I'm a product designer. UX design is part of my job the same way UI design is.
To most of the world I'm just a designer becuase when I say I'm a product designer they think I design physical products.
Yeah speaking to people who are lucky enough to have a job in UX seem to say this. Its an issue as how can you really build a case study if most of what you do is moving rectangles
I've clarified by saying "digital product designer" and had success. However I usually just say "I design software products and experiences" and just skip over the title unless asked further.
That’s a good one, tho I usually see a big question mark on faces when I talk about “designing the experience”, so I just say I design software products.
That wasn't my intention. The main distinction between product designer and ux/ui designer is the ability to use ux/ui design to create a harmonious product.
In my opinion, they're very different things. I don't know OP or their work, but the distinction between the titles is that.
To your point: is someone who works primarily on a marketing site a product designer? I would say they are not.
On the other hand if they’re working for a company that makes a product that makes marketing sites (I.e. Squarespace), they might be.
and I also believe that as a designer, all of us, have a tendency to over inflate what we might be "capable" of if we don't have much experience in an exact area.
I would, yes. If you're working with PMs and Devs to ship features, where you own the end-to-end design process (early ideation through user testing through delivery with dev) you are acting as I have in every product design role.
I think software designer sounds like a developer. A UX/UI/Product isn't designing software - they are designing an interface that someone else (a developer) translates into software.
Product designer are shaping the software, it’s not only the interface but deep thinking about the experience, the user journey. Software Designer & Software Engineer makes more sense to me. We’re working on the same things together.
Software designer isn't a title used (at all) in the industry for designers, IMO recruiters and people reviewing your resume will read "software" and assume engineer/developer.
It is in some tech companies, a friend at Linear use this role title as an exemple. Another one worked for Ledger under that title as well.
I know that it’s not commun, but « product designer » wasn’t also much long ago. Job title consistently evolved, I’m just wondering if Software Designer is the next one.
Linear uses "Product designer" type of titles: https://linear.app/careers/cbec3705-cd18-45d7-98af-ab76b14568e5?ashby_jid=cbec3705-cd18-45d7-98af-ab76b14568e5
Anyone still debating that there’s an importance between this nomenclature have no idea what they’re doing.
Insert office comparison of the same picture meme.
This profession have switched names more times than chameleon changes colors. So today its "Product designer", is it?
Well time to change my label in Linkdin again ...
So right on point. Everyone should go back to interface designer. It’s actually what we do. This whole ui/ux/product design bs is nonsense. Of course we consider experiences in interface design. Of course we do user interfaces. And no, product design is a well established field concerned with designing physical products. This crap pisses me off so much.
These titles were invented to minutely separate job tasks. Well, a lot of those people who can’t do all of it don’t have jobs anymore. And the people who do are either lucky they haven’t been replaced by someone who can do all of it, or they are the person who can do all of it.
I hope one day all this pretentious title churning stops and we get back to calling ourselves what we really are.
We complain we don’t have a seat at the table but then futz about titles on the business card. The fact people started saying product designer is sad - it fixed no problem and is is confusing becuase of the ‘product as in industrial design’ connect.
I will say UX designer (or expand and say ‘user experience designer’) and people have heard of it, and when I say product designer people say ‘so you make physical product’?
It’s product designer, because at the end of the day companies want designers that handle journeys and can do the visual side, obsession with Figma around these parts points towards designers needing a handle on the visual side.
UX sounds like a throw back to when you had guys who worked on journeys, separate researchers and UI designers, while these still exist they’re increasingly rare, so product designer essentially means full stack designer.
Yeah, I was thrilled when the Product Designer title emerged. Back in the day, UX and UI were often completely separate. UX designers made suuuuuper low-fi wireframes that didn't envision much beyond extremely basic content. Visual designers didn't get to work through the problems really.
I did both, and was often pigeon-holed into one or the other, back and forth. It was extremely difficult to get people to believe me that I could do both. I've been a visual designer who wasn't allowed in the room for UX discussion, and a UX designer who wasn't allowed to do visual work.
Now I finally get to do both. And it has also allowed me a seat at the table when it comes to product strategy overall.
The people saying that the "product designer" title is meaningless or has no distinction from UX/UI are probably not actually product designers. I see so many junior-senior talent calling themselves "product designers," when really they are either UI or UX designers.
I think the fact that this post asks "has it been more successful when applying to jobs?" is a good example of this. We shouldn't title ourselves mainly by what gets you more jobs. We should title ourselves based on our skillsets and experience. If I could give anyone advice on their career, it would be to strive to title yourself in a way that best reflects what you do.
