So many books, so little time: The problem of choice arises when you want to get better at product design by dipping into a few books of wisdom.
advertisements are useless. they are written so that you buy all the books, not to help you choose one. lists are better, but most of them are written by people who have only read blurbs. some other book-choice strategies are too… exotic.
You are reading: Best ui ux books
There was even an article that offered me to make a summer reading list based on the colors of my bikini.
Now, while you’re trying hard not to see the image above, it’s time to introduce the book selection principle I’ve used in this article to recommend the best ui/ux design books to you.
I got in touch with product designers I know personally (kudos to the eleken tribe) and also with product designers I don’t know personally (kudos to you kind folks). all of my experts named the book that lights up their career path with its vivid insight, practical advice, or fiery jokes.
so we have a living list of the best books to learn ui/ux design, it is by no means the latest, but it deserves your 100% attention. is divided into four categories:
- ui/ux design books for beginners
- best books on design fundamentals
- how-to guides for designers
- best books for ux research
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and here we go.
ui/ux design books for beginners
will you delve into the design? here we have a stack of books for you to test the waters before you jump.
the design of everyday things
There are many iconic design books, but aleksandra, eleken’s ui/ux designer, says they all pale to utter insignificance in light of the design of everyday things: she has a superpower to change people. everyone who reads it learns to love design. sometimes a feeling is so intense that people become designers.
Instead of sprinkling a thousand words, I’ll put here the story a redditor shared with me:
ux for beginners: a crash course in 100 short lessons
This started as an email newsletter, grew into a blog, and went viral. And now you have it in book form, organized into small lessons packed with practical advice.
designing products people love: how great designers create successful products
Now when you think design is your thing, it would be helpful to watch experienced designers at work to gain some practical insights. product design that people love was written just for this.
The author interviews dozens of product leaders from twitter, medium, squarespace and the like to learn their secrets. then shares all the secrets with you and teaches you how to implement what you read into your own process.
inspired: how to create technology products that customers love
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product design is by no means a lone ranger story. it is rather the story of a string section in an orchestra. In addition to designers, a great product team consists of a project manager, developers, testers, marketers, researchers, analysts, and release managers. you can’t play your string section well without understanding how it cooperates with all the other people and processes within the product team.
inspired is the perfect book to shed light on how it all works. ilya, our CEO at eleken design agency, highly recommends reading this book to all of us (especially the marketing department).
best books on design fundamentals
There are certain books that taught generations of people to be product designers.
Those little designers have become great professionals and today they have reached their old textbooks from the best shelves for you. they blow the dust and realize that even if the books are outdated at times when it comes to the visual component, the main component is now more relevant than ever.
welcome the nomination for the best ui/ux books that have been tested by time: the best books on design fundamentals.
interface design: patterns for effective interaction design
The interface design holds up even sixteen years after the original edition. this thick book with an adorable mandarin duck is a solid design guide for all possible interfaces.
the art of color
johannes itten was one of the main teachers of the bauhaus, the avant-garde school of design, architecture and applied arts. Sixty years ago he published The Art of Color, which is still considered the color bible for artists and designers.
don’t trust its simple and fun cover, the book is by no means easy to read. Dasha, who nominated this book for our list, recommends approaching it like strength training at the gym:
don’t make me think: a common sense approach to web usability
Need another reason to read what’s under the cover? Dasha, who recommended this book, has one for you. he says it offers the easiest (and probably most fun) way to discover how usability works.
practical guides for designers
Sooner or later, seeing how things can go wrong in practice, you start looking for some set of recommendations on best practices in design. We have these guidelines here, in our category of practical books.
a project guide to ux design: for user experience designers in the field or in development
Whether you’re feeling overwhelmed by your first ux job or stressed just looking at your new design project, this book will help. use a project guide for ux design as a meditation to calm the mind.
change by design: how design thinking transforms organizations and inspires innovation
To work as a designer you must think like a designer. To think like a designer and incorporate design thinking into your work process, you should read change by design.
evil by design: interaction design to lead us into temptation
With the previous book, we learned how to make life easier for users. Now, welcome to the dark side of ux, following the path succinctly outlined by jd, a guy I met in a slack community for designers:
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By learning to understand people, designers gain tremendous power to create interfaces that are not only easy to use, but encourage you to do things you didn’t intend to do. I’m not pointing fingers, but just look at those addictive social media interfaces or video platforms that automatically play the next video in a sequence.
any knowledge or tool can be used for good or for bad. it is really the ethics of the professional who uses it.
best books for ux research
When asking designers about the most important books of their careers, I heard the word “research” more often than any other word and even participated in a ux survey.
so we have indirect evidence that product design is not about “making it stand out” but about discovering big data that generates big insights and then turning it into novel ideas. where does big data come from? right, from the research.
To celebrate this finding, we have a special nomination for best books on ui/ux research.
just enough research
erika hall in her book says that research is a periscope that gives you a better view of your surroundings. I’ll tell you, she created a perfect manual for adjusting your periscope. In simple, vivid language, the book explains what research is and what isn’t, when you need to gather more information, and when it’s enough.
This book helped me survive in the wild wild web of controversial unstructured content when I was writing a series of articles on ux research. so I’m proposing it myself and I highly recommend it to everyone who wants to get into the field of ux research with no prior experience.
ux research: practical techniques to design better products
is a basic practical research book that explains everything about research questions, methods and analysis. here’s what alicja głowicka, the designer who recommended o’reilly’s ux research, says:
the mom test: how to talk to customers & find out if your business is a good idea when everyone is lying to you
People say you shouldn’t ask your mom if your business is a good idea; she will lie to you because she loves you. the book’s author argues that you shouldn’t ask anyone if your business is a good idea, just because it’s a bad question.
measure user experience: collect, analyze and present usability metrics
That’s the definitive research manual for non-researchers. it’s not really the one you ‘read’, it’s more useful to go through it all so you can refer to it later when you need to decide what kinds of tests to run, when to run them, how to calculate the numbers.
overtime
all useful things work best in groups. like, the lockdown helped me realize that I’m fatally incapable of doing sports on my own. And I know I’m not alone.
so if you want to read more books to raise your level of competition and you want company, I have found a suitable corner of the web for you. here’s a ux/ui book club on slack, where designers get together every month to read and discuss a suggested book.
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