. The result was a reported 80 percent drop in spillage and an 8 percent cut in total restroom cleaning costs. A tiny psychological nudge with a measurable outcome.
Urban UX: the anti-pee wall
Hamburg’s St. Pauli nightlife district had a public urination problem, so authorities coated walls with a superhydrophobic product that repels water-based liquids, alongside signs reading “Wir pinkeln zurueck” (“we pee back”). Anyone who tried got it back on themselves. The idea later spread to London, San Francisco and Paris.
Urban UX and ergonomics: winter sun
Rjukan, a Norwegian town in a narrow valley, gets no direct winter sunlight. In 2014, after years of research, artist Martin Andersen installed three giant sun-tracking mirrors on the hilltop that redirect sunlight down to the town square. A century-old problem solved by designing for a human need.
Conclusion: UX surrounds us
You can find successful and failed experiences in almost anything you touch daily: your chair, your door, the lights, your phone, the design of this very page. Each sets up an experience, and they interact to form more complex ones, as complex as a single day in your life.
It is the sum of a person’s perceptions and responses when using, or expecting to use, a product, service or system. It includes emotions and context, not just how something looks or works.
A restaurant’s whole atmosphere, a well or badly designed sidewalk, a dual-height water fountain, the fly etched in a urinal, and sun-tracking mirrors that bring winter light to a shaded town.
No. User interface and usability are small parts of UX. UX covers the entire relationship a person has with a product, service or brand.
Design that lets everyone live an experience fluidly regardless of ability or background. It recognizes individuality rather than erasing it, and it usually includes accessibility.
Permanent (for example a missing limb), temporary (an arm in a cast) and situational (hands full of bags). Good UX serves all three.
Want experiences designed on evidence, not intuition? Talk to Dorve.
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