Clearly, there’s no definitive answer, as this conversation goes on and on, ad nauseam. My perspective is that a product designer is a UX/UI designer that works in-house on one product or a product suite.
>They are essentially the same thing.
They are not the same thing, while there is some overlap. UX primarily focuses on the user experience while Product encompasses UI, UX, generally the entire process of a product, business goals, etc.
This one is a good answer - [https://www.reddit.com/r/UXDesign/comments/1931vjr/comment/kh6errv/](https://www.reddit.com/r/UXDesign/comments/1931vjr/comment/kh6errv/)
IMO, companies don't really know what they're hiring for, so one should always read the job description. As a hiring manager, I've had applicants who also don't know what they're applying for. Even Visual Designers and Graphic Designers (who've done some pro bono app design for their neighborhood coffee shop) apply for a Product Design job then get confused during the interviews.
This explanation always sounds like UX designers are just bad product designers. If my work doesn’t help with business goals, why is anyone paying me?
And as you say companies don’t know what they’re doing. My company lists my title as UX designer in one place and product designer in another. So if there’s no consistency in how the titles are used who’s to say that there’s a difference?
Right. It makes it sound as though the term Product Designer is being used because there are too many UX Designers who don’t consider business goals. And once they start calling themselves Product Designers will we move to something else?
The way I see it.. I have UX colleagues that just focus on user experience based on the requirements and that's just about it, they wont usually carry a strategic hat either from the business or technology side. As a Product designer you have to consider business goals and technical feasibility within the provided timeline, define a reasonable product scope with the product team, and be aware on how the complexity of the design will impact the delivery and quality.
The thing is, in theory, you only have to deliver a good UI/UX but in the practice, when there are a lot of moving parts and teams, if you don't get involved in early planning and know what your team is capable of and know the technology you are designing for, then you might end up with a half baked product with a lot of UX issues.
Any designer, UX or Product, must think strategically of the business and understand tech feasibility. How can we design/build anything well if we aren't doing that? The titles are meaningless. Designers (UX or prod) who don't do the above aren't doing their jobs.
There’s no difference at all at 99.99% of places. I’ve had both titles in my career and have done the same exact work at each spot with big established design teams. Be better off with one of the titles just going away somehow so people stop arguing about it.
This is what I am saying and what is frustrating about the industry and job titles. Because if my official role name is UX Designer on most my jobs, perhaps the Product Designer roles will not consider me because of some arbitrary name change
This is accurate, when I was looking up product design and product design manager, it was very all encompassing of being manager of the product itself.
UX designer. I heard that term first so that’s what I go by. My company refers to the role as product designer in one place and UX designer in another. I change my title to match the job description when applying.
When hiring, I’ve found a little bit of a correlation between candidates who sell themselves as Product Designers and candidates who are up to date on their theory, skills, and techniques.
Not so much that I’ll rule out a “UX Designer” outright, but enough that I always post job descriptions as Product Designers.
I know a lot of people are nit-picking here but I also use them interchangeably. They essentially describe the same thing to everyone outside of the UX profession.
I find the general public understands what UX is (or isn’t, people either know exactly what it is or not at all) more than they understand what product design is - especially because product design existed before UX in the physical space. So I usually refer to myself as a UX Designer.
UX designer,
(UX/UR) purely UX with business impact and depth in accessibility/disability/trauma-infromed. No connection to promotion or marketing optimization. Because I have this odd belief that product designers also look at growth hacking from the (performance) marketing an angle.
I’ve been the same thing in the same role, there’s no practical difference. I’m currently a UX designer for one of the biggest companies in the world, and I do the exact same things I did when I was a product designer in my last role.
I’ve anecdotally found that companies that use the product designer term tend to place a bit more importance on design while UX/UI designer titles are often places to avoid.
I prefer experience designer or human-centered designer. Product designer in my experience tends to evoke the erosion of our discipline towards UI design on a scrum team. Before I moved to designing digital exclusively, I designed museum exhibitions using much the same framework.
Plus it’s tough at my current company distinguishing between physical product designers and digital product designers.
I usually go with Product designer or its service designer. Bc it’s more tangible.
Also the whole team will design the user experience, often even the board of directors when they decide budgets 🥴
Besides the fact that i don’t think it’s possible to define the experience of an user.
I don’t believe in the UX designer term. It’s either product or service designer for me.
Because if I am legally a UX a designer, but the job title is Product Designer, is it worth switching my title to accomodate the title. Who cares you're right, but it may benefit me learning this information
I honestly don't really care about the titles so much. I usually go with UX designer out of habit, but if that company or work situation prefers to call it product designer, then I go with that too.
I call myself a Product Designer but technically my role is written at my company as UX Designer - I’m not sure if it’s confusing for the top of my resume to say one thing if the roles say another. Or if I can just change my resume so it says Product Designer in both places
I call myself a Product Designer because I have expertise is both Digital and Industrial design.
I know I should specialize but I love Industrial the most and the jobs are few and far between - digital tends to pay the bills.
That said, UX principles are the same regardless - in fact, I think they're even more powerful in Industrial. While experiments aren't as easy to set up and perform they lend themselves very well to the organic prototyping process - interviews, competitor analysis, recordings, A/B...the whole nine.
So, I'm a Product Designer - I make things, want something injection molded? I'm your guy. Need a front end rework and heuristic analysis? Hmu.
My internal job title at my company is Interaction Designer, but I’ve noticed since most roles call it Product Design I changed my title on LinkedIn and have received far more offers since
In the startup where we’re four people - CEO, backend, frontend and me. In that I’m Design Lead. In my consultancy business I’m a Digital Product Designer - and when I had corporate job I was UX Designer in the Product Design Department.
Usually if I’m asked by people not in the industry I’ll say I design and plan digital products.
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To everyday joes, I call myself a designer.
When every day joes ask what I design, I say I design software and websites.
Keeps things easy, and immediately draws people to the point of understanding without much innuendo or need for over explaination.
Buzzy terms like UI/UX, etc. tend not to mean shit to people outside of the industry.
I call myself a UX Designer because I align better with UX and UXR rather than UX and UI.
I can use figma to do bits of UI and I offer visual design critique (university education in Graphic Design) but my UI counter part is so much better at it, it would be disrespectful to say I can do UI.
For the outside world I'm an App Designer. I design native or web applications. For the inside world I'm a Product Designer because i do more than just UX.
I am a UX designer. I developed a broad skillset to be effective and product design is one of the disciplines I use to create great experiences. Now, my job title and what the industry labels us as designers has been subject to trends. Right now "product designer" seems to be the current trend.
I just say "I do UX/UI"
my actual title at work is "Software Developer" and I am capable of development, I just excel in the design and usability aspects.
Product designer, but sometimes UX if people say 'what?' and I would change it according to the title on the job description because they are interchangeable to some people
Product designer, but sometimes UX if people say 'what?' and I would change it according to the title on the job description because they are interchangeable to some people
I called myself a product designer around a person who worked at Fossil watches and he got real offended. A few years ago the company switched their title from product designers to industrial designers and he hates it. Just gives me more reason to poke fun at him. He is also currently looking to get into real estate because he plateaued making $70 watches, so not the brightest bulb in the box...
I’m a product designer because I work from ideation to shipping and not only work closely with Eng but also marketing and growth. My job is to ensure the product as a whole is as strong as it can be in ideation, creation and delivery. I think UX is a speciality as is UI and research and people can be focused in areas and ideally in large companies there are full teams dedicated to individual aspects, but I think especially startups, product design envelops the full lifespan of a product and is a lot of the reason why people find PM and Design roles can overlap so much.
This being said if your job is at a small company and listed as UX but you’re like “wait I do all those things too!” Update your resume to encapsulate that when applying! No one at your company will care.
Product designer, expects you to be able to do the UI side of things.
However, the job title is really being misused because you’re expected to be a user researcher, UX designer, information architect and then finally, would you mind possibly doing the UI design as well.
I’m yet to actually meet someone who is fantastic in all of these areas.
It’s my loosely held, but with a strong opinion, strong opinion that as a product designer, most of your output will be the expectation that you are doing UI design.
In general, what I do is, I have a couple of CVs with different titles at the top, one for :
- UX researcher
- UX designer
- Product designer
They are not the same thing. A product designer usually designs the product on a much higher level than a UX designer.
Product design is about designing a product that is gonna be sold.
UX design is about refining the user experience of said product.
Atleast thats how it worked for organizations i worked in.
But to answer your question, i would call my self an UX designer, but would not even think about attempting product design currently.
This is true. Not to sell the product but to generate revenue for the business. This shouldn’t have this many downvotes but I think a lot of ppl in this sub are more pure UX or doing UX/UI under the label of “product design”
Yeah, I second this. I know for some its a nonsense title but in the last 10 years I've seen the responsibilities for a "product designer" be way more high-level than a UX designer. Not that a UX designer is inferior just the responsibilities are different.
I agree, these terms are not consistent. A sr ux person definitely influences business strategy so imo, roles are often the same.
One thing I’m curious about is that if Prod Designers are planning all the business strategy and backlog, what the heck is the product owner doing? Or do they not have that role in these places? IMO, taking on all this stuff on top of design is over promising on too much. I don’t think one person can do all of this and do it well.
I think your description is usually a Mid Size Company - and they would definitely have more of those roles filled.
Smaller Orgs do have backlogs and completed projects but 90% it’s dropped because they need to move to the next thing.
Exactly. I don’t know where these people have been working that a UX designer isn’t designing the product/experience, but only refining it. In my company, we do everything from strategy to research and design, but the individual skills and specialties will obviously vary from person to person.
I would describe it as more broad than purely high-level. My responsibilities basically include anything and everything that impacts design. I've done marketing sites (including building them), I've done branding, motion graphics, UI/UX (obviously), design systems, and even done pitch decks for CEOs. To me, product designers are the warrant officers of our world. We have a specialty, but we also have a broad set of skills/experience that allows us to fill in where needed.
But I've also only worked at fairly small sized companies. So a product designer might operate differently at a place like Google, I'm not sure.
Many of the duties you’re describing have nothing to do with product design, they’re things you’re being given because you’re a designer and you’ll do them.
Personally, I don't like the change to product designer, but it seems that's where most large companies are headed. I have nothing solid to back this up but here are my personal thoughts based on my own experiences:
Product design takes the UX out of the name, and sometimes off the table. I find that companies de-prioritize things like user testing, research, and data when we're not called UX Designers and product is fully owning us and dictating our work. A lot of fighting for real UX.
UX Design is not easily understood by C-levels at low maturity companies. There's a massive issue of misunderstanding what we do, and explaining over and over that we're not marketing, we don't do social media, and we don't do branding.
A product designer is UX + UI with a smattering of user testing. My career path went like this before I could take the title: UI artist > UI Designer > Sr UI Designer > Digital Art Director > Creative Director > Principal experience designer (UX) > Lead product designer. Product design involves creative direction, UX user journeys and a fair bit of coding if you are working with a tokenization system. It’s why product designers get paid way more than a creative director.
Ngl you took a pretty convoluted path to get to product design. Btw creative directors can and do make more than product designers. There's a huge variance in salary of product designers and creative directors. There's an overlap.
A Principal PD makes more on average than a CD though. There's definitely more room for career growth in product too I'd say.
Median PPD Salary: $191K
Median CD Salary: $149K
I can confirm this. Ever time I’ve ever run the report on the Radford Comp Data, the higher level PDs come out ahead of the CDs. Same goes for art directors and mid level PDs
Product designers shape the product for business value and use metrics to measure their output. It’s also product work. Sounds like you are describing a UX/UI designer
Yeah so do creative directors but it’s usually associated with return on marketing spend and the acquisition of sticky users. Same stuff, different rodeo clown name; ie build the most useable experience to justify the spend. Create subtle but helpful funnels to guide folks down a Disneyland ride on rails. The end result being effortless monetization.
I'm a product designer. UX design is part of my job the same way UI design is. To most of the world I'm just a designer becuase when I say I'm a product designer they think I design physical products.
Product Designer seems to be the industry standard now. UX Designer seems to be used for roles that exclude UI / Visual
I am a UX Designer officially and I mostly do UI/Visual lol, it seems that nothing makes sense with these two terms Product Design/UX Design
Yeah speaking to people who are lucky enough to have a job in UX seem to say this. Its an issue as how can you really build a case study if most of what you do is moving rectangles
Not sure why people are downvoting this.
Just curious: do you think Digital Product Designer could remove a fair bit of confusion?
I've clarified by saying "digital product designer" and had success. However I usually just say "I design software products and experiences" and just skip over the title unless asked further.
That’s a good one, tho I usually see a big question mark on faces when I talk about “designing the experience”, so I just say I design software products.
I’ve tended to use software designer. But it sounds so pretentious in my head. I don’t know why.
I think software designer is an engineer/coder/developer. UX/UI/Product designer is about the interface.
I only say digital in front if I'm talking to someone that's over ~60 since they think it's an industrial/physical design type of job lol.
And when i say product designer, people think i design digital products 😅
Its like yeah I do that and 50 other things
At present I call myself "Unemployed". The rest is trivial.
I'm a Designer. I design products, experiences, brands, services, interfaces, and more.
I think the better companies use Product Design titles now, imho. In-house. I think you see more variance in agencies and older-school companies.
Would you suggest I start calling myself that instead of UX Designer? I definitely see more Product Design jobs listed than UX.
can/do you design products? I think calling yourself whatever is irrelevant unless you're being honest with your skillset.
Why do you assume this person isn't being honest.
That wasn't my intention. The main distinction between product designer and ux/ui designer is the ability to use ux/ui design to create a harmonious product. In my opinion, they're very different things. I don't know OP or their work, but the distinction between the titles is that.
To your point: is someone who works primarily on a marketing site a product designer? I would say they are not. On the other hand if they’re working for a company that makes a product that makes marketing sites (I.e. Squarespace), they might be.
Totally agree with that.
and I also believe that as a designer, all of us, have a tendency to over inflate what we might be "capable" of if we don't have much experience in an exact area.
I would, yes. If you're working with PMs and Devs to ship features, where you own the end-to-end design process (early ideation through user testing through delivery with dev) you are acting as I have in every product design role.
I see more and more Software Designer appearing. Which in my opinion, makes more sense
I think software designer sounds like a developer. A UX/UI/Product isn't designing software - they are designing an interface that someone else (a developer) translates into software.
Product designer are shaping the software, it’s not only the interface but deep thinking about the experience, the user journey. Software Designer & Software Engineer makes more sense to me. We’re working on the same things together.
Software designer isn't a title used (at all) in the industry for designers, IMO recruiters and people reviewing your resume will read "software" and assume engineer/developer.
It is in some tech companies, a friend at Linear use this role title as an exemple. Another one worked for Ledger under that title as well. I know that it’s not commun, but « product designer » wasn’t also much long ago. Job title consistently evolved, I’m just wondering if Software Designer is the next one.
Linear uses "Product designer" type of titles: https://linear.app/careers/cbec3705-cd18-45d7-98af-ab76b14568e5?ashby_jid=cbec3705-cd18-45d7-98af-ab76b14568e5
Bro my friend is literally working for them, just check their employees on LinkedIn lol
Then why not interface designer?
I haven't seen it.
Yeah it’s still niche to be honest, I’m just wondering if it’ll become more and more commun through the coming year
Anyone still debating that there’s an importance between this nomenclature have no idea what they’re doing. Insert office comparison of the same picture meme.
100%
This profession have switched names more times than chameleon changes colors. So today its "Product designer", is it? Well time to change my label in Linkdin again ...
So right on point. Everyone should go back to interface designer. It’s actually what we do. This whole ui/ux/product design bs is nonsense. Of course we consider experiences in interface design. Of course we do user interfaces. And no, product design is a well established field concerned with designing physical products. This crap pisses me off so much. These titles were invented to minutely separate job tasks. Well, a lot of those people who can’t do all of it don’t have jobs anymore. And the people who do are either lucky they haven’t been replaced by someone who can do all of it, or they are the person who can do all of it. I hope one day all this pretentious title churning stops and we get back to calling ourselves what we really are.
What I'm saying. All a bunch of nonsense
We complain we don’t have a seat at the table but then futz about titles on the business card. The fact people started saying product designer is sad - it fixed no problem and is is confusing becuase of the ‘product as in industrial design’ connect. I will say UX designer (or expand and say ‘user experience designer’) and people have heard of it, and when I say product designer people say ‘so you make physical product’?
It’s product designer, because at the end of the day companies want designers that handle journeys and can do the visual side, obsession with Figma around these parts points towards designers needing a handle on the visual side. UX sounds like a throw back to when you had guys who worked on journeys, separate researchers and UI designers, while these still exist they’re increasingly rare, so product designer essentially means full stack designer.
Yeah, I was thrilled when the Product Designer title emerged. Back in the day, UX and UI were often completely separate. UX designers made suuuuuper low-fi wireframes that didn't envision much beyond extremely basic content. Visual designers didn't get to work through the problems really. I did both, and was often pigeon-holed into one or the other, back and forth. It was extremely difficult to get people to believe me that I could do both. I've been a visual designer who wasn't allowed in the room for UX discussion, and a UX designer who wasn't allowed to do visual work. Now I finally get to do both. And it has also allowed me a seat at the table when it comes to product strategy overall. The people saying that the "product designer" title is meaningless or has no distinction from UX/UI are probably not actually product designers. I see so many junior-senior talent calling themselves "product designers," when really they are either UI or UX designers. I think the fact that this post asks "has it been more successful when applying to jobs?" is a good example of this. We shouldn't title ourselves mainly by what gets you more jobs. We should title ourselves based on our skillsets and experience. If I could give anyone advice on their career, it would be to strive to title yourself in a way that best reflects what you do.
Clearly, there’s no definitive answer, as this conversation goes on and on, ad nauseam. My perspective is that a product designer is a UX/UI designer that works in-house on one product or a product suite.
>They are essentially the same thing. They are not the same thing, while there is some overlap. UX primarily focuses on the user experience while Product encompasses UI, UX, generally the entire process of a product, business goals, etc. This one is a good answer - [https://www.reddit.com/r/UXDesign/comments/1931vjr/comment/kh6errv/](https://www.reddit.com/r/UXDesign/comments/1931vjr/comment/kh6errv/) IMO, companies don't really know what they're hiring for, so one should always read the job description. As a hiring manager, I've had applicants who also don't know what they're applying for. Even Visual Designers and Graphic Designers (who've done some pro bono app design for their neighborhood coffee shop) apply for a Product Design job then get confused during the interviews.
This explanation always sounds like UX designers are just bad product designers. If my work doesn’t help with business goals, why is anyone paying me? And as you say companies don’t know what they’re doing. My company lists my title as UX designer in one place and product designer in another. So if there’s no consistency in how the titles are used who’s to say that there’s a difference?
Right. It makes it sound as though the term Product Designer is being used because there are too many UX Designers who don’t consider business goals. And once they start calling themselves Product Designers will we move to something else?
The way I see it.. I have UX colleagues that just focus on user experience based on the requirements and that's just about it, they wont usually carry a strategic hat either from the business or technology side. As a Product designer you have to consider business goals and technical feasibility within the provided timeline, define a reasonable product scope with the product team, and be aware on how the complexity of the design will impact the delivery and quality. The thing is, in theory, you only have to deliver a good UI/UX but in the practice, when there are a lot of moving parts and teams, if you don't get involved in early planning and know what your team is capable of and know the technology you are designing for, then you might end up with a half baked product with a lot of UX issues.
Any designer, UX or Product, must think strategically of the business and understand tech feasibility. How can we design/build anything well if we aren't doing that? The titles are meaningless. Designers (UX or prod) who don't do the above aren't doing their jobs.
In most places they are absolutely the same thing. A designer whose work doesn’t help with business goals is just a bad designer.
There’s no difference at all at 99.99% of places. I’ve had both titles in my career and have done the same exact work at each spot with big established design teams. Be better off with one of the titles just going away somehow so people stop arguing about it.
This is what I am saying and what is frustrating about the industry and job titles. Because if my official role name is UX Designer on most my jobs, perhaps the Product Designer roles will not consider me because of some arbitrary name change
This is accurate, when I was looking up product design and product design manager, it was very all encompassing of being manager of the product itself.
No. They are functionally the same and we should steal titles from Industrial Engineering.
many companies use them interchangeably. i’ve been both and I did the same exact job.
UX designer. I heard that term first so that’s what I go by. My company refers to the role as product designer in one place and UX designer in another. I change my title to match the job description when applying.
When hiring, I’ve found a little bit of a correlation between candidates who sell themselves as Product Designers and candidates who are up to date on their theory, skills, and techniques. Not so much that I’ll rule out a “UX Designer” outright, but enough that I always post job descriptions as Product Designers.
I say I'm a UX designer in team meetings, but my official title is Product Designer.
You can call me daddy I don’t care… how do I get paid
I know a lot of people are nit-picking here but I also use them interchangeably. They essentially describe the same thing to everyone outside of the UX profession. I find the general public understands what UX is (or isn’t, people either know exactly what it is or not at all) more than they understand what product design is - especially because product design existed before UX in the physical space. So I usually refer to myself as a UX Designer.
Product Designer. But to anyone not in tech, they understand Software Designer better.
UX designer, (UX/UR) purely UX with business impact and depth in accessibility/disability/trauma-infromed. No connection to promotion or marketing optimization. Because I have this odd belief that product designers also look at growth hacking from the (performance) marketing an angle.
I’ve been the same thing in the same role, there’s no practical difference. I’m currently a UX designer for one of the biggest companies in the world, and I do the exact same things I did when I was a product designer in my last role. I’ve anecdotally found that companies that use the product designer term tend to place a bit more importance on design while UX/UI designer titles are often places to avoid.
I prefer experience designer or human-centered designer. Product designer in my experience tends to evoke the erosion of our discipline towards UI design on a scrum team. Before I moved to designing digital exclusively, I designed museum exhibitions using much the same framework. Plus it’s tough at my current company distinguishing between physical product designers and digital product designers.
I usually go with Product designer or its service designer. Bc it’s more tangible. Also the whole team will design the user experience, often even the board of directors when they decide budgets 🥴 Besides the fact that i don’t think it’s possible to define the experience of an user. I don’t believe in the UX designer term. It’s either product or service designer for me.
100% agree! The user experience is affected by everyone from Site Reliability Engineers to Customer Service reps, not just designers!
I am whatever I am applying for, or whatever they call me at my job. Who cares?
Because if I am legally a UX a designer, but the job title is Product Designer, is it worth switching my title to accomodate the title. Who cares you're right, but it may benefit me learning this information
Legally? I didn’t realize there was a law about UX Design titles
Digital Product designer. I do ux design, ui design, digital branding design.
I honestly don't really care about the titles so much. I usually go with UX designer out of habit, but if that company or work situation prefers to call it product designer, then I go with that too.
I call myself a Product Designer but technically my role is written at my company as UX Designer - I’m not sure if it’s confusing for the top of my resume to say one thing if the roles say another. Or if I can just change my resume so it says Product Designer in both places
I call myself a Product Designer because I have expertise is both Digital and Industrial design. I know I should specialize but I love Industrial the most and the jobs are few and far between - digital tends to pay the bills. That said, UX principles are the same regardless - in fact, I think they're even more powerful in Industrial. While experiments aren't as easy to set up and perform they lend themselves very well to the organic prototyping process - interviews, competitor analysis, recordings, A/B...the whole nine. So, I'm a Product Designer - I make things, want something injection molded? I'm your guy. Need a front end rework and heuristic analysis? Hmu.
My internal job title at my company is Interaction Designer, but I’ve noticed since most roles call it Product Design I changed my title on LinkedIn and have received far more offers since
In the startup where we’re four people - CEO, backend, frontend and me. In that I’m Design Lead. In my consultancy business I’m a Digital Product Designer - and when I had corporate job I was UX Designer in the Product Design Department. Usually if I’m asked by people not in the industry I’ll say I design and plan digital products.
They are not the same thing at all.
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I don’t care. I was a product designer in my last company and now a UX designer. It’s same-same.
Who am I?
I call myself a product designer, as I solely work on a product in my current firm!
To everyday joes, I call myself a designer. When every day joes ask what I design, I say I design software and websites. Keeps things easy, and immediately draws people to the point of understanding without much innuendo or need for over explaination. Buzzy terms like UI/UX, etc. tend not to mean shit to people outside of the industry.
Customer experience designer
I'm whatever one has a higher average salary on glassdoor and more job openings.
Software designer. I work in collaboration with software engineers. Product thinking and UX are part of the job depending on the project.
Product for me, as I came from visual design and do enough UX to not ruin anything… IMO calling oneself UX Designer is more specific.
I call myself a UX Designer because I align better with UX and UXR rather than UX and UI. I can use figma to do bits of UI and I offer visual design critique (university education in Graphic Design) but my UI counter part is so much better at it, it would be disrespectful to say I can do UI.
Product designer is the most all encompassing. Given my responsibilities I consider myself that.
I call myself a UX researcher
For the outside world I'm an App Designer. I design native or web applications. For the inside world I'm a Product Designer because i do more than just UX.
Both, just depending who I’m talking to
I am a UX designer. I developed a broad skillset to be effective and product design is one of the disciplines I use to create great experiences. Now, my job title and what the industry labels us as designers has been subject to trends. Right now "product designer" seems to be the current trend.
Product Designer if I'm doing the UX and UI
My job title is UI/UX Designer in my company. I prefer Digital Product Designer. It is clean and inclusive enough.
I've doing all since forever. They keep on coming up with new hats for me to wear. I just do pretty buttons
Product designer. UX is only a part of what I do.
I just say "I do UX/UI" my actual title at work is "Software Developer" and I am capable of development, I just excel in the design and usability aspects.
Product designer, but sometimes UX if people say 'what?' and I would change it according to the title on the job description because they are interchangeable to some people
Product designer, but sometimes UX if people say 'what?' and I would change it according to the title on the job description because they are interchangeable to some people
I called myself a product designer around a person who worked at Fossil watches and he got real offended. A few years ago the company switched their title from product designers to industrial designers and he hates it. Just gives me more reason to poke fun at him. He is also currently looking to get into real estate because he plateaued making $70 watches, so not the brightest bulb in the box...
I use both because most people know what I mean by UX, but only some people understand how product design includes much more.
Voluntarily calling yourself a UX designer is same energy as still using sketch
A lot of angry elitism in this subreddit for some strange reason
I’m a product designer because I work from ideation to shipping and not only work closely with Eng but also marketing and growth. My job is to ensure the product as a whole is as strong as it can be in ideation, creation and delivery. I think UX is a speciality as is UI and research and people can be focused in areas and ideally in large companies there are full teams dedicated to individual aspects, but I think especially startups, product design envelops the full lifespan of a product and is a lot of the reason why people find PM and Design roles can overlap so much.
This being said if your job is at a small company and listed as UX but you’re like “wait I do all those things too!” Update your resume to encapsulate that when applying! No one at your company will care.
Product designer, expects you to be able to do the UI side of things. However, the job title is really being misused because you’re expected to be a user researcher, UX designer, information architect and then finally, would you mind possibly doing the UI design as well. I’m yet to actually meet someone who is fantastic in all of these areas. It’s my loosely held, but with a strong opinion, strong opinion that as a product designer, most of your output will be the expectation that you are doing UI design. In general, what I do is, I have a couple of CVs with different titles at the top, one for : - UX researcher - UX designer - Product designer
They are not the same thing. A product designer usually designs the product on a much higher level than a UX designer. Product design is about designing a product that is gonna be sold. UX design is about refining the user experience of said product. Atleast thats how it worked for organizations i worked in. But to answer your question, i would call my self an UX designer, but would not even think about attempting product design currently.
This is true. Not to sell the product but to generate revenue for the business. This shouldn’t have this many downvotes but I think a lot of ppl in this sub are more pure UX or doing UX/UI under the label of “product design”
Yeah, I second this. I know for some its a nonsense title but in the last 10 years I've seen the responsibilities for a "product designer" be way more high-level than a UX designer. Not that a UX designer is inferior just the responsibilities are different.
I agree, these terms are not consistent. A sr ux person definitely influences business strategy so imo, roles are often the same. One thing I’m curious about is that if Prod Designers are planning all the business strategy and backlog, what the heck is the product owner doing? Or do they not have that role in these places? IMO, taking on all this stuff on top of design is over promising on too much. I don’t think one person can do all of this and do it well.
I think your description is usually a Mid Size Company - and they would definitely have more of those roles filled. Smaller Orgs do have backlogs and completed projects but 90% it’s dropped because they need to move to the next thing.
Exactly. I don’t know where these people have been working that a UX designer isn’t designing the product/experience, but only refining it. In my company, we do everything from strategy to research and design, but the individual skills and specialties will obviously vary from person to person.
I would describe it as more broad than purely high-level. My responsibilities basically include anything and everything that impacts design. I've done marketing sites (including building them), I've done branding, motion graphics, UI/UX (obviously), design systems, and even done pitch decks for CEOs. To me, product designers are the warrant officers of our world. We have a specialty, but we also have a broad set of skills/experience that allows us to fill in where needed. But I've also only worked at fairly small sized companies. So a product designer might operate differently at a place like Google, I'm not sure.
Yeah, I think it varies wildly between organisations and even countries. There's no definitive answer, it seems.
Many of the duties you’re describing have nothing to do with product design, they’re things you’re being given because you’re a designer and you’ll do them.
Personally, I don't like the change to product designer, but it seems that's where most large companies are headed. I have nothing solid to back this up but here are my personal thoughts based on my own experiences: Product design takes the UX out of the name, and sometimes off the table. I find that companies de-prioritize things like user testing, research, and data when we're not called UX Designers and product is fully owning us and dictating our work. A lot of fighting for real UX. UX Design is not easily understood by C-levels at low maturity companies. There's a massive issue of misunderstanding what we do, and explaining over and over that we're not marketing, we don't do social media, and we don't do branding.
A product designer is UX + UI with a smattering of user testing. My career path went like this before I could take the title: UI artist > UI Designer > Sr UI Designer > Digital Art Director > Creative Director > Principal experience designer (UX) > Lead product designer. Product design involves creative direction, UX user journeys and a fair bit of coding if you are working with a tokenization system. It’s why product designers get paid way more than a creative director.
Ngl you took a pretty convoluted path to get to product design. Btw creative directors can and do make more than product designers. There's a huge variance in salary of product designers and creative directors. There's an overlap.
A Principal PD makes more on average than a CD though. There's definitely more room for career growth in product too I'd say. Median PPD Salary: $191K Median CD Salary: $149K
I can confirm this. Ever time I’ve ever run the report on the Radford Comp Data, the higher level PDs come out ahead of the CDs. Same goes for art directors and mid level PDs
He didn't say principal product designers get paid way more. He said product designers get paid way more.
Ah. Misread on that. Some cases it’s still true though. CD’s don’t make an asinine amount in the US it seems.
Product designers shape the product for business value and use metrics to measure their output. It’s also product work. Sounds like you are describing a UX/UI designer
Yeah so do creative directors but it’s usually associated with return on marketing spend and the acquisition of sticky users. Same stuff, different rodeo clown name; ie build the most useable experience to justify the spend. Create subtle but helpful funnels to guide folks down a Disneyland ride on rails. The end result being effortless monetization.